Eugene O'Neill: Life as Art

He is considered one of America's premier playwrights. His early experimental plays stretched the boundaries of theater. He transformed the ancient Greek use of masks and Shakespeare's soliloquies into a modern format. He employed psychological ideas and motifs to shape the tragical circumstances of his personal life into great art. He won 4 Pulitzer Prizes for Literature. And now, Eugene O'Neill and his plays are the subject of a 3-month festival here in DC.

Tonight, 4 O'Neill experts engaged in a panel discussion on how O'Neill's life influenced his work. Entitled O:'Neill: My Life in Art, it was held at the Arena Stage at the Mead Center for American Theater.

The panel, moderated by University of Maryland theater history professor Frank Hildy, included Eugene O'Neill Festival producer Erin Dailey, senior theater researcher Aaron Malkin, and actor Rob Janson, who has written a one-man play about O'Neill and has starred as O'Neill's alter-ego in his masterpiece Long Day's Journey into Night.

Dailey said she immersed herself in O'Neill, known for both his on-stage and off-stage tragedies, in the months prior to the festival. "It was a very dark period in my life," Daily joked. "I was amazed about how much of himself he poured into his work."

Janson, who said his first encounter with O'Neill's powerful works "changed my life," agreed with Daily, noting "the blurred line" where the playwright's life and work "runs into one another."

Hildy said O'Neill's greatest contribution to American theater may be that "he was the 1st playwright to look at his own life experiences in a serious way. He was using the plays as a kind of therapy for himself"

The 1st of the festival's 3 major productions, Ah, Wilderness, is typical O'Neill in that it is based on personal experiences, but starkly different from the rest of his work in that it is comedic in nature.

"He put a different kind of spin on this play. This is a play of what he would have liked his family life to be like. He knew people who had that kind of childhood. People (who see the play) say 'I didn't know you could feel so warm at the end of an Eugene O'Neill play," Malkin said.

Dailey said that the greatest of all tragedies surrounding O'Neill is that despite his popular and critical success, the playwright never believed he truly achieved his ambitious writing aims. "He showed that the life we live every day is art. But it's so sad that he never really felt he got it," she said.

Tales, Tidbits, and Tips
The coming weeks are a treasure for O'Neill fans who can make it to DC or live in the Washington area. The main part of the O'Neill Festival consists of 3 of his better-known works. Ah, Wilderness is running until April 8. Strange Interlude ends April 29. Long Day's Journey into Night concludes on May 6. The festival also showcases several original works, readings, rehearsals, and discussions. You can check out the complete schedule by clicking here.