‘‘Stuff Happens” is a political drama written by British playwright David Hare, who is a knight, a liberal and fashion designer Nicole Farhi’s husband. But he’s a scholar, too, and far too good a dramatist to go for the knee jerk or easy empathy.
‘‘I describe it as a play about how a supposedly stupid man, George W. Bush, gets everything he wants,” Hare has said. ‘‘And how a supposedly clever man, Tony Blair, ends up with nothing he wants.”
It’s about power, and persuasion – and Skidmore seems intent on following Hare’s evenhanded lead.
‘‘I’m politically active in my own life,” he concedes, ‘‘and it’s not very often I get an opportunity to direct something like this: to change people’s minds.”
This play, which debuted at London’s National Theatre in 2004, came to the U.S. in 2005. It’s about what went down at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. just prior to the U.S. invasion of Iraq — an attempt at explanation rather than vilification, a look at all the players on the worldwide stage and what each had to say, on record (according to actual transcripts, interviews and press conferences) or imagined.
‘‘It’s funny sometimes, but it’s not a comedy,” says Skidmore. ‘‘It’s more like a documentary – a docudrama – at its heart.
‘‘It’s about getting the information, learning the story, not just a parade of characters passing by.”
History geek
But there is a parade of characters: from Condoleezza Rice and Donald Rumsfeld to Jacques Chirac and Hans Blix – even Yo-Yo Ma makes an appearance. Skidmore is adamant that his characters be more than just lookalikes: ‘‘I didn’t want the audience...sitting there judging how good the impersonation was.”
And Steve Schmidt agrees.
‘‘I don’t want to do a Darryl Hammond ‘SNL’ impersonation,” he says.
Still, Schmidt, who was born in Cincinnati and grew up in New Jersey before ending up at Walter Johnson High School, has a hard time shaking the Tony Blair out of his voice and mannerisms during a pre-rehearsal interview.
‘‘The more I heard about this play being performed at the Public (Theater) in New York, the more I wanted to be in it,” gushes the self-proclaimed history geek.
‘‘As actors, we get to explain history, to steep ourselves in it. This is not a documentary; it’s a historical play.”
Historical, not hysterical. Schmidt says it’s ‘‘an honor” to recreate some of the former British Prime Minister’s speeches. And he hopes that Hare’s fictional recreation of key Bush-Blair conversations will help the audience see Blair’s role in Iraq more clearly.
‘‘He saw – immediately – the good that could come out of 9-11,” Schmidt says. ‘‘That ‘the world had a responsibility to intervene in brutal regimes.’ That’s where he was coming from.”
That wasn’t exactly where he ended up, though. Blair stepped down in 2007 after 10 years in office, linked inextricably in the minds of the British people to George Bush and the Americans’ unpopular war.
‘‘To me, his arc is the tragedy of the story,” says Schmidt. ‘‘Not to diminish the suffering of the people in Iraq, of course. But he could have been one of the greatest leaders history has ever known.”
Schmidt is an affable guy, a suburban dad who lives with his wife and sons just a few miles from Olney Theatre. He had moved back to the D.C. area, but was in Manhattan on Sept. 11, 2001, and remembers meeting some British tourists in a restaurant that very evening.
‘‘They expressed their support – they were talking about ‘the spirit of Dunkirk – and Tony Blair said, ‘We will stand, shoulder to shoulder, with our American friends.’”
Since then, he says, ‘‘I have completely fallen in love with Tony Blair,” he says, and in the context of history and what might have been, it’s easy to see what he means.
Cowboy
And then there’s Rick Foucheux.
The Silver Spring actor has gone from playing Tevye here on Olney’s new Mainstage to portraying Willy Loman in Arthur Miller’s ‘‘Death of a Salesman” at Arena Stage. And now, George Bush.
‘‘It’s been a helluva year,” he says with a smile. Portraying two of the most complicated characters in theater, two iconic father figures, two larger-than-life demon-wrestlers was ‘‘hard work,” he says. ‘‘George Bush is the easiest fit I’ve had all year long. I put on my cowboy boots, and I’m ready to go.”
Part of that is a play in which ‘‘Cheney, Blair and Rumsfeld do all the talking,” he says, ‘‘and to a certain extent, Condoleezza Rice.
‘‘It’s a portrait of a man who’s surrounded by people who have a lot to say.”
Preparing that portrait without bias was the actor’s challenge. Foucheux may reveal his personal politics when he says ‘‘Stuff Happens” is ‘‘about how Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld got their plans through (despite) opposition from smart guys like Colin Powell and Tony Blair.” But he plays Bush from the heart.
‘‘He’s got a swagger, a courage of his convictions,” the actor observes. ‘‘Right or wrong, he’s simple about it: He decides on a course of action, and he doesn’t look back.”
Foucheux points out that unlike Tevye, who struggled with a faith that tied him to traditions he sometimes longed to reject, Bush has said ‘‘My faith frees me...to enjoy life, and not worry about what comes next.”
It’s this ‘‘simplicity of thought” that Foucheux seizes upon to create the character of George Bush, a man the actor says anyone must admit exudes a certain amount of ‘‘personal charm.”
‘‘This play definitely has a liberal slant,” Foucheux admits, ‘‘but it’s not a totally neutered view of the events: It lets the events speak for themselves.”
Both sides now
And it lets the characters speak for themselves – except when it doesn’t. Hare imagines discussions in ‘‘the inner sanctum” that he has totally invented as a playwright, a la Stephen Frears’ ‘‘The Queen.”
‘‘Those very private moments tend to be my favorites,” says Skidmore. ‘‘A walk in the woods at Camp David with a conversation between Blair and Bush – granted it’s fictional – but those private moments make good theater.”
And when he says ‘‘the woods at Camp David,” well, he really means the dark stage of the Mulitz-Gudelsky Theatre Lab.
‘‘I’m very proud of the theatricality of this play,” the director says. He adds that he has put together ‘‘a dream cast of people I’ve wanted to work with for a long time.
‘‘Casting it was quite easy.”
The difficult part? Convincing the audience that these events deserve fresh consideration.
‘‘Most of the people who will come see this play share our opinion,” says Skidmore. ‘‘But can they see, also, that Bush’s heart was in the right place?
‘‘Before I started working on the play, I was very pro ‘pull the soldiers out now!’
‘‘But I’ve come to have a greater sense of respect: It’s much more complicated than that.
‘‘Yes, it’s awful, but a group of people are also liberated from a dictator, ultimately. And there are arguments about what pulling out would do to the infrastructure, the economy.”
Foucheux wants the audience to go home as roiled up and politically challenged as the actors have been during rehearsals.
‘‘Reliving it, we’ve all been sad and angry,” he says. ‘‘And yes, it will have that effect on the audience...
‘‘Why bring it up?” he muses. ‘‘Because we have to remember the past, or we’ll have to repeat it.”
‘‘Stuff Happens” is on stage through July 20 in Olney Theatre Center’s Mulitz-Gudelsky Theatre Lab, 2001 Olney-Sandy Spring Road. Shows begin at 7:45 Wednesday through Sunday (except July 4) and Tuesday, July 1; and 1:45 p.m. Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday. The 7:45 p.m. July 2 performance will be audio-described, and the 7:45 p.m. July 3 show will be sign-interpreted. Tickets range from $25 to $48, with discounts available to groups, seniors and students. Call 301-924-3400 or visit www.olneytheatre.org.
