One-man Play Breathes Life Into Logging Controversy

Performance Network, Thursday-Sunday, Jamtary 9-9 Preview by Elizabeth Clare I n mid-January, a number of characters H from my hometown of Port Orford, Oregon are going to resurrect themselves on stage at the Performance Network. So it seems as I read the script for Todd Jef f erson Moore ' s one-man show "In the Heart of the Wood" that will play in Ann Arbor January 9-12 and 16-19. The play, written and performed by Seattle-based playwright and actor Moore, brings to life 1 8 people deeply affected by the logging controversy in the Pacific Northwest. Moore's script summons a range of voices: environmental activists concerned with the disappearance of old-growth forests and the destruction of ecosystems, unemployed and retired loggers and mili werkers who have made their homes and livelihoods in the woods, and pro-development and propreservation lobbyists. If you go to see "In the Heart of the Wood," don' t expect Todd Moore to teil you what to think or feel about clearcut logging. Don't expect your strongly held opinions to change. B ut do expect to find yourself understanding widely diverse viewpoints from across the political spectrum. And certainly I expect you will leave the theater buzzing with the complexities of environmental destruction, the consumption of resources, and the loss of jobs. In the end "In the Heart of the Wood" simply asks us to contémplate the complex choices we need to make to arrive at environmental justice and social justice. To write the play, Moore talked to more than 40 people from all sides of the controversy. In a recent phone cali, he described for me the process of getting interviews in Forks, Washington, a town besieged by media about the clearcut logging crisis, a logging town that still has a meager timber economy , and a town deeply suspicious of outsiders and urban people: went to the saw shop early in the morning and introduced myself. It was very bizarre. I would explain I was going to do this play. Theythought that was pretty funny. I said I was looking for somebody who was willing to take me out on their job, and they said, 'No way. ' They were very skeptical, but then in the process of telling me this, they would go and talk for the next three hours. l never got out of the saw shop. I was thereforever. People would just come in. They 'd piek up on the conversation and carry it on ... This topic - it doesn 't take muchfor them to teil you their three cents and more. Moore' s description makes me remember the saw shop in Port Orford, three or four battered one-ton pickups always parked outside. The loggers would linger in January to talk about how the salmón were running up the Elk and the Sixes, in June to speculate about when the Forest Service would close the woods, sparks from their chain saws becoming fire hazards. They would gab and gab as they bought oil and new chains for the ir saws. In a note prefacing the script, it's clear that Moore didn' t j ust sit and listen to loggers gab in Forks. He writes: I went to Victoria B.C. where over 800 teachers, grandmothers, priests, vacationers, and professional environmentalists were being tried for impeding trucks on their way to log the virgin forests from Clayquot Sound. I stayed in a tent with a Buddhistpriestandothers who were holding vigil in front of the Provincial Courthouse there. I went to Forks, Washington where the residents were rat her hesitant to talk. 'Been screwed by the media just too many times. ' But after my second and third trip, I had so many tape recorded interviews, that I still haven 't been able to go over them all. In Gray's Harbor, Washington I found that the unojficial figures were 33% unemployed and that halfofthosepeople (15,000) were living on handouts. I found exloggers and ex-mill workers taking stock ofthemselves in retraining programs, at once excited and terrified by what they saw. My trips even look me to Washington D.C. Moore then took these interviews and edited them down to to seven-minute monologues and duets, which he performs on a spare stage, using nothing but a few props, body language, and voice changes to move from character to character in rapid succession. Because of my familiarity with Moore's characters, I trust "In the Heart of the Wood." This play doesn' t turn loggers and mili workers into stupid working-class stereotypes, activists into silly parodies, or lobbyists into simple bombastic line drawings. It ref uses to appropriate all these voices for some particular political agenda. Instead the performance says, "Listen to all these voices. Listen to their differences. Listen to their complexiües." Larry, the ex-timber mili owner, spouts: "America is in denial ! It' s not Forks that' s the timber dependent community, it's Seattle. That's the timber dependent community. Ya know, they look at a clearcut and talk about the destruction of the ecosystem, but they look at a shopping center and think that' s just fine." Larry reminds me of Jack Tucker standing in his muddy lumber yard, shooting the breeze with my father, their voices barely audible over the din of the sawmill. Christy, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife biologist, talks quietly about the gentle and fearless spotted owl, the endangered bird that has become a focal point of the controversy. She could easily be Carrie Osborne, a neighbor who lived upriver of us, digging in her garden, telling me about tromping all over the Elk River watershed counting pileated woodpeckers and spotted owls, marbled murrelets and red-tailed hawks, for the U.S. Forest Service. Jim, an unemployed paper mili worker, explains that "when you been there 30 years in the middle of the paper, you can almost know the body of the paper." Henry, another unemployed mili worker, describes the shame of using food stamps for the first time. I know these men. They could be any one of dozens of guys I grew up with: Todd Gourgen, who won two high school state championships in the shot-put, or Cari Shephard, who at age 16 had never been outside of Coos and Curry counties, or Pat Royal, the meanest kid in my sixth grade class. Wolf, an impassioned environmental activist, argües, "If we cut down all the trees and get rid of all the plants and animáis, I mean, we're looking at a filter for our air. Well if we (CONTINUED ON NEXT PAGE) (FROM PREVIOUS PAGE) cut down the filter for our air, what are we going to breathe? We're killing ourselves by cutting down trees. By getting rid of the forest, we' re killing ourselves ! Okay?!!" He could be a younger version of myself, protesting outside of military complexes, marching the streets of D.C. to demand civil rights for lesbian gaybitrans people, spray painting sexist and racist billboards. Moore's performance does justice to all these characters. A Seattle Times review of the play calis him a "versatile and captivating actor." This strikes me as an estimation devoid of hyperbole. In the video clips I ve seen, Moore's characters remain tinct and crisp; no two loggers or lobbyists seem the same as be switches among various dialects and body postures, tones and styles of storytelling. Only when Moore portrays the few female characters in the piece does his performance even hint of a reliance on stereotype. In these transitions a mincing and tentative quality , stereotypie of women, enters his acting as if he is using those qualities to flag the move from male to female. This is one small flaw in an otherwise wonderful and diverse performance. But for all of its diversity, the center of the piece lies with the unemployed workers: Jack the retired logger reminiscing about logging in the old days; Gillespie the retired logger turned environmentalist; Darryl the unemployed logger who talks about the danger and excitement of logging; Jim the unemployed paper mili worker who after retraining still can't find a job; Mike a logger who tells funny, sad stories about the retraining program he's enrolled in; and Henry the unemployed mili worker who grapples with receiving welfare and food stamps for the first time in his 30year work life. When I asked Moore about two omissions from his cast of characters - there are no timber executives or govemment officials in the play - he answered: "One guy - a timber team biologist [from the federal govemment] - had some interesting things to say, but it was so removed, and he said pretty much what everybody has heard. I couldn't use iL The same with the executives ... The most powerful were the people you don't hear from, and they're the ones who revealed the most." From my political perspective to leave out the voice of big business in the guise of timber executives and complica govemment in the guise of the U.S. Forest Service is to miss a big piece of the puzzle. B ut Icertainly respect and appreciate Moore's decisión to give voice to the rural, working-class men and women who do the backbreaking labor of logging and mi Hing. In the media and in the struggle between environmental activists and the timber industry, these people haven' t been portrayed accurately but have been cast only as the dumb and complica brutes of the timber corporations. Moore's portrayal insists that we listen to them in all their humanness. Just as the loggers and mili workers are the dramatic center of "In the Heartof the Wood," the Pacific Northwest is its geographic center. Moore's Ann Arbor appearance will be the show' s debut outside of Washington and Oregon, where he has toured extensively, performing the play in Seattle and rural logging communities. Of himself Moore says, 'Tm not particularly a political person, but I'm very much involved in my community and the idea of a community theater that reflects the very immediate concerns of the people around them bas always appealed to me .... I wanted to see the environmental movement out in it, doing it, in the heat of it . . . because tfais was drama, and I wanted to know who were the people putting themselves in front of logging trucks, and then who were the people who live in these remote communities that rain 160 inches a year. Why are they out there?" This is community theater at its best, theater that grows out of a shared experience with specific concerns and perspecti ves. At the same time Moore wants the play to have relevance outside of the Pacific Northwest and beyond the specific issues. He tells me, "Fve been wondering if people in Nevada would see this piece and then bc able to look at the mining issue in a different way or look at their opponent, their enemy, in a new light." Moore'sexperience inOregon and Washington suggests that the play appeals to many people across the political spectrum. Loggers, timber executives, and environmentalists alike seem to enjoy the play, seeing themselves reflected in the monologues. Both timber companies and environmental groups have brought the play to rural communities. When Moore took the finished play back to Forks, he received a standing ovation. Several of the people portrayed in the play were in the audience and came away pleased. "In the Heart of the Wood" often attracts people who are not regular theatergoers, which leads Moore to cali the play a "great push for the arts world," attesting to the power of good political theater. He contrasts this to the "performing arts community [which] gets [to be] such a fish bowl kind of world where you know everybody, and you talk about the same things. The experience of going out and interviewing is tremendous wealth for an actor." Clearly Moore finds this brand of political theater rewarding. Currently he's working on a project about capital punishment, interviewing people on death row. As a style of political artMoore's collage of voices and perspectives with an emphasis on bringing forward marginalized experiences is no substitute for thoughtful political analysis and incisive political activism. But it goes a long way in helping us créate both. Show times for "In the Heart of the Wood" are 8 pm ThursdaySaturday and 7pm Sunday, January9-19atPerformanceNetwork, 408 W. Washington St., AnnArbor. Cali 663-0681 for ticket information. In the end "In the Heartofthe Wöod"simply asksusio contémplate the complex cholees we needtomake to arriveert environmental and social justice.