This is not the first time I’ve attended a play consisting entirely of love missives sent during war nor, I’m sure, will it be the last. We always meet both protagonists. It always shows past and present.
Over a thousand World War II letters were found in the actress/playwright Charlotte Purser’s grandmother’s Baton Rouge attic. They covered correspondence between her grandparents during 1944 and 1945. He, Red Evans, was stationed in Europe as the Captain of the US Army 529th Engineers Light Pontoon Company which built movable bridges under General Patton. Wife Mimi was in Louisiana.
We’re told by Purser, who morphs into her grandmother Mimi, that writing the play took seven years. She bemoans not having known her relative better. It’s difficult to imagine the editing challenge of such an endeavor. The good news is that its framework holds our attention. We liberally swing back and forth from Mimi’s writing to her husband with Red responding from abroad, to her current state of Alzheimer’s. Jens Rasmussen plays both Red and a facility nurse.
“My darling, I’m sitting in the middle of my bed listening to Kay Kayser…” Mimi writes/speaks aloud in a credible Southern accent. “Oh golly, Red, I love you so! Just remember I’m yours forever…” She’s ersatz seductive. (This needs work.) A box flap lowers revealing Red as if in a cave. “I do love my precious wife…” We hear artillery, bombs. He speaks of insecure GIs despite news of surrenders, of the stench of dead cows and horses. With no information as to rank or what he’s doing, we assume the man’s a private.
“Where are my letters? I wrote hundreds. Do you have them?” she says suddenly confused. “I don’t have yours anymore. I don’t know if they even made it back from the war.” He appears in the room. They dance (badly). He whirls off. She tells him (writes) about her church group, a birthday, her mother gifting a single dish in hopes of accumulating a set. When he’s in England there are hot showers and good food. Then it’s the continent. Where? Bombs. Mimi and Red hit the ground and crawl while talking.
A nurse comes in to clean up and perhaps take Mimi to dinner. We glean who he is when he calls her Mrs. Evans. Suddenly she can barely read – as if she had a stroke. “Mrs. Evans, what do you see when you look at me?” he gently asks. Bits of the past are recalled. There’s mention of children. Aha, he made it back. If they’re his. We learn the answer towards curtain.
As an actress, Charlotte Purser neither conveys loneliness nor elicits poignancy, both of which are wanted for contrast. We need to care more. Jens Rasmussen’s Red is better at this, but one-sided is inadequate. The actor is also solid in the role of caring health care aid often at a loss in her presence. Purser rides the pendulum of past and present believable in the throes of the disease. It’s then we feel for her.
The play is in need of more specifics on both sides. Too much of it washes over making it feel long. Additionally the denouement/reveal is so subtle, some may miss it. Perhaps another line or two? So – a mixed bag. With a little tinkering, however…
Ann Margineau’s direction is adroit except for Purser’s failings. Use of boxes is terrific. Rasmussen’s entrances and exits and change from character to character, effectively flow. Reaction to bombs adds interest.
Set and props by Deb O are fitting and clever. The entire stage is stacked with an architectural assemblage of brown cardboard boxes which form a table, act as entrance for the second character, and are ostensibly filled with letters. The letters themselves, we see a great many read, tossed, or dumped out, all are written upon, a detail too often overlooked onstage. Costumes are less successful.
Sound design by Eden Segbefia is excellent both in chosen material – from bombs to music – and volume
Photos by Tony Crawford
The War Letters – a Love Story by Charlotte Purser
Directed by Ann Margineau
WP Theater Space Program Residency
2162 Broadway at 76th Street
