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PAGE 10. BLYTH FESTIVAL SALUTE, WEDNESDAY, JUNE 5, 2002.
George F. Walker tells stories of forgotten people
By David Blaney
Citizen staff
George F. Walker, author of Filthy
Rich, the second main-stage
production at the 2002 Blyth
Festival, is arguably Canada's most
successful contemporary
playwright. Since his first play was
produced by Factory Theatre in the
early '70s he has gone on to have his
work produced all over the world.
"I wanted to take something
recognizable to the audience, • the
detective genre and characters, and
then add what is really going on,"
Walker says about Filthy Rich, one
of his early plays being revived at
the Festival in its "Canadian
Classic" slot.
He expands this idea by saying,
"The best thing you can do in theatre
is to speak out loud for people in the
audience. To say things they're not
allowed to say."
Walker tells a story about a
conversation he had with a producer
of his plays from the U.S. The
producer said Walker's plays told the
stories of the people other authors
used as walk-ons.
Walker is happy to put "centre
stage" people often ignored. It is
clear however that he wants his
people treated respectfully.
It is not an exercise in
anthroiology for Walker. He says,
"The audience is not here to study
these people but to connect with
them."
Only those involved in theatre
truly appreciate the work that stage
managers do in pulling the various
parts of the production together.
Stage managers play different
roles at different times in the
creation of a stage play. During
rehearsal, they are vital for making
the most efficient use of time.
Working with the director they
schedule what scenes will be worked
on at what time and which actors
• will be needed, leaving cast-
members not needed to make more
efficient use of their time, like
learning their lines.
They also co-ordinate with the
production staff — scheduling
actors for costume fittings, for
instance. If an actor needs a prop,
His success confirms he is able,
not only to speak for people, but to
them, as well. Walker's work has
been produced in countries around
the world and been translated into
German, French, Polish, Hebrew,
Turkish and Czech.
Zastrozzi has received over 100
productions in the English speaking
world alone.
Productions of Nothing Sacred
and Love and Anger were extremely
successful in the US in New York,
Los Angeles, Seattle, San Francisco
and Chicago. Much of Walker's
work has been published either as
individual scripts or in compilations.
It all began with his first play,
Prince of Naples, which was the
result of a chance encounter with a
poster requesting original scripts for
the Factory Theatre Lab. At the time
Walker was a taxi driver in Toronto,
where he had been born and raised in
the east-end.
The prolific writer has gone on to
produce a body of work the size and
diversity of which would be
impressive even without the critical
acclaim it has garnered.
He has written for radio including
the three-part series How to Make
Love to An Actor which was heard
on CBC's Sunday Showcase.
He also has spent time in the past
several years writing for Due South
and CBC's The Newsroom. Walker's
plays have received wide critical
acclaim and he has won seven
Chalmer's Canadian Play Awards,
they notify the properties
department.
With new scripts, stage
management also has the
responsibility of making sure all
actors get the latest revisions by the
playwright.
Once the show is on stage, the
stage manager is in charge of
making sure the productions
remains, night after night, faithful to
the vision of the director, who is
generally no longer around after
opening night.
For the stage managers on The
Outdoor Donnellys, the challenges
are even greater than normal,
including dealing with various
locations, the possibility of thunder
storms and the use of horses.
four DORA outstanding play
awards, and was twice the recipient
of a Governor General's Literary
Award. Critics comment on Walker's
use of language and his ability to
manipulate form to produce plays
that are witty, sometimes border on
farce and yet often remain
emotionally dark.
He has made clear, in a number of
interviews that he wants an audience
to connect emotionally with his
work. "When the body and the heart
are connected," he says, "it is more
powerful than the intellect in the
theatre."
In an interview with Kate Taylor,
on his production Heaven, he gave
this reason for wanting to direct his
own work. "I want to make sure they
have a pulse. I don't want the
intellectual approach to my work
that I think is a big deal in Canadian
theatre.
"I strive for intention and intensity
rather than polish. Each production
is a public interill'etatidn of my
play."
He admits, with the wry humour
of a theatrical veteran, that he has
been blamed for some of the
interpretations of his work by others.
"When I direct," he says, "if I am
going to hear all that criticism at
least it will be me."
In an interview with playwright
Ian Walker which, appeared in
Backstage West magazine, George F.
Walker described how. he wrote "I
like to write fast," he said, "and I like
to walk. I've done some plays on the
move, walking, or sitting in
doorways, taking pads and
scratching down stuff. It's an active
thing."
Walker admits quite cheerfully
that he is not an author who plans
everything out in advance. "I sort of
hear a voice and then another one
responding," he says. "I never know
where the play is going."
This process of getting close to his
characters and allowing them to lead
him on results, Walker claims, in a
problem. "I'm not really good at
endings. I don't really think •things
just end."
He semi-seriously suggests,
"Sometimes I end the play because I
figure the audience has been there
for two hours and I ought to let them
go and get on with things."
He talks about the stage and
society as if the theatre should be a
tribune for the people — his people,
the east-end Toronto community in
which he grew up. "The last thing
you want to do in the theatre," he
asserts, "is convince the middle class
everything is okay:"
Stage managers play
essential role in theatre