TALKING WITH PAUL WEITZ
What are the characters in Trust seeking?
In the play, the character Harry is unsure what he wants. Prudence is trying to balance upon the razor’s edge between being helpless and being in control. Morton, her boyfriend, is seeking something more tangible - thirty-thousand dollars to pay back rent. Aleeza, Harry’s wife, is a painter who hasn’t painted in a couple of years, ever since she and Harry became rich.
Far as I can tell, they all feel disconnected from themselves, and are sending down depth charges in an attempt to fish themselves out of the murky deep.
How do the characters’ professions reflect their struggles with relationships?
Each of them has a marginal profession, like I do. Each of them is lost, with secret dreams of conquest. Harry is also a huge success with secret dreams of abject failure. I used to justify being unhappy in a relationship by telling myself, what would I do if I was in a relationship with me?
Two of the characters in the play are extremely wealthy, while others struggle to pay their rent. What role does money serve in the relationships between characters?
The play is about power, and how it affects relationships. Money is a symbol of power. The money itself is usually less important to people than the symbol.
The only character with a healthy relationship to money in the play is Morton, who has none, and wants some, really badly, but not enough to get a job. That seems like a healthy attitude. The characters kind of dominate each other with money, or with dependency. Having a large amount of money comes with guilt, because being rich is a lot like being a necrophiliac. To really enjoy it is a fairly degrading proposition.
I grew up around some rich people, and people who were desperate to appear rich. It creeped me out as a kid, and it’s creepy now. I write about it a lot. My play "Privilege" at Second Stage was largely about money.
You’ve done a lot of work in film. How is the process of writing different in film versus theatre?
Writing for film is usually a fairly thankless proposition, artistically, unless you direct it yourself. If you direct it yourself, it is awesome.
The script for a film usually has to conform to the realities of production, because you have to suspend the audience's disbelief for them. They don't want to see the boom in the frame. You're the one having to dream the dream.
With theatre, the production comes to the script more, I think, because the audience is so complicit. We are sitting there in the dark, choosing not to leap up onto the stage and shake the actor's hand or give him a raspberry. The suspension of disbelief is exquisite and more true to the ultimate nature of things.
The rhythm of film is utterly different. It’s a basketball game with a lot of scoring. Short, short scenes, and you’re building momentum (hopefully) through an accretion of moments. Theatre is a gabfest, usually, more akin to soccer. The power is much more in the actors’ hands - they’re editing their own performances onstage. Theatre is scary.
In the play, one character finds herself stuck artistically. Have you found yourself in a similar position and how did you overcome it?
What kind of a question is that? Next you’ll be naming the Scottish Play.
I’ve noticed that some of the people I’ve known over the years who were talented painters stopped painting. Much more so than other art forms.
I have not yet had this problem, I hope because of a deep humility towards whatever story I am thinking of. I try not to worry about whether something I'm writing is good or bad, that is none of my business. I try to just take myself out of the equation, except to be like an elevator man or a bank teller and do the job.
In addition to being a writer, you are also a director. Do you approach these positions differently? How does your ability to direct inform your writing?
Writing is playing with dolls. With directing you play with the other kids in the sandbox. There’s something to be said for each.
Writing is kind of sanctioned lunacy. You are basically talking to yourself all day, telling yourself the same story over and over, hearing voices. Directing is a good antidote for the isolation and weirdness of writing.
Driving Directions/Parking
39th and Eighth Parking LLC
310 West 39th St.
enter between 8th & 9th Aves.
136 West 40th Parking LLC
enter on 40th St. between Broadway and 7th Ave.
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enter between 49th & 50th in Skyline Hotel
Bus
M42, M104 to 42nd Street & 8th Ave.
Subway
1, 2, 3, 7, N, Q, R, S, W to Times Square
A, C, E to 42nd Street/Port Authority
Through Sept 12, 2010
