Grace Notes and Anvils

Grace Notes & Anvilsbegan life as a book, “About Grief: Insights, Setbacks, Grace Notes, Taboos” (published by Rowman & Littlefield in 2010). Because its authors, Marasco and Shuff, were also actors, they decided to adapt the book for the theater by turning it into a concert-reading play.

The two of them, joined by actress Roxanne Hart, sit at a table and read the text in crisp, orchestrated fashion. Content takes precedence over form: they talk frankly and movingly about the impact of death on people. Universal as the theme is -- we've all experienced the pain of losing someone close to us -- it's not often addressed as openly and intimately as it is in Grace Notes

The performers know they are dealing with a difficult -- maybe even taboo -- subject. But to their credit, they address it in an unabashed, down-to-earth way that will have no truck with euphemisms, sentimentality and New Age sappiness. The result is an evening of intelligent, adult discourse that touches both the mind and heart.

By quoting the likes of Shakespeare, Auden, C S Lewis, E E Cummings and Joan Didion, the playwrights deepen their text by adding literary and poetic dimensions to it. They aren't above using humor as well.

The main message of the play is this: "It's okay to feel awkward when dealing with grief. Because it's in our awkwardness that we are at our most human, and it's when we're avoiding awkwardness that we're at our least."

The playwrights also deal with what they call "anvil moments." Triggered by a memory, the words of a song, the discovery of a family photograph, grief will suddenly hammer those who have survived a beloved's death, causing them to lash out against life or maybe even think of withdrawing from it. But ultimately they would be wise to remember what Yeats had to say about this kind of martyrdom: "Too long a sacrifice makes a stone of the heart."

Marasco and Shuff (excellent) will keep anchoring Grace Notes for the length of the run, but in the weeks to come Hart (equally superb) will be replaced by various guest stars. The list includes Morgan Fairchild, Glenne Headley, Camryn Manheim and Annie Potts.