Albee’s Seascape is set on a beach, the evolutionary boundary from which sea creatures emerged to walk on land. The action begins innocently. Charlie and Nancy Man are just finishing a picnic when they encounter two primordial green lizards, Leslie and Sarah, who have crawled up the beach. The confrontation is antagonistic and often cruel. It’s a very dissatisfying picnic, but the food is, however, is a delicious array of liver paste sandwiches, roasted chicken, peaches, iced tea, and wine.
2005 production directed by Mark Lamos . Frances Sternhagen as Nancy and George Grizzard as Charlie.
Nancy and Charlie, an upscale New York couple, are just finishing a beach picnic of liver paste sandwiches, roasted chicken, peaches, iced tea, and wine. The picnic setting is a wry comment on the notion that life is a picnic, which, at this point in their lives, they feel compelled to assess and rehash their different attitudes to life. Charlie says, “I have been a good husband to you; I did court you like a gentleman; I have been a good lover . . . “To which Nancy lightly responds, “Well, of course, I have no one to compare you with.” Nancy wants to be more daringly vivacious, but Charlie wants to let things be. Not exactly; he wants to visit beaches worldwide; she wants to retire. She says he wants to be dead: he wants to do nothing and enjoy (whatever he wants to enjoy).
At this moment, the picnic is interrupted—a pun on the quality of their life and literally as two human-sized green lizards, Leslie and Sarah, come out of the sea, determined to leave the ooze and become more highly developed. Despite their incongruities, the foursome engages in conversation, though Leslie and Sarah, being animals, have limited intellectual and emotional capabilities, not understanding concepts such as love, death, or parentage. They do what lizards do, though their adventure on the beach signifies that they want a different life. Nancy and Charlie give the “innocent” Sarah and Leslie a lesson in human anger, sorrow, and frustration. When Charlie makes Sarah cry, something very new to her, Leslie, the male protecting his mate, begins to hit and strangle Charlie. He is stopped by the females, whose emotional rapport contradicts the physicality of the males. Nancy reaches out to Sarah, who accepts her invitation to explore the world above the waterline. Leslie rejects the offer and returns to the sea and ooze.
Featured Image: 1975 production directed by Albee. Deborah Kerr as Nancy, Frank Langella as Leslie, and Maureen Anderman as Sarah.Nancy
See Edward Albee. Seascape: A Play. New York: Atheneum, 1975