La Connection

by Jack Gelber, Fernanda Pivano (Translator), Jerry Tallmer (Contributor)

Dramatically depicts the agony and desperation of heroin addicts as they await the arrival of their supplier

Genres: Plays, Theatre, Drama

131 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1960

Reviews

[Cameron Baguley · Rating 5 out of 5]

From a jazz musicians perspective this is fantastic! Watch the movie adaptation by Shirley Clarke

[Domenico Francesco · Rating 4 out of 5]

Insieme a The Brig (La Prigione), The Connection è tra le opere più importanti del primo Living Theatre: la rappresentazione di uno squarcio di vita nella quotidianità di un gruppo di eroinomani mentre aspetta il contatto (appunto la connection) che porterà la loro dose, nello stesso momento una troupe sta facendo un documentario su di loro. Come nelle altre opere del collettivo fondato da Julian Beck e Judith Malina la trama non ha importanza tanto quanto le cose che vengono dette ed il modo in cui esse sono esposte sulla scena. Lla presenza quasi continua di musica jazz sullo sfondo, il continuo sovrapporsi meta-narrativo dei piani di realtà e finzione e i dibattiti dei personaggi sulla rappresentazione del reale attraverso il filtro dell'occhio della macchina fotografica e presa (così come del teatro) rendono l'opera un unicum per molte delle avanguardie a venire. Anche certi discorsi sulla droga in sé sono sbalorditivi per l'epoca in cui l'opera fu originariamente rappresentata, di cui si parla inoltre senza alcuno stratagemma o eufemismo con un linguaggio in slang e molto gergale, e non per niente anche quest'opera ricevette come intuibile, infinite censure e critiche. Una sorta di neo-realismo beat ultra-minimale. Ottima la traduzione della Pivano e illuminanti i saggi e gli articoli che impreziosiscono il volume per saperne di più sulla genesi dell'opera, l'importanza che essa rivestì per il Living e la rappresentazione del sotto-mondo della droga.

[EJ Paras · Rating 5 out of 5]

“There is something perverse in me looking for meaning all the time.”

I listened to Al Pacino on Marc Maron’s podcast after getting my mind blown by Scarface at Metrograph (yep, late to the party there). He had mentioned this play as being something that really stirred something in him as a young man. I’m messing up details now, but he had friends while he was in acting school who were also strongly influenced by this play; they’d regroup and say after watching / reading it, “yeah, I’m going to do some monologues from this play.”

“Where do all those sinners get the energy to be saved? Fantastic. I couldn’t make it. You have to hand it to them. Day after day, trudging and pulling, they seek out energetic sinners.”

That Pacino and his peers (great actors in their own right) were stirred by this, was enough for me to explore.

And I was pretty enchanted from the beginning. I loved the Our Town-like conceit — that all the players know they’re in a play. Where this one separates from the purity of Our Town is that there is a perverted, existential futility of staging THIS specific play. In this play’s world, all the players are genuine junkies. Who are being paid by being given heroin.

And it’s messed up because the falling action of this play is quite disheartening, as everyone crumbles away. Waiting for Godot, you can say. Waiting for the connection — waiting for the hit. Waiting for the release. Waiting…

The musicality of it all and the attitude of this play are quite cool. So much jazz music exists within the piece; it’s integral. Until I get to watch this, I feel like I still only got a fraction of what this play has to say. And it does have a lot to say!

Nonetheless, I really enjoyed reading this. Can only imagine how trippy it feels as an audience member, too, when you have the cast emerging from the audience, when you have them addressing the audience; when you have the cast ‘breaking’ and wanting to get out of this production. Is it a production? Is it a documentary? What is the ethics of how and why we tell stories? It makes you think.

“I can’t tell the performance from the rehearsal.”

And this is all separate from the racial dialogue that can happen here, and the rampant injustices that exist for different communities in the context of drugs. Lots to chew on. Rock and roll.

[Julio The Fox · Rating 3 out of 5]

Is there no truth in junk? THE CONNECTION has not aged well. Jack Gelber thought he was was bringing his audience closer to REALITY by staging modern man's predicament, loss of faith, loss of kindness, absence of communication, in a room full of jazz musician heroin addicts waiting for their man, the connection, the H dealer. Wrong. This is not WAITING FOR GODOT. The jazz junkies have set themselves adrift and reverted to childhood, not grasping at some greater truth that will forever avoid their hands. Gelber's jazzmen are colorless, trying to out-cool each other and making us feel like unhip outsiders. If you're planning to go down this road stick with William Burroughs's JUNKY. At least Burroughs does not pretend the lower you are among pond scum the more saintly you appear.

[Brian McCann · Rating 3 out of 5]

Talky play (1959) that helped usher in the off-Broadway movement. Must have been so controversial in its initial run.

[Morgan Nugent · Rating 4 out of 5]

Waiting for lefty but it’s high improv