'The Diaries' Premieres at Signature Theatre

By Linda Busetti
HERALD Staff Writer
(From the issue of 6/20/02)

John Strand’s play, "The Diaries," asks the audience whether a writer is morally obligated to do more than observe and record what goes on around him.

The drama had its world premiere at Signature Theatre in Arlington recently and runs until July 14.

Strand was inspired by German writer and entomologist Ernst Junger (1895-1998), a Nazi army captain, whose diaries provide a vivid picture of occupied Paris during World War II. The Helen Hayes Award-winning playwright has created the character Stefan Altsanger (Edward Gero), a scientist and novelist who searches for the European goat moth, while ignoring the round-up of Parisian Jews destined for concentration camps.

The play opens with Steve Alton accepting a lifetime achievement award for his work in entomology. A young historian (Daniel Firth) confronts Alton with his long-lost diary, exposing his hidden past as Nazi officer Stefan Altsanger. Four-time Helen Hayes Award-winner Gero, as Altsanger, protests, "My role was as an observer."

Altsanger recalls what it was like to be a German soldier with the knowledge that something horrific was happening around him. When an anonymous soldier off-stage coldly executes a young boy who begs for mercy at Altsanger’s feet, the audience is forced to think what they would have done in his place.

Altsanger is disdainful of the Nazis, calling them "those vampires," but does nothing to intervene. He only writes down his observations. Because of an eye affliction, he cannot even cry.

In her very fine Signature debut, Julia Coffey portrays Charmille, a brave French Jew, who uses Altsanger romantically in order to get visas so fellow Jews can escape the Nazis and certain death.

On the other hand, veteran Broadway and local actress Sybil Lines as the Doctress, a psychiatrist whose objective is to have a good time, flirts as easily with Altsanger as she does with a young German soldier.

Director P.J. Paparelli elicits very strong performances from Gero, Coffey, Lines and Frith, who exchange rapid-fire dialogue on Ethan Sinnott’s minimally decorated set.

When the stage goes dark, the sound of gunfire reminds the audience they are in a war zone.

When a superior officer discovers diarist Altsanger is recording too many details of what is happening in Paris, he is ordered to create a "corrected" version and then sent to the Russian front. While on the front, Altsanger claims, he writes another version of the diary — including details he was ordered to remove from the original — in order to leave a true record.

Meanwhile, Altsanger is able to cry for the first time when he receives news that his own wife and son have been killed in the war in Germany.

The audience is left to wonder if Altsanger really had the courage to write the true story of what he saw or whether he is trying to pacify the young historian. Altsanger admits, "No darkness is darker than silence. …In a time of darkness I managed not to make the darkness darker."

At the end of the approximately two-hour performance, the audience is left with questions for Altsanger and themselves.

Performances of "The Diaries" run until July 14, with show times Tuesday through Saturday at 8 p.m., Sunday at 2p.m. and 7 p.m. There is no performance on July 4, but a performance has been added on Monday, July 1. Tickets are available by calling 1 800/955-5566 or 703/218-6500. Signature Theatre is located at 3806 S. Four Mile Run Dr. in Arlington.

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