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    The Secret Mask
    The Secret Mask
    The Secret Mask
    Ebook209 pages1 hour

    The Secret Mask

    By Rick Chafe

    ()

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    About this ebook

    This heartwarming and often hilarious play tells the story of Ernie and George, an estranged father and son who are reunited when a debilitating stroke leaves Ernie with a speech disorder and memory loss. While George is undeniably hurt and betrayed by the man who abandoned him as a child, Ernie can't remember his words, or where he lives. Together they must find a way to make sense of their past and their future through fractured memories and muddled language.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPlaywrights Canada Press
    Release dateNov 7, 2013
    ISBN9781770911925
    The Secret Mask
    Author

    Rick Chafe

    Rick Chafe’s plays include Governor General’s Literary Award finalist The Secret Mask, Shakespeare’s Dog (adapted from the novel by Leon Rooke), Strike! and its film adaptation Stand! (both co-written with Danny Schur), Red Earth (co-written with Kristian Jordan), Beowulf, and The Odyssey. Rick lives in Winnipeg with his wife, Martine; their daughter, Charlotte; two cats; and their new kitchen.

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      Book preview

      The Secret Mask - Rick Chafe

      9781770911925.jpg3153.jpg

      A wonderfully touching and often heartbreaking story that is also able to frequently bring the entire audience into an uproar of laughter. A simply beautiful play in just about every way.

      —Production Ottawa

      …great emotional power with wonderful moments of humour… This delicate play is a rare combination of heartbreak and humor… a beautifully layered portrayal of a man fighting to recapture as much of himself as possible… 3111.jpg

      —NCPR Radio, New York

      Alternately hilarious and touching… a poignant triumph…

      —The Ottawa Citizen

      Tender, touching, and tense… 3116.jpg ½

      —Uptown Magazine

      …a play that’s sensitive and humorous in equal measure… an enriching, cathartic theatre experience.

      —Apartment613

      Heartbreakingly funny… A beautifully affecting play.

      —CityTV

      "Unpretentious, satisfying, and personal. Humble and lovely… a story that’s as everyday and extraordinary as real life.

      —The Georgia Straight

      The Secret Mask © Copyright 2013 by Rick Chafe

      Sonny Boy words and music by Al Jolson, Buddy Desylva, Lew Brown, and Ray Henderson © 1928 (Renewed) Chappell & Co., Stephen Ballentine Music and Ray Henderson Music.

      Playwrights Canada Press

      202-269 Richmond Street West, Toronto, ON, Canada M5V 1X1

      416.960.9686 • info@playwrightscanada.com

      No part of this book may be reproduced, downloaded, or used in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, except for excerpts in a review or by a licence from Access Copyright, www.accesscopyright.ca.

      For professional or amateur production rights, please contact: Michael Petrasek, The Talent House

      204A St. George Street, Toronto, ON M5R 2N6

      416.928.0299, meaghan@garygoddardagency.com

      Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

      Chafe, Rick, author

         The Secret Mask / Rick Chafe.

      A play.

      Electronic monograph.

      Issued in print and electronic formats.

      ISBN 978-1-77091-192-5

      I. Title.

      PS8555.H265S43 2013   C812’.6   C2013-904411-6

         C2013-904415-94416-7

      cip

      We acknowledge the financial support of the Canada Council for the Arts, the Ontario Arts Council (OAC)—an agency of the Government of Ontario, which last year funded 1,681 individual artists and 1,125 organizations in 216 communities across Ontario for a total of $52.8 million—the Ontario Media Development Corporation, and the Government of Canada through the Canada Book Fund for our publishing activities.

      For my father, Fred Chafe, 1929–2012

      Preface

      My father had a stroke that resulted in aphasia and memory loss in September 2002. Over the following three months my siblings and I took turns flying out to Vancouver from our homes across Canada to help with his rehab and eventual relocation. Many of the events in this play are based on our collective experiences with Dad over that period.

      The character Ernie is closely based on Dad and his evolving personality and behaviour at the time. George is drawn from the stories of several friends who all share his backstory, a son to an absent or abandoning father. Mae is inspired by the warm and wonderful speech-language pathologist who worked with my father for his three months of rehab in Vancouver. Dad seemed to be magnetically pulled to women following his stroke, and all of the additional characters played by Mae are drawn from real events and people we encountered together along the way.

      Ernie’s language is not intended to be a textbook depiction of aphasia, but is a rough approximation of Dad’s speech as I remember it in the months after the stroke. A little Internet research will quickly tell you that aphasia can be expressive (the aphasic person has difficulty expressing himself), or receptive (the aphasic person has difficulty understanding what is said to him). Dad’s aphasia seemed to have characteristics of both. Furthermore, expressive aphasia can be fluent, with lots of words flowing easily, many of which are inaccurate, nonsensical, or even merely gibberish, and the speaker largely unaware that he’s not making sense. Or the expressive aphasia may be non-fluent, with the speaker unable to summon the right words or sounds to say what he wants to say and being acutely aware that what is coming out of his mouth is incorrect. Dad’s aphasia was mostly fluent, but at times he was painfully aware that he’d lost the words, as well as most of his old confidence.

      I should also say that for periods of time, although Dad seemed to use some words consistently as substitutes for others (the same way Ernie uses her royal highness, the square place, and piece of potato more than once), most of his misspeaks were one-time poetic-like utterances, never to be repeated. Sometimes his meaning would be obvious, other times we would have to play Twenty Questions to guess, and many times we didn’t have a clue. For this reason I haven’t attempted to impose definitive translations or any sort of glossary of Ernie-isms. For the productions so far, the actors have invented their own intentions behind Ernie’s words; sometimes the scenes provide context, other times, as anyone living with an aphasiac speaker knows, it’s anyone’s guess.

      I’d like to thank Pamela Bager, M.Sc., SLP (C), who generously gave her time, patience, enthusiasm, and hundreds of suggestions in the portrayal of Ernie’s aphasia and Mae’s approach to speech-language pathology. Thank you to Bob Metcalfe who commissioned the play, was an endlessly supportive dramaturg, and directed a gorgeous premiere production. Thanks also to the cast of the first production, John B. Lowe, Skye Brandon, and Sharon Bajer, who brought enormous contributions to the script, and to the Ottawa and Vancouver casts, Paul Rainville, Michael Mancini, Kate Hurman, Jay Brazeau, Haig Sutherland, Alison Kelly, and directors Ann Hodges and Pam Johnson, all of whom tested and pushed the script further towards its present form. Thank you Prairie Theatre Exchange Playwrights Unit for reading and responding, rewrite after rewrite, to Burgandy Code for a raft of great suggestions, and huge thanks to my great friend, David Stevens, who read and responded to every draft and paid for every beer to boot. Thanks also to the Manitoba Arts Council and the Canada Council for the Arts for financial support during the writing of this play. As always to Martine and Charlotte for patience and love. And to my father, for his bounty of humour and resilience, and to Vida,

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