DTC's 'excellent' 'City of Conversation:' politics and life
‘Tis the season. Not that season, coming soon enough. Not hunting season, though right now there’s plenty of muck to traipse through. No, it’s politics in season, and lest we forget it, the Delaware Theatre Company has opened a production of Anthony Giardina’s trenchant, well constructed and exceptionally timely “City of Conversation.”
Written in 2014, “City” is three acts of well-thought-out, finely honed characterization that creates dramatic action. And it’s a rare look at Washington politics through a long lens of almost 40 years that (opening just before Halloween) feels eerily timeless.
Both family drama and political saga, the play begins in October 1979 with an effective sound montage designed by John Stovicek that could be lifted from today’s news. Audio collages anchor the play firmly in each of three presidential periods – the Carter administration, the Reagan era in 1987 and the 2009 Obama inauguration, with stops and snipes at other presidencies along the way.
In the 1970s, Giardina posits, political deals in Washington are made the old-fashioned way. After fighting it out on Capitol Hill, politicians “lay down arms at the end of the day” and compromise over drinks in the living rooms of powerful Washington hostesses. Here, much of the “sausage-making” happens in the home of Georgetown doyenne Hester Ferris (Susan Wilder), who champions liberal causes aided by her ever-patient sister Jean (Laurel Merlington).
Hester lives with the inconveniently married Sen. Chandler Harris (Dan Kern). Shades of New England in her name, she is uncompromisingly steely, her barbs hidden behind a killer smile with the ease of a confident political fixer, holding court in James Dardenne’s perfectly appointed Georgetown house with classic archways, chilly elegance and perfectly placed power photos.
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Into this living-and-working room come varied DC types and tropes. The first to arrive is Hester’s malleable son Colin (Jered McLenigan), home from the London School of Economics with his fiancée Anna (Jessica Bedford). It takes only a moment for the two lionesses – one in charge and one come to challenge – to square off and set about sparring with one another.
Then Hester’s dinner guests arrive – bourbon-smooth Kentucky Sen. George Mallonee (Buck Schirner) and his oh-so-ladylike wife Carolyn (Drucie McDaniel). Soon the social part of the evening is split open to reveal the real business – making a political deal – in a night that holds surprises for everyone as Washington policies and family politics spark and flame.
After intermission, the second and third acts bring new characters to new political milieus. In 1987, we meet Colin and Anna’s 6-year old son Ethan (Ethan Wagner) and in 2009 we meet the grown Ethan (McLenigan again) and his partner Donald Logan (Brandon J. Pierce). As well as moving the family dynamics along the Richter scale, each of these acts explores the mines and mores of political setbacks and victories as Hester doggedly pursues her liberal agenda.
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The audience has to adapt to dense content reminiscent of George Bernard Shaw, who must have been one of Giardina’s models for this politically infused drama. Drawing in the watcher requires able and experienced actors to grapple with and explicate vast amounts of political exposition and history. Though William Roudebush’s direction seems slightly obtuse, the DTC company rises to the mark and the opening night audience responded fervently. A few more performances will undoubtedly see the actors tighten and enhance pacing and timing.
An intriguing facet of this highly polished play is the conclusion that not every setback is a loss and not every victory is a win. Giardina weaves complicated ideas over and under themes and conflicts from personal to political to universal. He grapples with a bushel of ideas – family solidarity, political efficacy, liberalism versus conservatism, ideals versus behavior, feminism, child rearing, the dynamics of a marriage. It could be a mess of a play, but his chops as a novelist allow Giardina to shape complexity into a cogent dramatic arc filled with situations and people that are recognizable inside or outside the Beltway.
In his notes, Roudebush says that cast and audience will experience the work differently before and after the election. For that reason, right now this is one of the most produced plays in the country.
The great 19th century writer Henry James called Washington “the city of conversation” because its power axis is situated away from the public eye and centered on intimate and private discourse.
“The secret of politics is to keep it simple,” says Sen. Mallanee, advice that Giardina wisely does not follow.
There is nothing simple about this excellent, trenchant and watchable drama.