1. FEEBLE-MINDED WHITE TRASH is a recent play you’ve submitted to The Baltimore Playwrights Festival What is it about?
During the 1920s in southern Virginia, Hattie Clawson, an illiterate laundress with two illegitimate children, one of them black, hasn’t heard of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes. But she will feel the devastating impact of his majority opinion in Buck vs. Bell, which upheld a Virginia law authorizing involuntary sterilization of the unfit – and it will be painful for her and her children for decades to come. After Hattie’s sterilization and loss of parental rights, Millie and Jed never see their mother or each other again.
All told, 33 states allowed forced sterilization as an outcome of the eugenics movement that swept our country during the 20th century; 65,000 Americans were affected, 85% of them were women. Efforts to restrict women’s reproductive rights persist to this day.
2. Talk about the structure of FEEBLE-MINDED WHITE TRASH and why you chose it.
This play covers many decades. I chose to tell it in chronological order from the point of view of the three main characters: Hattie, her son Jed and daughter Millie. Each one takes turns at being in the foreground while the others offer their reactions or commentary on one another’s behavior. For balance purposes, the play begins and ends with Millie; Hattie and Millie each sing a hymn during the course of the play. The secondary characters, who play more than one part, are a form of Greek chorus in that they represent the classism and racism of the southern establishment. The loss that Hattie and her family bear along with the stigma they internalize but don’t reveal is a through line of the play.
3. What is your approach to developing a play?
Because this play was inspired by real people and historical events, research and authenticity were critical. I read newspapers from the period to develop a sense of place, court documents to learn what happened to the character I call Hattie and reached out to a woman who was involuntarily sterilized as a teen. Later I developed character bios and an outline. Believing that playwriting is very much a collaboration, I brought individual scenes to the Playwrights Group of Baltimore and later spent a week at a playwright’s workshop at the University of Iowa making revisions. More revisions came after public readings, feedback from — other playwrights, my partner Rosser Pettit on technical details of rural life, director Barry Feinstein and two dramaturgs – Abby Katz and Lisa Wilde. Feeble-Minded White Trash was six years in development.
4. Tell us about yourself.
A native New Yorker, I moved to Baltimore in 1985. What I like best about this area is access to the arts as well as the outdoors. I’ve been writing plays for 30 years. I’m a charter member of the Playwrights Group of Baltimore, a member of the Dramatists’ Guild and the New Play Exchange. I sing alto in two mixed choruses, enjoy hiking, qigong and yoga. I’m a member of the Catonsville Women’s Giving Circle and the peace and justice committee at my church.
5. What are you working on now?
I’m reading and recommending the works of other playwrights who belong to the New Play Exchange. We’re all part of the same community.
6. What is coming up for you next?
The Swinging Bridge, a short play of mine, was a winner in the 10-minute play category of the Chameleon Theatre Circle’s 21st annual new play festival in Apple Valley, MN. There wasn’t an actual physical festival in 2020 due to Covid-19, but the theater plans to set up zoom recorded readings on its website sometime in 2021.