Salvage, a play by Tim Alderson
Artists sometimes struggle to
proclaim that their core identities have value and are tied to what they create.
The act of self-expression entails releasing a small part of yourself in the
hope that it will not only make your life better but also change others’
lives. But at the same time, you want to protect the part of yourself that you
are releasing. On a good day, you perform a small act of self-sacrifice and
hope it will help you change or make a mark in the world, even if you cannot
put your finger on exactly what you hope to achieve.
On your worst days as an artist, the world comes crashing through your door. You have bills to pay and responsibilities to fulfill, and you feel the weight of others whom you love and care for. You know they are depending on you to stand shoulder to shoulder with them in the grind to do whatever it takes to succeed. In my case, an old commercial would play in my head:
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| My 1st Seattle Headshot. |
I can bring home the bacon, fry it up in a pan
And never, never, never let you forget you’re a man!
’Cause I’m a woman! W. O. M. A. N.!
Not every artist succeeds in making
art a full-time career, in part because art is incredibly undervalued in American
society. I would have been the quintessential starving artist if I weren’t
married. At times during our marriage, both my husband and I have set aside
some of our artistic ambitions because we needed to make money. For example, I recently
became a full-time schoolteacher. A colleague carelessly remarked during my
student teaching, “This is your real career,” as if she expected me to agree
that my work in theatre had no value.
This long preamble seeks to explain
how I ended up sobbing my way through a brilliant new play, Salvage, written by
Tim Alderson and directed by Damian D. Lewis. I thought Salvage was going to be
a play about Mark Heard, one of my husband’s favorite songwriters and someone I
feel a deep kinship with through his music. Ultimately, although Mark isn’t a
character in the play, it borrows details from his life and examines themes he
often wrote about. We saw this play several weeks ago, and the details are
now not as sharp, but the emotional experience lingers.
My own experience resonates with a
quote from the play: “Having a dream is like running with scissors.” Falling
down can leave permanent scars.
Alderson has said that the idea for
this play stayed with him as a constant companion for 15 years before he wrote it
down. That’s often how art evolves or emerges. It’s always a product of the
artist’s inner life, but whereas some art emerges quickly and has to be
captured in the moment, other works are like a seed that waits to be watered
and nurtured into being.
Salvage is set in a neighborhood
bar. The first character we meet is Preacher (David Atkinson), who enters half drunk
and clearly not happy. We get the idea that his daily routine involves drinking
and lamenting the past; he has nowhere else to go and nothing worthwhile to do.
He sits, drinks, plays his guitar, and complains to the bartender, Johnson
(Damian D. Lewis), who comes in and out, stocking the bar, throwing out
challenges to Preacher, and asking customers to pay.
Harley (Sam O’Byrne), the only other
customer, wanders in because he realizes that one of his favorite songwriters
not only used to perform in the bar, but also died there. Johnson admonishes
him to buy a beer if he wants to admire the bar and gather details about the
night the singer died. Harley, who is also toting a guitar, stays and ends up
talking and wanting to jam with Preacher. Preacher roundly rejects Harley’s
interest and tells him to go away. Hence the main conflict of the play.
Beneath this simple storyline and seemingly
familiar characters is a complex, far-reaching emotional landscape, and we
catch glimpses of it through music. The first song we hear is Mark Heard’s Rise
from the Ruins on the jukebox. Preacher doesn’t like this song much as it
belts out:
We will roll like an old Chevrolet
The road to ruin is something to see
Hang on to the wheel
For the highway to hell
Needs chauffeurs
For the powers that be
Go and tell all your friends and relations
Go and say what ain’t easy to say
Go and give them some hope
That we might rock this boat
And rise from the ruins one day
Before long we learn that Harley is
on his way to the pawn shop next door to sell his most valuable possession, his
guitar, because “dreams don’t buy diapers.” First, however, he just wants to
play a song or two with Preacher, who ignores him and belts out parts of I’m
So Tired of It All by Hank Williams and Long Gone Lonesome Blues by
Johnny Cash. But these songs are more than just an exercise in self-pity,
they’re a window into what makes Preacher tick—the only such window he is
willing to open—and the lyrics begin to develop the play’s emotional themes. The
Hank Williams song paints a desolate portrait of just what the young musician
might yet regret if he gives up music to get a “real” job.
Ev’ry thing I loved, I lost, dear
Too many times I’ve watched my castles fall
My life is full of regretting
And now I’m so tired of it all
The conflict is sharpened by the betrayal of friends, speculation about what is real and lasting, and struggle
with forgiveness of oneself and others—ideas that Harley and Preacher struggle
to articulate, except when they sing. Music becomes more and more a part of the
language of the play as the story breathes and grows.
T his play, I learned from the playwright over dinner with him, was inspired by his time living with Mark Heard. Several of the songs performed by Harley in the play are actually Mark’s. I was already familiar with these songs, but in this new context, it was as if I heard them for the very first time. And they hit me like a ton of bricks. When Harley finally gets a chance to sing a song for Preacher, he chooses (Mark Heard’s) House of Broken Dreams.
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| Mark Heard circa the1980s. |
I’m old enough to know
That dreams are quickly spent
Like a pouring rain on warm cement
Or fingerprints in dust
Nectar on the wind
Save them for tomorrow
And tomorrow lets you down again
Lay me down to sleep
Come and comfort me
I’ll sleep in peace
In a house of broken dreams
Give me the reasons to go on
Soften the sorrow that shatters and bends
And mend
Broken dreams
By the end of that song, I was a
puddle on the floor of the theatre, cracked in two—and we were only 15 minutes
or so into the play. Other songs deepened the experience, but that moment
defined the story and seemed to outline how things might resolve. We learn that
Harley faces some hard choices. As for Preacher, he believes he’s made the
wrong choices and counsels Harley not to do the same. Johnson adds bitter notes
by telling Harley to ignore any advice from Preacher, who’s obviously a broken
man. We discover that Johnson has every right to say this, as betrayal and
friendship are weighed in the balance of each detail.
Another character, Destiny, enters
later. Skillfully played by Natalie Llerena, she injects warmth and hope into a
sometimes-dismal debate over the two sides of an artist’s soul. At first, I
thought she was mostly a plot device to give more weight to the choices Harley
has to make—but no, as the story unfolds we learn that she is more than that. She
and Harley sing a beautiful rendition of Mark Heard’s Everything Is Alright.
Destiny turns out be the God-given grace between the practical responsibilities
Harley faces and the dreams he thinks he must leave behind. She is pivotal in
the play’s ideas about sacrifice and forgiveness, about personal growth and redemption.
Another heartbreaking and heartwarming duet with Harley (Outrun the Wind
by Pat Terry and Randy VanWarmer) lays out more of the pair’s emotional
territory:
I held you
like a rosary
prayed you
like a prayer
sacrificed
everything
didn’t care
that mean
streak down inside you
is one cross
I couldn’t bear
my heart’s
the proof
the scars
are there
God knows I tried
Braved the
rain of those storm clouds in your eyes
When I said
I’d go the distance
Things were
so much different then
I could
still
Outrun the
wind
Without offering spoilers, I’ll say
that among all the philosophical turmoil and existential crises, there’s a
narrative that lands on the side of hope and recovery. The threads holding this
worn and colorful quilt together are the deepest questions about faith—in God,
in our heroes, and in our own abilities. These are the same questions Mark
Heard struggled with—in his career, in his personal life, and in his
songwriting. This is why I connect to his music and to this play.
If Harley and Preacher don’t get
all the way to a detente, they do at least send us off with a final duet, Rivers
of Hope (also by Terry and VanWarmer):
Nothing
grows
In this dry
hard ground
There’ll be
rivers of hope
When the
love rains down
This is just the tip of the iceberg.
There are 12 songs in the play, well curated for the script, that help us ride the
raging currents that flow underneath and between the characters. I felt exposed,
vulnerable, and exhausted after seeing Salvage, yet more understood than
I thought I ever could be. Alderson makes his living as the executive director
of a nonprofit, not as an artist, but he’s spent enough time around artists to
know what makes us tick. As for me, I’ve just started a teaching career, but
this play gives me hope to keep striving as an artist.
I could go on and on, but the play’s
the thing and should be seen. And despite all this deep material, it is a play
full of humor too. I laughed about as much as I cried. If you are in the L.A.
area this December, check out Salvage at Hudson Theatre. It closes on
Sunday, December 19. It is a small theatre, and the play is only 90 minutes,
but the best 90 minutes I’ve spent in a long time. The cast is an excellent
professional cast. As other reviews have said, “it packs a powerful punch.”
