Ghosts Within Ghosts: The Shakespeare Within Eugene O’Neill’s Tao House Plays by Patrick Midgley, BA/MFA A Dissertation In Theatre Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of Texas Tech University in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Approved Dr. Mark Charney Chair of the Committee Dr. Robert M. Dowling Dr. Felicia Londre Dr. Bill Gelber Dr. Sarah Johnson Dr. Mark Sheridan Dean of the Graduate School May 2021 © 2021, Patrick Midgley Texas Tech University, Patrick Midgley, May 2021 Acknowledgments I owe a tremendous debt of gratitude to many people who proved invaluable as I wrote this dissertation. First and foremost, I wish to thank my adviser, Dr. Mark Charney, without whose guidance, compassion, and unwavering belief in my potential I would not have attempted such an ambitious project. I first met Dr. Mark Charney when I was an undergraduate at the Kennedy Center/American College Theatre Festival’s National Critic’s Institute in June of 2002. Dr. Charney and I formed a strong and immediate bond: I like to think he admired my writing, but I certainly admired his energy, professionalism, and passion for theatre education, as well as his equally erudite and entertaining criticism. Dr. Charney and I maintained correspondence throughout my time as a graduate student at Purdue University’s Professional Actor Training Program as well as during my acting career at the American Shakespeare Center. When I came to study at Texas Tech, I did so primarily because of my desire to study under such an eminent, exacting, and compassionate educator. The past five years have been a delight, and I am truly lucky to call Dr. Charney both a mentor and a friend. Next, I wish to thank the numerous organizations that have supported my work during my Presidential Fellowship at Texas Tech University, primarily President Lawrence Schovanec, Graduate School Dean Mark Sheridan, College of Visual and Performing Arts Dean Noel Zahler, and the Ed and Linda Whitacre Graduate Fellowship Endowment. The Presidential Fellowship provided me with a generous income as well as a travel allowance, enabling me to present my work from Galway, Ireland to the United ii Texas Tech University, Patrick Midgley, May 2021 Arab Emirates. They covered my travel fees and conference registrations at The Modern Languages Association, The Comparative Drama Conference, The American Literary Association, The American Society for Theatre Research, and The American College Theatre Festival. As the first Presidential Fellow in the Fine Arts at Texas Tech, I cannot overemphasize how deeply this award impacted my life. My goal, every day for the past five years, has been to live up to the privilege and principles that award represents. In addition, I wish to thank the numerous scholars, artists, and organizations who have taken me under their wing during my time at Texas Tech. Foremost among these are the members of the Eugene O’Neill International Society, including Dr. Robert M. Dowling, Dr. Beth Wynstra, Dr. Steven Bloom, Dr. Alexander Pettit, Dr. Zander Brietzke, Dr. David Palmer, Dr. Katie Johnson, and many others. Joining the O’Neill Society has been one of the most pleasant and enlightening experiences of my scholarly career, and I am honored to serve as that organization’s Secretary/Treasurer. The Eugene O’Neill Foundation provided me with the Travis Bogard Artist-In-Residence Fellowship, where this project was truly born. The Association for Theatre in Higher Education awarded me with a regional award for Excellence in Graduate Instruction and Research, which brought more attention to my work and helped me uncover ways in which I can bring my insights into the classroom more effectively. I am grateful to write for one of the finest dissertation committees imaginable. Thank you to Dr. Felicia Londre, Dr. Robert M. Dowling, Dr. Bill Gelber, and Dr. Sarah Johnson. Without your time and expertise, this project would not have been possible. Lastly, and most importantly, to my wife, Sarah: thank you. iii Texas Tech University, Patrick Midgley, May 2021 Table of Contents Acknowledgements.……………………………………………………………………….ii Abstract…...……………………………………………………………………………….v List of Abbreviations……….…………………………………………………………….vi I. Chapter One: The Dark Mirror………………………………………………………….1 II. Chapter Two: The Shakespeare Within O’Neill……...………………………………18 III. Chapter Three: “Insubstantial Pageant Faded”: The Shakespeare Within Long Day’s Journey Into Night……….……………………………..…………………...38 IV. Chapter Four: “An Ad for the Past”: The Shakespeare Within A Moon for the Misbegotten…...……………………………………………………..86 V. Chapter Five: “Sing Willow”: The Shakespeare Within The Iceman Cometh……………………...………………………………………….120 VI. Chapter Six: Epigraph...…………………………………………………………….144 Bibliography……………………………………………………………………………152 iv Texas Tech University, Patrick Midgley, May 2021 Abstract In several of the Tao House plays — those written between 1936 and 1943 at Eugene O’Neill’s remote Danville, California, estate, including The Iceman Cometh (1940), Long Day’s Journey Into Night (1941), and A Moon for the Misbegotten (1943) — American playwright Eugene O’Neill alludes to Shakespeare, both directly and indirectly, with a sudden frequency and urgency. Each of these plays excruciatingly exorcises a personal demon, and, as O’Neill turns toward his past, he also turns towards a refracted image of William Shakespeare. In this dissertation, I argue that the Shakespeare within Eugene O’Neill’s Tao House plays is among the most important and least understood elements of Eugene O’Neill’s playwriting. More than an esoteric, literary feature of the plays, O’Neill’s use of Shakespeare is crucial to understanding, interpreting, and playing these foundational American works. O’Neill did more than embed a glimpse of Shakespeare within the Tao House plays — in them, he creates his own personal and partial Shakespeare. Expressed through the distinctly theatrical time signature or rotating repertory, the Tao House Shakespeare is among the most fascinating, complex, and moving achievements in twentieth century American drama. v Texas Tech University, Patrick Midgley, May 2021 List of Abbreviations CP1: Eugene O’Neill: The Complete Plays, Vol. 1: 1913-1920. Travis Bogard, ed. The Library of America, 1988. CP3: Eugene O’Neill: The Complete Plays, Vol. 3: 1932-1943. Travis Bogard, ed. The Library of America, 1988. CW: William Shakespeare: Complete Works. Jonathan Bate and Eric Rasmussen, ed. The Modern Library/The Royal Shakespeare Company, 2007. WD: O’Neill, Eugene. Work Diary 1924-1943, transcribed by Donald Gallup, preliminary edition. 2 vols. Yale University Library, 1981. vi Texas Tech University, Patrick Midgley, May 2021 Chapter One The Dark Mirror In a shadowy corner of the Tao House, an obsidian mirror, dark as the night sky of Danville’s foothills, hangs on a wall adjacent to O’Neill’s bedroom. As you stare into it — or, I should say, as it stares into you — the present moment expands, both deep into the past and eerily into the future. The mirror cannot be held, as ‘twere, up to nature: it does not reflect accurately what is there. I could only glance at it in passing as I toured the Tao House on my first day as a Travis Bogard Artist-In-Residence Fellow. But for the rest of my time at O’Neill’s home, its ominous reflection haunted me as I wrote, read, and rehearsed. Late at night, as I worked alone in the Barn Theatre drilling speeches and ironing out transitions, I found myself still thinking about its dark reflection. I was thirty-one years old, the youngest recipient of the Bogard fellowship, and I had been invited to the Tao House to write, rehearse, and perform a new play, titled Shakespeare and O’Neill, Cheek by Jowl: A One-Man Mash-Up. It was a play as young and naïve as I was, full of gee-whiz sentimentality and an almost desperate earnestness. But its over-eager charm masked a deep desire. I wanted to grasp and embody the literary, theatrical, dramaturgical, and psychological connections between Shakespeare and Eugene O’Neill, particularly in the late plays O’Neill composed at Tao House, when he began alluding to the Bard with increasing frequency and intensity. But none of that was on my mind now, as I stood in front of this mystical mirror. 1 Texas Tech University, Patrick Midgley, May 2021 My tour guide, Wendy, noticed that I had paused in front of my darkened reflection. “Chic,” she said. That, according to Wendy, is the word Carlotta Monterey used to describe the mirror when it was first hung in 1939 (the same year O’Neill completed The Iceman Cometh). I had to laugh. Carlotta’s euphemism struck me as impossibly optimistic. Wendy smiled politely, amused by my reaction. She explained that Eugene and Carlotta were once visited by Russel Crouse, the co-author of the Broadway mega-hit Life With Father. Crouse and O’Neill had been friends and correspondents for years. When Crouse first saw the mirror, Wendy continued, he turned to O’Neill and said, “It makes me feel as though I am dead.” O’Neill responded, “It makes me feel alive.” It made me feel neither dead nor alive, and certainly not chic, either. It made me feel insignificant: gravitas-less, common, intrusive. I stood before it in flattened running shoes and faded shorts, entirely undignified, a backpack slinked awkwardly over my shoulders. “Some visitors find the mirror a bit unnerving,” Wendy said with a wink, and walked down the stairs, leaving me alone with the mirror. I inched forward and squinted into the mirror, zeroing in on the left strap of my backpack. One centimeter at a time, it was beginning to rip under the burden of O’Neill’s Complete Plays (all three volumes) and The Royal Shakespeare Company’s Complete Works. Reflected in the black glass, the strap triggered a memory, and I was transported to a moment just a few months prior when I felt just as I did now, both connected to, and impossibly distant from, the playwright whose work and life fascinated me.