Ohio native and poet Hart Crane the focal point of the play 'A Crane Takes Flight'
“A Crane Takes Flight” aims to take a fresh look at Ohio native Hart Crane, a renowned American poet.
Evolution Theatre Company’s world premiere of Mark Phillips Schwamberger’s play will open Sept. 8 at the Ohio History Center.
“I was looking to write about a native gay Ohioan in the arts... Hart Crane intrigued me because he had genius as well as demons,” said Mark Phillips Schwamberger, the company’s artistic/executive director.
Schwamberger, who directs Dayton Edward Willison in the solo piece, said he hopes to arouse empathy for a gay Ohio artist who followed his “soul and heart.”
Schwamberger began researching Crane’s life and work three years ago, and began writing the play in 2019.
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“It’s not a biography but a dramatization reflecting my interpretation... What I focus on is what inspired and destroyed this artist,” he said.
Crane, he learned, was a complex man who got into fights, got “nasty” when drunk and sometimes was physically abusive.
“But that was because of his demons... his insecurities and feelings of failure...Being gay in early 1900s America meant he had to hide,” he said.
Much of Crane’s romantic poetry was veiled.
“It had to be ambiguous because a lot was inspired by his love affairs, especially his love for one particular man that he met and lived with in New York,” Schwamberger said.
The 70-minute one-act imagines Crane’s spirit time-traveling to discuss his poetry, love affairs and the modern world.
“He realizes he’s deceased, and comes back, not necessarily as a ghost, to the present to New York’s Columbia Heights overlooking the Brooklyn Bridge where he was happiest in life,” Schwamberger said.
Praised as one of the most influential poets of his generation, Crane (1899-1932) is remembered for “The Bridge,” an epic poem celebrating urban culture.
Responding to T.S. Elliot’s “damned depressing” poem “The Wasteland,” Crane thought poetry should “uplift society,” Schwamberger said.
Willison, 34, was eager to portray Crane.
“He’s a burst of exuberant energy with a very deep soul... but there are also moments of complete stillness when he’s in pain or feeling deep emotion,” Willison said.
This is Willison’s first solo play.
“I wasn’t really scared, maybe daunted a little because it’s an hour onstage by yourself with no one to help you,” he said.
“But I’m an actor who feels: Bring it on!"
Willison wanted to do the play partly because he admires the writing and empathizes with his character.
“The play looks at who Crane was and what he went through as a gay man during an era when gay men could be arrested, beaten or killed, or at least ostracized from society,” he said.
Crane died at 32, drowning by apparent suicide while taking a ship from Mexico back to New York.
“I make it mysterious to leave questions in the audience’s mind,” Schwamberger said.
“My own interpretation, from ship reports, is that he was murdered.... He was sexually active...There were times when he was beat up,” he said.
Evolution Theatre Company, a small professional troupe focused on LGBTQQIA artists and themes, selected the history museum as the play’s venue to bolster awareness of significant gay Ohioans.
“It’s a perfect fit there,” Schwamberger said, “and if people come an hour before curtain, they can visit the whole museum and witness Ohio history before experiencing this play about an important gay Ohio artist.”
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At a glance
Evolution Theatre Company will present “A Crane Takes Flight” at 7:30 p.m. Sept. 8-9 and 8 p.m. Sept. 10-11 at the Ohio History Connection, Interstate 71 and East 17the Avenue. Tickets, including museum admission and requiring masks and proof of vaccination, cost $25, or $20 for senior citizens, $15 for students. Call 614-233-1124 or visit www.evolutiontheatre.org.