OnStage: The 'Third' phase

Sally Wingert is feeling it -- the whole megillah.

The actor recently celebrated one of those landmark birthdays that become shorthand for middle age. She has a son in college, another one on the way next fall. Aging and dying parents, the insecurity of not knowing where the next job will come from, the drumbeat of every day. Time is not on our side (that's right, Mick Jagger, look in the mirror).

And so, as Wingert and director Casey Stangl sat down to talk about Wendy Wasserstein's "Third," it seems natural that the play's theme of reflection and second-guessing weighs on Wingert's mind.

"It is uncanny how this character and my life are intersecting at this point," said Wingert. "At one point [the character] Laurie talks about how 'Everything is good in my life, so why do I feel this unease, this free-floating anxiety?' "

Good question. If you come up with an answer. ...

"Third," which opens in previews at the Guthrie Theater's Proscenium stage this week, was Wasserstein's final play. As the piece was rehearsed for its 2005 premiere at Lincoln Center, Wasserstein often needed a cane because lymphoma was overtaking her body. She died the next January at age 55. It is easy in retrospect to examine "Third" and realize that it was the playwright's final work.

"She was definitely facing her mortality," said Stangl.

But even absent that knowledge, critics remarked on its autumnal chill and introspection. Wasserstein invested her self-doubt in the character of Laurie Jameson, a liberal college professor who finds that her youthful idealism has calcified into institutional power. When she encourages her students to fight the power, Laurie comes to understand that she has become the dominant culture.

Wasserstein's title cuts in two directions. It refers to Laurie's antagonist in the play, a student named Woodson Bull III. A son of privilege, an athlete and a Republican, he has darkened the doorstep of Laurie's literature class at a leafy, elite college in the Northeast. When he hands in an articulate essay on "King Lear," Laurie accuses him of plagiarism. The ensuing drama sends liberal Laurie into a funk of self-reflection as she questions her motives and experiences in this "third phase" of her life. That hook caught Wingert and Stangl.

"That's all I'm thinking about," said Wingert as she catalogued the midlife path that millions of other baby boomers are sharing in the collective unconscious. She quickly added that she's not complaining, that in many ways her life is fulfilled and happy. But still -- there's something about getting older.

"You realize you're lucky in a lot of ways," said Stangl. "But that doesn't stop the anxiety and worry."

A reflection of real life

Critics have commented frequently how Wasserstein's most seminal works reflected the stages of her own life. There was the wave of early 1970s feminism in "Uncommon Women and Others," the maturation and backlash of the 1980s in "The Heidi Chronicles" and the family dynamics in "The Sisters Rosensweig." By the time she wrote "Third," Wasserstein had completely filled in her comfortable identity as a New York liberal who was known for preaching to the choir.

This is why audiences and critics were so intrigued by the self-doubt that Laurie Jameson expresses. Suddenly, she was questioning how liberals go about their agenda, pondering the smug and self-righteous cant that drives conservatives and moderates crazy. An uncharitable observer would consider Wasserstein's epiphany naive: What? Liberals can be intolerant, too!? Giving her the benefit of the doubt, though, Wasserstein at least had the courage to give public voice to her personal thoughts.

"Knowing she was dying, and leaving a child behind, addressing her life, I think she was very brave," said Wingert. "Not to mention, she managed to stay funny."

This is the first time Stangl and Wingert have worked together since Stangl's days with Eye of the Storm Theatre Company. She has since moved to Los Angeles, where she pursues film and theater, with regular returns to the Twin Cities.

"Some of the work I am proudest of was work that Casey Stangl directed," Wingert said.

The cast also includes Angela Timberman, a naturally dry comic actor; young comer Emily Gunyou Halaas; Guthrie veteran Raye Birk, and Tony Clarno, a graduate of the Guthrie BFA program.

Other than Birk, who plays Laurie's father, all the other cast members are younger than Wingert. Hope that doesn't make her feel old.

Graydon Royce • 612-673-7299