I'm Claudia Catania and you're listening to playing on air you are about to hear pouf by Lynn Nottage directed by surrett Scott it features Audra McDonald Tonya Pinkins and Keith Randall Smith it is the present we are in a kitchen when I count to 10 I don't want to see you I don't want to hear you 1 2 3 4 damn you to hell Samuel Samuel Samuel where'd you go don't fool with me now I'm not in the mood Samuel I didn't mean it really I got be good if you come back now come on now dinner's waiting stop your foolishness and let's sit down oh don't be cross with me sure I forgot to pick up your shirt for tomorrow I can wash another I'll do it right now right now Sam you hear me maybe I did never intend to wash your shirt Florence honey could you come on down for a moment there's been a little accident quickly please quickly Pease quickly quickly please Hey ah oh I can't find Samuel only this pair of spectacles on the floor you all right what happened hmm smells like you firm something Oh devil is that over there Samuel I think that pile of ashes over there is Sammy oh oh what has he done now no no no no it's it's him the ashes it's him ja what's wrong with you did he finally drive you out your mind I knew something was gonna happen sooner or later now my month long why are you scaring dial nine-one-one I think I killed him what I killed him I killed Sam go again he's dead dead dead dead oh no stop it I don't have time for this I am going back upstairs you know how Samuel hates to find me here when he gets home gonna get me this time hmm y'all can have your little joke I'm not part of it did you really do it this time I don't know how it happened it just did why are you whispering I don't want to talk too loud something else is liable to disappear where's his body you burned it I don't know I think so well either you did or you didn't what do you mean you're talking murder Loreen not oven setting he's begun playing well how many times have I heard you talk about being rid of him how many times have we sat at this table and laughed about the many ways you could do it and how many times have you done it none look here a pair of cheap spectacles no that's all that's left and you know how much I hate these you ever seen her without him no he counted to four and poof disappeared I sweat I don't bring the Lord into this just yet I said I don't know what you got to sip on I don't know whether to have a stiff shot of scotch or a glass of champagne oh my god is a sherry it has got to do okay well tell me a little bit more than that he will take your time he was standing and he exploded did that mother hit you again no he exploded boom right in front of me he was shouting like he does being all colored and then he raised up his big crusty hand to hit me and poof he was gone I barely got the words out I'm looking down at a pile of ash oh that's good pull me a little bit more ciao I give you this in terms of color you've matched my husband Edgar the story King he came in at 6:00 Sunday morning talking about he hit someone with his car and had to spend all night trying to outrun the police I feel sorry for him turns out he was playing poker with his paycheck no less you don't want to know how I found out but I did you think I'm lying I certainly hope so Loreen for your sake and my hearts Samuel always said if I raise my voice something horrible will happen and it did I'm a witch The Devil's spawn you've been watching too much television never seen anything like this on television I wish I had then I'd know what to do there's no question I'm a witch yeah don't tell me you've been messing with the Mojo women again what did I tell you will you sit down now she's not coming back oh no how goody it would be a miracle two in one day who I could be canonized worse yeah he could be all that needs to happen it's for my palms to bleed and I'll be eternally remembered as say Loreen the patron of battered wives and women from across the country will make pilgrimages to me laying pies and pot roast at my feet and asking the good Saint to make their husbands turn to dust how often does a man like Samuel get damned to hell you smoking crack do I look like I am hell I seen old biddies coming out to crack houses talking about they would do in church works Flores please be help I'm very close to the edge I don't know what to do next what do i do i do i sweep Aman do I call the police Oh God no but what if it's his mother she knows I should be mourning I should be praying huh I should be thinking of the burial but all that keeps popping into my mind is what I will wear on television when I share my horrible a wonderful story with the studio audience you made me a killer Flores and you remember what a gentle child I was I'm a killer killer that word about you lightly even in Jess talk like that gets around think you don't lock me up if you misplace words and up I'll probably get the death penalty Enid now what they do with women like me murderesses folks have done time for less thank you just what I need to hear well what do you expect that I was going to throw up my arms and congratulate you why'd you have to go and lose your mind at this time of day well I got a pot of rice on the stove and Edgar's about to walk in the door and wonder where his damn food is Oh and he's gonna start in on me about all the nothing I've been doing during the day and why I can't work and then he'll mention how clean you keep your home and I don't know how I'm gonna look at him in the eye without I'm sorry Florence really I don't know what I done but it done you swear on your right tip I swear both of both your breasts Lorene you know what will happen if you're lying both your breasts Loreen oh sweet sweet Jesus he must have done something truly terrible no more than usual I just couldn't take being hit one more time you've taken a thousand blows from that man couldn't you have turn the cheek and waited I'd helped you pack like we talked about Oh a pile of ash hmm I could blow on him and he just disappeared cross the linoleum just like that should I be feeling remorse or regret or some other r-word strange the jubilant like a long prom night when Samuel and I first made love that's the feeling oh it's like a ton of bricks has been lifted from my shoulders yeah really yeah you selfish wish what we made a pact No you've broken it we agreed that when things got real bad for both of us we you know together do I have to go back upstairs of that what next thought you tell me I do I don't know I don't know I don't know well now you got me Lorene I'm truly at a loss for words everybody always told me keep your place Lorene mmm-hmm my place the silent spot on the couch with a wine cooler in my hand and a pleasant smile that warmed the heart mm-hmm all this time I didn't know why he was so afraid for me to say anything speak up poof I never been by myself except him two weeks when he won the office pool and went off to Reno with his cousin Mitchell wouldn't tell me where he was going till I got the postcard but the Cowboys smoking a hundred cigarettes didn't Sonny lock and look good last night at Caroline's he looked good didn't he know what you sitting on Daniels jacket his favorite Jackie's gonna kill me but guess what no no no no I'm sorry they look at that never cleans out his pockets what's that a ticket stub and he said he didn't go to the movies last night working late picture of his motorcycle hmm social security card driver's license oh look at that from my wedding hmm I look good didn't I hmm there were some good things what are you doing I'm throwing it away can you believe it out of my mouth those words made him disappear all these years and just words Florence that's all they were I'm afraid I won't ever get those words out I'll start resenting you honey I'm afraid won't anything change for me I've been to that place yeah but now I wish I could relax those old lines on my forehead for a minute maybe Eadie has never done me the way Samuel did you but he sure took the better part of my life not yet Florence yeah I have the children to think of right you you can think up a hundred things before then come upstairs with me we'll wait together for Edgar and then you can spit out the world but now I can't do that yes you can oh come on now well I guess my mornings are not gonna be any different you can say that for certain and I guess they won't be I couldn't say that but you got a broom and a dustpan and you don't need anything more than that he was a bastard and nobody will care that he's gone phone's gonna start ringing soon people start asking soon they'll care what's your crying speaking your mind maybe I should mail him to his mother well I I owe her that I feel bad for her she didn't understand how it was I can't just throw him away and pretend like it didn't happen can i I didn't see anything but a pile of ashes far as I know a little careless and burn the chicken he was always threatening not to come back I heard him it would have been me eventually yes I should call the police or someone Wow what you gonna tell him about all those times they refuse to help about all those nights you slept in my bed cuz you were afraid to stay down here about the time he nearly took out your eye cause you flipped the television channel no you got it girl hmm goodbye to the fatty meats and salty food goodbye to the bourbon and the bologna sandwiches goodbye to the smell of his feet his breath his bow move goodbye why you sniffing those ashes Samuel just checking goodbye Samuel I'll let the police know he's missing tomorrow why not the next day chickens warming in the oven you're welcome to stay child I got a pot of rice on the stove kids are probably acting out an Edgar well listen I'll stop by tomorrow for dinner Edgar wouldn't stand for that Cod maybe cards what you're gonna do with that pile ashes sweep them under the rug honey you just heard poof by Lynn Nottage directed by Sir ed Scott it featured Keith Randall Smith as Samuel Tonya Pinkins as Florence and Audra McDonald as Lorene we have Lynn Nottage the author of poof here thank you for joining us thank you poof premiered in Kentucky at actors theatre of Louisville in 1993 what's it like revisiting it 20 years a Pulitzer Prize and multiple awards later well it's sort of wonderful because poof is a very special to play to me it was the first play that I wrote after I had decided that I was never going to write another play ever again so it's not true that it was your first play it was not my first play it was my first professionally produced play and it was certainly the first play that I wrote after I die consider coming out of retirement and it's sort of a long slow story I don't know whether you have time but I will tell it anyway after I graduated from the Yale School of Drama where I went for a playwriting I was feeling as though playwriting was a very decadent thing and I'd gone from first grade through to graduate school without having any break and I decided that I wanted to do something more substantive and immediately after graduate school I went to work for Amnesty International I sold my computer decided that I was going to make a life in human rights you know I was going to change the world and after being there for three years I had this experience which was transformative and really what sort of lifted me out of the human rights world and back into the creative world this woman named Donna Ferraro who's a brilliant photographer late one evening had brought in some images that she had taken at a women's shelter for women who had been battered and there were images that she captured the moment the women entered through the door and I went through all of these rather stunning very disturbing very emotional photographs and I had a strong visceral response and I didn't know what to do with those emotions because I felt like I can't do anything for these women but after she left I went into my office I closed my door sort of cleared all of the piles of papers that had been accumulated and I wrote a play and that play was poof in the published edition of you play there is an author's note prior to the dialogue in which you write nearly half the women on death row in the United States were convicted of killing abusive husbands so this notion of domestic abuse came after these photographs yeah the the photographs were images of women who had been battered by their husbands who were seeking refuge and were fleeing and so I was really interested in that moment of liberation when a woman finally is capable of finding her voice and saying no more you know I'm going to I'm going to reclaim my life so given that you were working for Amnesty International and that there are yes many professions that affect change and highlight social inequities you discovered that you could in fact effect more change writing plays well it's interesting I don't know that I could effect more change but I certainly could effect some change you know I had while I was working one of my frustrations is that I kept sort of hitting my head up against the wall it's like no matter how hard we work it seemed as though nothing was getting better and I thought why can't I marry my passion with my purpose and my passion was writing as finding creative ways to tell stories that have resonance you know beyond sort of my own my own little family and my own little circle and so I think in many ways I discovered with poof that I could write a play that could speak universally to what women were experiencing in ways that I couldn't with a press release when I was at M Misti International because very often I was dependent on whether a news outlet would pick up that press release and sometimes when they did they'd only pick up the statistics but it really wouldn't give a sense of what was the struggle behind that that number and that visceral feeling that visceral yes how do you know the women in proof for example I mean you might have seen those photographs but is there a connection to those women other than observation at the time when I wrote the play I didn't know many women who had been abused but since writing that play I've realized that I did know many women that were abused eighty-fourth in and also as I get older and yeah as I get older and have encountered many more people in my life I discovered that they're friends of mine who were reluctant when they were younger to speak out and in many respects proof is about that ability for a woman to finally use her voice to say no and I think it's really hard for a lot of young women who blame themselves when they're being abused and sort of suffer in silence I have a very dear friend who said she was abused on a regular basis by her husband but she felt ashamed to say anything because she thought somehow she had failed shame is powerful proof deals with domestic violence clearly how has its subject been received nationally versus internationally puffers had a really interesting journey immediately after it premiered at the Actors Theatre of Louisville it was picked up by other theaters and I think for a period of time it was their most produced one-act play across the country that came out of that that festival I don't know that that's true anymore but what's more interesting to me is the international journey that the play has made it was seized upon in many Latin American countries in Asia surprisingly and then most recently I had an encounter with an actor who had been in Tehran and he said he'd seen proof performed by two of Iran's foremost female actresses and they did it without perta they were unveiled and it caused this tremendous in sensation and I think in many ways it's done because it's universal I mean women throughout the world are suffering from domestic abuse women throughout the world are suffering in silence and I think that this speaks very loudly to them it's accessible it is very accessible and I think more than it being accessible I think it's funny and I think that that humor can disarm people in ways to get them to listen more deeply I even felt a little to me almost like Ethel and Lucy at some level I mean not to diminish it in any way but that tight friendship and the humor well it's interesting I always wondered whether Lucy when she closed the door got a little smack from Ricky [Laughter] I read Lynn that one of your plays intimate apparel is being made into an opera is that true that is indeed true I'm in the process of finishing the libretto for intimate apparel which was commissioned by the Met the composer is Ricky Ian Gordon and I'm very very excited that's very very exciting what is involved in in revisiting and adapting a play into an opera well it's for me it's sort of lovely because it's a very intimate play it was a play that had written immediately after my mom died and it was something that had written for her and so in revisiting and I feel like I'm going home then I'm sort of revisiting a really dear wonderful old friend and in some respects I also get to sort of nip and tuck things that always bothered me and improve upon lines or take out lines does the fame and tension and power to some extent that come with success with your success as a playwright make your life easier or harder well may I say that life is a playwright is never easy you know it's not it's not like being an actor who's recognizable and someone see it sees you on screen or sees you on the stage I mean we really write in isolation and very rarely does someone recognize you when you're walking down the street and very rarely even to someone recognize you when you say your name just because theater doesn't occupy the same space in our cultural landscape that say television are filmed us it's so no difference so I mean yeah well there are there differences within the theater community definitely but I don't know in the world at large whether my life has changed significantly we've been speaking with Lynn Nottage the author of poof it's been a delight and an honor to welcome you to playing on air thank you so much for staying and talking oh thank you so much you've been listening to playing on air great Americans sure plays with great American actors theme and play music by Tom coach am recording and sound design by John Kilgore associate producer Michelle O'Brien literary and development management Bonnie antosha distributed by PR X public radio exchange we invite you to visit our website at playing on air dot org where you can stream short plays and find information about our artists and plays join us on Facebook or Twitter and subscribe to our podcast on iTunes while you're there leave us a review we value your opinion for playing on air I'm your host Claudia Catania thanks for listening [Applause] Oh