Minnesota Star Tribune

Women in war

Frank Theatre overlays the Iraq war with a classical Greek story and issues specific to female combat soldiers.

By Rohan Preston

November 6, 2011 at 2:28AM

From left: Taous Khazem, Rich Remedios, Maria Asp and Katie Guentzel in "Ajax in Iraq" (Star Tribune/The Minnesota Star Tribune)

Ask actor Katie Guentzel of New Prague, Minn., to play, say, a Central European immigrant from a century ago, and she nails it flat. Give her a character in a drama that takes place today, and she is liable to freeze.

Guentzel, who won an Ivey Award for her turn as the title character in "My Antonia" at Illusion Theater and starred in the stage adaptation of Louise Erdrich's "Master Butchers Singing Club" at the Guthrie last year, has been cast as the central soldier in playwright Ellen McLaughlin's "Ajax in Iraq." She has never before played a warrior, much less one who is a victim of sexual assault.

"I guess I have an affinity for old souls, but this role just terrifies me," she said Monday. "I'm glad I have a sensitive scene partner. We want to do the best job we can, even if it means going to some scary places for me."

From 'Angel' to 'Ajax'

McLaughlin, also an actor, is best known for originating the role of the Angel in Tony Kushner's "Angels in America." She has long been fascinated with Greek classics, mining them to find contemporary resonance. Her lucid and lyrical adaptation of "Oedipus" gave us one of the enduring memories of the old Guthrie Theater. Her take on Helen of Troy recently was produced by 20% Theatre.

"What I love about the Greeks is that they're all very clear-eyed about what soldiering is, what's good about it, what's horrifying," said McLaughlin by phone from Barnard College, where she teaches. "It's very different from the way we treat soldiers, which often is misted with sentiment and misunderstanding, and filled with a desire of what we want them to be."

For her latest work, McLaughlin draws on Ajax as described by Sophocles. "Ajax is universally acknowledged as second only to Achilles as the greatest fighter in the Greek force" during the Trojan War, she said. "When Achilles dies at the end of the war, there's a contest for his armor. It's assumed that Ajax will get it, but something goes wrong, and the armor goes to [rival] Odysseus. Ajax has a complete nervous breakdown and decides to kill his enemies. ... But Odysseus is [goddess] Athena's favorite, and she's not going to allow it to happen. So she fogs Ajax's mind. He drags sheep and cattle back to his tent, thinking that they are his enemies, and tortures and kills them. When he comes to and realizes what he has done, he is ashamed. If word gets to [his superiors], he will be court-martialed. Ajax kills himself."
Tuning out war

In "Ajax in Iraq," Guentzel's character, A.J., is raped by her commanding officer. She is ashamed, and unable to deal with her trauma.

The violation of A.J. "is the ultimate betrayal, because your superior, in the military culture, is supposed to have your back," said McLaughlin. "And it's a big problem now that 14 percent of the fighting force is female."

For cast members in the Frank Theatre production, which opens today at the Playwrights' Center in Minneapolis, the drama has been an education, painful at times.

"For the last many years, I kind of tuned out the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan," Guentzel said. "I didn't really know about women in the military in combat roles. ... They're fighting and dying just like the men."

'Pro-soldier'

During rehearsal, an Air Force veteran of the Iraq war visited the cast.

"What she told us blew our minds and created a hush in the room," said Guentzel. "The whole idea is that female soldiers are not supposed to be in combat, yet they are. And sometimes they are dealing with enemies within."

There have been reports lately about a crisis of sexual assault in the military. According to a Veterans Administration report, posted on the agency's website, about 1 in 5 female and 1 in 100 male veterans reported yes in a questionnaire about encounters with "military sexual trauma," which includes physical assault of a sexual nature, battery and sexual harassment. The numbers are generally underreported, said director Wendy Knox of Frank Theatre. "But it's eye-opening, shocking stuff."

Knox's company is known for often staging stridently political productions. This play, she said, is a departure in one significant way.

"It's not the usual lefty tirade," she said. "It's totally pro-soldier. It shows us a world that most of us have tuned out but that impacts all of us in small or big ways."

The surprising thing about writing the play was how morally and emotionally complicated the soldier's situation can be, said the playwright.

"It's easy to get reductive about the American grunt experience over there and say, well, they're all victims," said McLaughlin. "There's a lot of stuff going on in our name. And the consequences, the damage, doesn't stay over there. It comes home."