I woke up this morning thinking about a play I first conceived in the 1980s, at the height of my playwriting career, with the title above. What I liked about the conception is that one actress played all the women, which meant two actors performed the play, which also made it very accessible to theaters. I started maybe half a dozen false starts over the years. Never finished it. I don't know if thinking about it in my waking dreamstate means it's time to revisit this or not. For the moment, I think not, but sometimes material bugs you for release and doesn't let up until you tackle it. I'm supposed to be retired as a playwright. But I still like this concept a lot.
However, I never had an ending. I figured one would occur to me along the way, as happened more than once, but in my falsestarts this never happened. The play was autobiographical at root, but I didn't hold this against it, and the parts for the female would be delicious. The male, at least in all my attempts, told his story to the audience. A very minimalist set. Probably just a small table, chairs and a bed. I think I was working with six women, six characters. Any number from four to seven or eight would work. The role for the woman would be delicious indeed, although I had no particular actress in mind as I wrote but later I hoped several would take interest in it, particularly Katherine King, a first rate actress active here at the time. I don't think I ever told her this.
Well, it was in my head as I woke, for the first time in decades. Awake now, I am not rushing off to write anything, as usually happened when this "meant" something. So maybe it's a moment of nostalgia about one of the many projects that was attractive in concept but which I never figured out enough to finish. And if this same title is bugging me tomorrow as I wake ...
(Also, what a different play it would be now, written by an old man, as then. Maybe this is advantageous to the material.)
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