Theatre

In the year that voices of Chicago held the attention of the globe – South Sider Barack Obama convinced a sceptical world democracy shouldn’t be counted out yet while comedians who learned their trade in Chicago, Amy Poehler, Tina Fey and Seth Meyers, did all the heavy lifting that a collapsing news media couldn’t – Chicago playwright Tracy Letts did something even more impossible. He held the attention of New Yorkers. For three and a half hours, no less.

The success of ‘August: Osage County’, Letts’s scabrous comic melodrama about a cranky Oklahoma family disrupted by the suicide of its patriarch, has been a Broadway anachronism. New American plays don’t make it to Broadway without a proven star above the title or a test run at an off-Broadway, non-profit company. Feature continues

But then, Letts the American theatre artist is also something of an anachronism. With only a semester of college to his credit and no academic faculty appointment, the sun-scorched (but never rednecked) Oklahoma native stands apart from the past decade of Pulitzer winners whose industry connections and financial security are directly linked to collegiate theatre. Letts’s route to Broadway and the Pulitzer Prize, which included the tragic grace note of the cancer death of one of August’s cast members – the playwright’s own dapper father – was an uncharted one.

And, like an upmarket version of Steinbeck’s Okie Joads, fiercely loyal Letts brought his entire clan with him.

‘My agent came to see it in previews [in Chicago], and afterwards he said, “Well, the size, the way the audience is responding, that’s a Broadway show,” ’ the rangy, 42-year-old Letts recalls with a typically sarcastic chuckle. ‘And I said, “Really?” That word, "Broadway", had never come up in the development of the thing.’

‘August’ debuted at Chicago’s Steppenwolf Theatre Company in June 2007 as the last show in the company’s subscription season. A three-act, 13-character contraption of epic length, it was meant to give some of the non-famous members of the Steppenwolf acting ensemble a big collective chew toy.

Letts based the riotously miserable Weston tribe on characters from his own childhood – savage matriarch Violet Weston is drawn from his mother’s mother – but tailored the roles specifically for the thespians he’d shared the boards with for years. Letts may be known to international theatre audiences as the urban cowboy scribe who also wrote pitch-black, prairie-set plays like ‘Killer Joe’ and ‘Bug’, but locally, he’s one of the city’s most well-regarded actors.

When the sceptical troupe of Midwestern actors was finally convinced by a fanatical Chicago audience reaction and competing New York producers to transfer ‘August’ to Broadway last December, it was on the agreement of a limited engagement. But as soon as the New York opening – delayed in previews for an expensive, nail-biting 19 days when the stagehand strike shut down Broadway – was met by messianic reviews, the hitherto-unknown cast’s fate was sealed. They all had to stay until at least June, aka Tony season.

At London’s National Theatre, audiences will see nine members of the original cast, including Tony winners Deanna Dunagan and Rondi Reed. Best Actress Tony winner Dunagan famously turned down the physically demanding role of vicious widow Violet several times for fear of the number of stairs she’d have to climb each night. Meanwhile, Featured Actress trophy winner Reed, who’s appeared in more than 60 plays at Steppenwolf, also told Letts to take a hike before she conceded to play the squawking aunt Mattie Fae, which Letts created specifically for her.

‘I’ve played her before,’ Reed remembers telling Letts when she first turned down the frowzy comic role to remain in her then-paycheck gig, ‘Wicked’. ‘One day [in rehearsal] I was at the end of one of Mattie Fae’s rants, and suddenly I turned to Tracy and said, “Oh, now I see why you made me do this.’”

Celebrated for its unusually juicy complement of female characters, ‘August’ is at last in London, where ‘Killer Joe’ first gave Letts international exposure. But unlike during the play’s New York bow, forever spoiled for Letts by his father’s passing last February, Chicago’s favourite playwright intends to appreciate the experience. Letts is currently scheduled to remain in London for the entire run.

‘I’m going for the whole fucking time. And I’m going to enjoy it.’

‘August: Osage County’ previews at the National Theatre Lyttelton from Nov 20.