The Parisian Woman
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49th Season • 471st Production JULIANNE ARGYROS STAGE / APRIL 14 - MAY 5, 2013 Marc Masterson Paula Tomei ARTISTIC DIRECTOR MANAGING DIRECTOR David Emmes & Martin Benson FOUNDING ARTISTIC DIRECTORS presents the world premiere of The Parisian Woman by Beau Willimon inspired by Henri Becque’s La Parisienne Marion Williams David Kay Mickelsen Lap Chi Chu Cricket S. Myers SCENIC DESIGN COSTUME DESIGN LIGHTING DESIGN SOUND DESIGN Kelly L. Miller Jackie S. Hill Sue Karutz* DRAMATURG PRODUCTION MANAGER STAGE MANAGER Directed by Pam MacKinnon The Playwrights Circle Honorary Producer THE PARISIAN WOMAN was commissioned by The Flea Theatre in New York City Jim Simpson, Artistic Director; Carol Ostrow, Producing Director The Parisian Woman • South CoaSt RepeRtoRy • P1 CAST OF CHARACTERS (In order of appearance) Chloe ...................................................................................... Dana Delany* Peter .......................................................................................... Steven Culp* Tom ......................................................................................... Steven Weber* Jeanette ............................................................................. Linda Gehringer* Rebecca ................................................................................. Rebecca Mozo* SETTING Late Fall, Washington, D.C. PRODUCTION STAFF Casting ........................................................................ Joanne DeNaut, CSA Production Assistant ................................................................ Julie Renfro Assistant Director ..................................................................... Peter J. Kuo Assistant Scenic Designer .................................................. Jason Sherwood Costume Design Assistant ............................................. Adriana Lambarri Assistant Lighting Designer ................................................. Amanda Zieve Stage Management Intern ............................................... Natalie Figaredo Light Board Operator ..................................................... Sumner Ellsworth Sound Board Operator ...................................................... Bryan Williams Automation Operator ............................................................. Emily Kettler Wardrobe Supervisor/Dresser .................................................. Alma Reyes Hair Stylist ................................ Traci Boyd, Theodora Katsoulogiannakis Additional Costume Staff ........................................................ Sarah Timm * Member of Actors’ Equity Association, the Union of Professional Actors and Stage Managers. Please refrain from unwrapping candy or making other noises that may disturb surrounding patrons. Video taping and/or recording of this performance by any means whatsoever are strictly prohibited. Cellular phones, beepers and watch alarms should be turned off or set to non-audible mode during the performance. Smoking is not permitted anywhere in the theatre. P2 • South CoaSt RepeRtoRy • The Parisian Woman The Parisian Provocateur by Beau Willimon his important contribution to the French theater, Becque remains rarely produced and largely unknown. couple of years ago, the Flea Theater approached I hope I’m not perpetuating the litany of injustices me about adapting Henri Becque’s La Parisienne with The Parisian Woman. It’s unfair to Becque to call (1885). I had never heard of Henri Becque. Many my play an adaptation of his. Aside from setting the story A theater-goers haven’t, even in France. After reading in contemporary Washington D.C., I have consolidated the play I quickly fell in love with his work, and came to five acts into one. I removed two characters entirely and learn that he was among the first, arguably the first French created two new ones. Direct addresses to the audience dramatist to bring realism and naturalism to the stages of have been abandoned. While some of Becque’s brilliant Paris. lines remain intact, contempo- He wrote during one of rary idiom, cultural differences HENRI BECQUE Europe’s most dynamic cultural and a re-imagined narrative periods, the mid-to-late 19th have necessitated drastically century. His precursors were changed language, or in most Honoré de Balzac and Gustave of the play, new language alto- Flaubert, who introduced real- gether. ism to French literature; and My goal was to channel painters like Gustave Courbet Becque, not imitate or and Édouard Manet, who intro- translate him. That’s why I duced it to the canvas. His con- think it’s more appropriate temporaries were Henrik Ibsen to say “inspired by” rather and August Strindberg, Émile than “adapted from.” Have no Zola and Leo Tolstoy and Guy doubt, I stole a lot. I’m wholly de Maupassant. Everywhere art- indebted to Becque—my play ists were striving to portray the would not exist without his. human condition with naked, But I also liberated myself from unadorned truth. the original in order to achieve Becque was on the the freshness and relevance front lines of this rebellious that (I hope) Becque would paradigm shift. He drew from have appreciated. It’s been theatrical tropes familiar to over a century since he left this French audiences—the farce, earth, so there’s no way we’ll the parlor play, the comedy of ever know whether he would manners—and turned them on have approved of The Parisian their heads. In La Parisienne for instance, he eschewed Woman. But I like to think he would have gotten a kick romance for obsession, he explored sex in terms of out of it, seen some of himself on the stage, and maybe power rather than pure scintillation, and he tossed aside even had a laugh or two. cartoonish archetypes and populated the play with three- I’m deeply grateful to Monsieur Becque, of course, dimensional souls. He did all this with biting wit and but I’m also grateful to the Flea Theater for commissioning comedy, and in so doing, brought the French theater up me to write this play. And forever grateful to South Coast to speed with the rest of Europe. Repertory for producing its world premiere. SCR offers Becque suffered for his innovation. Some of his playwrights the sort of encouragement, resources and plays—like La Parisienne—were financial successes. But support that Becque never had available to him. And its many were disastrous flops, met with hisses, critical scour- audiences thirst for challenging new work rather than ings and short-lived runs. In 1886, a year after La Parisi- turning their backs on it. Were Becque still with us, I enne was first produced, Becque was awarded the Legion bet he’d feel quite at home in Costa Mesa. If you enjoy of Honor. Just 13 years later, he died penniless and home- The Parisian Woman (or even if you don’t), I hope it less, an outcast in the French theater. History hasn’t been will pique your curiosity enough to read the original La much kinder. While academics have come to appreciate Parisienne and the rest of Becque’s extraordinary work. The Parisian Woman • South CoaSt RepeRtoRy • P3 Artist Biographies STEVEN CULP* on Broadway; Dinner with Friends in New York, Los Peter Angeles and Boston (alternating roles); Blood Moon, both in New York and Los Angeles; Much Ado About appeared most recently in Harold Nothing at The Old Globe; and most recently, Helter Pinter’s Old Times at the Shake- Skelter by Neil LaBute at Ensemble Studio Theatre in speare Theatre Company in Wash- New York. Film credits include Light Sleeper and Patty ington, DC, directed by Michael Hearst directed by Paul Schrader, Housesitter, Fly Away Kahn. He returns to SCR after Home, Tombstone and most recently, Freelancers with appearing in Raised in Captivity Robert DeNiro and 50 Cent. Delany has starred in many (Drama-Logue Award for Outstanding Ensemble), Art, films for television including the miniseries Wild Palms and the premiere of Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa’s Doctor and True Women. Her favorite series roles were in Cerberus. Additional theatre credits include the pre- “Pasadena,” “Kidnapped,” “Desperate Housewives” and mieres of Tony Kushner’s Slavs! and Phyllis Nagy’s Trip’s “China Beach,” for which she won two Emmys for Best Cinch at Actors Theatre of Louisville’s Humana Festival; Actress. She is the longest-running voice of Lois Lane in Angels in America (Drama-Logue Award for Outstand- animated television and film. Delany is on the boards of ing Performance), Blackbird and The Quality of Life at Ojai Playwrights Conference and New York Stage and American Conservatory Theater; If Memory Serves at Film and is a strong supporter of the arts. Pasadena Playhouse; Opus, Doctor Cerberus and Biff in Death of a Salesman at LA TheatreWorks; Light Up the LINDA GEHRINGER* Sky at Ahmanson Theatre; The White Rose at The Old Jeanette Globe; Highest Standard of Living at Playwrights Ho- rizons; the premiere of A.R. Gurney, Jr.’s Sweet Sue at appeared at SCR earlier this season Williamstown Theatre Festival; Coastal Disturbances at in How to Write a New Book for Circle in the Square; the premiere of Terrence McNally’s the Bible, for which she received The Lisbon Traviata at Theatre Off-Park; and Richard III a Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle at New York Shakespeare Festival. Film credits include nomination. She also appeared in Thirteen Days (as Bobby Kennedy), The Emperor’s the world premieres of The Lan- Club, Spartan, Firehouse Dog, From Within, Leaving guage Archive, The Piano Teacher, A Naked Girl on Barstow, The Sisters, Nurse Betty, James and the Giant the Appian Way, Getting