Trying: Fritz Weaver so Memorable as Forgotten Public Figure

Go to the theatre often enough and through the years you'll see plenty of plays that follow the same formula as Joanna McClelland Glass's Trying. It's a classic combination for a two-character piece. Take an accomplished older actor (in this case Fritz Weaver) and have him play an amusingly crusty curmudgeon who for the sake of some contrivance has to spend a great deal of time with a much younger person (enter Kati Brazda) on a regular basis. At first you think they'll never get along as personalities, backgrounds and egos clash, but gradually they start learning from each other and their bond grows into a special relationship. Having the crusty curmudgeon die in the end is optional.

But just because a play is formulaic doesn't mean it can't supply one heck of a good evening at the theatre, and Trying, based on the author's experiences serving as a 25 year old secretary to former U.S. Attorney General under FDR, Francis Biddle, offers a little history, a warmly inviting text, a wonderfully detailed performance by one of our greats and a fine supporting turn.

Biddle, who also served as a judge at the Nuremberg trials of Nazi war criminals and supervised the relocation and internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II (an act he later renounced), was often accused of betraying his patrician Philadelphia upbringing by championing liberal causes. As the play opens in 1967, the 81 year old man is not taking well to old age, both physically and mentally, as he slowly climbs up the stairs every morning to his office, located above the garage of his Georgetown home. ("I'm always ill. Occasionally I'm ill horizontally. Usually I'm ill vertically.")

He's convinced he'll die within a year and has been sluggish in getting his contractually promised memoirs completed, partially because of his failing short-term memory and partially because he is so set in his ways and quick to find fault in others that he's not been able to hold on to a good secretary. He criticizes the earnest Sarah on her first day of work for, of all things, being early. "You probably wanted to make an impression on your first day," he tells her as she keeps her coat on in the chilly room that does not get heated until the judge enters. "You'll find, if you stay, that I'm far more impressed by adherence to rules." These rules include being strictly forbidden to touch the gas heaters or split any infinitives. Even her kind offer to rub his arthritic knuckles with Ben-Gay is met with a scolding.

"That's the bathroom", he explains several times, not realizing he's already mentioned it. "If you're like all the others you'll go there to cry."

"If you make me cry," Sarah eventually summons up the courage to say, "I'll do it here in this chair so you can watch me."

The workaholic Sarah comes from a humble farmland upbringing and resents the Eastern privilege and snobbery which was a great part of her employer's youth. Indeed, although Judge Biddle's public life was focused on helping the American work force get through the Great Depression, as portrayed in Trying he's a man who feels disgraced and humbled by his growing need for assistance.

Although there are many fine contributions to this production, the focus of the evening, and so rightfully so, is on the extraordinary performance of Fritz Weaver. His Biddle is a fascinating presence of slowly crumbling magnificence; vocally commanding, yet physically and mentally deteriorating before our eyes with the slightest of degeneration from scene to scene. Whether humorous, menacing, sympathetic or dictatorial, he always retains the dignity of his character and shows us why Sarah doesn't slam the door behind her. And it's especially charming to see the shadow of the 79 year old actor energetically placing himself during the scene-changing blackouts.

As his much-abused secretary, Kati Brazda has a job similar to that of a vaudeville straight man. She is mostly there for Biddle to react to and her moments of defiance, vulnerability and concern, though nicely played, run the risk of going unnoticed next to the master craftsman beside her. But under Sandy Shiner's direction there is definite teamwork and chemistry between the two and although Weaver has the far juicer role to play, Brazda's non-verbal characterization keeps it from becoming a one-sided affair.

If not exactly a love story, Trying is certainly an admiration story. Though short on plot, the play is long on affection for a barely remembered American political figure. One would wonder how effective the play would be with a lesser actor in the central role, but Fritz Weaver in Trying is certain to be one of the more memorable entries in this young season.

Photo of Fritz Weaver by Joan Marcus

 

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