Edward Albee, the most interesting American playwright of the post-Williams and Miller years, has stepped off stage at eighty-eight--an age some of us no longer consider all that old.
Albee, best known for "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf" (a title he took from graffiti on a mirror in a New York bar) first grabbed attention with a series of one-act plays, most particularly "Zoo Story." It fascinated audiences and made them uncomfortable, which was true of most of his work. He seemed more an extension of Eugene O'Neill than of Williams and Miller.
In 1979, Albee spent three days in Edmonton, at the University of Alberta, possibly drawn there by Henry Woolf, then a member of the drama department faculty. He gave a series of memorable lectures, some broadcast by CKUA, the university's outstanding campus radio station.
Albee wrote a great number of plays, and it would be good to see some of them again, especially puzzles like "Tiny Alice" and "Seascape," and what night have been his last major work, "Three Tall Women," portraits of his mother at various ages.
Incidental information: In the first (1962) staging of "Virginia Woolf," the character George (Richard Burton in the film) was played by Arthur Hill, who was born in Melfort, Saskatchewan, and began his stage career at the University of British Columbia. Uta Hagen was Martha. "Woolf" won the Tony Award for best play of 1962; Hill and Hagen took Tony Awards for best actor and actress.
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I join you in not considering 86 all that old. Nor was I aware that Arthur Hill, one of the finest character actors ever, was a Saskatchewan native and a UBC alumnus. I'd appreciate a revival of Virginia Woolf with Tina Fey and John Hamm in the Taylor and Burton roles. Hamm is good at everything but his comedy is brilliant. As for Albee, theatre jargon names him a "onesie." We will not soon see his like again.
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