Grateful American: A Journey from Self to Service(19)
It was a wonderful experiment in how stupid we could be. We shot the twelve-minute movie in the basement, then realized some of the film I’d bought wasn’t equipped for sound. We had to shoot part of the movie again. Joan Allen was part of the first shoot, cast as a dancing girl with Laurie, but she couldn’t be there for the reshoot, so she only appeared in the soundless outtakes I strung together as a blooper reel. We rented a projector and a screen and threw a couple of parties where we showed the film. I still have copies, and one of these days, who knows, maybe it’ll show up again.
At one point, Terry decided to leave again. Then he wanted back in again. This time, we held a meeting to decide if Terry could rejoin. We all argued and shouted about “standing on our principles” and “being fully committed.” Moira was there, and we were still dating, although our relationship was constantly up and down, on and off. Her father was dying of cancer then, and all the chaos and stress of the meeting prompted Moira to boil over. Her passion turned to fury, and she lost it. I mean, absolutely lost it. She started yelling, “How can we not let our friend back in the company?! My father is dying, and this is all so stupid! If we’re a company, then we’re a company, and we should stay together no matter what!”
She ran out of the basement into the grassy yard of the school yelling at the top of her lungs. We all ran out into the yard after her. Her logic made sense. Terry was our friend. Moira’s dad was dying. Terry wanted back in the company. Why did we care so passionately about something so trivial when life-and-death issues were all around us?
Moira was still screaming and crying. We grabbed hold of her and hung on. Neighbors poked their heads out of doorways. She screamed and screamed, and the commotion grew so loud the police showed up. Moira calmed down. The police left. We all felt bad for Moira, bad for Terry, and we ended the meeting. Of course, Terry was back in the company. He was a founder and our friend. In those early days, the drama wasn’t limited to the stage.
I don’t think any of us knew exactly what we were doing. The basement cocoon we created gave us a foundation to try anything, do anything, become anything—and the freedom of the space allowed us ultimately to glimpse the world through a wider lens. All of us were committed to becoming better at what we were doing, and we often mixed and mingled our directing and performing, directing one play, acting in the next, sometimes doing both. In those early days, we didn’t talk about going to Hollywood or New York or being in the movies. We wanted to do our own thing—there, in Chicagoland—and I think by being in the basement, isolated, we developed the chip on our shoulder necessary to survive. We felt we had a lot of emerging talent and wanted our work to feel real and raw and fearless, and we worked hard to keep it deeply rooted in the sheer grit that we had onstage together. Whether it was true or not, we needed to somehow believe our work was different, unique, and special. It would take some time and effort before anyone tried to branch out beyond our city, but I think in those early days we all felt like we were getting better and stronger and more confident as artists, and that the sky would be the limit—eventually.
What I know today is that our theater benefited from a larger institution—the United States of America. The country of our birth allowed us any number of freedoms that we subconsciously used and enjoyed and benefited from, even though we didn’t realize it. We had freedom of speech at Steppenwolf—we could express thoughts and ideas about anything in public or private. The people around us might disagree or debate us or push back when they thought we were being stupid, but by no means were we ever stifled in what we said or thought. We exercised the freedom to assemble. We used a sort of freedom of religion, although nothing we did was religious, which was a freedom all its own. No one forced us to dress a certain way or talk a certain way because of their beliefs. We were free to live or travel anywhere we wanted, and we were free to work any job we wanted—so we played in bands and created our own theater and worked in sewers where we found baby racoons. We were free to educate ourselves by any means possible, formal or practical. And all this freedom led to something. It allowed us to create and innovate. It allowed us to dream big. Gratefully, it allowed us to be us. Everyone who stayed with the theater in those early days went on to make their livings as actors and directors. And I think everyone would agree that those days spent in the basement provided the solid foundation for each of our careers. The building of Steppenwolf Theatre is truly an American dream story, a story of starting with nothing but an idea and a passion, and building it into something purposeful, meaningful, and successful. And you know, one of these days I’m going to have to get around to reading the Hermann Hesse novel.
Moira and I got together as a couple a year after the Vietnam War ended in 1975, and I started to meet her family members who had served in the US Army. Moira’s brother, Arthur Harris, was a helicopter pilot, having flown eight hundred combat hours in Vietnam. Moira’s oldest brother, Boyd McCanna “Mac” Harris, had been to Vietnam twice, first as a lieutenant and platoon leader, and second as captain and company commander. He’d received the Silver Star for gallantry in combat. Moira’s sister, Amy, went through ROTC in college and went into the army herself after graduation. She met and married a great guy, Jack Treese, who’d served as a combat medic with the 101st Airborne Division in Vietnam. Jack earned two Bronze Stars and two Purple Hearts. When Arthur came home from Vietnam, he withdrew from things, and I would see him only on rare occasions when Moira and I would visit her mother. But from time to time, Mac, Jack, and Amy came to visit us in Chicago and would see our plays.