'Love Letters' At First Congregational Church

In what has become an autumn tradition, the First Congregational Church of Chatham and the Friends of the Eldredge Public Library are co-sponsoring a fundraising play at the church that will benefit both institutions.

 This year’s play is A.R. Gurney’s “tender, tragicomic” “Love Letters.” It stars Richard Figge as Andrew Makepeace Ladd III and Sara Patton as Melissa Gardner. Both actors are affiliated with the College of Wooster in Wooster, Ohio.

 Figge, a professor emeritus at the college, was in Chatham last year to perform the one-man play “Clarence Darrow.” And in 2023 he was here to portray Harry Truman in another one-man play, “Give ’em Hell, Harry.”

 But Figge and Patton, who goes by “Sally,” are old hands at performing the two-character play “Love Letters.” In fact, they have been doing so for 15 or 20 years.

“From New York to San Francisco we have had grand fun doing it, and audiences have been very receptive to this play and to A.R. Gurney’s characters,” Figge said in an email interview last week. “Sally and I have been in a number of shows together, but I think this one is our favorite. She is a joy to share the stage with.” Despite the nearly two decades they have been performing the play together, “it is still as fresh as when we first read it.”

Figge is a member of the Screen Actors Guild and the American Federation of Radio and Television Artists. For 10 years he has hosted a weekly podcast called “For Reading Out Loud” during which he reads classic short stories. You can listen to him at richardfigge.com/reading-out-loud.

Patton, a long-time resident of Wooster, worked for many years in the development and alumni relations office at the College of Wooster. During those years she also performed in numerous plays including “The Lion in Winter” and “All My Sons.”

“Love Letters,” which was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1990, is performed in a way that might strike the average theater-goer as somewhat dull. The two characters sit side-by-side at a table and read out loud five decades of letters they have written to each other.

 “You know, if someone had told me there was a play in which this happened, and where the characters didn’t move around the stage at all nor even look at each other, I would have said it’s impossible,” Figge says. Yet several years ago a friend invited Figge to read the male part in “Love Letters” during a Christmas party. “Isn’t that unlikely? And then the magic began, and I remember vividly looking at the faces of several young women…with tears running down their cheeks.”

 The plays of Gurney (1930-2017) are said to explore WASP life; he often drew upon his own experiences as he fleshed out his characters. The characters of Melissa and Andrew grew up together in “the world that A.R. Gurney specializes in, that is to say, upper crust East Coast American. They are the children of privilege but very different from one another.” 

 Andrew is proper and “has inherited his father’s sense of duty of those who have been blessed with privilege. He is very serious about his schoolwork and eventually decides to go into law and politics.” He is elected to the U.S. Senate.

 Melissa, in contrast, is more of a free spirit, artistically gifted but emotionally volatile, Figge says. “Their correspondence begins with exchanged notes in grade school and continues into their adulthood. It is fascinating to see their developing love and the fun and conflicts they share.” They write to each other through angst-ridden boarding school days, European adventures, failed marriages, and the vicissitudes of their working lives.

 Over the course of a half century, sometimes the two are loving, and at other times they are estranged. Yet they remain each other’s most trusted confidante.

 Gurney’s writing brings the play to life and, just as vital, are “the way the play is read and then, subtly but importantly, by emotions that can be read in the faces of each actor.”

 Even how the two characters are clothed reflects “the good taste of their class,” Figge says. Melissa wears an elegant dress while Andrew wears a blazer and tie.

 The play has proven popular since its initial performance 36 years ago. After Figge’s first reading of the play, he knew he wanted to perform it widely, but he had to wait at least a year for permission from the holders of the rights — the play was that popular. 

“One critic justly observed that the playwright had issued himself a license to print money,” Figge says. The Broadway production, which opened on Halloween 1989, starred Colleen Dewhurst and Jason Robards. Since then, many, many famous actors such as Mia Farrow and Alan Alda, have performed in “Love Letters.”

 “Love Letters” will be performed on Saturday, Oct. 25 at 7 p.m. in the First Congregational Church of Chatham, 650 Main St. Tickets are $25 per person and may be obtained by calling the church at 508-945-0800.