Friday Mar 29

Weissshot.jpg Matthew Weiss was born in Zurich, Switzerland and grew up both there and in and around New York City. He attended Bennington College in Vermont. His plays include Claus, Slow Children and Hesh. He has written screenplays for Martin Scorsese, Ron Howard and Tony Scott, as well as many others. He now lives in Pasadena.
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Matthew Weiss interview, with Kathleen Dennehy
 
 
What inspired you to write Claus?
 
For as long as I can remember, I’ve been writing about Santa Claus, and the elves, too. When I was in 5th grade, I started writing this thing called Santa Jaws, which is about this shark who’s Santa Claus who comes up the toilet and leaves presents in the sink or in the bathtub. This was 1975, so that sort of thing was very much in the zeitgeist. Then in 6th grade, I started a novel called Famous Potatoes, which was about two of Santa’s elves and what their lives were really like. For me, there were never more than two elves, maybe three. The first draft of Claus actually had three elves. But more than that…I just don’t see it. I’ve given the matter a lot of thought, obviously. Maybe because I’m a Jew I’m able to be fascinated by the whole phenomenon in a way the true believer kids never can. Or won’t allow themselves to.
 

I am a huge fan of the old movie classics, "Maltese Falcon", "Angels With Dirty Faces", "All About Eve", "Jezebel". I may be assuming that you've been inspired by them as well, but were you initially inspired to re-write the Santa story in the vein of the classic movies, or did it generate in another fashion?
 
Angels With Dirty Faces is one of my all time favorites and also The Maltese Falcon, of course. Gutman and Wilmer! And Peter Lorre, who’s one of my favorite actors, who started out as a member of Brecht’s first theater company back in Germany. In the movie M, in that climactic scene where everyone is accusing Peter Lorre of committing the crimes, there’s a quick shot of Brecht as part of the crowd, the angry mob. I don’t think he’s credited, but I’m sure it’s him.
 
 
This probably isn't fair, but since I know you and I know you were young when you wrote the play, how old were you when you wrote Claus?
 
Not that young. I was 26 or 27.
 

What elevates this play above spoof and/or parody is that each character has their own fairly dramatic and humanistic arc.  And at the end I was truly touched and moved.  Granted I am a new mother, and I cry at hockey games, but what motivated you to put a sweet, heartfelt message inside such a hilarious, profane and delicious send up?
 
I’m really glad you felt that way because that’s the way I always felt about it, too. Of course, I wanted it to be funny, but for me it was crucial that the Santa Claus character be portrayed as someone with a very real heart and soul; a very sad, lonely, bitter old man disappointed by life and desperately in search of something to make it all mean something, which in that last scene I think it does, though not in the way he expected,. I really wanted everyone in the play to be happy at the end, and I wanted it to snow in Santa’s hospital room. Only I never wanted him to be called “Santa” – at least not by the people who were close to him.  He wants to be called “Alan”, even though it’s not his real name. It’s very important to him. And the weird complexity of that, as well as of all these other things going on in his psychological make-up, gives him depth, makes him real. Or at least I hoped it would. Because that’s what he had to be: this real flesh-and-blood guy, very emotional, sure, but an actual human being and not some hokey cartoon character. It always upset me when people – and there were a few of them – wanted to turn him into this clichéd, over-the-top, total camp diva or whatever.  Drove me nuts.
 

Did the play change as you went through production? Did new situations rise up or characters change as the rehearsals went on and you saw actors in the roles?
 
Sure. But overall the actors really got the characters and played them pretty much exactly as I always saw them. Of course, that doesn’t mean they didn’t come up with some really brilliant stuff of their own. One time during rehearsal, or maybe even during a performance, Bradley White, who played Constable Noël, suddenly sang out one of his lines instead of speaking it, literally sang it out like the star tenor of a Gilbert and Sullivan musical. And it was so bizarre, so completely unexpected that it was perfect. Absolutely genius. I totally stole it, going back and putting it in the script after the fact. But it was his. The actors were all amazing. I was really lucky, and I’m very grateful.
 

I am also a big fan of your play "Hesh". I feel some of the characters in "Hesh", or at least their gritty language, struggles with alcohol, violence and masculinity have permeated "Claus". Is there something in your background or upbringing that your writing bears witness to?
 
Hesh is about my father, who had a lot of demons, who was always my total hero. Claus was written a couple years earlier, and my father’s in that one, too, at least in the later part where Alan’s in the hospital. Very much so. What’s interesting though is that Ned Eisenberg, the actor who played Curtis and then later played Hesh, was a big influence on me while I was writing it. He did some things in the way he played Curtis in Claus that reminded me more of my father than my father did, and a lot of that ended up in Hesh.
 
 
I know this is a comedy and I'm asking more invasive questions, but the play intrigues and also works on so many dramatic levels. About disappointment, loneliness and the loss of moral compass as we age and lose our innocence... what would you say the play is essentially about?

About how difficult it is to reach out to people emotionally when you really need to. About how complicated and convoluted it can get, but when it works out, it’s always so simple, like this huge relief.
 

Where did you learn to write?
 
I had a some genuinely fantastic mentors in high school and in college, and after that in the New York Playwrights Lab, which was led by Israel Horovitz. I learned a lot there.
 

What or who made you want to be a writer?
 
There were several writers in the New York Playwrights who were also members of Naked Angels, which is how I first got involved with that company. I’d wanted to be a writer for a while already, but they really solidified it, put a jumpstart on it for me, because they were all so smart, and funny, and sharp and seemed to be living these lives that were just really great, and I wanted that, too.  Not that their lives were all glamorous and fabulous or anything, but just the way they thought and talked, how they engaged the world in their day-to-day lives. And they wrote.
 
I was introduced to the Tuesdays@9 open reading series at  Naked Angeles, and I would go every week and bring in a scene and have it read by great actors and it was so much, and people really seemed to like it, which made me think maybe I could actually do this.
 

What writers inspire you?
 
Kenneth Lonergan, who’s one of the best playwrights and screenwriters out there. He was in the Playwrights Lab, and a member of Naked Angeles, so I got to know his writing pretty well, pretty quick. Aside from Kenny I’d also say Waldo Salt (Midnight Cowboy) and Frank Pierson (Dog Day Afternoon). Martin Amis, though he’s primarily a novelist and not a script writer, is another profound inspiration. And I love Harold Pinter.
 

What are you working on now?
 
I’m developing this new cop show for TV with a friend who’s a producer; writing a screenplay adaptation of a Holocaust book for young adults, also a horror movie I’ve been meaning to write for years. Plus a couple other jobs I’d really love to do; we’ll see how it goes.
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All Connotation Press plays are presented online to the reading public. All performance rights, including professional, amateur, television and the rights of translation into foreign languages are strictly reserved. If you are interested in seeking performance rights to a specific work contact the Drama Editor, Kathleen Dennehy.