Come to the Edge: A Memoir by Christina Haag Page B

line, but it was there, unspoken. Like the scent of warm rain on pavement.

Falling
    They talked some and perhaps dreamed some,
because they were young and
the day was beautiful.
    — BRIAN FRIEL



 
    I had known him almost ten years by a June day in 1985. It was a warm Saturday—the kind of day New Yorkers live for. The sky was clear; there was a slight breeze and no trace of the humidity we knew would come. On days like those, you dream, and your step is light on the pavement.
    After rehearsal at Robin Saex’s apartment on Christopher Street, John got his bike and walked me, as he usually did, the couple of blocks to the subway at Sheridan Square. Passing the bustle of gay bars and leather shops, we stood for a moment under the hand-painted sign outside McNulty’s as the heady smells of hazelnut and bergamot wafted onto the street. Robin, our director and friend from college, drank the strong vanilla tea they sold there, and now, after four and a half months of sporadic gatherings at her apartment, both John and I were hooked. When rehearsals ended, we’d sometimes stop in the store with the low tin ceilings and the burlap bags of coffee and glass canisters of tea from all over the world.
    Since the end of January, we had begun to read through the play every few weeks. Everyone was busy and we met when we could. Because there was no production in the works, it was an open-ended venture—more like playing around, something we did for fun. Robin was directing her own projects, in addition to assisting prominent directors at Circle Rep and the Manhattan Theatre Club. I had finished my third year at Juilliard and was juggling auditions with a pastiche of jobs—paralegal work, catering, and coat checking—to pay the bills. John was busy, too. He was working for the City of New York in the Office of Economic Development. He was also weighing whether or not to apply to law school that fall.
    For me, these meetings were a relief from the rigidity of Juilliard. Legend has it that Robin Williams, an alumnus, called it boot camp, and on many days that’s what it felt like. For John, they were a way to hold on to his love of the theater. Robin Saex knew that he missed acting. Although he had majored in history at Brown, he’d appeared in plays there with authors as varied as Shakespeare, Pinero, Rabe, and O’Casey. She sensed that we would work well together and often spoke of finding the right vehicle. The play she found was Winners . It was a perfect fit.
    Brian Friel is one of Ireland’s most prominent playwrights. He was born in Omagh, county Tyrone, in 1929 but grew up in Derry. His more notable plays include Philadelphia, Here I Come!; Translations; and Dancing at Lughnasa , which would receive the Tony for Best Play in 1992. In 1980, along with actor Stephen Rea, he had co-founded Field Day, a theater company and literary movement that sought to redefine Irish cultural identity. He also happened to be one of my favorite playwrights. At twenty, while traveling through Dublin, I had attended the opening night of Faith Healer at the Abbey Theatre, and when, by chance, I was introduced to him, without thinking I bowed slightly. It was as if I’d met a rock star.
    Winners had premiered at the Gate Theatre in Dublin in 1967 before coming to Broadway. It’s really one part of a two-part play, Lovers: Winners and Losers. Losers is about a middle-aged couple married for many years, but Winners is about young love. It’s often performed on its own, as we did in our production.
    Maggie Enright and Joseph Brennan are seventeen and seventeen and a half, respectively, and Catholic. It’s a warm day in June, a Saturday, and they are studying for final exams on Ardnageeha, the hill above their town. Mag is “intelligent but scattered” and Joe dreams of becoming a math teacher. They’re to be married in three weeks because Mag is pregnant. As they look out over Ballymore, they fight, they sleep, they laugh, and they tease;