Playwright Ray Werner confronts age issues with 'Elder Hostages' trilogy
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Pittsburgh playwright Ray Werner will have his trilogy of plays "Elder Hostages" showing at the Pittsburgh Playwrights Theater this month.
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"Elder Hostages," a trilogy of one-acts tells the stories of people coping with the indignities of aging, takes the stage for its first full production after an acclaimed reading in 2010.
For its run in Pittsburgh Playwrights' new Downtown home at 937 Liberty Ave., the Ray Werner play is bonded with "Work in Progress," an exhibition by former Post-Gazette photographer Annie O'Neill showing portraits of people who have worked at one job for more than 50 years. Receptions and talk-backs with hard-at-work Pittsburghers, including artist Robert Qualters and sculptor Thad Mosley, will be presented throughout the weeks of the shows' run.
Mr. Werner, of Point Breeze, has relaunched himself as a playwright after taking a 40-year break to become a successful advertising writer/producer and head of his own company. He had studied playwriting at Yale School of Drama after graduating from Duquesne University, then went on to be inducted into the Pittsburgh Ad Federation Hall of Fame in 2002. All the while, he served on the boards of such groups as Pittsburgh Public Theater and Pittsburgh Irish and Classical Theatre, in whose companies he first saw the current star of "Elder Hostages," Roger Jerome.
Where: Pittsburgh Playwrights at 937 Liberty Ave., third floor, Downtown.
When: Friday through Feb. 26. 8 p.m. Thursday-Saturday; 3 p.m. Sundays (but 2 and 7 p.m. Feb. 26).
General admission tickets: Feb. 10 preview, $15 in advance, $20 at the door; Feb. 11 opening night fundraiser with live music, $35; all other performances, $25/$30, or $20/$25 for 65 and over. For tickets and info on talk-backs: www.pghplaywrights.com .
Mr. Werner's 10-minute play "Night Song" was included in the Source Festival in Washington, D.C., in 2009. And a year later, during the same week in November, "Elder Hostages" received a staged reading starring Tom Atkins and Bingo O'Malley at Pittsburgh Playwrights and another in Capetown, South Africa, for the fringe program of the National Arts Festival.
The cast for the first full production of the trilogy features UK native Mr. Jerome in three roles. Susie McGregor-Laine returns from the original cast and is joined by David Crawford and Stevie Akers for director Marci Woodruff.
As Mr. Werner's plays began to take shape, he read about theater competitions and festivals like the Source in D.C. He also began to see a theme emerging as he built on a one-act play, "Mum's the Word," about two elderly brothers who live together in disharmony.
He wrote that play during a trip to Ireland, and when he came home, "I had another idea involving an elderly couple in the middle of the night, and we all of us know people who suffer from Alzheimer's," he said.
That one-act became "Night Song," inspired by a friend whose wife suffered from the disease. Mr. Werner said his older sister has been afflicted in recent years.
"So I wrote it, and I thought, gee, I have two plays now that fit, in a sense, all about elderly people. My marketing background kicked in, and I tried to come up with a third play with three characters, and I thought of an umbrella title. I've learned since then it is kind of a niche, it's unusual to have an evening when all the actors are elderly. There are roles out there, but they are not concentrated like this. That kind of caught people's attention."
When "Night Song" was performed in D.C., "that was my first taste that I can do that," he said of his second career as a playwright. He recalled, "When it was ending, you could hear a pin drop. To see it with a 150 strangers and hear their reaction, that was a thrill.
The final play in the trilogy, "Wandering Angus," takes a comic turn at a forsaken bus stop.
Although the topics may be about the difficulties the elderly face in America, Mr. Werner said they are infused with a hopeful spirit.
"There's anger and love and resilience," he said. "And there's laughter, too."
First Published February 9, 2012 12:00 am
