Kathleen Turner Berkeley Rep Red Hot Patriot

The playwrights need a mention for this one, especially:  sisters, Margaret and Allison Engel, both with careers in journalism.  Allison is a media rep at USC her alma mater and Margaret runs the prestigious Alicia Patterson Foundation in Washington, DC. Margaret thinks Molly Ivins, a Smith College graduate, who got her Masters in journalism at Columbia University --became  an Ameican icon, and Allison, sees her as our "Mark Twain" who could balance the "corn pone" with the "high tone".  .  She said that when you laugh, people open up their ears and listen.  She was very honest and spoke truth, but in a humorous way.  Margaret adds, "Bill Moyers really said it best - "she made the mighty humble" and the "wicked ashamed."   

Of her own career in journalism(which I considered, but was told it was not a safe job for a woman< --even after getting a journalism fellowship my freshman year to go to the University of Wisconsin , Molly Ivins said, that when newspapers hired women, it was to "cover food, fluff and fashion.   "They'd hire you to do the 'safe'things."   However, Ivins never played it safe, always opting to tell the truth in bold and ruthless terms, which she perhaps learned from her oil tycoon father. 

Lexi Diamond, in his article opens with the following:  "Sharp", "Biting", "Skewering".   Words like these inevitably appear in any discussion of the fiercely clever Molly Ivins and her ferocious approach to journalism.  But to get a true sense of Ivins, one must consider her acerbic gibes and her unforgiving scrutiny in the context of her passion for the outrageous, for the truth, and for her readesr and her country.  As she once wrote, "Being a cynic is contemptibly easy.  If you let yourself think that nothing you're working on is ever going to make a difference, why bust your tail over it?  Why Care?  If you're a cynic, you don't have to invest anything in your work.  No effort, no pride , no compassion, no sense of excellence, nothing."  Diamond continues, "Molly Ivins devoted herself entirely to dissecting the political landscape she surveyed, making a corrupt and often alienating world accessible and even hilarious."   

Some examples from the program:  "The thing about democracy, beloveds, is that it is not neat, orderly or quiet.  It requires a certain relish for confusion.'   Here's another which is now history:  (On George H.W Bush):  Personally, I think he's further evidence that the great scriptwriter in the sky has an overdeveloped sense of irony." And a third:  "All anyone needs to enjoy the state legislature is a strong stomach and a complete insensitivity to the needs of people." 


I saw Kathleen Turner in "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof", ---which after seeing Liz Taylor in this role, it was an amazing change and tour de force which won her a Tony nomination for best actress. She received a second Tony nomination for "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf", which I also saw. 

Turner  says, quotably, "I have to confess that it's right up my alley in terms of her(Molly Ivins)  -- not just her humor but also her positions and her values."    Turner certainly can act this role.  Her own 2008 autobiography titled "Send Yourself Roses:  Thoughts on my Life, Love and Leading Roles' was on the NYT best seller list. "

Ivins said of her own humor, "There are two kinds of humor... One is the kind "that makes us chuckle about our foibles and our shared humanity.  The other kind holds people up to public contempt and ridicule.  That's what I do."  

For some reason, I have no recollection of  Molly Ivins in my own history in the USA. Of course, I would have been in high school and college, as were the playwrights.(only in another era) There is also the factor of her returning to Texas in 1982 to write, after leaving her position at the NYT,  She continues to write for Mother Jones, The Nation, and Atlantic Monthly.   So Molly Ivins  embraces her Texas roots and as she is writing for a Texan audience, she also speaks their language, a vernacular.Some "kick-ass witticisms" are the following, "Next time I tell you someone from Texas should not be president of the United States, please pay attention."  

In a personal sense, Molly Ivins  also lost her love in the Viet Nam war, and that enters into her position taking. She was lonely and angry, that the war took the love of her life.  She struggled with alcoholism, which went with Texas, the territory of her job, at different newspapers, and died of breast cancer, in 2007.

 The tribute that is paid to her in the Berkeley Rep article is the following  "The bite, fire, vivacity, and heart present in all of her work secure her legacy as a heroic American voice."  .   The show was well received by a Berkeley audience.  We turned up to see not only the tribute to Molly Ivins, Journalist, but also to Kathleen Turner.  As a postscript, the "helper" who takes out copy from a copy machine, and periodically appears on stage, acts as a parenthesis, and transition for each of the anecdotes presented by this one woman performance.  

The stage setting for the Berkeley rep production