But maybe now Bette, having been divorced, was no longer committed to changing him and actually accepting him with whatever flaws he had. In many of the other scenes, she keeps saying you've got to do this, you've got to do that, you've got to change. My parents actually did love one another on some level and cared for one another too. Jerry told us not to play sadness. It's a happy scene, but also sad because you realize they could have succeeded in thier marriage.
Plays can be mysterious.
Olympia Dukakis played Soot, and once, late in rehearsals, she said this is a very forgiving play. And I remember thinking that that sounded right. I acted the part of Skippy at the Public. In the first preview, I was startled by how much emotion I felt at the end of the play. I hadn't felt it in rehearsal, and I was thrown by it.