Taking Graf’s ‘Lessons’ to Heart

“Movies will make you famous; television will make you rich; but theater will make you good.’ Whether the ambiguity is intended or not, for playwright Wendy Graf the theater has proven the best form to tackle ‘serious stories, questions of politics and religion,’ and has intensified her moral aesthetic. After enjoying a successful career in television, Mandeville Canyon resident Graf left the episodic, small arc of that genre to focus on writing plays. Her first three, fueled by her search for her own Jewish identity, formed a trilogy centered on themes of faith and identity. The second in the trio, ‘Lessons,’ which was directed by Adam Davidson and starred Mare Winningham and Hal Linden, debuted in the summer of 2005. The show, which was well received and sold out for its brief run, will reappear in a new guise opening tonight at the West Coast Jewish Theatre in West Hollywood. For theatergoers who saw the first iteration, Graf’s revised ‘Lessons’ explores onstage what had previously been reported offstage in the play’s original production. While the storyline remains the same–Graf’s humor and humanity intact–she comes closer to the truth of the protagonists as complex, nuanced human beings. In the current production, Graf and this time director Gordon Davidson (Adam’s father) pose questions that emerged as they deepened the exploration of the journey that the two protagonists make, each from a very different starting point. It’s rare that a playwright will revisit a produced work for a variety of reasons, but more often because they’ve moved on. ‘Most writers think their work is done,’ says Davidson, a Santa Monica Canyon resident. In fact, Graf, too, had moved on when the West Coast Jewish Theater called in January wanting to include ‘Lessons’ in the 2007-2008 season. ‘Artistically, I was ready to move on to a new project, I didn’t have the distance to revisit it and I had already gotten involved with ‘Leipzig,'[which debuted in October 2006],’ she says. By last spring, Graf had achieved some distance and agreed to take a second look at the script. She restructured it into one act, worked out some problematic plot issues, then sent it to Adam Davidson, whose busy schedule prevented him from taking the job, suggested to Wendy that his dad might be interested. She sent Gordon the script, and three weeks later, Gordon called Wendy and told her he was ‘excited about the possibilities. My son got me the job,’ Gordon quipped in an interview with the Palisadian-Post. ‘Low paying’a 99-seat theater, but” This would be Gordon Davidson’s first directorial gig since retiring after 30 years as artistic director of the Center Theater Group in 2004, where he oversaw productions at the Ahmanson, Mark Taper and Kirk Douglas theaters. ‘I responded to the humanity in Wendy’s play,’ Gordon says. ‘Here was this man, Ben, who starts with no faith, no roots and no family’he had just lost his wife. His tennis partner, a rabbi, suggests that he might consider a change in venue, following such a serious loss. He suggests Israel; it may even awaken his Jewish roots. He might study Hebrew. ‘Ben responds to the challenge,’ Davidson continues. ‘He likes to win, he’s a salesman after all, and so he finds a teacher. The teacher, Ruth, is former rabbi who has lost her faith along the way, she can’t even praise God any more. ‘This is a story about these two people in pain who have an encounter. As they seek answers, I responded to the power of faith and the difficulty of holding onto it. ‘We all wonder why things happen to us and try to understand the lessons that life is teaching us. By couching her story within the context of the Torah, Graf reiterated the value of questioning, as Judaism welcomes change and questions to God.’ While Davidson and Graf were intrigued with the idea of working together, each viewed the initial meetings as a trial period. ‘I didn’t want to do it unless we shared the same questions, philosophical, theological and aesthetic,’ Davidson says. ‘Wendy jumped in and learned to trust me, although she was skittish at first.’ For her part Wendy, while excited to be working with the respected theater veteran, feared that he might overpower her. But as they worked through the summer, they bonded with the play, bonded with the characters and slowly created two people who, through their lessons, learn to reconnect with another person, with faith and with the community. ‘Our process kind of mirrored the process in the play in a lot of ways,’ Graf says. ‘We weren’t tool masters, but together asked questions. Gordon was kind of my spiritual guide. He inspired, encouraged and pushed me to explore and to go deeper.’ “Lessons,” starring Hal Linden and Larissa Laskin, plays through December 23 at the Lee Strasberg Creative Center’s Marilyn Monroe Theatre, 7936 Santa Monica Blvd. For tickets, please call (323) 650-7777 or visit www.westcoastjewishtheatre.org.