CECIL BROWN
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going to jump. Sometimes it seems quite arbitrary. There are one or
two who have a certain point of view to which they adhere, like
Walter Kerr. I think he's the most brilliant in the sense of writing;
he and Harold Clurman write the most brilliantly
written
criti–
cism. They have certain biases and Mr. Kerr is convinced for some
reason that I cannot write very well about male characters. He's right
to this extent, that the feminine sensibility is more usable to me as
a writer.
Int.:
Why?
Williams:
Just is.
Int.:
Because the feminine sense is closer
to
the artist's sense?
Williams:
I think it is closer to art, yes, but I think I have, especially in
my play
Red Devil Battery Sign,
created a very very intense readable
male character, that is equal in force to the female character. Brick
(in
Cat)
is a very very delicately drawn character, he just didn't have
as many lines but he was not a superficially drawn character. Stanley
was pretty primitive and primordial in his instincts, but in many
ways defensible. He was reacting with an animal's instinct to protect
its own, its own terrain from invasion, by that element that he could
not comprehend, which happened
to
be Blanche. Shannon was a
more complete sympathetic male. Shannon was a very complex
male, at least I think so.
Int.:
Nothing expresses the essence of religious man better than the
characterization of Shannon, the Episcopal minister, who knelt with
one of his young, attractive female followers and found himself in
the reclining position. Was it his despair that made Shannon so real
to us?
Williams:
He was torn between belief and disbelief, between sexuality
and guilt. Yes, it's been sometime since
Iguana
and I don't recall all
the details of Shannon. I just know he was a pretty well-drawn
character.
Int.:
When you say that the feminine sense is closer to the artistic
principle does that have anything to do with your own sexuality?
Williams:
I think the sensibility of the kind we're discussing can exist
in a person totally celibate.
Int.:
As in Hannah?
Williams:
Yes. Well , you'll call me the Artful Dodger now. After you
have written and published this piece we'll have a real conversation
(hahahaha).
Int.:
What are you hiding from?
Williams:
Right now, man, this is Watergate. I'm not about to have
any incriminating tapes (hahaha).
