A Warm Reception for ‘Widows’

A play’s opening-night party can encompass many things. First, there’s relief that the work is finally on the stage. There’s the basking in praise. The wait for the reviews. Sometimes nervousness over the beginning of a long haul. Or fear the haul will be abruptly cut short.

For Chilean poet and playwright Ariel Dorfman, the party at Stepps on Thursday after the world premiere of his play “Widows” at the Mark Taper Forum was “like a wedding celebration.”

“You’re letting loose one of your children,” said Dorfman at the reception. “It’s not like a birth; that was many years ago. Now the child is ready to walk on its own.

“What people think of it is their problem,” the playwright added. “It’s not mine anymore. I’ve done what I had to do.”

And generally what people thought of his drama was positive. It deals with peasant women in a South American country and their men who have been “disappeared”--taken away by the military, never to be heard from again. L. A. City Councilman Mike Woo said he thought “Widows” was about the “importance of confronting evil.”

“I don’t need to bring up any controversial LAPD analogies,” said Woo. “But I think there are some lessons here about people who feel weak or ignored or oppressed standing up against stronger forces.”

Jackson Browne came to the play and the post-performance party because Dorfman was “one of two poets who have reduced me to tears.” Daryl Hannah also stayed on after the play to gather around the buffet of salmon, chicken and mussels at Stepps.

However, if Dorfman’s comparison to a wedding could be extended, most of the notable guests made it to the ceremony but skipped the reception. At the Taper were Assemblyman Tom Hayden, director Costa-Gravas, Tri-Star Pictures Chairman Mike Medavoy and wife, Patricia, actors David Soul, Helen Slater, Jessica Walters, Louis Nye, Tamlyn Tomita, Rene Auberjonois and Kate Mulgrew, whose husband, Robert Egan, directed the play.

But the play ended late for a work night--11 p.m.--and it was a three-block walk to the party site. So it was primarily cast and friends who celebrated there until 1 a.m.

And while the analogy to a wedding might work for Dorfman, it didn’t necessarily apply to the actors.

“He’s the writer,” said actress Novell Nelson. “For us, the work is still going on.”