Word: mamet
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...Woods typifies the theatre of David Mamet, taking us into the depths of postmodern relational angst. Cristopher Scully's Leverett House production presents the emotional isolation of a man and a woman whose love affair becomes destructive at worst, tenuous at best...
...couple in love at the beginning, Ruth (Karen Todd) and Nick (Ian Lithgow) indulge in an idyllic weekend retreat. In classically structured form, Mamet moves to the moments of crisis in which the dissolution of their relationship is most pronounced. Then focuses on achieving resolution--structurally of the play, and literally of the relationship...
Nick's sporadic violence is the only action in the play; all else is dialogue that often appears pointless and incoherent. Mamet's critics often consider this ultimate realism--the diminishing of action into perpetual, unconstructive, oververbalization...
...Mamet, like Philip Roth, justifies his oververbalization within the script. Ruth declares to Nick in the third act of the play: "You're so fucking corny." Writing off Nick and Ruth as corny characters may redeem many corny lines that are obviously unnatural. "We put on clothes, we can not make out what we look like...It's very lonely and we all get desperate to be warm. We have to find our lovers when it's warm...
...Woods--by David Mamet. In the Leverett House Old Library Theater at 8 p.m. Admission is $4, $3 for students...