Theater Festival Opens Thursday at Powerhouse with ‘What’s Done Is Done’ [Q&A]

This week, the Broadway Bound Theater Festival (background here) launches at the Powerhouse Theatre in Waveny, presented by the Town Players of New Canaan.

We put some questions to Alan Richards, a contributing playwright whose work, “What’s Done Is Done,” opens the festival at 7 p.m. Thursday (tickets here).

Here’s our exchange.

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New Canaanite: Give our readers some of your own background. When did you start playwriting?

Alan Richards

Alan Richards: I grew up in an Irish Catholic, working class neighborhood on the southside of Chicago. I was neither Irish nor Catholic. The first of four high schools I attended was an all-boys technical school. Ninety percent of the students were African American. I am white. I know what it feels like to be an outsider.

I worked at various unskilled jobs into my twenties; auto worker on the night shift at American Motors; beer truck driver for an Anheuser Busch distributor; foundry worker making Weber grills; tuck pointer repairing masonry buildings; house painter. I know what it’s like to work for an hourly wage.

I went to a small liberal arts college in Wisconsin where I earned an BA in English and met my wife. We got married a few weeks after my graduation while my wife had one more year to go. A few months after getting married, I went to basic training. My first job as a college graduate was teaching high school English to students who either couldn’t read or didn’t want to. After two years, I decided to give law school a try.

I practiced law in the county just north of Chicago in a firm I started with a friend. Most of my work was in the court room trying cases involving business disputes – nothing that provided interesting stories at parties. The law would have been a gratifying career had it not been for clients, other lawyers and judges. After thirty hears, I left the law profession to pursue other interests, one of which was writing.

The first thing I wrote was a novel entitled The Second Cycle. I thought it was pretty good, but hardly anyone bought it and so after a few weeks it disappeared from the shelves of the Chicago area bookstores. My after-the-fact assessment of the book was that the dialogue was strong but the narrative was weak. So – I decided writing plays would be a better fit. And so I began.

How did you hear about the Broadway Theatre Festival?

I’m an associate member of the Dramatists Guild. I saw a listing for the festival on its website.

Here’s the description of “What’s Done Is Done” on the Town Players website: “Ex-spouses Marty and Kay meet for a final time after years of being apart. As they reminisce about their relationship and reconcile their sins of the past, the present looms heavily over both their heads, as Marty has a proposition for Kay that causes them both to reconsider the future.” How did you come up with the idea for this play?

Almost spontaneously. A friend and I were driving down Lake Shore Drive in Chicago on our way to a Cubs game. I had written my first play and he asked if I intended to write a second. Up to that point I hadn’t given the matter any thought, but in response to his question I told him I thought a conversation between two people, one of whom knew he would be dead in an hour, could be interesting. Except for the premise, I had nothing specific in mind. ‘What’s Done Is Done’ is the result of that initial concept.

What has this experience been like you, seeing your written words come to life on Stage?

Several months before my play was selected as one of seven to be performed as part of Broadway Bound, my wife asked me if there was anything I hoped to accomplish before I died – not a bad question to ask a seventy-five-year-old. I told her seeing a play I had written being performed by professional actors for a paying audience was my dream. So this will be a dream-come-true experience. 

How are you feeling about the August 8 premier?

Anticipation. Apprehensive. 

What else, if anything, would you like to tell our readers about yourself, your play or festival?

I would ask them (not tell them) to support the festival by attending one or more performances. An enormous effort by some very talented and dedicated people has been made to provide the New Canaan community with theatre that is entertaining, thought-provoking and reasonably priced.