A CONVERSATION WITH BARNARD HUGHES

by Stephen F. Smith (92)

With the Celtic Theatre Company (CTC) presenting Hugh Leonard’s comedy DA as their final production of the 2000-2001 season, who better to shed some light on the play than Barnard Hughes, the 1978 Tony Award winner for best actor for his performance in the Broadway production’s title role?

With that in mind, CTC Artistic Director James P. McGlone, CTC Founding Member Mark Roger (portraying the title role in the upcoming production), Director Stephen F. Smith, and Photographer Jerry McCrea met with Mr. Hughes, known to his many friends simply as "Barney." Barney’s relationship with the CTC reaches back almost 17 years. In 1984, he accepted Bishop Dougherty's invitation to serve as an Honorary Trustee for the organization and he continues in that capacity to this day.

On a Saturday afternoon in early March, the CTC group joined the actor and Helen Stenborg, his wife of 50 years and an accomplished actress in her own right, at their lovely New York City home. Their spacious apartment’s walls are adorned with posters from their numerous theatrical productions as well as pictures of several fellow artists, including Barney’s appearances with Richard Burton in Hamlet, Jason Robards in The Iceman Cometh and Lauren Bacall, Rosemary Harris, and his wife, Helen, in last year’s Waiting in the Wings, among many others.

As he reminisced over his long and successful career, Barney fondly remembered his work and friendships with such luminaries as Walter Matthau, George C. Scott, Jessica Tandy, and Hume Cronyn, whom he recently saw at Jason Robards’ memorial service in Manhattan. There we were we made quite a pair! Barney recalled laughingly, "He couldn’t see and I couldn’t walk!" When he and Hume Cronyn were both nominated for the 1978 Tony Award for Best Actor (along with Jason Robards and Frank Langella), his good friend Cronyn was seated behind him at the awards ceremony. "They seated me here," Cronyn whispered in Barney’s ear, just prior to the award’s presentation, so that I can carry your train when you win.

Among his treasures from his long and successful career, there is, of course, memorabilia from his great success with DA which he played on Broadway, Off-Broadway, in a national touring production (appearing on-stage with his wife and daughter), at Dublin’s Olympia Theatre, and eventually on film (nearly 10 years after he first starred in the role on stage).

Barney claims that DA remains his favorite role and that it did more for his career than any other part. "There is more to DA than anybody imagined," he said, "I can’t tell you how many times people would come to see me after a performance and before you knew it, they were crying on my shoulder." They were just so surprised by the play’s emotional power. "DA is a wonderful combination of many things," he went on to say, "Everything is in it. Everything is just there, written for you. You never need a theatrical bridge to get you from one place to another."

He also praised the play’s universality, recalling Melvin Bernhardt’s (the original production’s director) comment on DA: "It’s the best Jewish play (he) had read in years." Barney said conversely that Fiddler on the Roof was the "best Irish play" that he had seen in years. You didn’t need to be Irish to relate to DA's humorous and touching family dynamic, he added.

DA’s playwright, Hugh Leonard, was not involved in Barney’s rehearsal process, and did not see the production until it reached preview performances. Knowing that the play was heavily autobiographical in nature, Barney naturally assumed there would be heavy rewriting and rehearsals after the playwright arrived. "At last, you’re here. Now we can get to work," the actor said to Leonard upon meeting him after the performance. The playwright simply replied, "I’m not going to touch it." Barney knew then that they had a hit on their hands.

Barney readily admits that he ultimately finds it difficult to talk about DA in great detail because, he says, "There is a great deal of mystery about performing a role; how you arrive at acting decisions; about what to play and how you play them." Barney says that there is just no substitute for the pure wonder and joy of the artist’s personal discovery process.

At age 85, Barney talks about retirement but there always seems to be just one more project on the horizon. He is currently considering undertaking a role in an upcoming summer production of Chechov’s The Cherry Orchard at the Long Wharf Theatre, where his son Doug serves as Artistic Director. Barnard Hughes remains as charming and beguiling as his most famous stage creation, DA, and we, at CTC, consider ourselves very fortunate to have a living legend of the American theatre to be counted among our Honorary Trustees and our friends.