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Todd Haimes and British director Mark Clements find Speaking in Tongues both mysterious and timeless.
FRONT & CENTER: How did you become aware of this Australian play and why did you decide to stage it at Roundabout?
Haimes: A British agent named David Watson sent me a copy of the script, along with a copy of the spectacular reviews of the original production. As audiences will see, it’s a hard play to read the first time. I thought it was really interesting, but I couldn’t imagine how it would work on stage without seeing a reading of it. So I called Mark, and we began a conversation about it and ended up organizing a reading of it last February.
At the reading I was struck by three things. First, it tells an interesting story—it’s sort of a mystery. Second, Andrew Bovell has multiple scenes happening at the same time, and when I heard the actors at the reading it became clear that this works fantastically well. Third, even in the pale fluorescent lights in the rehearsal hall, I could imagine an incredibly atmospheric and provocative production with scenery, costumes, and lighting fully designed. And it was perfect for a production at the Gramercy, where we mount important new plays by established playwrights.
 
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Clements: I first came across Speaking in Tongues when Aubrey Miller, an artistic director in Australia, mailed a copy to me at my theatre in the United Kingdom. As I read the play, I found it incredibly challenging: each act has a totally different narrative tone, and it is both a mystery and a play about relationships and fidelity. I think it’s quite a bold, brave play, so that was really the starting point. The distinctive tone of the writing sprung out straight away. You constantly think the story is going in one particular direction, and then it does something else. Theatrically this poses a challenge, which always entices me as a director.
You hear a story, then you hear it coming back from a different angle all the time, so you’re constantly reassessing your moral evaluation of the characters and what they’re doing. The characters are neither villains nor heroes, and they all do things they’re not proud of. And I think that’s kind of how life is for most of us, we make good decisions and we make bad decisions on a daily basis.
What I think is particularly good about the play is that it allows the audience to be smart. After twenty minutes of some plays or films or television shows you can second-guess the outcome; in Speaking in Tongues you’re forced to concentrate. For audiences in an age of information technology and fast images, I think it offers a kick for people who enjoy theatre and are looking for different forms of intellectual stimulus. This is the sort of play that allows people to think and immerse themselves and actually exercise their brain. It doesn’t spell it all out for them. (Incidentally, Harold Pinter came to see this play and loved it, and you can understand why he would.)
F & C: Like Pinter’s Betrayal, which Roundabout recently staged, Speaking in Tongues deals with the theme of infidelity and the breakdown of trust. Is there a connection between these plays with similar themes?
Haimes: I think one of the characteristics of a great play is that it deals with themes that transcend time and place. Speaking in Tongues is an Australian play, but it also speaks to contemporary life in New York and elsewhere.
Clements: People might say it has a Pinter-esque quality because the narrative doesn’t form an absolutely linear structure, but it is such a different perspective and landscape. And that’s the great thing as a theatregoer, that you can compare the resonances of various plays and productions.
But in a way most plays are about people connecting or not connecting, people finding a way to speak to others, trying to find forms of communication. That’s where the title of Speaking in Tongues comes from. It’s not related to religion, it’s just about different languages, different people trying to express themselves in different ways, trying to find a voice. Andrew presents the timeless, all-consuming things that go on in our lives. It’s a challenge just to stay in a marriage or a relationship, it’s really hard work. This play says something really interesting about the characters, who are just normal people. When something happens they are forced to re-evaluate their lives and what they stand for and believe in. And they can’t always come up with the answers.
F & C: Where are you setting the play?
Clements: The specific setting is actually not relevant because it’s never referred to in the play. But it’s useful for the actors and the creative team to have a context in mind. It has to be a place where it’s hot, where it’s summer, because there is a reoccurring theme of heat and humidity, which works very well for the play. For reasons in the narrative it has to take place where somebody can drive fifteen to twenty minutes outside of the city and be in terrain where they can get lost in the dark, fall down or into things, and be at high risk of being bitten or falling prey. It also has to be set in a big city that has a small-town feel to it. My original production was set in Australia. For this production I imagine it someplace like Jacksonville, Florida. I mentioned Jacksonville to Richard Hoover, the scenic designer, and he knew that area and thought that would make a really good choice.
But you can’t be too literal about it. Speaking in Tongues is not at all a naturalistic play, as you can tell right away in the opening scenes, with an incredible coincidence of two couples having affairs on the same night. So the set and the staging will transcend the audience’s expectation of naturalism. The setting also has a sort of film noir feel. All the locations—with one exception in the forest or in the swamp—are interior locations. Everything happens in other people’s houses or nightclubs, and so we only want to intimate the landscape, not spell it out. It travels to all sorts of other head-territory, in a dream sequence using mirrors and projections, for instance. It feels very film-noir, but it’s also quite radical.
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