Esteemed actor Jonathan McMurtry, a veteran of more than 170 productions at the Old Globe, co-stars with Christine Marie Brown in the West Coast premiere of Joanna McClelland Glass’ poignant comedy “Trying.” Director Richard Seer displays his customary compassion and humanity in staging the 2004 work, which continues in the Globe’s Cassius Carter Centre Stage through May 21.
Those old enough to remember former Secretary General Francis Biddle (1886-1968), a liberal New England aristocrat educated at Groton School and Harvard Law, may get a special kick out of Biddle’s memoirs as he dictates them to his new young secretary, Sarah Schorr (Brown). Sarah has been hired Katherine, Biddle’s unseen wife, after a series of abrupt secretarial departures by women older than she.
Based on the playwright’s youthful experience as Biddle’s secretary, McClelland’s play rings true in many ways. Affectionately, she captures the brilliant man in self-aware and fragmented old age, his penchant for repetition, his irascible nature, his forgetfulness. Standoffish and abrupt, nearly abusive at first, Biddle comes to care deeply for his young assistant, who buoys him up and helps him clear his desk, if not his mind.
It is a loving revelation of faded genius seeking a graceful means to let go of the physical body. McMurtry’s depiction of Biddle’s infirmities is so painful that those with arthritis will find it more difficult than usual to rise at the end of powerfully affecting two-and-a-half-hour play. Brown’s embodiment of the tenacious “Sarah with an H” is understated and compassionate.
The play may disappoint those who want more about Biddle’s youthful apprenticeship to Chief Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, his long-time association with Groton classmate Franklin Delano Roosevelt, his experiences as the chief American judge on the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg, and his opposition of Japanese Internment during World War II. McClelland’s play concerns the private Biddle she knew, and by extension, all the extraordinary men, once so occupied and active in the world, now fraught with the reality of old age. Any younger person privileged to have such a man in his or her life will be profoundly moved by the play.
Readers may construe from these statements that “Trying” is a depressing work. It is not. It is an uplifting, affirming, important piece that does not flinch. As theater, it is an extraordinarily intimate two-hander with outstanding roles, in this case brilliantly performed and directed. Truly, “Trying” pays off.
“Trying” continues through May 21 at the Cassius Carter Centre Stage, The Old Globe, 1363 Old Globe Way, Balboa Park. Tickets range from $19 to $56. Visit www.theoldglobe.org or call (619) 23-GLOBE.
