SOURCE: Dean, Anne M. “Balm in Gilead” and “Burn This.” In Discovery and Invention: The Urban Plays of Lanford Wilson, pp. 61-79, 94-122. Rutherford, N.J.: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 1994.

[In the following essay, Dean asserts that Balm in Gilead displays Wilson's talent for poetic dialogue and that Burn This is one of his most important works.]

I hear America singing, the varied carols I hear—

—Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass

Balm in Gilead is the earliest and perhaps most disconcerting of Wilson's urban plays. Like his other works set in a city, this drama is both ambitious and brave, seeking to cover a wide range of issues by means of unconventional, even alienating, effects. It is at once a fairly realistic chronicle of life as lived by a particular section of the New York underclass at a specific period in history and a dynamic and intensely theatrical celebration of the poetry of the streets. It deals not only with the many betrayals, disappointments, and hardships that characterize the life of its protagonists, but also with their hopes, dreams, and small victories.

The play is a coruscating, yet strangely moving evocation of a socially disadvantaged corner of New York. To become involved in its dissipated milieu is to share its fears and elations to an uncomfortable degree. Although it is set in the 1960s, with clear indications of a very “sixties” kind of mentality in its writing, it is also timeless.

Despite Wilson's concentration on the seamier elements of life, Balm in Gilead is far from being a depressing or unsavory work; there is much to admire, even in its bleakest moments. For example, his motley cast of characters each have the ring of absolute truth about them, and their experiences are dramatized with much knowing humor and understanding. Equally, their sometimes twisted morality is, nonetheless, rooted in a street culture that has established its own moral structure, where certain codes of conduct are permitted and others are not. Even here, certain rules may not be breached, and displays of dysfunctional (as defined by this society) behavior are vehemently discouraged. When the finely wrought structure is tested, discord and panic take over but, soon enough, the group reforms and the status quo is reestablished. This is nowhere more evident than in Joe's murder, which, while horrifying to all who witness it, is quickly “forgotten”—or repressed—and life continues as before.

Balm in Gilead is also extremely inventive, both in its use of language and its visual imagery. Much contrivance is at work here to ensure that word and image combine at exactly the correct moment to achieve their dramatic aim, with innovative use of lighting, repetitions both of whole scenes and snatches of dialogue, and surreal interventions by singers and children in Halloween masks all conspiring to create powerful tableaux. This is, after all, a glimpse into a world usually unseen by the majority, and Wilson takes every opportunity to mold it into a fantastic concoction of positive and negative imagery, dark and light, sound and silence, color and monochrome.

Here, for the first time, Wilson dramatizes the kindly prostitutes, losers, and frustrated dreamers who populate his other urban plays, and he indicates the direction he would take as a dramatist. In his introduction to the play, he describes those who people the work as “the riffraff, the bums, the petty thieves, the scum, the lost, the desperate, the dispossessed, the cool.”¹ This may sound harsh and condemnatory, but the tone of the play is quite the opposite. At no point does he adopt a moral or censorious stance; on the contrary, his characters are delineated without apology and with considerable humor and affection.

As John Beaufort observes, “however down and out and disreputable the social castoffs of Balm in Gilead may be, the playwright still regards them as human beings.”² Similarly, Gene Barnett notes that “the playwright's presentation of the characters' courage and persistence in confronting low life suggests that even such people as these have his respect.”³ Robert Brustein describes the play as basically documentary, objectively recording what Wilson observed around him; for Brustein, Balm in Gilead is

a closely observed sociological study of hookers, hustlers, pimps, pushers, and dopers of every sexual persuasion converging on each other in an all-night coffee shop on Halloween—Gorki's Lower Depths transferred to Upper Broadway.⁴

Described by John Beaufort as resembling “a verbal folk opera with set pieces for arias recited by several of its … characters,”⁵ the action of the play takes place during the week or so prior to Halloween and spans several days. Of the thirty-two characters (including four “negro entertainers” and four children) moving in and out of the all-night café in which the work is set, the audience's attention is gradually focused on two: Joe, a dope pusher a cut above the rest of the habitués of the café in social class, and Darlene, a naive and rather stupid prostitute who has come to New York from Chicago with the intention of improving her career prospects, to become as Wilson observes, “a serious hooker.”⁶

The dynamic, relentless pace suggests the kind of culture shock a young writer from Missouri must have felt when he first came to the Upper West Side of New York, finding it to be a living—albeit consumptive—museum of drugs, graffiti, and street people who seemed to exist according to their own rules. Far from feeling faint-hearted at the sights and sounds that engulfed him, Wilson seized the opportunity to become part of this counterculture.

During this period, Wilson lived in a run-down hotel named the Hebro. With two friends, he rented one large room and spent his evenings in Pan's Restaurant. Here, stunned by the diversity of life he witnessed, he eavesdropped on as many conversations as he could, becoming entranced by the street life he observed. He remembers being “so excited by the sound of what was around [him]. Those incredibly vibrant though maybe burned out lives banging against each other.”⁷ He elaborates:

The night life was just so amazing to me. I made sound patterns out of what I heard and wrote down everything I heard. Every night I would just write down more and more, and anything else I heard on the street. Later, I would incorporate it all into my writing.⁸

Thus, from a back seat in a café just like the one portrayed in the play, Wilson set about watching and noting the speech and behavior of his potential cast of characters. Virtually every character in Balm in Gilead was inspired by someone Wilson knew during this period, and he clearly relished incorporating salient aspects of their experiences and personalities into his play, emphasizing certain areas and diminishing others.

The character of Darlene, for example, was developed from an amalgam of people he and his friends knew during their early days in New York; like them, she comes to New York from Chicago. The long description of her lining up with her “fiancé” and friends in Chicago's City Hall for a wedding licence is also based upon a real event: Wilson's friend Michael Warren Powell was at that time getting married, and underwent the same endless waiting among a similar group to those portrayed in the play (act 2, pp. 54-56).

Dopey was based on an acquaintance named Bobby, who was particularly interesting to the playwright since he “wasn't a drug addict yet, but he had ambitions to be an addict!”⁹ Bobby actually read Balm in Gilead, the only one of the “cast” to do so. Wilson remembers his critique with glee: “He said, ‘that's about right’. I was delighted.”¹⁰ Wilson stresses, however, that Dopey's speeches are not verbatim representations of Bobby's, observing that “if Bobby had said those things, I believe that's how he would have said them.”¹¹ Similarly, Michael Warren Powell, the first actor to play the character, notes that, “while Lanford put the words in Dopey's mouth, they were not foreign.”¹²

Powell knew Bobby—and many of the other characters in the play—very well indeed. With Wilson, he lived among them, becoming familiar with their physical demeanor and speech rhythms. Taking on the part of Dopey therefore evolved almost by osmosis, with director Marshall Mason encouraging his cast to closely identify with their roles. Powell recalls:

Marshall was at the time very into Stanislavski and so we virtually lived the roles for the whole rehearsal period. We used to hang out in a place very similar to the one Lanford had written about [the original café, Pan's, was no longer in existence] whose clièntele was almost identical. Rehearsals were invariably set for midnight and so the lateness of the hour added its own dimension.¹³

While Dopey's speeches are fictionalized versions of their original's discourse, the monologue spoken by Fick at the end of act 1 was reproduced virtually verbatim. Fick is based upon a “tiny, stringy little guy”¹⁴ Wilson encountered early one morning:

Fick's character evolved out of an experience that occurred during a driving thunderstorm at 3 o'clock in the morning. I came out of the 72nd Street subway stop, and this guy latched onto me and ran backwards beside me all the way to the hotel door. I told him, “I'm really very sorry, I just don't have a nickel for you.” It wasn't what he had asked for at all. He just wanted to talk. You know, “If I had a buddy, if I just had somebody I could pass down the street with.” Just company.¹⁵

In the play, Fick's need to pass the time with someone is explained still further. He states: “See I'm on H [heroin], I mean, I'm flying and I gotta talk man” (act 1, p. 45). After the above episode, Wilson went straight back to his hotel room and wrote down everything the man had said to him: “I had never heard anything like it,” he recalls, “as a result, almost the entire part of Fick was written in one sitting. This guy was one of those people who spoke in poetry, so foreign; such a strange style and with a wonderful mix of dialects.”¹⁶ Elsewhere, he notes that the whole episode was “an exercise in getting down exactly what he said, exactly the way he said it.”¹⁷

At the time he wrote Balm in Gilead, Wilson recalls that he had an almost perfect ear; he could reproduce conversations—and written matter—almost verbatim as much as two years later. Wilson confirms that “a lot of the play is dictation … I was just trying to take things I'd heard and adapt them to a flow.”¹⁸ Until then, he had not realized that he had a natural talent for accurately reproducing dialogue with all of its verbal idiosyncrasies and repetitions:

I didn't realize it until I started writing plays. … Not only do I hear the way people talk—and the specific rhythms of their speech—but I have a talent for reproducing that in an organized and exciting way. That is a talent—everything else is work.¹⁹

Balm in Gilead was originally conceived by Wilson as a novel, and some time elapsed before he revised his manuscript into a play format. Never believing for a moment that it could ever be produced (in the first draft, a total of fifty-five characters were included; he would later amalgamate some of them and eliminate others), Wilson felt completely unrestricted and thoroughly immersed himself in experimentation. The scope and breadth of the work allowed Wilson to experiment on a scale he had never previously imagined, and a number of the theatrical devices that would later become his trademarks were incorporated: the mesmerizing, confusing, overlapping dialogue with several characters conversing simultaneously; direct audience address; innovative use of staging techniques and lighting, together with a musicality bordering on the operatic. He recalls:

I never believed it could be produced so it didn't matter what I did. I included everything in sight … and, of course we were going to see many wonderfully experimental works, and much of the play is clearly taken from other things. Much of it isn't; much of it is totally original, but I did absorb a lot of other influences.²⁰

Joan Littlewood's Chicago production of The Hostage was a direct influence, and there are clear indications of the impact on Wilson of such works as Maxim Gorki's The Lower Depths and Eugene O'Neill's The Iceman Cometh. The play's circularity of form owes much to a work by Gertrude Stein, In Circles, which Wilson saw at the Judson Poets Theatre. Equally, Wilson states his piece was influenced by an experimental dance group who were working in the same theatre at the time. He recalls how emotionally affected he was by the dance:

It was set in the middle of a big, open stage and, in the middle, the cast moved the piano across the stage while the pianist was still playing. Later, very gradually, they slid the piano back over to where it originally was. … moving that piano was just one of the most moving moments I had ever seen. I didn't know what it meant, but it was terrific! So the moving of the set around in a circle that occurs in Balm in Gilead was directly influenced by that.²¹

The moving of the set has been attempted only once, and that was in the first production of the piece; the subsequent revivals directed by John Malkovich have not repeated the process. Wilson regrets this, although he acknowledges that the Malkovich productions were extremely effective. Ideally, however, he believes that the work benefits from this visual counterpoint to its circularity:

Virtually the whole set turns inside out. … I couldn't do it without it meaning something; the whole play is written in little circles, all contributing to and commenting upon the overall structure. … Even the monologues spin back on themselves, turning in circles.²²

Wilson describes the physical action of the play thus:

Everything seems to move in a circle. Within the general large pattern the people who spend their nights at the café have separate goals and separate characters but together they constitute a whole, revolving around some common center.²³

An excellent example of Wilson's use of the circular motif occurs immediately prior to Joe's murder. John cries to the children who have recently appeared onstage in Halloween masks: “Go on, scram. Get out of here. Scram out of here. Go on!” (act 2, p. 68) The lights dim, and the Stranger stabs Joe “underhanded in the heart”²⁴ as the children run out, not understanding, “screaming and yelling joyously.”²⁵ To add to the nightmarish and surreal aura onstage, they immediately return after circling the café set, entering from the back and running through again. Exactly the same scene is repeated, though this time the children flee screaming in terror. The chilling atmosphere of unreality is compounded by Wilson's instruction that, following the murder, “There is a time lapse. No one mentions the stabbing.”²⁶ Life continues as though nothing has happened.

In his production notes, Wilson states that much of the play “consists of simultaneous conversations in various groups with dialogue either overlapping or interlocking. These sections should flow as a whole, without specific focus; they rise and subside and scenes develop from them.”²⁷ Later, he indicates that “each group, and there are several of them, must maintain a kind of life of its own. … Improvised, unheard conversations may be used. … Their lines should come from scenes developed within the situation.”²⁸

The characters themselves sometimes become a living part of the café set, as when they “stand in a line across stage, back to the audience, forming a ‘wall.’ There is a space about four feet wide at the center of the wall, forming a doorway. Joe and Darlene walk down the wall slowly.”²⁹ Similarly, a mesmeric visual counterpoint to any changes onstage occurs every time a new character arrives. Wilson describes how

everyone in the café (with the exception of Babe and Fick) looks up the moment someone enters … a kind of reflex “once-over” to evaluate any new opportunity or threat.³⁰

Balm in Gilead is clearly the work of a young and headstrong dramatist; any flaws it may have arise out of an urgent need to experiment with the technical possibilities of theatre. Marshall Mason has commented both on the tremendous vitality that imbues the text and on the clear indication that Wilson was a playwright with great natural potential. Wilson was, however, still learning at this stage and was keen to expand his skills. Mason observes that

[Wilson's] early writing had great originality and energy, but he wanted to grow as a playwright, particularly in terms of learning structure. … [His work is] structured by its inner drive, which is almost like music.³¹

Further, Mason notes that Wilson incorporates such poetry, combined with the most naturalistic sounds, to achieve his aim:

There is a great energy in the play; it's teeming with naturalistic life, but at the same time [Wilson] was also experimenting with the here and now of the theatre in a very vivid present-tense kind of way. He much admires the work of Brendan Behan, and Balm in Gilead has a similarly vivid use of language.³²

Wilson's extraordinarily inventive manipulation of language, particularly “street” and debased language, is here already resoundingly in evidence. His abilities as a poet are also developing, although there are occasions when the music of language is rendered in a somewhat obvious and strained fashion, and can sound a little false and self-conscious. One example occurs when several people order coffee at the same time:

ERNESTO.
Just the coffee's okay. Black. Black.
ANN.
Black.
JOHN.
Black.
JOE.
Look!

(act 1, p. 14)

Although this bears rather obvious hallmarks of “artistic” contrivance and poeticizing, these were very early days in Wilson's writing career. What is remarkable is that the vast majority of the poetry in the play is seamless, sophisticated, and complex enough to bear close scrutiny and analysis.

Wilson's use of alliteration and assonance frequently recalls works such as Dylan Thomas's Under Milk Wood, where disparate snippets of dialogue eventually cohere into a mosaic of meaning. In Balm in Gilead, the sounds produced by various characters create an aural miasma of interlocking and overlapping noises. This is very strong in the opening moments of the play, when the bustle and raucousness of street life are forcefully implied:

TIG.
[overlapping] What are you, some kind of housewife, Judy?
JUDY.
[to DAVID] You're the housewife, aren't you, sweetheart?
DAVID.
You're the fishwife, Judy. Fishwife, Fish. Pheew!

(act 1, p. 7)

This and other conversations are repeated in the second act (act 2, p. 64), where the echoing of the words provides a hypnotic counterpoint to the vaguely drug-induced euphoria evident onstage. These repetitions are a source of confusion even to some of the characters; after listening to a series of conversations identical to those in the first act and then being informed that Joe is about to be murdered, the drug-addled Fick is completely nonplussed. He asks “We ain't seen this, have we?” (act 2, p. 67).

Repetitions and circularity of theme also mark the hard, consonantal sounds that reverberate and twang throughout the work and establish an impression both of speed and of harsh, soulless interactions. At one point, Ann states, “He don't truck with that junk. He'd better not; I'd crack him over the head” (act 1, p. 11); and at another, Tim says, “At least I'm drunk on drunk, not on junk like everyone” (act 1, p. 17). The slang of the streets has permeated the diction of Wilson's characters as surely as the air they breathe; its jazzlike rhythms infect almost every word they speak. For example, Fick describes how he has been beaten up: “I tell you they had me pinned, man. Down in this hall-thing. Four or five big black cats, they must have been huge” (act 1, p. 43); and Judy indicates her jealousy over Rust's relationship with Terry: “You sawed-of [sic] little bitch, you moving in? You moving into our pad. … Get your hot little ass out of here, now.” (act 1, p. 31).

The repeated use of slang unites them, no matter how aggressive or violent the content of their speech; their knowledge and use of such argot forms a bond that allows them to function, to operate, apart from mainstream society. Delighting in the use of the expletives that pepper their conversation, they exclude the faint-hearted, who would find it impossible to cope with such a hostile and challenging atmosphere; these are mean, tough streets, and the only way to survive is to adopt a hard veneer, both verbal and physical.

The jargon used by drug addicts and other hustlers is also closely observed; the reluctant drug-pusher, Joe, expresses his distaste for the cattle syringe the Stranger takes from his pocket: “You don't use something like that. That's too fancy. You use a works. An eye dropper, a piece of dollar. A needle.” (act 2, p. 67). At the foot of the page on which this text appears, Wilson explains that “a junkie seldom uses a syringe. He uses an eye-dropper, attached to a surgical needle with a thin piece of paper rolled around the needle, serving as a gasket. For paper they often use a thin strip torn from the edge of a dollar bill.”

Elsewhere, the character's use of nonsense language also takes on a jargonized tone; although one may be little wiser when confronted cold with the actual words, in the context of performance the mystery unravels itself. A good example occurs during a brief contretemps between the drunken Tim and Judy (a lesbian); Judy tries to help get Tim home, but he misconstrues her concern and calls her “a whatsit,” turning to the audience as if to explain: “She's a whatsit, without a gizmo” (act 1, p. 17).

Wilson's use of language, dazzling throughout the work, is perhaps at its most impressive in a number of superbly timed and controlled monologues that appear at fairly regular intervals. The playwright's talent for such writing is at its best in this play. Of particular note are those spoken by Dopey, by Fick, and, especially, by Darlene. Her long and discursive monologue was originally intended by Wilson to be a short story but, he recalls, “about half-way through the writing of it, I decided it was going to be in the play.”³³ At first, Wilson intended it to comprise the entire second act; originally written to last forty-five minutes, it now runs for about twenty-six minutes.

John Malkovich has hailed this speech as containing “arguably some of the best writing of the last 40 to 50 years.”³⁴ For him, Darlene forms the centerpiece of the play, which he sees as being essentially about “a girl who comes to the big city. A very dumb, dumb girl who is really pretty pathetic and sad.”³⁵

Without once descending into parody or adopting a patronizing tone, Wilson expertly guides and delineates Darlene's rambling, frequently incoherent, thoughts. He describes her character as “not at all bright. … she is supposed to be stupid, and not the sweet, girl-next-door, common-sense-saves-the-day type of ingenue.”³⁶ Wilson's attitude toward Darlene might seem to be rather harsh; although he clearly feels affection for her, he nonetheless uncompromisingly conveys her innate stupidity and vulnerability, not least by the absurdity of her explanation to Ann that an albino is “a kind of horse” (act 2, p. 53), as she tries to describe a former lover.

Darlene tells a story that is absolutely believable without any prettifying of its basic sadness or any attempt to make it more interesting. She is without the sophistication that might prompt her to at least partially rewrite her (not very thrilling) history for the benefit of the listener. Like the truly ingenuous, she believes her story to be fascinating and rambles on endlessly. It is, on the surface at least, tedious, repetitive, pathetic, and apparently pointless.

Darlene buttonholes Ann and offers vague recollections inarticulately—and very probably inaccurately—delivered. In verbalizing her memories, she reveals herself with total and poignant candour, mercilessly signalling her flaws and weaknesses and unselfconsciously conveying her credulity and stupidity.

Wilson thus portrays Darlene as a disappointed fantastist who clings to muddled dreams of love and old romances. So vague is her recollection of the good times that, when she tries to reclaim a memory of a comforting experience from the past, she inadvertently relays a tale of ineffable sadness. Unable to recall the name of the park near her Chicago apartment or the name of the hotel from which her favorite “collected” towel came, she attempts to describe for Ann something of her “love affair” with Cotton:

DARLENE.
… Old Cotton had, I'll swear, the funniest temperament I ever saw. If he got mad … he wouldn't argue or anything like that, he'd just walk around like nothing was wrong only never say one word. … Course I make it sound worse than it was, cause he didn't act like that very often. Fortunately. But you never knew what was going to provoke him, I swear. … And when we decided to get married all our friends were so excited—of course, they'd been expecting it probably. But we were so crazy you'd never know what we were going to do. I know he used to set the TV so it pointed into the mirror, because there wasn't a plug-in by the bed and we'd lay there in bed and look at the mirror that had the TV reflected in it. Only everything was backwards. Writing was backwards. … Only, you know, even backwards, it was a better picture, it was clearer than if you was just looking straight at it.

(act 2, pp. 52-53)

Darlene's monologue has all the hallmarks of real speech, full of ellipses, pauses, and non sequiturs. Wilson draws on her inarticulateness to delineate character at the same time as he seamlessly suggests her nostalgic longing for the past and her need for such reminiscence. It is what sustains her. In this respect, she is like all the other lonely and emotionally hungry people in the café—indeed, in Wilson's urban plays; she needs to talk, to have someone listen to her, and she wants to hold on to a rapidly disintegrating past that daily seems to move further away. To speak the words aloud somehow helps to make them true.

The anecdote is given added authenticity by Darlene's frequent use of interjections such as “I'll swear,” “of course,” and “you know.” And, despite her verbal stumblings, she obviously enjoys telling her story; her eagerness to relive what must have been, ironically, the happiest period of her life is forcefully conveyed.

Wilson's overt use of poetic imagery and heightened language is noticeable here. Poetry and practicality combine to achieve the desired effect: because of the lack of a plug by the bed, Cotton turned the television so that its image was reflected in the mirror. What is ostensibly a very mundane and ordinary action is here given immense depth. Everything that Darlene and Cotton watched on television was seen backwards; the resulting imperfect image was, nonetheless, considered by Darlene to be “a better picture … clearer than if you was just looking straight at it.” This clearly has implications far beyond the prosaic: Darlene prefers to regard life at an oblique angle, hoping that the view she is granted will be an improvement on a more cruel and harsh reality.

Darlene's fundamental dimness is skillfully woven into the fabric of her speech; by qualifying many of her apparently factual statements, she deflates or undermines her most heartfelt sentiments. Realizing that her description of Cotton's tendency to mope about in silence for days on end may make him sound unattractive or undesirable to her audience, she suddenly interjects that she is exaggerating, making his behavior “sound worse than it was, cause he didn't act like that very often. Fortunately.” Similarly, when she and Cotton had finally decided to marry, she gleefully exclaims that their friends were “so excited” for them, but her joy is immediately diminished as she adds “of course, they'd been expecting it probably.”

By such subtle linguistic means, Wilson illuminates Darlene's complexity, while simultaneously demonstrating, once again, his profoundly humane attitude toward those he dramatizes. It is all too easy to reject such a character out of hand and to become impatient with her dizziness and self-delusion, but, in Wilson's hands, Darlene's very inarticulateness speaks volumes about her plight and reminds us that no one's experiences are worthless or simplistic.

Dopey is described by Wilson as “a heroin addict as well as a sometimes-not-too-good hustler.”³⁷ With little to recommend him for it, this character has nonetheless adopted the role of commentator on the action for the benefit of the audience. He is one of those characters who can frequently be found on park benches, who will engage one in interminable expositions of his opinions on the world and its problems; an ersatz philosopher, he airs his views or attempts to clarify—often where no clarification is required—any issue that comes to mind.

Throughout act 1, Dopey's ramblings serve as a verbal backdrop to onstage events. In the first section of his long speech, he laboriously explains what he sees as the workings of the pimp-and-prostitute relationship; later, he stresses his concern over the resilience of cockroaches. In his mind, the two subjects would seem to be inextricably linked. Wilson indicates that the following part of Dopey's monologue should be spoken as though he were “a bit irritated”:³⁸

DOPEY.
… it's a crawling bughouse up there. … all the roaches playing like games on the floor. … A roach's attitude just gripes the hell out of me. But what burns me, I've been reading up, not recently. … they [were] around about two million years before man, you know, before we came along: Anthropologists or whatever, geologists over in Egypt or somewhere, looking for the first city, they dug down through a city, and straight on down through another, you know, they're piled up like a sandwich or in layers like a seven-layer cake. … But not only that! They've made tests, and they found out that a roach can stand—if there was going to be a big atom explosion, they can stand something like fourteen times as much radio-whatever-it-is, you-know-activity as we can. So after every man, woman, and child is wiped out and gone, like you imagine, those same goddamn cockroaches will be still crawling around happy as you please over the ruins of everything. Now the picture of that really gripes my ass.

(act 1, pp. 26-27)

Dopey adopts a confiding tone and prattles on as though he were an authority on the life expectancy of cockroaches, although he is almost certainly merely resurrecting half-forgotten facts from the hinterland of his atrophied brain. In a misguided attempt to back up his statements with a little learning and objective proof, he states that he has been “reading up, not recently” on the evolution of the insects. Just how seriously we are meant to take this assertion is unclear.

Dopey's use of language nicely complements the disarray of his ideas: he interrupts his sentences with endless commas and repetitions of “you know” and “like,” his muddle-headedness even extends to forgetting the correct word for radioactivity and then punctuating his groping with “whatever-it-is” and, again, “you know”.

The longevity and resilience of cockroaches clearly annoys Dopey; their hardiness is an affront to someone whose daily existence is fraught with precarious health problems and the fiscal dangers inherent in drug addiction. About as far down the social scale as it is possible to drop, Dopey nonetheless steadfastly classes himself with the rest of humanity and misses the irony implicit in his opinions. Disgusted with and dismissive of what he believes to be a particularly revolting form of insect life, he nonetheless personally enacts a lifestyle not entirely dissimilar to such creatures by foraging, scavenging, and living in whichever corner he can find.

That the cockroach can, apparently, withstand almost any form of attack, even nuclear, is very telling: in one form or another, people like Dopey manage to survive despite incredible odds. They exist in the most abject poverty, withstand disease and infection, and even manage to escape those who would destroy or restrict them. Metaphorical deinfestation may periodically occur, but some members of the attacked always survive.

Unknowingly lending weight to the connection between certain sections of humanity and cockroaches, Dopey anthropomorphizes the insects, calling their “attitude” unacceptable. To illustrate his skewed point of view, he attributes human characteristics to their antics wherever possible: “playing like games on the floor”; “crawling around happy as you please.”

Fick is another drug addict who shares something of Dopey's predilection for constant chatter. He will, according to Wilson, “talk to anything that moves,”³⁹ and so the long monologue toward the end of act 1 is merely an extension of an interminable and garbled diatribe, full of woeful self-pity, that has continued for some time. Fick variously complains of the cold, of becoming ill (he explains that he is “weak as a kitten” (act 1, p. 44) due to his heroin addiction that began when he was only thirteen), of not having anyone to talk to, and, particularly, of needing protection. The speech reaches its climax when he describes how “four or five big black cats. … big, strong fellows” have beaten him up:

FICK.
… And they pushed me into this alley, not an alley, but this hallway and back down the end of that to this dark place at the end of the hallway and they start punching at me, and I just fell into this ball on the floor so they couldn't hurt me or nothing. But if I came down there with a couple of fighters, a couple of guys, like my friends, it wouldn't have to be you or anything, but just a couple or three guys, big guys, like walking down the street, you know. … just a few guys and they'd leave me be, maybe, because they'd think I had these buddies that looked after me, you know …

(act 1, p. 45)

The long first sentence, interrupted by only three commas, forcefully suggests a succession of muddled thoughts and half-forgotten memories; as these swim and curve through Fick's mind, Wilson implies the speech rhythms of one whose mental state owes much to a chemically induced euphoria. To Fick, all dark places seem the same; in his desperation to remember the “facts” of the attack on him, he confuses the location, first stating that it took place in an alley and then immediately retracting this in favor of a hallway.

While there is much bleak humor in Wilson's treatment of the plight of Fick, whose paranoid repetitions and panicky tone accurately portray the kind of chaotic discourse associated with addicts and alcoholics, there is also pathos and compassion.

Fick casts around for an inordinate amount of time in an effort to harness attention and assistance from someone, anyone; he desperately tries to advertise his predicament without actually addressing any particular individual. For him, the possibility of rejection is too strong; it is easier to talk generally and without specific focus. Fick knows that his companions' perception of him is negative in the extreme; on their list of those deserving of assistance and friendship, he ranks very low.

It is highly unlikely that any of Fick's companions in the café will help him; they have problems enough of their own. Even if they do not consider themselves to be leading dysfunctional lives—which is possible for some of the more vague inhabitants—they are almost certainly too lazy or apathetic to care or to become involved. For others, life is already hard enough, fraught with danger and uncertainty; taking responsibility for and protecting themselves is a full-time job.

It is therefore all the more pathetic that Fick should try to suggest that he is among friends. Although he specifies that his proposed helpers should be “fighters,” “friends,” and “big guys,” he dare not point to anyone in particular. People stand up and move away, but still Fick keeps on talking, in the hope that eventually a kindly soul will take pity on him and take his part.

Besides the usually jagged and discordant music in the speech rhythms of its characters, there is also a great deal of actual music in the play, signalling the constant noise and bustle of city life. Here, silence is a very rare commodity. To illustrate this, the opening moments of the play are described as follows:

A noise from a crowd begins and reaches a peak as the curtain rises. From the wings come four Negro entertainers (two from each side) who sing a rock'n'roll song with much clapping, dancing, etc. They are accompanied by a typical clangy, catchy instrumentation. From far out on the apron they sing to the audience—very animated. As the song fades out, and they begin to move (still singing) back off the stage, the noise from the group rises again.⁴⁰

Thus, music permeates the entire fabric of Balm in Gilead: during a rare calm moment, John observes that “When it gets quiet in here you almost think something's gonna happen” (act 1, p. 20), and the quartet of black singers starts up a “soft blues”⁴¹ Rake and Ernesto add to the overall circularity of the piece with their “round” song entitled “Men on the Corner,” the melody of which Wilson describes as “shockingly gentle; rocking; easy; soft; lilting.”⁴² This song requires that all participants sing a line each, taking turns; Rake encourages his friends to join in by singing the song through himself:

They laugh and jab
cavort and jump
and joke and gab
and grind and bump.
They flip a knife
and toss a coin
and spend their life
and scratch their groin.
They pantomime
a standing screw
and pass the time
with nought to do.
They swing, they sway
this cheerful crew,
with nought to say
and nought to do.

(act 1, p. 41)

To further the incessant musicality, Wilson also provides the music for this song (act 1, p. 41). Later, the concluding moments of Darlene's long monologue are accompanied by the quartet as they “harmonize in a rock'n'roll wordless ‘Boo, bop, boo, bah, day, dolie, olie day’ kind of rambling that gets louder and eventually takes over the scene.”⁴³ Later, they sing a jazzed up version of the famous hymn “There Is a Balm in Gilead,”, which has provided the title of the play. The play concludes with another rendition of the “round” song, but this time performed “not as a round, but [with the cast] all singing softly and liltingly.”⁴⁴

Wilson had a strong religious upbringing, and theological argument and imagery recur throughout his work (notably in Brontosaurus and Angels Fall). Indeed, he refers to his plays as “Baptist sermons,”⁴⁵ whose purpose is to question behavior and motivation.

Of all Wilson's dramas, Balm in Gilead is perhaps the most deeply saturated with religion. Its monologues often resemble corrupt sermons; actions are repeated, giving an impression of iconographic imagery; music takes on a ritualistic, celebratory function; and the setting of the work echoes a city of lost souls akin to Sodom and Gomorrah. However, the only reference to any kind of balm in the play occurs during a conversation between Tig and Ernesto (act 1, p. 20) when they discuss the ancient rituals of the Egyptians.

In the Old Testament, Gilead is the name of both Manasseh's grandson and a historic mountainous region east of the River Jordan. Wilson uses the latter as a “type” for his play: in the books of Genesis and Jeremiah, Gilead is cited as being famous for its medicinal balm,⁴⁶ although, in Hosea, it is described as “the iniquity of Gilead” and as “a city of evil doers, tracked with blood.”⁴⁷ Yet another reference occurs in the book of Samuel, where it is noted that some of the Hebrews took refuge in Gilead to avoid the ravages of the Philistines.⁴⁸

There are clear analogies to be made with contemporary New York and an earlier city of “iniquity” and of “evil doers”, not to mention a city of the disenfranchised clinging together and seeking refuge and comfort—or a soothing balm—away from the marauding and cut-throat city outside. As John Beaufort notes, “the irony of the title remains that there is no balm in this Manhattan Gilead. There is instead the vulnerable companionship of outcasts, destructive delusion of drugs, and pursuit of sordid pleasures.”⁴⁹

It is noteworthy that Margaret Atwood's futuristic novel, The Handmaid's Tale (1987) is set in a late-twentieth century Monotheocracy named Gilead, whose spurious history is the subject of the Symposium reported at the conclusion of the novel. The audience is exhorted by the speaker to recall that Gileadean society was under a great deal of pressure and that therefore caution must be exercised in “passing moral judgement”⁵⁰ on it.

Balm in Gilead is one of Wilson's most successful and critically acclaimed works. Since its premiere, it has enjoyed a high reputation among critics and audiences alike; it is a play that thrives on repetitions, counterpoints, and juxtapositions and that often seems to work in spite of itself. Sometimes so much is happening at once that confusion is a distinct possibility; that this is never realized testifies to Wilson's discipline as a dramatist.

For all the play's visual brilliance, for me its greatest strength resides in its manipulation of language. Wilson's ability to mold shards of street language into a kind of vibrant vers libre is first revealed here. Even the dim-witted Darlene's shaky grasp of story-telling is elevated into something profound and moving, and Dopey's and Fick's hallucinatory ramblings become far more than mundane and pointless verbiage. Much later, dramatists such as Sam Shepard and David Mamet were also to create poetry out of the basest forms of speech but, as early as 1964, Wilson's was the pioneering achievement in this area.

My passions have made me live and my passions have killed me

—Rousseau

Burn This is an extraordinarily rich and complex work that both encompasses and expands upon almost every dramatic idea ever expressed by Wilson—while adding a few more. It is, effectively, the cumulative representation of all of his interests and obsessions. Here he explores sexual fascination and love, loss and grief, the formation of nontraditional familial groups, fear of urban life, homosexuality, the forced trendiness of modern New York living and its associated decline in oral communication, frustration, artistic creativity, loneliness, violence, and broad comedy. A rich texture is afforded by themes that at first appear diverse and unconnected, but soon meld to form a complex and satisfying drama.

Permeating the work is the leitmotif of loss, the impact of an artist's untimely death. For Wilson, the play was a personal challenge and even a kind of catharsis in that he wrote it following the death of a close friend, an artist who lived in Sag Harbor, New York, where the playwright resides. Wilson has stated that the somewhat cryptic title relates to an admonition a writer might add to the head of each page of a particularly personal letter or essay. If the author constantly reminds himself that what is being written is so private that it can be burned if necessary, without being seen by anyone else, he might be encouraged to release his inhibitions and commit the absolute truth to paper. Thus, when Wilson began work on this play in the fall of 1985, he wrote the words “burn this” at the top of every page, to spur himself to be as open and as honest as possible. No vulnerability was to be spared, no pain unconfronted. Ironically, it is Burton, the high-flying but rather shallow screenwriter in the play, who actually describes the title: “Make it as personal as you can … Make it personal, tell the truth, and then write ‘Burn this’ on it” (act 2, p. 60).

Robert Allan Ackerman, director of the London productions of the play, describes the creative process involved:

… after you have expressed your most personal thoughts, especially as a writer or any artist, once you've expressed your most personal, most naked self, you have the option then to destroy it, but the important thing is to go through the process of expressing and searching and looking inside yourself for those very, very personal thoughts, the artistic expression of them. It is the process that is important.⁵¹

In many ways, Burn This is a song of innocence and experience. During the years leading up to Robbie's death and her meeting with Pale, Anna has largely avoided confronting genuine emotion and has maintained an almost adolescent innocence. Her apparent dedication to dance has, in reality, had little more depth than the strangulated screenplays of her lover, Burton, which always strive toward important and epic themes, but remain resolutely earthbound and faintly ludicrous. Experiences were not something in which this couple became involved, but merely events that occurred without really touching them.

Anna does seem to have genuine creative potential where Burton does not, but, as Lou Liberatore (who has played Larry since the play's inception) observes, she has compromised her talents in the name of leading a “beautiful but shallow existence, making cute little dances that look pretty but really go nowhere.”⁵² To create, one must first experience, and Anna's experience evolves out of the rigorous emotional shaking she receives from Pale. Marshall Mason believes Pale represents

all that is uncivilized; what we don't like to deal with in life; these are perhaps the sources that the artist must draw from: the deep fears, the awful guilts, the horrors.⁵³

Wilson confirms this, observing that

The play has to do with art and what you have to know and what you have to go through before you can do anything worthwhile; before you are able to produce something that people will recognize and believe in. Pale allows Anna to become an artist; he makes her live again.⁵⁴

At least one critic has suggested that the apparently philistine Pale is the only true artist in the play, calling it “a play about art in which the strongest sensibility belongs to a character who looks upon artists as frauds.”⁵⁵ Certainly Pale believes in his own creative potential, stating that he “could've been a dancer” (act 1, p. 39) and that he has composed “whole symphonies … tone poems, concertos … huge big orchestrations” (ibid.) in the shower. Just how seriously we are meant to take this is unclear, although John Malkovich (Pale in both American and British productions of the work) believes that he may have artistic abilities that have been ground down over the years: “He sees himself as a creative person, but he's never had the chance to do anything about it. That's one reason why he resents his brother's success as an artist.”⁵⁶

Although Pale may have an artistic temperament, he cannot really be regarded as an artist because he does not create art—although he certainly facilitates its expression in Anna. His reaction to the world may be vibrant and sensitive, but that does not make him an artist, despite what he says. Burn This stresses the necessity of committing oneself, of taking responsibility. It is insufficient, Wilson seems to be saying, merely to have unfulfilled ideas in one's head without committing them to paper or acting them out; it is essential to write it down, to express it, to create something of importance. After this, if necessary, it can be destroyed.

A clear progression can be traced from Balm in Gilead to Burn This. In some respects the two works could hardly be more different—the social milieus are completely dissimilar—but there are in fact many similarities. The sheer energy that permeates Burn This, its characters' intensity of expression, and its raw emotion coupled with the bleakest comedy clearly link it with the earlier play. Similarly, the language Wilson uses here is closer to Balm in Gilead than to any other play. For example, Pale's “tree speech” (act 1, p. 35) is written in a stream of consciousness style similar to that of Dopey's cockroach monologue (act 1, pp. 26-27). Wilson describes the surrealism of such language as having “a logic that is very special, very tenuous, and very specific to that character's train of thought.”⁵⁷

Many of the plays Wilson wrote between the two appear to move away consciously from the rawness of expression common to both toward a milder, more overtly poetic kind of drama. In works such as The Hot l Baltimore, for example, Wilson continued to mold what appears to be ordinary speech into poetry, but his method had become far more subtle; the lyricism had no separate existence and blended invisibly into the whole. During the years that followed, Wilson continued to work in this vein, his refinement of language becoming more and more extreme, perhaps climaxing in Angels Fall, written in 1983. This play is virtually a tone poem, so finely attenuated, so filled with what Marshall Mason calls “soft and gentle grace notes,”⁵⁸ its language and action so subtly and completely integrated that it could scarcely become more genteel without risking blandness.

Wilson became aware of this continuing tendency in his writing when he saw a revival of Balm in Gilead, and immediately set about writing Burn This with the intention from the outset to consciously link the two works in an effort to recapture some of the creative energy he felt he had lost:

I had just seen John Malkovich's revival of Balm in Gilead and I thought, God, I used to have such incredible energy; where has all that energy and imagination gone? … so in Burn This I was trying to get back some of that energy and put it into the kind of plays I write now. Also, I think some of the play could be interpreted as Pale being representative of Balm in Gilead and the other three characters standing for myself, just so complacent and sophisticated and above it all. … so Pale is there to goose the others—and myself—into doing something fresh and worthwhile.⁵⁹

Malkovich clearly agrees with this assessment, seeing the work as Wilson's

attempt to get back to a kind of raw—rawer—perhaps darker—expression … away from the Talley plays. Some of Lanford's earlier plays like Balm in Gilead, Home Free! and The Madness of Lady Bright are unbelievably dark. Burn This is similar.⁶⁰

This is further borne out by Marshall Mason who notes that:

There's a kind of harkening back to Lanford's earlier impulses here; he wanted to move away from being overtly poetic and refined and to find again the danger and energy of his early work, although there is still much to admire in the poetry of Burn This. Pale breaks into the beautiful, rather artificial world that Lanford has created and explodes it. … Pale's energy comes from the same place as that in Balm in Gilead; in fact, the two works are very similar in many ways.⁶¹

The extent of Mason's contributions to and involvement in the development of Wilson's work has changed over the years. In some works his involvement has been considerable; on occasion, he “insisted certain things had to be changed and served almost as an in-house critic.”⁶² To Burn This, however, his contribution was minimal:

I really haven't had a lot to do with it. In this play Lanford has looked for those forces in our urban life that are huge and undeniable and that we spend a lot of our civilized life avoiding. We think of civilization as protecting us from the abyss, but in fact our civilization has itself become a force to be reckoned with.⁶³

The play hinges on the sudden death of Robbie, an unseen gay man who has died in a boating accident while out with his boyfriend. Although Robbie never appears, he is crucial to the work; the crisis and change that his death precipitates in each of the onstage characters forces them to confront their inadequacy and vulnerability, as well as their fears of mortality. His importance was deeply felt by Robert Allan Ackerman; during rehearsals, the cast would improvise situations that might occur had Robbie actually been in the work.

We spent a lot of time talking about Robbie, and what the others would have done if he had actually been there, and what he meant and represented to each of them. We all felt that he was as important a character as anyone on the stage, so fundamental was his impact on their lives.⁶⁴

Robbie's ability to influence the lives of his friends extends even beyond death; as a result of the accident, they are introduced to his elder brother. In the early hours of the morning, Jimmy (known as Pale, because of his fondness for VSOP brandy), erupts into the play with volcanic rage, ostensibly to collect his brother's belongings. Nothing is ever the same again. Pale brings with him the dangers, the gross realities, and the seamier aspects of New York street life. However, his invasion also brings with it vibrancy and passion, raw truth, and, for Anna, the possibility of genuine and unfettered love.

A major concern in Burn This is undoubtedly love—not a love that is in any way clichéd or romanticized, but one that engulfs and transforms. Wilson has stated that he set out to write an adult love story, but one that tackled and elucidated issues usually ignored or side-stepped by most authors. He recalls:

I was trying to push myself further than I had gone in a love story. I had seen thousands of love stories and I always felt they didn't go far enough; they didn't show what really happens … I wanted to write about what love really is and how sexual it is and how beyond sexual it is, how it transforms and the sacrifices that you have to make, what you have to go through to find someone to love.⁶⁵

Similarly, Tanya Berezin observes that

Burn This deals with love itself; not really romantic love—although the play is astonishingly sexual—but real love. It is a question of giving up part of yourself in order to let another person into your life.⁶⁶

Throughout Burn This, Wilson stresses the need for emotional involvement and risk-taking, even when this may seem foolhardy or, indeed, dangerous. In the relationship that develops between Pale and Anna, the play finds its raison d'être: a plea for commitment to a loving relationship despite the potential hazards inherent in sexual contact. Better to experience the pain of a genuine loving relationship, Wilson seems to urge, than merely to exist in bland mediocrity.

He cites Iris Murdoch's novel A Severed Head as having made a contribution to the play. In this work, the protagonists embark upon a potentially destructive, certainly enervating, love affair that Wilson describes as “a collision course relationship. The man asks the woman if they will ever be happy, and she replies ‘Happy has nothing to do with this.’ Their relationship just has to be.”⁶⁷

Burn This has proven to be one of Wilson's most successful ventures, both critically and at the box office. An important focus for the attention it received by the media was undoubtedly ex-Steppenwolf actor John Malkovich's extraordinarily feral, yet sensitive, central performance as Pale. This was hailed, almost without exception, as a landmark in contemporary acting. His interpretation of Pale is so central to the play that it bears close scrutiny here; Wilson had written half of the role before he saw Malkovich in action and then completed it with him in mind. It is difficult to conceive of the play without the strength of Malkovich's portrayal, so perfectly does he adapt the demands of the work to his powerful acting technique.

Malkovich was one of the founding members of the Steppenwolf Theatre Company, based in Highland Park, Chicago. Between its inception in 1976 and 1982, Malkovich acted in, directed, or designed sets for over fifty productions. The Company is noted for the passion, creativity, and energy of its performers, and for their original—often unsettling—productions of contemporary and classic plays. Malkovich is, to date, the most famous Steppenwolf alumnus working both in the theatre and in such films as The Killing Fields, Death of a Salesman, Dangerous Liaisons, The Sheltering Sky, The Object of Beauty, and Of Mice and Men, but many of the original members have made successful careers in theatre and film.

During a BBC programme dedicated to the work of Malkovich, Laurie Metcalf, a long-time member of the Company, theorized about how the dynamic and often overtly aggressive techniques adopted by the Company have evolved and noted that they have been variously described as “rock and roll” or risk-taking;⁶⁸ John Mahoney, another Steppenwolf member, described the Company's approach as profoundly intense, whether acting Noël Coward or Sam Shepard; the sheer intensity of application that the Company brings to each of the works it performs is its most notable trait.⁶⁹

The Steppenwolf method of acting certainly found a willing and creative interpreter in Malkovich whose primary aim as an actor is to present in as honest and direct a manner as possible salient aspects of the human condition. If this involves aggression or violence, so be it; he seizes upon such opportunities to depict the truth of those he portrays. He acknowledges that he does, perhaps, have more anger and aggression in his personality than most people,⁷⁰ but insists that this is channelled and focused during performance. Michael Billington believes that Malkovich has “great presence”⁷¹ and believes that:

… what Malkovich brings onstage in Burn This is first of all a sense of danger, unpredictability, wildness … you never quite know with Malkovich what he is going to do next. And I think danger is crucial to good acting. … that quality that you find in nearly all the best American acting—the ability to live the moment; it's an extraordinary ability, to concentrate that.. intensity onstage.⁷²

Milton Shulman described Malkovich's interpretation of Pale as “rampaging, threatening, mesmeric,”⁷³ while Jack Tinker commented upon his “wall-blasting intensity.”⁷⁴

Aggression and ferocity were not, however, the only aspects of his performance that attracted attention. There is a peculiar kind of virile effeminacy about Pale that Malkovich shares and that he explored to the full in creating the role. Robert Allan Ackerman recalls Malkovich's feminine characteristics as constituting

a particularly telling part of his nature. In the tea-making scene when he cossets that kettle and makes what must be the best cup of tea in the world, he presents such a wonderful image; in that woman's bath-robe with his long hair, cleaning up like some Italian housewife.⁷⁵

Similarly, Michael Simkins believes that, without this aspect of Malkovich's performance, the play could easily have fallen into a typically heterosexual/homosexual comedy of manners:

There is a very feminine air to Malkovich. Feminine but not effeminate. By openly exploring that part of his personality, he gave the production colossal strength. … That was one of the wonders: his being able to be both toweringly powerful and-delicately vulnerable, almost at the same moment. Instead of the gay element becoming compartmentalized, John's performance allowed something of that to run through the play. It marbled the whole work. I am sure there were audiences who thought that Larry and Pale would end up together!⁷⁶

Pale's persona is in some ways very close to that projected by Malkovich himself, and it is interesting to note, Bernardo Bertolucci's opinion of the actor. After directing him in the film version of Paul Bowles's The Sheltering Sky, where he plays the complex central character—an emotionally deracinated musician abroad in a desert landscape—Bertolucci saw him in Burn This. To him, the actor represented the perfect manifestation of the existential hero: attractive though lonely, hardened by life's experience yet vulnerable, tough but at the same time curiously delicate.⁷⁷ Thus, violence and sweetness of nature coexist; a seemingly impermeable surface is, in reality, as fragile as glass.

The potency and complexity of Malkovich's acting have led a number of critics to compare him to the young Marlon Brando. For example, Kenneth Hurren cited Brando's performance as Stanley Kowalski in Williams' A Streetcar Named Desire as an apt forerunner.⁷⁸ Irving Wardle wrote that Malkovich brought to the play “the animal magnetism of Brando's Stanley Kowalski,”⁷⁹ and Michael Billington felt that, “like Brando [Malkovich] combines an imploding intensity with sudden, revealing touches of feminine gentleness.”⁸⁰ For his performance in the London productions of Burn This, Malkovich was nominated for various theatre awards and won the Time Out Awards Best Actor prize for 1990.

Although it is never made explicit, Burn This is also an exploration of the effects of AIDS on those its victims leave behind. Wilson has stated that Robbie's character is symbolic of the AIDS virus, in that his untimely and tragic demise is perhaps occasioned by the fact that he is homosexual. Much ambiguity surrounds his death; there is an underlying suggestion in the play that, because of Robbie's openness about his homosexuality—he even broadcast it on national television—he has been murdered by sinister and hostile forces within his own family or by the Mafia. Pale certainly regards Robbie's death as “No fuckin' accident,” (act 2, p. 70) and tells Anna that “the mob did it” (ibid.). Later, Anna relates another of Pale's anecdotes to Larry:

ANNA.
… [Pale] was saying he and his dad and their cronies got to drinking, someone says I saw your fruit brother on the TV with his boyfriend. All the usual fag-baiting braggadocio. Someone ought to off the fucker, embarrassment to the family, that crap. And a couple of nights later, Robbie's dead.

(act 2, pp. 74, 75)

Tanya Berezin elaborates on this possibility:

Robbie dies, and on one level there is the question of whether he dies because he is gay, and I think that is the connection with AIDS in a concrete, though symbolic, way. Does Robbie's family have Mafia connections who want him out of the way? It's possible, but we simply do not know. The untimely loss of what is assumed to be a major talent is something that we in the theatre and the arts have been going through for the last ten years, and this is Lanford's way of dramatizing such loss.⁸¹

Similarly, Marshall Mason observes that:

Although AIDS is referred to only very indirectly, the play is saturated with its consequences. The resultant intense feelings of loss and frustration—here epitomized by Pale—are only too familiar to those in the arts who have lost friends and colleagues.⁸²

The specter of AIDS moves insidiously through the lives of all the characters, forcing them to adapt their sexual habits and to protect themselves in any way they can. Perhaps the most tragic figure in the play is Larry, despite his wisecracking persona and ironic acceptance of his lot. He is alone, without a partner, living vicariously through the relationships of those around him.

After Burton's recollection of his homosexual experience in the snow, Larry wistfully observes, “Lord, the innocence and freedom of yesterday” (act 2, p. 63). Full of camp bravado, Larry is nonetheless clearly terrified; he rejects the possibility of a serious relationship because of his fears, and he does not even manage to attend the gay New Year's Eve party where, he says, “the suicide rate is higher than all of Scandinavia combined” (act 2, p. 57).

Robert Allan Ackerman describes Larry's life as being “in a very sorry state … because of AIDS, he is living in a city where gay life has completely had the lid put on, and where everyone is very, very afraid.”⁸³ Larry is thus imprisoned because of his fear of contracting the disease; when even the formation of a loving, sexual relationship can result in a fatal illness, a carefully cultivated survival strategy must be developed; in Larry's case, this takes the form of completely opting out of a sexual life. Lou Liberatore notes that

Larry doesn't really know how sad he is until the end of the play; it really hits him then and he asks what he has done with his life. He has to face something very, very painful.⁸⁴

Larry's marginalization enables Wilson to utilize him as a kind of mordantly witty chorus whose remarks both contribute to and comment on the action around him. He acts as a filter for the rest of the proceedings, the constant that allows the variables of the play to interact in a far more candid fashion than if he did not exist, facilitating the emotional interaction of others. Tragically, his fear of involvement precludes his own participation in similar scenarios. As Liberatore says,

Larry is the lynch-pin. A lot hinges on him. Because he is the outsider in a way, and not really part of the relationships onstage, he can balance the other characters, keep things in order, stop them from getting out of hand. He is the objective chorus that allows the audience to understand and participate in the work. It would be too frightening to watch the violent scene between Pale and Anna without Larry's presence; he deflects the tension and keeps it tolerable. He is far more than mere wisecracks and gay humor.⁸⁵

Although Larry's predicament is perhaps the saddest in the play, AIDS stains the lives of its heterosexual characters, too. Juliet Stevenson, who played Anna in the London productions of the play, identifies the terrible irony of a fatal virus that attacks the very core of human relationships:

AIDS is so horrible, so evil, because even if you sleep with somebody, one of the most natural and normal human things you can do and, ironically, what should bring people together, you are endangering yourself and the other person. You become contaminated.⁸⁶

In such a climate, intimate relationships can flourish, but they are often superficial and unfulfilling. For the most part, safe mediocrity is preferable to unpredictable passion. Until she meets Pale, and a different, vibrant world opens up for her, Anna has, in the main, sought solace and affection from her male homosexual friends—indeed, she has shared her apartment with two of them for a number of years. By comparison, her relationship with Burton appears to be rather sterile, a compromise, although the love on his part seems genuine enough.

The concept of AIDS, thus infecting the play and forming an apt and very modern metaphor for fear of human involvement, permits Wilson to explore the complexities of sexual mores in contemporary New York. However, Wilson utilizes its metaphorical potency in more than one way. While it permits him to illustrate emotional compromise in three of his characters, it also allows him to exemplify the antithesis in the character of Pale.

Here is a man who may have yielded to pressure and compromise in the past, but who has now reached breaking point. His brother's death and his own sense of guilt, frustration, and remorse have combined to sharpen his pain. Realizing that he has failed his brother by rejecting him because of homosexuality, Pale has also always resented Robbie's success as a dancer—an artist who could enjoy freedom of expression through his work. Furthermore, Pale has ruined any chance of happiness with his own wife and family and has betrayed himself and his own potential; he can no longer cope with this overwhelming frustration save by excessive drinking and drug abuse. Carrying so much pain within him, he is exhausted from the effort of living.

Pale feels everything keenly. As if his intense guilt and the acknowledgment of his own failure were not enough, he also recognizes that the life he has lived till now has been a sham and that most of what he has believed in has also been a lie. Wilson remarks

Pale has been done in. He has done himself in; his whole life is just a mockery of anything that he could really buy into. … he is, by far, one of the best examples of the walking wounded I have ever written.⁸⁷

John Malkovich describes Pale's life experience as

just terrible … he has been working his ass off his whole life. Such ridiculously hard work. He has been married since he was eighteen, just a kid, and now, at work, there's always some problem, some person who's doing something wrong, something always going wrong. He has to deal with everything, and it's killing him. He is called upon to take responsibility constantly.⁸⁸

Pale represents all that is hazardous and threatening, but at the same time demonstrates an authentic, if warped, innocence and need. Full of paradoxes, he is foul-mouthed, almost insanely aggressive, and yet strangely vulnerable. For Marshall Mason, he is the embodiment of everything brutal and uncultivated,

He is a monster of need. He typifies the basic animalistic sexual persona, the childlike take-what-you-need-when-you-need-it mentality, and the need to grab life and squeeze it. There's a primitive aspect to Pale that is very heartfelt and gutfelt, and in complete contrast to the other characters in the work who are so refined. He really shakes them up! Anna's life is so genteel, so far away from genuine feelings, of deep fears and real love. Pale awakens all this in her again.⁸⁹

In the way that he suddenly bursts onto the scene, spitting with anger and frustration and permeating the atmosphere with his unrestrained sexuality, Pale invades the lives of the other characters as powerfully as their fear of the lethal virus. He is, however, by no means a negative character; he is the fulcrum of change on which all is finally—perhaps positively—resolved. He “gives Anna back her life”⁹⁰ and enables her to become a creative artist.

The dance that Anna eventually creates arises from the anguish of her relationship with Pale, which despite the pain, has invigorated her and facilitated an artistically truthful representation of their love affair. In creating the work, Anna undergoes a profound catharsis and is finally liberated. Larry attempts to describe her achievement for Burton:

LARRY.
… I can testify that the work she's doing is phenomenal … it's a regular man—dancing like a man dances—in a bar or something, with his girl. You've never seen anything like it.

(act 2, pp. 91, 93)

Even Pale is impressed, if embarrassed, at the nakedness of the representation: “That was me and you up there. Only we ain't never danced. I could probably sue you for that” (act 2, p. 97).

Pale represents for Anna the second tidal wave of emotion that has recently engulfed her, the first being the shock of Robbie's death and her subsequent sense of loss and outrage. Because of this initial emotional upheaval she is, in a way, prepared for Pale when he bursts into her life; he matches the depth of her anger and she sees in him a kindred spirit. During rehearsals, Robert Allan Ackerman was inspired by a Laura Nyro song entitled “Stony End”; The lyrics of this always made him think of Anna:

This song was written long before I knew the play, but it seems to be so pertinent. It talks about the fury and raging thunders that come to match a raging soul, and I believe that is what happens here with Anna and Pale.⁹¹

This is confirmed by Juliet Stevenson:

Anna comes to recognize and accept her anger and outrage. She finishes the first part of act 1 in a mood of great frustration and resentment, recalling Robbie's funeral; she didn't have a moment alone to say goodbye to him and vows never to forgive his family for the way they treated him—and her. The next minute, anger in the form of Pale comes in through the door, and it's a recognition! It is “I”! … When you are in a state of extremis, and you feel your skin has been ripped off, everything that used to interest you or involve you no longer does; what Anna had now means little; everything needs re-evaluating. She needs Pale as the focus of her anger and hatred. What she feels, he feels. It is a great relief.⁹²

Before the advent of Pale, Anna had relied on her relationships with Burton, Larry, and, especially, Robbie. As the play progresses, it gradually becomes apparent that she has long been in love with Robbie without being able to admit or express it; suddenly, Pale enters her life—virtually Robbie's physical double, the heterosexual embodiment of a man she has loved for years without ever being able to satisfy her sexual frustration. She can finally realize her dream of a love affair with the living image of an idealized partner.

However, before Pale's arrival, Anna has endured the endless futility of yearning for the reciprocal—physical—love of a gay man. No doubt, her dilemma was exacerbated by the fact that she and Robbie were both dancers and, consequently, in constant close, physical contact with each other. As Juliet Stevenson observes,

I believe Anna was tremendously attracted to Robbie in a very physical way, and that their proximity during dances and rehearsals just increased her desire for him. Their relationship stopped just short of them actually being lovers.⁹³

Similarly, Robert Allan Ackerman describes the frustration Anna must have felt because of her sexual attraction to a gay man: “Dancers are extraordinarily physical with one another; they have their hands in each other's crotches, their legs are wrapped around each other—they are forever in intimate poses.”⁹⁴

Notwithstanding these frustrations, there is still much to be gained from platonic relationships: although painful, they can be a source of much happiness and emotional support, offering unconditional affection and loyalty. For these very reasons, however, they present their own problems. As Juliet Stevenson remarks,

Women's relationships with gay men are so complex. I have them in my own life … I often find that they are most intimate and of great importance. … they are a source of enormous gain but also enormous loss, because you get to a point where you are safe with them and that's why they are valuable, and it's also why they are a problem to you because you can't go beyond.⁹⁵

It was, perhaps, for this very reason that Anna's artistic relationships with Robbie could never have been very strong, despite their obvious compatibility. Indeed, such compatibility was perhaps why their work was unable to progress beyond mediocrity; it precluded any real intensity. This is borne out in comments Anna makes concerning her work and the extent of outside influences; she frets that her choreography has been shaped too much by her colleague, Charley: “I could walk down the street, it's Charley walking down the street, it isn't me” (act 1, p. 20).

In counterpoint to the inevitable compromises entailed by straight/gay friendships, Wilson comments with deadly irony—and great humor—on some of the pitfalls of heterosexual affairs. Pale and Burton are, after all, rivals for Anna's love and their physical demonstration of their affection for her is both excessive and humiliating for all concerned. They actually engage in combat over her, and endeavor to outdo each other in manly braggadocio—what Anna calls “macho bullshit” (act 2, p. 73)—circling like animals about to strike.

The result is unintentionally hysterical, as Burton constantly moves around Pale, referring to him as “fella” and “buddy” (act 2, pp. 71, 72). Since Burton is by profession a screenwriter, it is tempting to link his language here with the heroes he creates on film; certainly, his choice of words is evocative of the likes of Bruce Willis or Clint Eastwood. As if this were not embarrassing enough, Burton demonstrates his knowledge of the martial arts, while Pale laughs at his efforts, refusing to be drawn into what he considers to be a ludicrous display: “Nobody does that shit, nobody pulls that shit” (act 2, p. 71). Later, Pale calls him “Bruce” in a reference to kung fu star, Bruce Lee (act 2, p. 80). For Pale, in violent struggle as in all things, the straightforward approach is the one to adopt, his strategy is to lunge and punch, kick and trip. He pays little heed either to the etiquette of the martial arts or to the Queensborough Rules.

In an effort both to support Anna against her warring lovers and to inject some light relief into the situation, Larry eventually tries to evict Pale from her apartment by saying: “Pale? It's not as butch as Burton, but if you don't leave, I'll hit you over the head with a skillet. I'm not joking” (act 2, p. 73). At the end of this fiasco and in acknowledgment of Larry's injection of some wit and sanity, it is hardly surprising that Anna should observe that “I could live my life very well, thank you, without ever seeing another straight man” (act 2, p. 74).

Although the relationship between Anna and Burton is built on compromise (the opening lines of the play exemplify Anna's apathy: “Uh, Burton, could we make it another … Sighs, buzzes him in …)” (act 1, p. 6), it is by no means totally unsatisfactory. There is genuine affection on both sides, even to the extent of Anna's seriously considering getting married. Certainly Larry would be in favor of that: “I don't know why you don't just marry him and buy things” (act 1, p. 19). John Malkovich believes that Burton is “a great guy”⁹⁶ and that “the relationship between he and Anna is as strong as most.”⁹⁷ In his opinion,

Burton's just fine, but that's not necessarily enough or even what Anna wants. Therein lies the lesson. Why do women like Rhett Butler? It's because he says “I don't give a damn”; it's attractive to women. Pale has that kind of attraction for her. There's nothing wrong with Burton, though, he just isn't enough for her at that time.⁹⁸

Burton realizes that he cannot compete with Pale, who is an unknown, alien entity, completely outside of Burton's experience and hence impossible to compete with. Burton is completely mystified that an uncouth, foul-mouthed and lower-class (certainly less wealthy) man has been able to steal Anna from him. Clearly, whatever it is that Anna sees in Pale, Burton does not possess. Finally, however, he realizes that he has never really deserved Anna. Michael Simkins notes:

He is basically a good guy, but so full of himself. All those forced anecdotes! What saves him is that he finally realizes in the last scene with Larry that he just isn't good enough; it has all been slightly phony, slightly unreal. He is a poseur, but a poseur with redeeming qualities. He's not a bad fellow. Anna could have done a lot worse.⁹⁹

In his setting of the work, Wilson extends the metaphor of restraint that, before Pale's invasion, has epitomized the characters' lives. The action takes place in a converted New York loft in the artistic environs of Lower Manhattan, the minimalist decor and nonchalant sophistication being described as “the sort of place that you would kill for or wouldn't be caught dead in” (p. 5). Pale certainly remains deeply unimpressed with the loft, constantly complaining about the heat, describing it as “a empty fuckin' warehouse” (act 1, p. 32), and deriding its supposedly desirable location overlooking the river:

PALE.
(Looking out the window) That's the bay, huh, the river? Jesus. What a thing to look at. Oh, look, darling, they got tugboats pushin', like, these flatcars; like, five flatcars piled about a mile high with all this city garbage and shit. Who the fuck wants to look at that? You pay for a view of that? Maybe there's people find that fascinating, that's not what I call a view.

(act 1, p. 30)

Pale cannot comprehend the attraction of such a view or of living in close proximity to the city's rubbish; he despises what he sees as a middle-class affectation, a desire to be close to “reality” without actually confronting it. As a working-class man for whom such realities are only too common, this ersatz realism is a ready target.

The loft's stark, simplistic design—no frills or obvious signs of conspicuous wealth—offers a specious sense of security to its tenants; once locked behind their reinforced steel doors, they pretend that nothing can harm them, and they persuade themselves that they are safe, in control of their lives, and able to survive. John Malkovich identifies the fundamental difference between Pale's attitude to the terrors of New York and that of the cosseted loft-dwellers:

These characters in their expensive apartment are, metaphorically, like people who don't know, or don't want to know, that there is a maniac killer in it, whereas Pale knows full well that the danger always exists, and that the killer is there all the time.¹⁰⁰

Their security is thus essentially illusory; though reluctant to admit it, because any acknowledgment may somehow make it a reality, Wilson's tenants conduct their lives behind a veil of barely suppressed panic masquerading as sophisticated irony.

The relationship that develops between Pale and Anna enables her not only to flourish as an artist, but to cope better with the pressures of city living. His practicality and strength rub off on her and transform long-pent-up terrors into endurable burdens. Born of a wealthy family in suburban Highland Park (which Lou Liberatore describes as “very nice, rich suburbs, very Kennedy”¹⁰¹ Anna has led a very sheltered life; watched over by both Robbie and Burton, she has never had to fend for herself or accept real criticism.

In truth, she has seldom had to take responsibility for anything important. As Larry observes, “She's had a very protected life. I mean, she's never had to even carry her own passport or plane tickets—she's not had to make her own way much.” (act 2, p. 94). Moreover, life in New York has gradually eroded what stamina and resilience she originally possessed; paranoia about the dangers of the city has caused her to lead a careful unadventurous life, marked by caution, superficiality, and undue circumspection. Suddenly exposed to grief and raw fear, she naturally gravitates toward a man who can offer her strength—if not stability. Juliet Stevenson analyzes it thus:

You can understand the attraction of that kind of animal strength, because at least if someone like Pale was on your side it would be a bonus. Jeanette Winterson's Sexing the Cherry is so entitled because it is about grafting one thing onto another and making it stronger. It's a horticultural metaphor; experts do this with cherries or apples or whatever. In a way, I think Anna grafts herself to Pale to allow herself to flourish and survive.¹⁰²

Wilson includes much symbolism in this play: virtually every cinematic or literary allusion has a connection with the unfolding tale; even the “love story” that Burton sets out to write is probably Burn This. By far the most striking symbol throughout the play is heat and flame, the intensity of Pale's body temperature, the color red, passion, and, of course, the title.

Time and again, Wilson works in such references, sometimes several per page. For example, Pale sarcastically decries Anna's impatience to call the Salvation Army to pick up Robbie's clothes: “What's this huge rush? They're on fire or something? Spontaneous combustion, something?” Moments later, he hears a noise from the radiator and complains that “The fuckin' room's a oven, bake pizza here, they turn on some heat.” When Anna protests that it is the middle of winter, Pale tells her: “I got like a toaster oven I carry around with me in my belly someplace. I don't use heat. I sleep the windows open, no covers” (act 1, p. 29). All these references are clearly intended to reflect the intense passions that percolate throughout the work, always on the verge of explosion or cataclysm. Lou Liberatore elaborates:

The whole idea of fire and passion, flame and red, hot and burn is central to the play; it's about being fired up, the spark of Anna's heart, new passions being unleashed and so on. It's a very hot play!¹⁰³

Many other symbols occur throughout the play, not least in the references to Wagner's opera The Flying Dutchman. The Dutchman is condemned to perdition unless he can find a girl who will love him, but he is allowed only limited chances to succeed. He meets and falls in love with Senta, who is already in love with another; however, she does fall in love with the Dutchman and sacrifices herself for his sake, throwing herself into the fjord to save him from eternal damnation. Once she does so, “The sea starts boiling, the Dutchman's ship sinks, all hell breaks loose” (act 1, p. 15). The connections are obvious, the boiling sea being linked by Wilson to the stormy waters ahead for Pale and Anna.

Of the play's many symbols of awakening and liberation, two are perhaps the most potent: Anna's description of the live butterflies “beating their bodies against the walls” (act 1, p. 21) when she stayed at Robbie's family home during the funeral and of Pale unpinning them (act 1, p. 22). And later she wallows in metaphorical mud to acknowledge her potential fecundity after a bout with Pale: “… a brood sow. Flat out in the mud, with about ten piglets squealing around you, trying to nurse. … Their eyes rolled back in their heads? Lying back in the sun, in some other world” (act 2, pp. 57, 58).

Burn This is not a play capable of attracting a half-hearted response; critics and audiences either welcome it as a superbly vitriolic and observant study of art, life, and death in contemporary New York, or they condemn it as a worthless indulgence in sickly sentiment and pretentiousness. It has been variously described as “enthralling … an affecting humanist play,”¹⁰⁴ “a great play, part comedy and part tragedy,”¹⁰⁵ like “Chekhov on speed,”¹⁰⁶ “a four-hander thirtysomething … crossed with a wisecracking sitcom,”¹⁰⁷ “a wry Manhattan fantasy,”¹⁰⁸ and a “blazingly violent and hugely compelling story.”¹⁰⁹

The work certainly appears to inspire great affection in those who have been involved in its production. Each member of its London cast was delighted to have been associated with it, and the director believes that it is

a wonderful play … it's incredibly likable, incredibly moving, intelligent, just so rich and alive and full of perception and wit and humor and insight … Almost more than any play I have done, I can still watch this over and over and be moved by it and laugh at it.¹¹⁰

But Burn This has been castigated for what some see as sentimentality and implausibility of plot, as well as for its enormous dramatic reach, which has led at least one critic to observe that “Wilson has two or three plays occupying the same stage.”¹¹¹ Others see it as “disappointingly flabby and soft-centered,”¹¹² as a work with “no centre of gravity and no centrifugal force”¹¹³ and “a wish-fulfilment exercise of the hoariest kind.”¹¹⁴

I would argue that this play is far from sentimental, although the closing tableau could, for example, imply a “happy ending” in an insensitive production. In reality, Anna and Pale's predicament is far from cloying, or even optimistic: the couple recognize that what lies ahead, is inevitable and will almost certainly bring anguish and suffering:

ANNA.
I don't want this … Oh, Lord, I didn't want this. …
PALE.
I know. I don't want it, either. I didn't expect nothin' like this.

(act 2, p. 99)

Mel Gussow observes that Wilson “exposes deep, uncauterized emotional wounds—and offers no salve”¹¹⁵ and that, while the play ends with Pale and Anna about to embark upon a perilous affair, “it would be precipitous to think of that as a happy ending. There is no guarantee of durability in this relationship.”¹¹⁶ The resignation with which they both confront the future is summed up by Wilson as

something they both know they have to go through or they will never be able to look themselves in the face again. But the play is not about cottage small by the waterfall; it's not about moving to the suburbs and leading a normal life. I wouldn't give them a plugged nickel for their chances, but they wouldn't either, so who knows? It's not about that; it's not even about their standards by the end of the play. Having said that, I don't think they will destroy each other and I believe they will emerge as stronger people. What they feed on from each other is positive, not negative.¹¹⁷

It is true that a strong production is needed to convince an audience that this pair would eventually come together, after having been throughout as diametrically opposed as “two different breeds of animal in the zoo.”¹¹⁸ What is once again apparent throughout Burn This is Wilson's compassion for his characters. As Marshall Mason has stated, Wilson's “softness of heart”¹¹⁹ often leads him into potentially sentimental situations, but he is constantly alert and on his guard to avoid them. I believe he has succeeded in so doing in this play, without in any way compromising or attenuating his affection for the characters.

Once again, critics are almost unanimous in their praise for Wilson's striking use of language, which is, as ever, meticulous and innovative, to match the massive scope of the work. Lasting three hours, Burn This is very demanding of its audience; as Lou Liberatore says, “There's a lot going on! … Some people hate it this long, others love it, most don't want it to end. There is so much.”¹²⁰

Pale's scrupulously constructed arias of frustration dominate the work, despite the fact that he is, for quite long periods, not even onstage. Their power is simply overwhelming, and his presence impossible to ignore. The audience's first encounter with this character sets the tone for the rest of the work: his initial, raging soliloquy against the world in general and against parking problems, city living, and potholes in particular embodies the primal scream of the disaffected—and furious—New Yorker whose need for instant gratification is thwarted by constant frustration:

PALE.
Goddamn this fuckin' place, how can anybody live this shit city? I'm not doin' it, I'm not drivin' my car this goddamn sewer, every fuckin' time. Who are these assholes? Some bug-eyed, fat-lipped half nigger, all right; some of my best friends, thinks he owns this fuckin' space. … Twenty-five fuckin' minutes I'm driving around this garbage street. … The only thing save this part of the city, they burn it down. … This has made me not as, you know—whatever—as I usually am.

(act 1, pp. 25, 26)

Although threatening in the extreme, Pale invites audience identification with his plight. As Michael Coveney amusingly observes, “He hates everyone. You warm to him immediately.”¹²¹ Lou Liberatore believes Pale to be the very epitome of city life—brutal, impatient, and frustrated:

Pale is very urban, of the city. He tells you what is on his mind absolutely. He doesn't edit. There is no pretense. Nothing at all. … The other characters don't talk about what they feel; they don't show what they feel, their emotions, but Pale does.¹²²

Pale's relentless, coruscating obscenities almost collide as they explode from his lips. So keen is he to emphasize his disgust that he elides his sentences, as in “how can anybody live this shit city?” and “the only thing save this part of the city, they burn it down.” There simply isn't time during this oratorio for syntactical niceties. Perhaps the most telling elision occurs in Pale's description of the individual who has initiated all of this wrath: “Some bug-eyed, fat-lipped half nigger, all right; some of my best friends, thinks he owns this fuckin' space.” This callous invective reveals both viciousness and inherent racism before Pale quickly qualifies it by asserting, with a well-worn cliché, that he counts black people among his closest friends. The assertion is, however, difficult to take seriously in light of what has preceded it. A bit later, Pale is still worrying about the impression he has created, as he fumblingly states that the incident has confused and upset him: “This has made me not as, you know—whatever—as I usually am.”

Another of Pale's seemingly wild and anarchic monologues occurs a little later in the play and illustrates even more vividly the creativity and depth of Wilson's linguistic invention. Again, Pale is angry with the world in general, but this time his bile is directed toward an irritating fellow-drinker in a downtown bar, as he describes the incident that has led to his hand being bloodied and bandaged:

PALE.
There was this character runnin' off at the mouth; I told him I'm gonna push his face in, he don't shut up. Now, this should be a fairly obvious statement, right? But this dipshit starts trying to explain to me what he's been saying ad nauseam all night, like there was some subtle gradation of thought that was gonna make it all right that he was mouthing this horseshit. So when I'm forced to bust the son of a bitch, he's down on the floor, he's dripping blood from a split lip, he's testing a loose tooth, and that fucker is still talking. Now, some people might think that this was the problem of this guy, he's got this motor going, he's not privy to where the shutoff valve is. But I gotta come to the conclusion that I'm weird. Cause I try to communicate with these jerkoffs in what is essentially the mother tongue, but no one is picking me up; they're not reading me.

(act 1, p. 34)

Wilson's sparing, but effective, use of coarse language, together with the many abbreviated sentences and missing link words, exactly conveys the frustration and disbelief Pale feels. Barroom argot and naturalistic rhythms are manipulated and combined to create an impression of absolute authenticity. Pale's delivery of his tale in the present tense adds to the sense of spontaneity, and the sudden juxtaposition of elevated speech with raw obscenities simultaneously adds to the truth of the passage and lends it a poetic edge.

Wilson's character delineation is also first-rate. To analyze this one speech is to learn almost everything there is to know about Pale. The stylistic peculiarities that proliferate in this character's self-righteous, though ingenuous, speech patterns enable Wilson to convey his very essence. It is essential that Pale's unpredictability should be as fully realized as the many contradictions and juxtapositions that make up his personality. Wilson builds on these elements, giving them oral exposition that artfully depicts Pale's many incongruities.

That his violent, explosive tendencies can believably coexist with an almost refined sensibility is expressed by his use of sophisticated or subtle phrases such as “ad nauseam,” “subtle gradation of thought” and “privy.” These are not words one would expect to hear alongside the scatology and rushed phrasing that make up most of the speech.

Although holding down a conventional job as a restaurant manager and being married with children, Pale is aeons away from conformity; he is a complex mixture of violent thug and sensitive naif, and apparently has a predilection for alcoholic or chemical stimulation. (A little earlier he had admitted to Anna that he “did maybe a couple lines [of cocaine] with Ray” [act 1, p. 31], but claimed that it does not affect him.)

It is typical that he should shift the blame for his own violent actions to the victim; he stresses that he has been “forced to bust the son of a bitch.” By refusing to take responsibility for his actions, he thereby exonerates himself. Even as his victim lies bleeding on the floor, Pale is unrepentant; instead, he maintains that, despite his very best efforts to make himself plainly understood, “in what is essentially the mother tongue,” the idiot in question was incapable of comprehension. Believing himself superior to the “jerkoffs” he meets, Pale selflessly gives them every opportunity to communicate with him. That they seem unable to do so leads to his ironic observation that, he, rather than they, must be “weird.” This is clearly not meant to be taken at all seriously; by so denigrating himself, Pale makes it all the more plain for his audience that he is an all-too reasonable man who is constantly misunderstood and abused.

These excursions into the depths of Pale's angst are by no means mere excuses for scatological excess. Wilson manages to make them very funny by means of verbal juxtapositions. Pale constantly surprises us by the unexpected quaintness of a particular turn of phrase. Into the midst of his first ferocious outburst a grammatically strangled, yet almost polite, phrase is suddenly injected: “I mean no personal disparagement of the neighborhood in which you have your domicile, honey, but this street's dying of crotch rot” (act 1, p. 26).

Even this early on, Wilson hints at submerged, unseen elements of Pale's personality. This tirade may have the cadences of realistic speech, but it is far from prosaic. Its combination of high-flown phrases with the downright demotic is typical of Wilson, who frequently allows his wilder characters thus to expose unexpected sides.

It is instructive to compare Wilson's use of scabrous though emotionally loaded language with that used in similar situations in the drama of David Mamet. Mamet has, in fact, cited Wilson as a primary influence on his writing: “The contemporary playwright I admire the most is Lanford Wilson.”¹²³ Conversely, Wilson greatly admires Mamet's work, calling him “a wonderful writer—I adore his plays.”¹²⁴ Using similar linguistic techniques, Wilson structures and paces explosive tirades into muscular verse, the expletives taking on a resonance that elevates them above mere verisimilitude into a heightened dramatic idiom.

A good opportunity for comparison occurs in Mamet's American Buffalo. Teach, a weak, deluded small-time crook believes that his coconspirator Don has somehow betrayed him and has acted “unprofessionally” by siding with and supporting Bobby, his pathetic young drug-addicted friend. In fact, Don's protection of and love for Bobby is one of the few genuine demonstrations of emotion in the play. It is typical of Teach that he should misinterpret affection for treachery:

TEACH.
You fake. You fucking fake. You fuck your friends. You have no friends. No wonder that you fuck this kid around. … You seek your friends with junkies. You're a joke on this street, you and him.(125)

Like Pale, Teach inverts or perverts facts in accord with his bitter self-righteousness; he instigates a (verbally) violent attack, blames others for it, and then demonstrates his convoluted sense of morality by his contemptuous and vicious denigration of his companions' friendship. There is great irony here, because Teach is conniving and perfidious in the extreme, easily capable of betraying a friend. The incongruity of the phrase, “You seek your friends with junkies,” appears to escape him; he is, after all one of Don's friends, too. Mamet conveys Teach's spluttering anger with alliteration and the repeated use of expletives; here, the word “fuck” becomes merely one of many obscenities since, in this context, “fake” and even “friend” take on equally damaging connotations. Similarly, the alliterative impact of “junkies”; and “joke” wields its own power.

In complete contrast to Pale's brutal—yet profoundly honest—outbursts, the other characters in Burn This do not really communicate. Lou Liberatore notes that “Anna is really unable to show her real feelings through language, except perhaps with Larry—when no-one else is in the room.”¹²⁶ Rather than risk direct communication, Anna prefers on the whole to pepper her conversation with the kind of leaden clichés that can be found in pop songs, soap operas, and movies. Only occasionally is she aware that she is falling into a linguistic rut of the kind she would despise in others.

Having just returned from Robbie's funeral and, as a result, having been unable to exercise, she complains in tones reminiscent of soap opera that she is “completely out of touch with [her] body” (act 1, p. 19). Her reliance on pop psychology emerges when she observes that her sorrow is being wasted by not being sublimated into artistic expression: “… if I were still dancing, I'd probably be brilliant tonight” (act 1, p. 23).

Anna's essential shallowness of expression is thus analyzed by Juliet Stevenson:

Some of the lines Anna has are desperate because they are so tinny … “a crackerjack feeler” for example! “I feel blue”! But of course that's partly what Wilson is writing about … She is just beginning to be aware of using second-rate, plagiarized song titles, instant accessible culture … the world of instant feeling which is very unresonant.¹²⁷

Even Larry, by far the most articulate and witty of the characters onstage, relies on camp—verbally dexterous homosexual innuendo—to communicate. He hides his real feelings beneath a sardonic, self-deprecating humor and a barely suppressed yawn of hopeless resignation; instances of emotional exposure are rare and are quickly followed by a caustic dismissal.

The language of a successful and wealthy screenwriter of science-fiction blockbuster movies “reminiscent of something like Total Recall”¹²⁸ is no better. Burton's speech, often emotionally immature and contrived, shows little originality, although he is both confident and articulate. However, there are several moments when his speech breaks down. Speaking about his recent trip to Canada, he notes its influence on his writing style: “Amazing things happen to your mind, you feel like you're all alone, or you're one with the … something, or … well …” (act 1, p. 12).

The four characters' contrasting speech patterns afford a rich canvas for Wilson. Pale's vituperative animal ferocity, just occasionally hinting at a submerged finer sensibility; Anna's mostly second-hand yet heartfelt rambling; Larry's razor-sharp, though shallow, wisecracks; Burton's stolid phrasings—all enable the playwright to capture with wit and verisimilitude the conversational styles of contemporary New York.

Burn This is another Wilson play that includes characters whose sexuality is either ambiguous or blatantly nonconformist. Although containing only one openly homosexual character, Larry, the play features people who, while appearing strongly heterosexual, exhibit personality traits at variance with their chosen projected image. The ostensibly macho Pale, for example, has a strongly feminine side in conflict with the urban aggressor he presents to the world.

The homoerotic aura pervading the work continues with Burton, who constantly, though good-humoredly, rebuffs Larry's joky sexual advances and suggestive innuendo. Burton is drawn as a “man's man”: athletic, self-sufficient, and teaching akido at the local YMCA. A well-heeled screenwriter of blockbuster movies, he appears a man in control of his destiny. But one night he temporarily doffs his usual sophisticated, man-about-town image to candidly recall a homosexual episode from his youth when he was fellated in the snow by a passing stranger. As Michael Simkins observes, however, much of Burton's speech is contrived:

He's very fond of what are, in effect, slightly forced anecdotes. He loves to talk about himself and his experiences … and likes to impress upon his audience that “I've lived as well.”¹²⁹

His happy memory of the incident is thus a little too self-conscious, a little too pat: “It was very nice, and I never thought about it. And it didn't mean anything, but I've never been sorry it happened or any of that crap” (act 2, p. 63). This is not to suggest that Burton may harbor suppressed homosexual longings. More likely, he just wishes to demonstrate to his friends his broad-minded and enlightened attitude.

However, his choice of reminiscence to illustrate these traits is an interesting one. Notwithstanding his “acceptance” of Larry, subtle suggestions exist (not least in his strident, overcompensatory telling of the above anecdote) that Burton may nourish homophobic fears. In spite of his assertions to the contrary, he is perhaps homophobic—the only true homophobe in the play.

Pale may project a superficial homophobia, but it is not borne out in his relationship with Larry. Indeed, the pair share the most domestic scene in the whole play, and, although dismissive of Larry's camp persona, Pale seems able to communicate with him. John Malkovich believes that Pale is not so much homophobic as contemptuous of the New York superficial glitziness and sophisticated swagger so often projected by the likes of Larry. He believes that the play is a veiled comment on the inherent snobbery of New York:

It [New York] is full of quite selfish, mindless, narcissistic bullies and it drives me berserk. … I can just land there and after a few minutes I'm enraged.¹³⁰

About Pale's contemptuous attitude to Larry, he observes:

What he doesn't like is that Larry is a little too witty and needs to be punched. … there is an almost exquisitely painful provincialism about people who come from the cities as though they were somehow terribly cultured and artistic, which they rarely are … those who live there are supposed to be so cool … they think they are so interesting and superior. This goes for the criminal element, the media element, and the sort of Village Voice element or whatever. For a character like Pale, this sort of thing is just a target.¹³¹

By the end, each character has learned something of value. Anna has grown both as an artist and as an individual; having tasted the extremes of experience, she is enriched and, probably, less prone to easy reliance on compromise and concession. In Anna's new-found maturity, Pale has found a match for his ardor and strength of feeling; for the first time, he experiences love and enters a relationship built on genuine emotion rather than on empty sentiment. And possibly, within the confines of a supportive relationship, his own creative impulses can be set free; perhaps his “artistic temperament” can now be channelled into positive and fulfilling directions.

Larry is finally forced to acknowledge the futility and barrenness of his chosen lifestyle; living vicariously through the love affairs of others is deeply unsatisfactory. However, his part in helping Pale and Anna to come together could signal a change for the better; observing the inevitability of their relationship—despite its many problems—might impel him to seek out a partner, even though aware that such a step could be potentially hazardous.

In losing Anna to Pale, Burton has learned that, for her, his attractiveness has been based largely on convenience. He is forced to recognize his limitations and that he and Anna were and never could be a suitable match. What beguiles Anna about Pale is his complete lack of phoniness and pretension—two prominent components of Burton's personality.

Burn This spreads its dramatic reach wide with an ambition, humor, and inventive use of language that place it very firmly at the forefront of Wilson's dramatic canon. Far from being “a wish fulfillment exercise of the hoariest kind,”¹³² it is one of his most important and vibrant works into which he has incorporated many themes examined in previous plays, but all the while extending them to new depths.

Notes

1. Lanford Wilson, Balm in Gilead and Other Plays, (New York: Farrar, Strauss, and Giroux, 1965 (Noonday Press edition, 1988), p. 3.

2. John Beaufort, “Definitive Revival of Lanford Wilson's First Full-Length Play,” The Christian Science Monitor, 18 June 1984, p. 22.

3. Gene Barnett, Lanford Wilson, quoted in Contemporary Authors Bibliographical Series—American Dramatists, vol. 3 (Detroit: Gale Research Co., 1989), p. 443.

4. Robert Brustein, “Post-Naturalist Triumph,” New Republic, 5 November 1984 pp. 27-29.

5. Beaufort, “Definitive Revival of Lanford Wilson's First Full-Length Play,” p. 22.

6. Wilson, interview with author, 14 September 1991, Circle Repertory Company, New York.

7. Shewey, “I Hear America Talking,” p. 20.

8. Wilson, interview with author, 14 September 1991, Circle Repertory Company, New York.

9. Ibid.

10. Ibid.

11. Ibid.

12. Powell, interview with author, 14 September 1991, Circle Repertory Company, New York.

13. Ibid.

14. Wilson, interview with author, 14 September 1991, Circle Repertory Company, New York.

15. Ibid.

16. Ibid.

17. Kakutani, “I Write the World As I See It Around Me,” pp. 4, 6.

18. Ibid.

19. Ibid.

20. Wilson, interview with author, 14 September 1991, Circle Repertory Company, New York.

21. Ibid.

22. Ibid.

23. Wilson, Balm in Gilead, p. 3.

24. Wilson, Balm in Gilead, p. 68.

25. Ibid.

26. Ibid.

27. Ibid, p. 3.

28. Ibid, p. 9.

29. Ibid, p. 33.

30. Ibid, p. 10.

31. Leslie Bennetts, “Marshall Mason Explores a New Stage,” New York Times, 11 October 1987, p. 7.

32. Mason, interview with author, 15 September 1991, New York.

33. Wilson, interview with author, 14 September, 1991, Circle Repertory Company, New York.

34. John Malkovich, interview with author, 27 September 1990, Lyric Theatre, London.

35. Ibid.

36. Wilson, Balm in Gilead, p. 5.

37. Ibid, p. 4.

38. Ibid, p. 26.

39. Ibid, p. 7.

40. Ibid, p. 7.

41. Ibid, p. 20.

42. Ibid, p. 41.

43. Ibid, p. 57.

44. Ibid, p. 71.

45. Kakutani, “I Write the World As I See It Around Me,” pp. 4, 6.

46. Gen. 37:25 and Jer. 8:22.

47. Hos. 12:11 and 68.

48. 1 Samuel 13:7.

49. Beaufort, “Definitive Revival of Lanford Wilson's First Full-Length Play,” p. 22.

50. Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid's Tale, (London: Virago Press, 1987), p. 314.

51. Robert Allan Ackerman, interview with author, 3 October 1990, Lyric Theatre, London.

52. Liberatore, interview with author, 27 September 1990, Shaftesbury Avenue, London.

53. Mason, interview with author, 15 September 1991, New York.

54. Wilson, interview with author, 14 September 1991, Circle Repertory Company, New York.

55. Jack Kroll, Newsweek, cited on back cover of Lanford Wilson, Burn This (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1987, Noonday Press edition, 1988).

56. Malkovich, interview with author, 27 September 1990, Lyric Theatre, London.

57. Wilson, interview with author, 14 September 1991, Circle Repertory Company, New York.

58. Mason, interview with author, 15 September 1991, New York.

59. Wilson, interview with author, 14 September 1991, Circle Repertory Company, New York.

60. Malkovich, interview with author, 27 September 1990, Lyric Theatre, London.

61. Mason, interview with author, 15 September 1991, New York.

62. Bennetts, “Marshall Mason Explores a New Stage,” p. 3.

63. Ibid.

64. Ackerman, interview with author, 3 October 1990, Lyric Theatre, London.

65. Wilson, interview with author, 14 September 1991, Circle Repertory Company, New York.

66. Berezin, interview with author, 18 September 1991, Circle Repertory Company, New York.

67. Wilson, interview with author, 14 September 1991, Circle Repertory Company, New York.

68. “John Malkovich,” Omnibus, BBC2 Television, 7 September 1990.

69. Ibid.

70. Ibid.

71. Ibid.

72. Ibid.

73. Milton Shulman, “Dangerous Liaison,” Evening Standard, 30 May 1990, p. 39.

74. Jack Tinker, “High Wire Magic with No Holds Barred,” Daily Mail, 30 May 1990, reprinted in London Theatre Record, vol. 10, 21 May-3 June 1990, p. 716.

75. Ackerman, interview with author, 3 October 1990, Lyric Theatre, London.

76. Simkins, interview with author, 19 November 1990, Stoke Newington, London.

77. Omnibus, 7 September 1990.

78. Kenneth Hurren, “Theatre,” The Mail on Sunday, 3 June 1990, reprinted in London Theatre Record, p. 715.

79. Irving Wardle, “Shattered Sanctuaries,” The Independent on Sunday, 3 June 1990, reprinted in London Theatre Record, p. 723.

80. Michael Billington, “A Sweeter Shade of Pale,” The Guardian, 30 May 1990, reprinted in London Theatre Record, p. 717.

81. Berezin, interview with author, 18 September 1991, Circle Repertory Company, New York.

82. Mason, interview with author, 15 September 1991, New York.

83. Ackerman, interview with author, 3 October 1990, Lyric Theatre, London.

84. Liberatore, interview with author, 27 September 1990, Shaftesbury Avenue, London.

85. Ibid.

86. Juliet Stevenson, interview with author, 1 November 1990, Queen's Park, London.

87. Wilson, interview with author, 14 September 1991, Circle Repertory Company, New York.

88. Malkovich, interview with author, 27 September 1990, Lyric Theatre, London.

89. Mason, interview with author, 15 September 1991, New York.

90. Ibid.

91. Ackerman, interview with author, 3 October 1990, Lyric Theatre, London.

92. Stevenson, interview with author, 1 November 1990, Queen's Park, London.

93. Ibid.

94. Ackerman, interview with author, 3 October 1990, Lyric Theatre, London.

95. Stevenson, interview with author, 1 November 1990, Queen's Park, London.

96. Malkovich, interview with author, 27 September 1990, Lyric Theatre, London.

97. Ibid.

98. Ibid.

99. Simkins, interview with author, 19 November 1990, Stoke Newington, London.

100. Malkovich, interview with author, 27 September 1990, Lyric Theatre, London.

101. Liberatore, interview with author, 27 September 1990, Shaftesbury Avenue, London.

102. Stevenson, interview with author, 1 November 1990, Queen's Park, London.

103. Liberatore, interview with author, 27 September 1990, Shaftesbury Avenue, London.

104. Billington, “A Sweeter Shade of Pale,” p. 717.

105. Thomas M. Disch, “Theater,” Nation, 15 November 1987, pp. 569-70.

106. Charles Osborne, “Like Chekhov on Speed,” The Daily Telegraph, 31 May 1990, reprinted in London Theatre Review, p. 723.

107. Paul Taylor, “Creative Blocks,” The Independent, 31 May 1990, p. 12.

108. Maureen Paton, “Burn This,” The Daily Express, 4 June 1990.

109. Sheridan Morley, Herald Tribune, 6 June 1990, reprinted in London Theatre Review, p. 715.

110. Ackerman, interview with author, 3 October 1990, Lyric Theatre, London.

111. Rhoda Koenig, Punch, 8 June 1990, reprinted in London Theatre Review, p. 716.

112. Martin Hoyle, Financial Times, 30 May 1990, reprinted in London Theatre Review, p. 717.

113. Clive Hirschorn, The Sunday Express, 3 June 1990, reprinted in London Theatre Review, p. 717.

114. Jim Hiley, The Listener, 7 June 1990, p. 32.

115. Mel Gussow, “Lanford Wilson's Lonely World of Displaced Persons,” New York Times, 15 October 1987, p. 5.

116. Ibid.

117. Wilson, interview with author, 14 September 1991, Circle Repertory Company, New York.

118. Stevenson, interview with author, 1 November 1990, Queen's Park, London.

119. Mason, interview with author, 15 September 1991, New York.

120. Liberatore, interview with author, 27 September 1990, Shaftesbury Avenue, London.

121. Michael Coveney, “Burn These Wigs,” The Observer, 5 June 1990, p. 58.

122. Liberatore, interview with author, 27 September 1990, Shaftesbury Avenue, London.

123. Gussow, “Talley's Folly: A Valentine Hit,” p. 36.

124. Wilson, interview with author, 14 September 1991, Circle Repertory Company, New York.

125. David Mamet, American Buffalo, (London: Methuen, 1978), p. 104.

126. Liberatore, interview with author, 27 September 1990, Shaftesbury Avenue, London.

127. Stevenson, interview with author, 1 November 1990, Queen's Park, London.

128. Liberatore, interview with author, 27 September 1990, Shaftesbury Avenue, London.

129. Simkins, interview with author, 19 November 1990, Stoke Newington, London.

130. Edwardes, “Beyond the Pale,” p. 15.

131. Malkovich, interview with author, 27 September 1990, Lyric Theatre, London.

132. Hiley, The Listener, p. 32.