1970s

1972 THE CURSE OF LANGSTON HOUSE

CAST

SYNOPSIS

PRODUCTION HISTORY

Directed by Fornés for performance at the Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park, Cincinnati, Ohio.

PUBLICATION HISTORY

Unpublished.

1974 AURORA

CAST

SYNOPSIS

A sensitive youth, William, and his spirit, Bill, discuss their struggles amongst the aristocratic society of Duke Denzo’s castle. In the castle’s ballroom there are Slavic dances and games but amongst all the humour insults are traded. William and the Duke have a fencing duel in which the Duke is mortally wounded in this parody of film and theatre. [MM]

PRODUCTION HISTORY

With music by John FitzGibbon, Fornés directed Aurora when it was presented by New York Theatre Strategy at the Truck and Warehouse Theatre, 79 East Fourth Street, NYC. Lighting Design was by Susan Gregg and Choreography by Aileen Passloff. Cast: Ken Fitch, Bob Harders, Caroline Kava, Lee Kissman, James Leon, Ed Setrakian, Lola Belle Smith, Gayle Swymer, Camille Tibaldeo. Piano – Stephen Spitz, Flute – Dan Erikkila, Guitar – Dick Hobson.

PUBLICATION HISTORY

Unpublished

1975 CAP-A-PIE

CAST

4W, 4M

SYNOPSIS

Cap-a-Pie – the title means “from head to toe” – was simple, personal, and honest, more psychohistory than ethnography. There were no characters, plot, or setting. The performers simply played themselves, recounting personal experiences directly to the audience in a casual manner that enhanced the immediacy of the event and even allowed for on-the-spot variations or embellishments from one performance to the next. The piece avoided mention of historical events or familiar place names in favor of evocative memories of childhood. Johnny recalled his days as a kid bottling, labeling, and selling bleach water in the projects. Vicenta remembered waking up early one morning when she was three just in time to glimpse the wings of an angel as it flew out the window after her mother gave birth at home. Jose Rafael recreated the construction of a nativity scene that each Christmas season took over a room in his mother’s house. Ivan summoned up the many smells on the sugar plantation in Cuba where his uncle worked: the orange blossoms, the soil “when it’s damp y el olor del estierol que olía bién,” the manure of cows who eat fresh grass instead of hay, and the café con leche made with warm milk straight from the cow.

Cummings, Scott T.. Maria Irene Fornes (Routledge Modern and Contemporary Dramatists) (pp. 58-59). Taylor and Francis.

PRODUCTION HISTORY

A bilingual theatre piece with lyrics by Fornés and music by José Raúl Bernardo, this has been staged and directed three times in 1975 by Fornés. On all three occasions it has been staged at INTAR, (International Arts Relations), Hispanic American Arts Centre, 508 West 53rd Street, NYC. It was INTAR’s first original production and was dedicated to Elsa Ortix de Robles: ‘without her it would never have been possible.’

PUBLICATION HISTORY

Unpublished.

1976 WASHING

CAST

2 W

SYNOPSIS

PRODUCTION HISTORY

It has been staged once when directed by Fornés at the Theatre for the New City, NYC. Cast: Margaret Harrington, Aileen Passloff.

PUBLICATION HISTORY

Unpublished.

1977 FEFU AND HER FRIENDS

CAST

8 W

SYNOPSIS

A three-act play set in 1935. Eight women meet in the New England home of Fefu to rehearse for an educational fundraiser. The play morphs into an environmentally staged look into the intimate lives and relationships of these women. Part I takes place in Fefu’s living room, establishing her unconventional marriage, tensions with her own sense of self and surroundings, and the previous relationships between the eight women. Part II has four scenes, each in a different location: the garden, the study, the bedroom and the kitchen. These scenes were originally staged simultaneously and environmentally although the most recent publication of the scripts presents a more traditional proscenium staging. The play ends in Part III in the evening of the same day. The women rehearse for their meeting. The play ends with a bizarre gun accident wherein Fefu shoots a white rabbit inadvertently causing one of the women, Julia, to receive a wound to the forehead. [MM]

PRODUCTION HISTORY

Fornés directed this (12th – 15th May, 19th – 22nd May) when it premiered at the Relativity Media Lab, 648 Broadway with New York Theatre Strategy, NYC in 1977. Set Design by Linda Conaway, Lighting Design by Candice Dunn and Costume Design by Lana Fritz. Cast: Sue – Janet Biehl, Cindy – Gwendolyn Brown, Paula – Connie LoCurto Cicone, Julia – Margaret Harrington, Christina – Carolyn Hearn, Emma – Gordana Rashovich, Fefu – Rebecca Schull, Cecilia – Joan Voukides. Fornés was awarded an OBIE for Playwriting. When first written as performed in a SoHo loft Fornés took advantage of the rooms in the loft space to innovatively divide the audience into four groups for Part II. Each group moved between the four sets to watch at close hand the simultaneously performed scenes until each group had seen all four scenes. The audience then came together again for Part III.
Fornés directed it again in 1978 (6th January-5th May) with the American Place Theatre, 111 West 42nd Street, NYC. The Set Design was by Kert Lundell and Nancy Tobias, Costume Design by Theo Barnes and Lighting Design by Edward M. Greenberg. Cast: Fefu – Rebecca Schull, Cindy – Dorothy Lyman, Christina – Elizabeth Perry, Julia – Margaret Harrington, Emma – Gordana Rashovich, Paula – Connie LoCurto, Sue – Arleigh Richards, Cecilia – Judith Roberts.
In 1979, Fornés directed it at the Padua Hills Playwrights Festival, Claremont, California and also at the University of Wisconsin, Parkside, Parkside WI. In 1979, she also directed it at Pasadena Community Arts Center, Brookside Theatre, Pasadena, CA.
1981 – Eureka Theatre, San Francisco CA (dir. Alma Becker)
1981 – The Empty Space, Seattle WA (dir. M. Burke Walker)
1982 – Victoria College for the Arts, Melbourne, Australia (dir. Ros Horin)
1983 – Paradise Island Express, Washington Project for the Arts, Washington DC (dir. Deirdre Lavrakis)
1983 – Theatre Off Park, New York NY
1984 – Blind Parrot Productions, Blackbird Theater, Chicago IL (dir. Janice St. John)
1985 – Théâtre des Cinquantes, Paris France (dir. Lucienne Hamon)
Fornés did not direct it again until productions in 1986 and 1987 at At The Foot of the Mountain, Minneapolis MN. In 1989, Fornés directed Fefu at New City Theatre, Seattle, Washington, where in 1993 she would return to direct Enter The Night.
1992 – Yale Repertory Theatre (Winterfest), New Haven, CT (dir. Lisa Peterson)
1992 – Amersfoort, The Netherlands (dir. Moniek Merkx)
1996 – Single-set Version at Muhlenberg College, Allentown PA (dir. Maria Irene Fornes)
In the summer of 1999, Fornes directed a production of Fefu and Her Friends at Santa Fe Stages, Santa Fe, New Mexico. Donald Eastman was the Set Designer.
2001 – Chickspeare Theatre Company, Charlotte NC (dir. Anne Lambert)
2001 – Actor’s Express, Atlanta GA (dir. Wier Harman)
2010 – Reading at the 2010 New York Fornes Festival, Theater for the New City, New York NY (dir. Billy Hopkins)

PUBLICATION HISTORY

First Published: Wordplays 1, (New York: PAJ Publications, 1980).
Subsequent Publication/Anthologization History:
- Fornes, Maria Irene. Fefu and Her Friends : A Play. 1st ed. New York: PAJ Publications, 1990.
- Fornes, Maria Irene. Fefu and Her Friends. New, Expanded ed. New York, New York: PAJ Publications, 2017.

1977 LOLITA IN THE GARDEN

CAST

SYNOPSIS

A fairy godmother grants three wishes to an eleven-year old girl – she can do as she likes, no one can order her to do anything, she will never have to do as others would wish. Lolita’s mother agrees that she can go into the forest to play but in the paradise of playing just as she likes Lolita comes to long for someone to tell her what to do. Lolita asks the fairy godmother, a tree and a poetical bear for advice before understanding is reached in time for her mother to find her in the forest. [MM]

PRODUCTION HISTORY

With music written by Richard Weinstock, this was directed by Fornés in June 1977 at INTAR, (International Arts Relations), Hispanic American Arts Centre, 508 West 53rd Street, NYC. Sets and Costume Design were by Beth Kuhn. This has been its only known staging. According to The Village Voice review of 5th December, 1977, published after the production had closed, the cast was: Lolita – Catherine Slade, Mother – Badoni de Cesare, Bear – Wendell Cordtz. A review in the Daily News, 19th May, 1977 gives the Cast as: Lolita – Judy Vargas, Bear – Joey Infante, Carmen Rosario, Edwin Avila and Rene Troche.

PUBLICATION HISTORY

Unpublished.

1978 IN SERVICE

CAST

SYNOPSIS

PRODUCTION HISTORY

Directed by Fornés at the 1978 Padua Hills Playwrights Festival, Claremont, California. This has been its only staging.

PUBLICATION HISTORY

Unpublished.

1979 EYES ON THE HAREM

CAST

SYNOPSIS

On 27th April 1909 Sultan Abdul Hamid, the last sultan of the Ottoman Empire, is about to flee his palace before the people break in. The women of his harem are in confusion for by tradition they are murdered as sultans have been replaced. The split level stage of lavish, elegant opulence and stark simplicity are settings for tap dancing, vaudevillian music and song and improbable non-linear sketches as the harem of myth and film is repeatedly concerned with castration, imprisonment, assassination and savage repression which corrupt the lives of abused and their abusers. The authority of empire becomes a joke. [MM]

PRODUCTION HISTORY

This has been staged once in 1979 when it was directed by Fornés at INTAR, (International Arts Relations), Hispanic American Arts Centre, 420 West 42nd Street, NYC. The Set Design was by Larry Brodsky, Costume Design by Frank Krenz, and Lighting by Edward M. Greenberg. Cast (incomplete): Robert Daniel, Kathleen Burns, Lucinda Hitchcock Cone, Janet Leuchter, Sultan – Cliff Seidman, Court Attendant – Michael Kemmering.

PUBLICATION HISTORY

Unpublished.