Director's Notes • About the Playwight • About the Artists • Press Reaction

Director's Notes:

Not too long ago, Frank had an artistic retreat where we had some discussion of what Frank was doing, where it was going, how we could strengthen the organization. In discussing the nature of Frank's work, one of the artists commented that while there are people in the world who want us to believe that things are black and white (as Arturo Ui said, "You are either for me or against me"), one of the most compelling aspects of Frank's work is that it seems to revel in the gray zone, rather than pointing to a clear black or white, the work insists that the viewer have to wade through the gray, examine the question(s), and come to their own conclusion. In an era of mass entertainment that reduces complex questions to simplistic scenarios that don't require you to put your brain in gear, Frank is clearly following a path which can sometimes make you uncomfortable. Performer Maria Asp cited FARMYARD as an example, expressing how much she wanted to hate the farmhand portrayed by Tom Sherohman, but she couldn't. The situation of the play, the depth of the character(s), and the presentation of the story forced an unwilling empathy with a character who was, at first blush, not a very likeable guy; in fact, the whole play forces you to examine issues you might rather leave lying under the carpet. In staging work of this kind, we hope to encourage a complexity of thought, to provoke an examination of values, and a discussion of the intricate and interrelated issues in the world around us.

SELF DEFENSE, or death of some salesmen once again provides Frank the opportunity to stir up reaction. Inspired by a series of murders in Florida in the late 80s and early 90s, the play attempts to raise questions surrounding the case of Aileen Wuornos, portrayed as the character of Jo in the play. While the actual events of the case, donât need any added drama (they are sensational in and of themselves), the related events raise a host of questions. Carson has lifted elements from the real-life events, including some of the difficult testimony from the actual transcript of the case, and mixed them with her imaginings of characters, questions and ideas which contribute to a deeper understanding of some fundamental societal questions. Does a prostitute have the right to say no to a john? Can a prostitute be raped? What is the relationship between class and justice in our society? Are crimes that occur involving prostitutes, drug dealers, the homeless, or immigrants treated differently than the bookkeepers of Enron, the politicians at the Capitol, or the white guy whoâs driving a Mercedes? She has also created a central character who, much like the real-life model, causes you to react in the gray zone: she is one moment charming, funny, spunky, and you almost like her, and the next minute, sheâs a pathologically abusive liar.

This oneâs not for the kids (although our 17 year old intern endorses it heartily). PG-17: Strong language, dangerous ideas, compelling theatre.

Thanks for coming.

Wendy Knox, Artistic Director

About the Playwright

CARSON KREITZER\'s Self Defense finishes out her "Women Who Kill" triptych, begun in 1993 with Valerie Shoots Andy, an investigation of Valerie Solanas' 1968 assassination attempt on Andy Warhol, followed up with Heroin/e (Keep Us Quiet), featuring Ellie Nesler, who entered a California courtroom and put five bullets in the man who molested her son. The Slow Drag, a jazz cabaret about a woman who passed as a man to play the music she loved, enjoyed a three-month run at the Whitehall Theater in London's West End in 1997/98, following a successful run in the Fringe and an original Off-Broadway production at The American Place Theatre in 1996. Other work includes Freakshow, Caravaggista, Take My Breath Away, The Love Song of J. Robert Oppenheimer, and Dead Wait. Ms. Kreitzer holds a degree in Theater and Literature from Yale University, and has received grants from NYFA, NYSCA, and TCG, a residency with Mabou Mines, a Jerome Fellowship, and a McKnight Advancement Grant for the current year. She is delighted to be working with Wendy Knox and Frank Theater here at the Playwrights Center.

About the Artists

Last spring, Phyllis Wright led the cast of PERFECT PIE with her compelling performance (recognized in both major papers as a stand-out performance of the year) as "Patsy." She has stolen Frank audience's hearts in both of our incarnations of FARMYARD, first as the adolescent retarded daughter in our debut production, then as the mother in our restaging ten years later. Now she tackles the role of "Jo," inspired by real-life character Aileen Wuornos. The research that Phyllis and the rest of the gang have done on this project have led them to a string of strip clubs to investigate "pole dancing," the morgue to understand what the daily life of a coroner involves, and now they're trying to get INTO jail! Maria Asp, a long time Frank offender, joins much of the ARTURO UI gang their return to Frank. Frank's "energizer bunny," Maria has tackled her roles as coroner, pole dancer, and Born again Baptist with characteristic zeal. In her spare time, she continues to head up CTC's "Neighborhood Bridges" program, inspiring fourth graders in the Minneapolis public schools. Tom Sherohman, who last killed us with his performance of "Old Dogsborogh" in UI, continues to refine his ability to create those oh, so sympathetic characters in Frank productions (he really is a nice guy-donât be fooled!). The delightful Bianca Pettis is back after UI, tackling the roles of a pole dancer, cop, and a guardian angel. John Riedlinger continues to build his rap sheet with Frank, adding to previous offenses such as UI and HERCULINA, He gets no clubfoot here, nor does he take his clothes off as he plays the role of several lawyers (flaky and not), a cop. Sandra Struthers builds her "trilogy of whores" with Frank, previous installments seen in THREEPENNY and in UI÷she does, however, get to balance it out with the portrayal of a guardian angel this time.. Ron Menzel and Kim Schultz, two fine actors who are making their Frank debuts, have appeared on stages of many of the fine smaller theatres around town, among them Hidden Theatre, Ten Thousand Things, and 15 Head-we're thrilled to have them join us for this production. The production team consists of the core of wonderful, wonderful designers: Steve Rohde, who did the set design for PERFECT PIE, THREEPENNY and many more than he would like to remember; Kathy Kohl, the costume queen, who has done more Frank shows than anyone except Wendy Knox; Mike Kittel, the "A" team lighting designer; Reid Rejsa, sound wizard, who even took the effort to record (undercover) live applause at an actual strip club-it's that attention to detail that makes Reid such a great player, and Mark Tang, videographer, who did film for Frank's second production, KATZELMACHER, in 1990. Our production intern from the Arts High School, Hanna Zipes, has also been a great help. Artistic Director Wendy Knox wrangles the whole crew.

Press Reaction

"Self Defense" is a trick-filled play, one that messes with the audience's sensibilities, sympathies and sense of time. Dense with language and ideas, the play's very trickiness sometimes undercuts itself.

The play is based on the real-life events of Aileen Wuornos, a Florida prostitute who killed a half-dozen men during the late 1980s. In each case, Wuornos claimed that her victims tried to rape and kill her and that she acted in self-defense. She was convicted, sentenced to death and recently waived the remaining appeals that stand between her and Florida's electric chair.

Playwright Carson Kreitzer uses Wuornos' story to examine a host of questions about a strata of American society most of us read about but never see. Can a prostitute be raped? What role do class, gender and sexual orientation have in the administration of justice?What is the role of the media in shaping opinions about crime and punishment? And what is the relative value of a human life?

These questions weave, interlocked and tendril-like, through a play that slashes its way through time and space. We see Wuornos' fictional stand-in — a character named Jo — on death row, at home with her lover, in police interrogation rooms, at strip joints. We don't climb into her head so much as we're offered a recitation of her circumstances and her actions and then differing perspectives on those actions.

Still, there's a nightmarish quality to Kreitzer's script, a series of quick shots flailing from one setting to the next. That quality is certainly intentional, but it fuzzes up what might have been a clearer, more compelling inquiry. That fuzzing-up, too, is intentional, giving the piece an impressionistic feel that, to some degree, sacrifices the playwright's intentions for her aesthetics.

Director Wendy Knox indulges the playwright's pursuit of aesthetics, injecting — among other things — live and recorded video segments and an episode of low-brow strip-club dancing that's squirmingly accurate in its not-so-quiet desperation. Though her direction is as rapid-fire as Kreitzer's script, it doesn't go very far in clarifying the playwright's intent.

Frank Theatre veteran Phyllis Wright plays Jo with a wry toughness. Jo's loyalties are misplaced and her view of the world tragic in its myopia. Both nature and nurture have slighted her, but Wright finds— well, dignity's not the right word — but the internal gyroscope that drives Jo to do what she does.

The rest of the eight-member cast revolves around Wright's Jo, playing lovers, johns, coroners, cops, shrinks and hookers. It's a rogue's gallery, indeed, but for the most part, the ensemble handles its duties well.

With his expressive face, Tom Sherohman occasionally bug-eyes a little too much, and Maria Asp overreaches once in a while as the born-again Christian who adopts Jo. Ron Menzel is nicely understated as a cop with a brain and a conscience. Bianca Pettis morphs smoothly from being a hooker with a huge Afro one minute and a feminist apologist the next. And Kim Schultz brings the right amount of rough, dissipated entitlement to her role as Jo's lover, Lu.

"Self Defense" is a complicated and flawed play. Though it stumbles on its own construction, it's difficult not to admire its ambition.

Dominic Papatola, St. Paul Pioneer Press

"Self Defense, or death of some salesmen" is caught between playwright Carson Kreitzer's desire to create a fictional heroine unjustly railroaded by the system, and the real-life character who inspired the story.

Staged by Frank Theatre, "Self Defense" is based on the case of Aileen Wuornos, who was convicted in 1992 for killing six men in Florida. In the first case, Wuornos claimed her victim had raped her and she acted in self-defense, an argument rejected by the jury. She then pleaded guilty to the other murders and was sentenced to die. The story was rekindled in November 1992 when an NBC reporter revealed that Wuornos' first victim had spent 10 years in jail for a violent rape in another state, lending credence to her story.

Kreitzer leverages that fact to create a polemic about how Wuornos got a raw deal from a justice system skewed against women and the disenfranchised -- particularly prostitutes. Wuornos was working as a prostitute at the time of the killings.

Here's where the fictional/real world element makes it difficult to accept Kreitzer's work on its own terms. She wants it both ways -- ignoring enough of Wuornos' story to create a sympathetic fictional persona while insisting the real-life case makes a specific point.

The piece overplays its hand, presenting "Jolene" as a rough but honest woman who approaches Messianic status as she awaits the electric chair. When she's told on death row that murders of prostitutes in Florida have dropped from 11 to 4 -- the same number of men she originally was accused of killing -- she exclaims, "I could've saved as many people as I killed." I took that line to indicate Jolene's absorption in self-delusion, but in the greater context of the play it seemed more like a justification.

Kreitzer's writing, fluid and lyrical in many cases, occasionally sounds thinly obvious, as when a police officer begs for permission to arrest Jolene, screaming, "White, middle-aged men are at risk!"

Director Wendy Knox suggests in program notes that Jolene shouldn't be viewed as a victim but it's hard to accept it without a greater sense of ambiguity about the character. Phyllis Wright is a marvelous, natural actor who catches the rage and tics of Jolene.

Supporting roles and arguments are cardboard stereotypes of the wicked system. Nonetheless, a good group of actors led by Maria Asp, Bianca Pettis, Tom Sherohman and Ron Menzel get the essence of what's intended in these caricatures.

Graydon Royce, Minneapolis Star Tribune