Scott McPherson, renowned playwright and actor, was regarded as one of Chicago's most vital artistic and creative forces. McPherson was one of the first openly gay, HIV-positive American artists. Three of McPherson's plays were produced in Chicago: 'Til the Fat Lady Sings, Scraped and most notably, Marvin's Room. Marvin's Room, first produced by the Goodman Theatre in 1990, has also been produced at Hartford Stage, Playwrights Horizon, and at Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C. The play received the Drama Desk Award, the Oppenheimer Award, the Obie Drama Award, and the Outer Critics Circle Award. It was later made into a major motion picture starring Meryl Streep, Leonardo DiCaprio, Robert De Niro, Diane Keaton, and Hume Cronyn. In spite of variable and increasingly failing health, and the illness and death of his lover, political cartoonist Daniel Sotomayor, McPherson continued writing until shortly before his death. He died in Chicago on November 7, 1992.
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Marvin's RoomA Play
DR. WALLY: Do you mind if I call you Augustina?
BESSIE: Well, my name is Bessie.
DR. WALLY: Bessie. Of course. I’m sorry. Things have been a bit hectic around here. Dr. Serat is away on vacation and this morning our receptionist quit. Usually Nurse Abrams would draw the blood for any blood test but… where’d I put the whatchamacallit? The uh, do you see it?
BESSIE: What?
DR. WALLY: You know, that um, um, I tie it around your arm to make your veins pop out.
BESSIE: Tourniquet?
DR. WALLY: Yes, that’s it. Oh, I’m sitting on it. How’d that happen? Okay, give me your arm please.
Marvin's Room (mcpmarvi)Premiered in1990 -
Marvin's RoomA Play
RUTH: Being confined to your bed is nothing to be afraid of.
BESSIE: I’m not confined to my bed. I’m just a little tired today.
RUTH: I was confined to my bed most of my life. You find things to do.
BESSIE: Like what?
RUTH: Oh my, well, you can sleep or you can lay there awake…
BESSIE: Do you want any of this?
RUTH: No, no. That’s all for you. You eat that and be strong. Have you made a stinky today?
BESSIE: Yes.
RUTH: That’s good. That’s important.
Marvin's Room (mcpmarvi)Premiered in1990 -
Marvin's RoomA Play
BESSIE: They always have a last picnic down by the river. This year there was kind of a cold snap so a lot of people were bundled up. But Clarence, he’ll deny it, but he likes to be the center of attention. Clarence goes swimming anyway. And he knows everybody is watching him. Everybody is there, his family, his friends, me. And he bobs up out of the water and he’s laughing, making that monkey face, which gets all of us laughing, and he dunks under again and pops up somewhere else laughing even harder which gets us laughing even harder. And he dives under again and then he doesn’t come up and he doesn’t come up and he doesn’t come up. Laughing and choking looked the same on Clarence. He drowned right in front of us. Every time he came up for air, there we were chuckling and pointing. What could be have thought?
Marvin's Room (mcpmarvi)Premiered in1990
“ . . . one of the funniest plays of this year as well as one of the wisest and most moving . . . When the American theater gains a new voice this original, this unexpected, you really must hear it for yourself . . . Mr. McPherson's ability to find laughter in such matters as bone marrow transplants are at least minor miracles of absurdist comedy.” —Frank Rich, The New York Times [on Marvin’s Room]
“ . . . the themes of death, love, duty, care and service are frugally intertwined in a play of considerable emotional resonance. Laughing one minute, we are shuddering with a stealthy empathy the next. Death has rarely seemed more interesting or love so complex.” —New York Post [on Marvin’s Room]
“Marvin's Room is a beautifully written, deeply moving new play . . . [with] an assured balance between sorrow and joy, rage and laughter, piercing pain and utter hilarity . . . McPherson [has an] almost breathtaking ability to combine the ridiculous and bizarre with the poignant and profound in an illuminating juxtaposition . . .” —Chicago Tribune
Selected Works
