Playing Roles Within Roles : In therapy at Group Repertory Theatre, characters’ struggles emerge in music

Group therapy. The mood is edgy, tentative--a little hopeful, a little combative. The psychologist eyes her five patients. Who wants to go first? Suddenly, one of the women opens her mouth . . . and begins to sing.

“There are probably very few group therapies where people actually break into song,” said Doug Haverty, whose “Roleplay” is at The Group Repertory Theatre in North Hollywood. (Haverty wrote the book, Adryan Russ wrote the music and they both wrote the lyrics.) But convention was never a consideration for this duo.

“I was in group therapy, and I started to see the dramatic possibilities of re-creating that as a musical,” said Russ, 46, who became pals with Haverty when both were classmates in the Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Workshop at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. “I’d begun to work on it by myself, but I was having a hard time, because I’m not a book writer. I write music and lyrics. Doug would always come up to me after I’d taken a stab at dialogue and say, ‘You know, if you tried this. . . . ‘ “

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Eventually, Haverty agreed to co-write, on the condition that--with the exception of a few songs--they’d start from scratch. It took three years to get their work on stage.

“The ideas I gave him were actually things we were doing in my own therapy,” Russ said. One technique was role playing, in which a patient assumed the persona of another (for example, their mate) and had a mock confrontation with herself. Another technique, called “Behind My Back” had group members standing behind a member’s back, saying things they would not say to her face. Another was “If You Really Loved Me,” a listing exercise of crippling emotional expectations.

Although Russ often taped her own sessions--with the permission of the group--and later transcribed them (“I need to listen to something a few times to understand what went on”), the characters of “Roleplay” are not carbons of her real-life fellow patients.

“I suppose some of the women in the group could think that one or two of the characters are based on them,” Russ said. “One of them was a businesswoman like Liz. Another, like Sage, believed in reading cards. But that’s the end of it.”

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If any one person is represented on stage, Russ believes, it’s her.

“I think I’m in everyone. I’m like the businesswoman. I have my own editing business. I relate to that whole ‘Do it at home, be your own boss’ thing. Dena’s a singer/songwriter. I used to make my living as a songwriter. Sage is a peacemaker. I was in the Peace Corps. Like Molly, I always feel that I’m fat. And there’s that part of Chlo about never getting enough love. I think when you come from a very loving family--then go out in the world and find out it’s not always like that--you can never get enough.”

The final judgment on therapy, she stressed, is affirmative.

“There was another musical about group therapy some time ago, ‘Walls.’ When I saw it, it made me want to do mine even more. I didn’t think it presented therapy in the proper light--at least what I think it is. For me, it’s a very positive thing. I’m a believer. And from the feedback we’ve gotten, it seems audiences are getting more from the show than just entertainment: stepping into other people’s shoes, doing the role play, seeing things from another point of view.” (See accompanying story.)

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Haverty (a member of Group Rep, where his “In My Mind’s Eye” ran in 1984, with Russ’ incidental music) is also enjoying another point of view--as a man involved in what is, unarguably, a woman’s story: “It’s funny; I seem to be able to write women better than men. I grew up in a family of boys--I have three younger brothers--so women fascinate me. I study and collect them. When they tell me things, I remember them. All of my plays either have a female lead or really strong parts for women.”

(Here, he’s also outnumbered: In addition to Russ and the six cast members and six understudies, the stage manager, choreographer, assistant director and director are all female.)

Like Russ, Haverty, 36, hopes that the therapy theme is having therapeutic effects. “I wanted to present a subject people are either afraid of or make fun of--and show it can be a rewarding thing. Adryan had a really good experience in group therapy. At the beginning it was scary, it was always challenging, and at the end she felt better. I think this is something that makes audiences appreciate their own lives, and shows there is still some humanity about people.”

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As the play moves into its 12th week (the show has been extended twice), both authors continue to show up each weekend (with Russ commuting from Santa Barbara) to work with the actresses, watch the performances and check out audience reaction. What next? Russ’ fantasy future includes regional stagings on the way to an East Coast production. Haverty says he’s “listening all the time, trying to streamline,” although he admits the cuts are painful--and slow.

As an actor-turned-writer, however, he admits that the responsibility definitely feels good. “You get to be the parent,” he said. “And when the audience laughs or cries, you have a sort of shared parentage.”

With due credit to the offspring.

“I feel like Adryan and I have written a good floor plan, a springboard--and that these women have colored and built this incredible house,” he said. “The life and humanity they bring is what catches audiences up, makes them feel good. They make the show.”