Holly and Division

It was a cold Saturday night in the spring of 1969. We were all gathered for a cast party since we had just given our final performance of Arthur Miller's "All My Sons". I was fairly new to high school drama, and George Deever had been my first real part. We were all still feeling pretty euphoric since our final performance had been particularly moving and quite successful. Everyone was chatty and excited, feeling, in our minds at least, that we had all just been part of something important. And it had been special to be sure.

High school parties then were coca-cola cheese curl extravaganzas. This one was no different. People were discussing their parts and how their character wove into the story as a whole. Others searched for symbolism and greater truths. My friend Bill and I were mostly just interested in soda pop and potato chips.

Eventually someone produced a guitar and it began to be passed around to the various people who could play. Soon the room was full of people singing along to "Michael Row Your Boat Ashore" and "Rock My Soul In the Bosom of Abraham". I watched the whole thing with total indifference. I didn't know those songs and I didn't care to learn them.

Eventually the guitar made its way around to me. I hesitated because I wasn't the greatest player in the world, but I decided to try my hand anyway. I put my head down, closed my eyes, and took off on a growling, rousing version of Bob Dylan's "Maggie's Farm". "I ain't gonna work on Maggie's Farm no more. I got a head full of I-dee-yas, driving me insane...." When I got done, the room was absolutely quiet. I looked up and some of the girls had been staring at me and were now starting to giggle. They rolled their eyes, and gave me sideways glances as they asked incredulously, "What was that?" It was obvious I'd made a fool out of myself. I decided I needed to look for more snacks and simply went outside to get away.

Out in the cold night air, I began to see things as clearly as I could see my breath slipping out like puffs from a steam engine. I began to see that these girls, who didn't know a songwriter from a typewriter, would never get it. They would never see The Monkees as a corporate marketing ploy, and never see Dylan as the quintessential singer-songwriter. Somehow there in the lonely night of Wyoming Michigan on the corner of Holly and Division, I figured out some empirical truths about art. And how public acceptence has never been an accurate gauge of artistic achievement. I mean, Donnie Osmond sold millions of records for crying out loud, but nobody will ever accuse him of being a great 'artist'. Maybe Arthur Miller was to blame for my realizations; he'd just sent me spinning through empirical truths.

Suddenly I sensed another presence. I turned and saw that I wasn't alone. My hostess and fellow cast member Shawn was there. She came up close to me and whispered in my ear "I thought it was wonderful." And then she was gone. And so was my anxiety.

I have never forgotten that night. I'll always be grateful to Arthur Miller for writing that brilliant play. I'll always be grateful to our director Jim Hoffman for giving me a chance. But mostly I'll always be grateful to Shawn for her simple words that were spoken at just the right time.

I had an opportunity to direct "All My Sons" for a local theater group a year ago or so, and many memories came flooding back. I remembered certain lines and phrases, and how other people delivered them 35 years earlier. But mostly I remembered Shawn and her brilliant, inspired performance as Mother Keller, and her sensitivity to a friend.