By Terry Keefe
David Rambo's play The Ice-Breaker, currently running at Theatre 40 in Los Angeles, revolves in part around the evocative fact that polar ice preserves the climate memory of the world. Drill just a bit into the largest glacier and you're into the time of the American Civil War. Drill further and you're at the dawn of man. As a character says in the play, "We can drill two miles deep, and a hundred-and-ten-thousand years back. We analyze isotopes from Mozart's air and Plato's oxygen." The science of ice memory provides the backdrop, and a reflection, for the two-character relationship at the heart of The Ice-Breaker. Sonia Milan (played in this production by Ashleigh Sumner) is a doctorate student in climatology, who is finishing her thesis. She has traveled out to the Arizona desert to find the reclusive fiftysomething Dr. Lawrence Blanchard (played by Robert Mackenzie), formerly one of the top experts in the world on the effects of global warming on the polar ice caps. Although he seems to barely remember his climate research now, Blanchard was the inspiration for Sonia, and a relationship forms between the two.
This is the Los Angeles Premiere of The Ice-Breaker. Some of David Rambo's other notable theater works include God's Man in Texas, as well as The Lady With All the Answers, a one-woman show about Ann Landers, which recently opened Off-Broadway, starring Judith Ivey. Rambo has also served for several years as a writer-producer on "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation." The Ice-Breaker is directed at Theatre 40 by producer-director-actor Andre Barron, who previously directed Theatre 40's Annual One-Act Festival, which was Critic's Choice at the L.A. Times.
In terms of the germ of the idea for The Ice-Breaker, was it the desire to write something involving global warming that drove you first, or was it the characters?
David Rambo: To be honest, I read a New Yorker essay by Elizabeth Kolbert, entitled "Ice Memory." In the piece, she discussed ice-core drilling, which I had never heard of. I didn’t know that there was this 100,000 years of climate history, just locked in the ice. I had no idea and I loved that, and I thought that drilling down into it, finding more and more, is kind of a metaphor for relationships…getting to know one another. It seemed kind of theatrical to me, so I pitched it to the Geffen Playhouse, and they said to go ahead and write the play. It never really worked out for the Geffen to do it - they helped me develop it - but an opportunity came up for me to premiere it at the Magic Theatre in San Francisco first.
In the dialogue of The Ice-Breaker, you have to work in this hard science, but you also have to make it colloquial. Did it take a lot of drafts to make that balance work?
Well, it took a lot of listening, pretty acutely, to the scientists that I consulted with, and also trying to find a way that it would make sense to the audience. Because, you can use jargon, and you know, arcane scientific conversation to a point…but the audience has to know what they mean, or at least the actors need to. So, it’s not quite, maybe, how scientists would speak, but it’s the theatrical equivalent. And, I’ve had a lot of scientists come to the play, as it has made its journey, and they all thought that I got the science talk on the money, so I’m very gratified for that.
Did you have any experts on global warming read the play as you were doing different drafts, to make sure you nailed the facts right?
I would ask them certain questions, but I did not have them read the play, because, frankly, not everybody knows how to read a play, you know?
That’s true. How different is the current version of the play to the one that first premiered?
It’s essentially the same. I would say that it’s been sort of focused, more than anything. There are no big moments cut out, and no back story that I changed. It’s very much the play, but writing the play took quite a while, so by the time I got it into the hands of actors, I knew the story I wanted to tell.
How long did the writing process take?
It took almost a year.
When you’re writing a play, do you workshop it with actors at all, to hear the dialogue as you go through drafts, or is a reading something you save until after you feel you have a final draft?
I was fortunate on this one, because it actually had its development journey built into the creation. It was co-commissioned by the Geffen, and A.S.K. Theatre Projects, both of whom gave me actors, and opportunities to sit down in rehearsal rooms, and sometimes with audiences, to hear it read.
I have to tell you that the big development component for this play happened in Denver. Denver Center Theatre developed it in a workshop that I think had nine performances, and that was really where the play found its feet.
Was it helpful because you were able to hear the dialogue, and also improv certain things?
Not improv so much, but just sort of in exploring the play...that’s where it was helpful. Explaining moments, and science, to the actors, and working with the director on it…we kind of found it. It revealed itself. That’s where you kind of find out what’s essential…and what you can send to the drawer [laughs].
(David Rambo, above.)
In terms of the germ of the idea for The Ice-Breaker, was it the desire to write something involving global warming that drove you first, or was it the characters?
David Rambo: To be honest, I read a New Yorker essay by Elizabeth Kolbert, entitled "Ice Memory." In the piece, she discussed ice-core drilling, which I had never heard of. I didn’t know that there was this 100,000 years of climate history, just locked in the ice. I had no idea and I loved that, and I thought that drilling down into it, finding more and more, is kind of a metaphor for relationships…getting to know one another. It seemed kind of theatrical to me, so I pitched it to the Geffen Playhouse, and they said to go ahead and write the play. It never really worked out for the Geffen to do it - they helped me develop it - but an opportunity came up for me to premiere it at the Magic Theatre in San Francisco first.
In the dialogue of The Ice-Breaker, you have to work in this hard science, but you also have to make it colloquial. Did it take a lot of drafts to make that balance work?
Well, it took a lot of listening, pretty acutely, to the scientists that I consulted with, and also trying to find a way that it would make sense to the audience. Because, you can use jargon, and you know, arcane scientific conversation to a point…but the audience has to know what they mean, or at least the actors need to. So, it’s not quite, maybe, how scientists would speak, but it’s the theatrical equivalent. And, I’ve had a lot of scientists come to the play, as it has made its journey, and they all thought that I got the science talk on the money, so I’m very gratified for that.
Did you have any experts on global warming read the play as you were doing different drafts, to make sure you nailed the facts right?
I would ask them certain questions, but I did not have them read the play, because, frankly, not everybody knows how to read a play, you know?
That’s true. How different is the current version of the play to the one that first premiered?
It’s essentially the same. I would say that it’s been sort of focused, more than anything. There are no big moments cut out, and no back story that I changed. It’s very much the play, but writing the play took quite a while, so by the time I got it into the hands of actors, I knew the story I wanted to tell.
How long did the writing process take?
It took almost a year.
When you’re writing a play, do you workshop it with actors at all, to hear the dialogue as you go through drafts, or is a reading something you save until after you feel you have a final draft?
I was fortunate on this one, because it actually had its development journey built into the creation. It was co-commissioned by the Geffen, and A.S.K. Theatre Projects, both of whom gave me actors, and opportunities to sit down in rehearsal rooms, and sometimes with audiences, to hear it read.
I have to tell you that the big development component for this play happened in Denver. Denver Center Theatre developed it in a workshop that I think had nine performances, and that was really where the play found its feet.
Was it helpful because you were able to hear the dialogue, and also improv certain things?
Not improv so much, but just sort of in exploring the play...that’s where it was helpful. Explaining moments, and science, to the actors, and working with the director on it…we kind of found it. It revealed itself. That’s where you kind of find out what’s essential…and what you can send to the drawer [laughs].
(David Rambo, above.)When you set out to write something like The Ice-Breaker, do you plot it out the same way you would outline a story that is driven more by action beats, as opposed to a story such as this where the plot information comes out in the dialogue predominantly?
I’ve never outlined a play. I think, because it’s a poetic medium, you can really let the characters speak to you. I have some big ideas, and some little details that I want to include, but often you end up not including them. It takes on its own life. But, all those things that you intend to write are very important, because they really are the ignition.
You let the characters speak and the story reveals itself to you as you’re writing the characters, then.
Absolutely. Often, by the way, I go to a cabin I have in Lake Arrowhead. I went up there and sat with foam ear plugs to make sure that I was writing and thinking in complete silence to write this play. It was a very difficult play for me to hear.
How long are you able to do that type of writing isolation before you go crazy?
[laughs] You go into deprivation. You don’t do email all day. I think I was able to give myself three weeks up there. That’s great solitude. That’s like a residency at MacDowell’s [laughs], except it’s ninety minutes from L.A.
How different is your creative headspace when you’re writing a play like this, as opposed to an episode of “CSI?” I imagine they’re very different processes?
They’re very different because, in a play, you really do go into the unknown on every page. By the time you’re writing an episode of television, you’re working from an outline, and you’ve had input from all the different departments that are going to make it happen, and you know who your actors are, and you know what your characters did last week, and the week before.
The difference, I think, is between what’s known and what’s unknown.
Have you seen much of the rehearsal process of the current production that is about to premiere in L.A.?
I was at the very first table reading, and this cast blew me away.
I wanted to ask about what you’re doing next. I read something about a one-man show about the life of Ronald Reagan?
Yeah, you know, years ago, a playwriting teacher in a workshop, she was challenging us, and she said, “Write the play that you thought you’d never write.” And boy, a one-man show about Ronald Reagan was that show for me.
I imagine you did quite a bit of research?
I did a tremendous amount of research, because the producers who approached me and asked me to write this - I initially resisted the idea and then came around to actually kind of loving it - they had a very tight schedule because they wanted it on Broadway by the Reagan Centenary, which is February 6th of next year.
The family was very cooperative, particularly Patti Davis, who helped me tremendously…sharing private correspondence, and moments, and giving me a sense of who her father was.
Was what you learned about Reagan surprising?
Very surprising. You know, I didn’t take a lot of time in the 80s to get to know Ronald Reagan. I was very angry with him in the 1980s, and I’m still angry at missed opportunities of his, and what that cost us. But, I really also came to appreciate things that I never allowed myself to appreciate before, and to look at the larger picture.
Location: Performances of The Ice-Breaker will take place at Theatre 40, at the Reuben Cordova Theatre, 241 Moreno Drive on the Beverly Hills High School campus.
Dates: Wednesdays-Saturdays, through June 6th.
Reservations: 310-364-0535. For further information, go to the Theatre 40 website.
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