John Guare is known for his comedies Six Degrees of Separation and House of Blue Leaves. The playwright, however, considers a different work to be his masterpiece. Guare’s Lydie Breeze Trilogy has just been performed as a continuous entity for the first time by EgoPo Classic Theater in Philadelphia. Although these are three full-length plays, Philadelphia’s Barrymore committee agreed to judge Lydie Breeze as a single unit for its awards in October, and I’ll treat it that way here. I attended one of the company’s day-long presentations when audiences experienced all three plays with meal breaks between. I also saw each of the plays on individual days. Guare started writing the epic in 1973 and the first installment came to the stage in 1982, but this marks its premiere as the single theatrical experience Guare intended. The trilogy follows a group of idealistic characters and their attempts to create a better society. It begins with Lydie's childhood in the age of American whaling on Nantucket, progresses through the Civil War, then American Utopianism, before ending at the birth of the twentieth century. Guare has melded poetic lyricism, comedy and drama. Lane Savadove, EgoPo’s founder and artistic director, says “The giant sweeping epic joins a personal spiritual journey with the landscape of American history. They are heartfelt and vulnerable while containing soaring theatrical lyricism. It hit me that John had created a new American Expressionism that carried forward the legacy of Tennessee Williams and early Eugene O’Neill.” Many stunning images are presented by director Savadove, elevating the trilogy beyond the words on the page. There’s no question that Savadove is the outstanding director of the year for melding three disparate plays into a cohesive whole. The configuration of the theater’s interior changes according to each play’s content. Repeatedly, the audience experiences action moving toward them from great distances, upon the unsteady foundations of sand or water. Ropes are ever-present, underlining elements in the drama. The first play, originally named “Women and Water” and now named Cold Harbor after the 1864 battles near Richmond Virginia, is an adventure story with vaudeville elements. The second play, Aipotu, is named for a commune which the characters establish in New England after the war and has the form of intimate psychological realism. In the third play, the next generation grapples with the crumbling foundation of their family and with the physical crumbling of their island, causing us to think about the changes in topography caused by today’s global warming. Originally named “Home” and now re-titled Madaket Road, this third play recounts the internal struggles of the participants in the style of fantastical expressionism. In Cold Harbor, a Union commander orders waves of men to charge to their deaths, while army nurse Lydie Breeze collects their valuables to deliver to their loved ones back home if the soldiers should die in action. Lydie and friends speak of a vision for a new America after the conflict. Markéta Fantová’s set is a wooden fortress and a Union Army sergeant orders wave upon wave of soldiers to advance toward the audience as if we are the Confederates. He cynically promises them “women and water” on the other side. Mounds of bodies pile up in vividly creative staging by Savadove. Flashbacks show us racial tensions onboard the whaling ship owned by Lydie’s father and the rebellion of Lydie’s brother against their dad. Other plots reveal corruption within the army, and the development of the underground railway that transported black people to freedom. A sea voyage, reminiscent of Ulysses’s, is captained by Lydie’s father, and it leads to a mutiny. While not at the sublime level of the “Iliad” and “Odyssey,” Guare’s creation does share Homer’s epic style of story-telling. The Lydie Breeze trilogy also uses the Greek design of major plot changes taking place off stage; we hear about big events rather than seeing them. Melanie Julian gives a strong performance as Lydie, who develops from an idealistic caregiver into a determined woman of passion. Mark Knight is an appealing presence as Lydie’s father. Dan (David Girard) seems like an opportunist who wants to eat, drink, and have sex with Lydie, and we wonder if we’ll find more depth to him. Joshua (Charlie DelMarcelle) is an idealistic person who urges Lydie to serve a higher cause. Amos (Ed Swidey) is a simple soul who seems to be an amiable companion, but maybe more. Cold Mountain has a cast of 24. Then a dramatic shift occurs at the start of Aipotu, which employs a cast of only four. They named the commune Aipotu because that is utopia spelled backwards, but visionary high-mindedness gives way to jealousies and bickering among Lydie, her husband Joshua and her sometime-lover Dan. Their comrade on the island is the stammering, simple-minded Amos who is the butt of taunts by the others. There are surprises in the first act of Aipotu, but there’s outright shock when we get into its second act. The transformation packs such a punch that I won’t ruin the surprise by disclosing what happens. The story of these individuals gains extra resonance as Guare’s script involves them with politics in the late 19th century. In the third play, Madaket Road, one of the central characters is a potential candidate for president. He is a tool of corrupt oligarchs in the Republican party. Newspaper publisher William Randolph Hearst is in collusion with them, inciting America into a war with Spain. We hear that ''the curtain is about to go up on a new century'' with electricity and industrial sewing machines, as America follows ''the itch of the pocket'' instead of its democratic promise. As the times have changed, so have the ideals and the actions of the characters. It’s a parallel to the United States’s evolution from the 1860s to the 1900s. Lydie started these plays as an idealistic and nurturing young woman, and Guare turns her into a badly-compromised person who inflicts harm on those around her. The surrounding story is just as melancholic—a tale of a nation that failed to follow what Lincoln called its “better angels.” Lydie Breeze might be considered as Guare’s “Ring of the Nibelungen” in its grand scope. Unfortunately, the culmination of this saga is a letdown. The hopes and plans of the principal players have crumbled. Their epic ends in a whimper. In addition to the powerful performances of Julian and DelMarcelle, excellent contributions are made by Kylie Westerbeck as their daughter Young Lydie, Kristie Ecke as her sister Gussie, Hannah Gold as the caretaker Beatty, and Grant Struble as the out-of-wedlock young man who moved to England and became a successful actor. Composer, harpist and fiddler Jay Ansill paired with performance artist Cynthia Hopkins to create music based on traditional American song, played by a small ensemble. Marie Anne Chiment designed the apt costumes and Mike Inwood the lighting. Markéta Fantová’s sets are arresting.
