“…the hopeless pursuit of an idealistic, even utopian, dream where all things are naively held to be possible.”
This week my mother took my sister and me to see the play “Oleanna” by David Mamet. From the opening monologue, and throughout the entire eighty minute performance, I sat with my arms folded tightly across my chest, attempting to counter the extreme discomfort ignited and fueled by the controversial performance. My feelings grew with increasing intensity and while part of me was drawn in, hanging on every word, another part was repulsed, resisting a strong urge to bolt right out of the theater (as at least one person did!). In the end, I cannot even tell you what the play was about – other than the relationship between a student and her professor – only my experience of it; which, for me, is precisely what the play is about.
There is a line midway through the first scene where John, the Professor, states:
Well, you see? That’s what I’m saying. We can only interpret the behavior of others through the screen we… (The phone rings.) Through… (To phone: ) Hello…? (To CAROL:) Through the screen we create.
(theater.harvard.edu/archive/2001-fall/Oleanna/script.doc)
This, for me, expressed the play’s core message. Two people interacting with their environment and with each other the only way they know how – based on their unique and limited experiences, data sets and perspectives. Because of this I found “Oleanna” to be a truly magnificent depiction of the human struggle, and a testament to what a miracle it is we all get along as well as we do, live together and even survive at all.
After the play, we stayed for the “Take a Side: The Oleanna Talk–Back Series.” At first, I found myself subconsciously (and silently) jeering at the audience members and, with an air of superiority, judging their opinions as myopic, ridiculous and wrong. However, I soon found myself laughing not at them but at my own arrogance. I was impressed by my unwillingness to try on their perspective and see how what they were saying must be absolutely real for them. Here again the theme rang glaringly true – each of us is completely right and valid in our own perspectives, based on the “screens we create,” or contrarily, as stated in the play’s tagline: “Whatever side you take you are wrong.”
I left the talk-back series feeling a deep sense of love and compassion for our human struggle – the struggle to evolve our perceptual limitations so we may harmoniously exist – first within each of us and then with each other. I also felt affirmed and ever more motivated and convicted in the work I do as an invaluable resource to help us overcome this challenge.
The subjects of this play were two people, a student and a professor, but the essence and process relates to all of humanity. It was about Palestinians & Jews, Catholics & Protestants, Turks & Serbs, and so on. If we cannot come to understand ourselves and the “screens we create” we will continue to destroy each other to prove our perspective is valid, to prove we are right, in control and, ultimately, that we are ok. Call me naïve, but I believe evolving ourselves beyond this limited viewpoint is not only possible, but the first and most crucial step towards building a more humane world. By bringing this to our attention, “Oleanna” helps us do just that. Or, at least, it helped me.
