We went to see Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice last night, presented by the Ross Valley Players in their Barn theatre. (Excellent production, by the way.) It was the only possible performance that did not overlap with any of Jessica and my appearances in A Christmas Carol at Novato Theater Company. On the way there, she kept asking me where the theatre was located. Despite having been there dozens of times as a little girl, she just couldn’t place it in her mind.
When Jessica was just three, my then-wife Beth returned from a weekend seminar at Esalen Institute with the news that she wanted a divorce. We had been going through a rocky patch, but I still had had hope. Her announcement put an end to that fantasy, and her timing could not have been worse. I was scheduled within the hour to start rehearsals for Dancing at Lughnasa, my directorial debut at RVP.
Written by Brian Friel, Lughnasa is the story of a Irishman, Michael, who takes us back to the ruins of his childhood home in fictional Ballybeg to recount a significant year in his life. It is also the story of a family that is coming apart at the seams – like mine was at that moment.
Arriving at the theatre that evening, I gathered the cast and then felt the need to explain my current emotional state, lest I fail to hold myself together at some point. Then we dug into this amazing script. Sometimes you have to search for meaning in the text of a play, or even supply it where it does not exist, but Friel is on a different level as a playwright. Layer upon layer were revealed to us during rehearsal and we drank it up like nectar.
Within a couple of weeks, Beth moved into her own apartment and I began dealing with the reality of shared custody. I hopefully supposed that Jessica would be able to accompany me to rehearsals and entertain herself with toys and books. Unfortunately, it would be couple of years before she reached that level of independence. While she was content most of the time, I often had to stop proceedings to attend to her needs and wants. The cast was sympathetic for a while, but then let me know gently that they weren’t getting my full attention. Of course they were right, and I arranged for baby-sitting for the remainder of the rehearsal period.
I redoubled my efforts, and I don’t think there is another play that I have directed where I have done half as much work on characterization, historical research, dramaturgy, and collaboration with designers. I poured my broken heart into Lughnasa as if, by stopping, the dam might burst and the reality of my marital disaster would flood in.
Sometimes in theatre you just get everything right. The set works, there isn’t a false note in the cast, and all that you imagined appears magically on stage. Lughnasa was one of those productions. One director friend said that it was the best show she had seen at The Barn “…since, well, forever.” I wish I could take all the credit for its success, but I am happy just to have been a part of such a talented team.
Given my circumstances at home, I found it difficult to watch every single performance. Some evenings, I would take long walks down into the town of Ross and through the Marin Art and Garden center, contemplating my past, my present and my future. Then I would return for some of my favorite scenes, right before intermission. Even still, I loved that production and our wonderful cast and clung to them like a lifeline.
All plays eventually come to an end, as do some marriages. We struck the set and I reluctantly moved on. I decided that what my daughter needed, more than anything, was an amicable divorce and I worked hard to make that happen. I am proud to say that Beth and I have succeeded as parents, where we may have once failed as a couple, and have remained close friends.
Driving home from the play last night, I took the route down the Miracle Mile in San Rafael that I used to take when Jessica and I came home from rehearsals, thirteen years ago. When we turned onto Fourth Street, decorated with holiday lights on all the downtown trees, it all came back for her in a rush.
She remembered how much she used to love the way those strings of white lights combined with the red and green traffic signals to create an unexpectedly beautiful Christmas scene. Then she remembered exploring the backstage at The Barn and the stuffed bear she found upstairs during one rehearsal. The one with the yellow bird on its hat, she recalled. I told her that those are most likely some of her earliest childhood memories.
It’s notable that she should remember almost nothing of her mother’s and my divorce, or of her struggling to get my attention during our long rehearsals. I suppose life is like that – we get to choose whether or not to carry all of life’s pains and disappointments in our hearts. That is what the character of Michael learns in Dancing at Lughnasa, when he goes back to visit his childhood.
How much better to recall the joy of being bundled up in your car seat and watching the pretty lights on main street pass by as your Daddy drives you home in the rain; then pretending to fall asleep, just as you get there, so that he has to carry you in his arms to your bed, where the bear with the bird on his hat awaits. Much, much better.
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