The Luck of Friendship

by James Laughlin

  Mr. Martin told me that Jay is better and I’m very relieved about that. Please give him my love and thank Gertrude for the great job on the jackets.

  Ever,

  10.

  Paul Scofield seems quite seriously interested in “Out Cry” but Margaret Leighton is still “dragging her foot” a bit, I think because of ill health, hers and her husband’s. I hope to see her today. Meanwhile I keep refining the texture. I’m thinking of emigrating to England as I feel that there is no longer much chance for me in the American theatre. Too much awful personal publicity and hostile press. I’m looking for a country place, a cottage, in Sussex: could build a heated pool: keep a cow and a goat and get Mary Poppins (my latest secretary) into a dairy-maid’s outfit.

  This afternoon I met Harold Pinter and he was very charming and gave us tickets to his new play this evening. I feel that over here I could maintain stimulating contact with a theatre which is so much better than ours.

  I’m very happy with my new agent at IFA, Bill Barnes. He is young and “with it” and, unlike Audrey, wants me to remain active in the scene.

  Of course, the primary and ultimate object is to remain alive.

  « • »

  Henry [sic] Martin: Frederick R. Martin, then managing editor of ND.

  dust-jackets for the plays: The jackets for the first three volumes of The Theatre of Tennessee Williams.

  I would like to use the sub-title: This change was never made though it is not clear whether the request was overlooked or TW changed his mind.

  “Le Doux Oiseau de la Jeunesse” with Edwige Feuillère: The French premiere of Sweet Bird of Youth starred Edwige Feuillère (1907–1998).

  Paul Scofield: (1922–2008), English stage and film actor.

  (my latest secretary): Most likely Victor Campbell.

  Harold Pinter: (1930–2008), English playwright and director.

  176. TLS—1

 

  1/22/72 [New York]

  DEAR BOB:

  I’m glad you liked the story but I’m afraid this does not presage a new vital era in my life as a writer as you kindly profess to think. Actually I am just about through with writing and after this last production at—guess where?—“The Truck & Warehouse Theatre” off-Broadway—I’m going to pull up stakes in America and settle somewhere abroad and face up to the fact that things are approaching a conclusion.

  I have been a writer nearly all my life, well, from before puberty, even, but it adds up to almost nothing. I mean I’ve discovered nothing. There’s been no answer to the questions. I am sure this must be the feeling of nearly all writers when they sense that their work is finished. Probably all of them, as I did, had hoped that the Sphinx at the edge of the desert would reply to their shouts, but she remains a silent stone enigma at the edge of the desert.

  (Rilke, Duino Elegies, #10.)

  However—

  I have no complaints to make in sharing a common experience. There’s been a lot of satisfactory encounters along the way.

  I don’t mean to sound elegiacal. Take that back. I probably do. Last summer’s experience in Chicago was shattering and I want no more. I won’t let this off-Broadway bit bother me much, in fact I plan to stay through the early pre-views and leave before the opening.

  The Two-Character Play will be done with a pair of fine actors someday, here or in England, but it doesn’t seem at all likely that I will see the production although I continue work on it.—

  Love—

  10.

  « • »

  this last production: Small Craft Warnings opened off-Broadway April 2, 1971, at the Truck and Warehouse Theatre, moving that June to the New Theatre, and ran for a total of six months. TW often declared that any given upcoming production would be his “last.”

  (Rilke, Duino Elegies, #10.): TW loved Rilke and had the character of August paraphrase from this elegy at the end of Something Cloudy, Something Clear.

  experience in Chicago: The second incarnation of The Two-Character Play (after London in 1967) was in Chicago, under the title Out Cry. It opened July 8, 1971, with Donald Madden and Eileen Herlie in the principal roles, directed by George Keathley. Not only was the Chicago run unsuccessful, but it was also the occasion of TW’s break with his agent Audrey Wood. See note to memo from RM to JL of September 27, 1971.

  177. TN—2

  3/29/72 [New York]

  J—

  As you know Tenn’s new play [Small Craft Warnings] (Confessional, now expanded, with one new character and a second act) is going great guns and will open next Sunday night, April 1, Easter night. Bill Barnes has been keeping everyone from Tenn, and I guess rightly, for at least last week he was acting as director and also rewriting every night, and he had moved Tenn from the Plaza because so many people knew he was there.

  Last Sunday night Barnes invited up to 8 ND people to a dress rehearsal, but I seem to have been the only one able to go (and I had come in from the country). I expect I made people like Peter and Carla and even Eleanora who “just couldn’t get to it” feel that they missed a theatrical event, for the theatre was crowded with stars of all kinds, mainly young, and the run through was without break and excellent. I got there late and had to stand at the back, but it was where TW passed at the intermission, and he hugged me warmly and said he wanted to see me.

  Barnes then called Monday, gave me Tenn’s number at the Elysée, said he wanted to see me after the opening for lunch “to talk about everything.” Audrey in the meantime called to say she had heard a rumor that “Barnes was negotiating with a big publisher for TW’s Memoirs.” She didn’t know anything about it but just thought we’d like to know and perhaps ask at some point.

  Today I was up there “for lunch.” This turned out to be something of a misnomer, but I did have a steak sandwich and some coffee while Tenn phoned new speeches for the principal lady (I heard them first from the hallway, and thought for a while that he was in trouble and calling for the police himself and then remembered that this fit into the play). Then people kept arriving and leaving, and Maria was phoning from London. (She presumably has gotten Paul Scofield to play in Out Cry which is of course Two-Character Play, and she and Bowden are to be co-producers, to which Bill Barnes is very opposed.) Then at 12:50 exactly there arrived Mel Gussow and a photographer from the NY Times for an interview. I just stayed on and listened, took part in fact, trying to get the interview which lasted until after 3:00 back from attacks on the critics and on the interviews last year in Esquire & in the Atlantic (Tenn said he fired his lawyer “because he wouldn’t sue the Atlantic”). I think I helped for TW was very edgy about the interview and learned many things about which I’ll tell you in time.

  One thing though I’d like your reaction about. Gussow asked TW if it were true that Doubleday had offered him $50,000 for his Memoirs, and Tenn said it was true, but he hadn’t agreed yet. [ . . . ]

  However, he is going to write a beginning for Esquire he said. I expect of course this is what Barnes wants to talk about.

  My own feeling is that we should not stand in his way, as long as it is clear that all other books come to us. For I don’t imagine we want to get into a sensational kind of work, nor equal this kind of advance, and this is obviously what they want. I can also imagine that Barnes wants some feather in his cap, as indeed this production of Small Craft Warnings (the new title of Confessional of course) [is].

  Barnes had said that he had had inquiries “from other publishers” about this play, and I said that of course we wanted to publish it.

  However, I would like your earliest reaction about the Memoirs. We could of course pony up the advance. Even though sales are behind we have lots of “reserve.”

  After learning of a real fight in the office on Monday between Gertrude [Huston] and Carla, with Gertrude leaving in the elevator with George [Zournas] and saying she was “Resigning,” I called her Tuesday AM and asked to go to the opening with me (and Fred and Kathy [Martin]).
They are all coming for an early supper at 77 Washington Place. Audrey by the way tells me she’s going to be “out of town.”

  Bob

  « • »

  Peter: Peter Glassgold began work as an editor at New Directions in 1970 and helped MacGregor put together the five initial volumes of The Theatre of Tennessee Williams. Made editor in chief in 1983, Glassgold left to pursue his own writing in 1993 but remained editor at large and was JL’s preferred editor for his own poetry books, including The Collected Poems of James Laughlin 1935–1997, published by ND in 2014. Glassgold and his wife did, in fact, attend a performance of Small Craft Warnings with Robert MacGregor and George Zournas sometime after the opening.

  Carla: Carla Packer, production manager for New Directions at the time.

  Eleanora: Ellie Sassani, publicity director for New Directions at the time.

  Bowden: Charles Bowden produced several TW plays.

  Mel Gussow: Gussow was a theater critic for the New York Times.

  178. TLS—1

  4/4/72 [Norfolk]

  DEAR BOB—

  Many thanks for your report on Tenn’s affairs. Called office this AM but you were at home so gave the message for you to Fred that I’m sure we don’t want to get into “uptown” bidding on Tenn’s autobiography IF he writes it. But I certainly hope you can hold on to the plays, the present one, and those to come. Also poems and stories. Please let me know what to say if you think I ought to write him anything. I don’t know quite how to put it, I mean we must be sure he understands that we’d love to do the auto if it were in our price range, but we must conserve cash or we wouldn’t be able to do young poets and translations that don’t sell . . .

  JL

  « • »

  179. TL—2

  May 22, 1972 [Norfolk]

  DEAR TENNESSEE:

  I’m sorry to have been such a lousy correspondent for so long a time. As Bob may have reported to you, I have been deeply engaged in the editing of Tom Merton’s Asian Journal, which he left in a very rough state, almost stenographic, but I know he wanted it to be published, and so I have been trying to do what he would have done with it to finish it, and also trying to get all of the Asian terms spelled right—he spelled phonetically in the handwritten journal—which has meant all kinds of correspondence all over the East. Then, on top of that, we went out to Utah, as usual, for some skiing with the children, during their Easter holiday, and I managed to take a slide on some ice, and ran into a big direction post, about four inches square, at high velocity, and why I wasn’t killed I don’t know, I guess because it didn’t hit my head, and no bones were broken, but I had a sore muscle which kept me crippled for about a month. But, happily, that is over now, and I was able to get down to New York the other day, and one of the first things I did, of course, was to take in a performance of Small Craft Warnings, and I wanted you to know at once what a wonderful play I think it is, and how both Ann and I liked it enormously. It held us absolutely absorbed, and not only because of that remarkable performance by the girl who played Leona. She is terrific, and I think this is one of your greatest character studies. But all of the characters are good, and each one very moving in his or her own way, and the way you alternate between action and poetic revery, or “confessional” as you first called it in the original version, is very beautiful, and I think most effective theatre. There is great poetic beauty in many of the passages, and also a great deal of human wisdom, and beyond that the touching effect of one’s feelings of your compassion for suffering humanity. I think it is a very beautiful play, one of your finest, and I am happy that it is getting the recognition it deserves. I talked a little bit with the boy in the ticket window and he said they were getting good audiences and expected to be running right through the summer. And, needless to say, I’m very happy that we will be bringing out the book, and I believe it is already in composition, and that Fred and Bob are pushing it as rapidly as possible.

  Are you writing any poetry these days? You know how I love your poetry. I know you have sometimes felt discouraged because of the neglect it has suffered at the hands of the academic critics, but surely you must understand that their hearts are as constipated as their bellies, and not let it upset you. Your poems move me in a way that those of no one else do, and I know that my feeling is shared by many readers. So, while I don’t want to push you, I think it is time we should be thinking about another volume of poetry, when you have enough gathered together that you like. Do let me know how matters stand, on this, if you have a moment. I know that between us, Bob and I have in our folders half a dozen poems which haven’t been in books but I suspect that you may have a great many others around, in various stages of completion, which you could perhaps finish up without too much difficulty.

  [ . . . ]

  I do hope that I will have a chance to see you the next time you are back in New York. And, meanwhile, do think about more poems, and congratulations again on Small Craft Warnings, which is a beautiful, beautiful play.

  As ever,

  [James Laughlin]

  « • »

  180. TLS—1

  <7/?[sic]/72> [New York]

  DEAR JAY:

  It was such a joy to receive that long, wonderful letter from you. You know how badly I need reassurance about my work. I always have and more so now than ever as the work becomes more difficult with age despite the fact there seems so much more to say.

  “S.C.W.” [Small Craft Warnings] is minor. But I have corrected the proofs, I hope accurately, and I know that you will make of it an attractive looking book. Sometimes someone will bring me all the old first editions from New Directions (of my work) and I am always thrilled by the beauty of the way the books look—at least before opened for readings. . . .

  I am working, now, on a long play. Wish me luck. And I wish you all the best.

  Love,

  Tenn.

  « • »

  a long play: At about this time TW began drafts of what would eventually become The Red Devil Battery Sign.

  181. TL—2

  August 11, 1972 [Norfolk]

  DEAR TENN:

  It was so good to have your letter, not long ago, you sounded well and happy, and I hope that work is going along well on the long play. Needless to say, I’m all eagerness to see it when you have it completed.

  I think you underrate Small Craft Warnings when you pass it off as being just “minor.” To me so much of life, both its tragedies and its heroism, and above all its pathos, and whatever it is that keeps people going in the face of it all, is right there, “in cameo,” if you will, but all crystallized in such a wonderfully poetic way. I came away from the theatre that evening both saddened—because it seemed so unjust that life has to be so rough on so many people—and yet wonderfully heartened, by the very fact that they do find ways to make it meaningful to themselves, small, pathetic ways, perhaps, but nevertheless ways that work—and all this you have understood and put down so delicately, and yet so strongly.

  I’ve not been down too much to the New York office this summer—I was finishing up the work on the Merton Asian Journal, which is finished now, and then starting to pitch in on the selection of material for the next Annual—but I gather from Fred and Bob that things are on schedule with the book, and that we ought to have it out in the early fall, and I hope you’ll be pleased with it.

  You made me very happy saying what the books meant to you, and let me reply, in turn, that they mean just as much, and perhaps even more, to me. I love the original editions, remembering something special about each one, and then when I look at the sturdy volumes of the “theatre” set, it makes me feel that I have been part of something very important in the course of American drama and literature, something which was only possible because of your friendship and loyalty.

  Could I come back to asking whether you’ve been writing any new poems? Just the other day, there came up a copy of Fred’s memo to the production department that In the Winter of Cities was soon
to go into its fourth printing in paperback, so you really must think of yourself, always, seriously, as a poet, and write poems when you can. Is there by any chance some new one you may have around that we could put into next spring’s Annual, ND 26, that will be, for which I’m assembling material now? I would love to have you in the Annual again, it seems some years since you have been there, and you belong there so much.

  [ . . . ]

  Very best, as ever,

  James Laughlin

  « • »

  182. TLS—1

  12/15/72 [New Orleans]

  DEAR JAY AND BOB:

  This last time I got a letter from you all, you asked if I had a new poem. Well, here is one, a grim celebration of the festive season.

  I leave here (New Orleans) for Key West tomorrow but expect to be in New York on or about Christmas, skipping the first week or ten days of rehearsals of Out Cry—my nerves are in no condition to encourage the director and cast.

  I plan to emigrate to England the day before the play opens, and I do mean emigrate.

  Four more years is eight too many for me, since a bit of humanity still survives in my heart.

  I’m also hoping to find a place in England for Rose.

  I saw her just before I flew down here. She arrived at my door with the chauffeur and said: “Tom, this is Charlie, I’ve invited him to dinner!”

  —Always a great lady . . .

  Love and Xmas cheers,

  Tenn.

 

  « • »

  a grim celebration of the festive season: Possibly “I Think the Strange, the Crazed, the Queer.”

  Out Cry: The revised version of The Two-Character Play titled Out Cry opened on Broadway March 1, 1973, and closed after twelve performances. Directed by Peter Glenville, the play starred Michael York and Cara Duff-McCormick.