John Logan made his bones in Chicago during the mid-1980s, with two plays about sensational real-life crimes—a Leopold-and-Loeb drama, Never the Sinner, and Hauptmann, which looks at the case against convicted Lindbergh baby-napper Bruno Hauptmann. A decade later Logan was in Hollywood, beginning a career that would have him writing movies like Any Given Sunday and The Aviator for directors like Oliver Stone and Martin Scorsese.
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You dedicated Red to Stephen Sondheim, “for reminding me.” What did Sondheim remind you of? He reminded me how much I love writing plays. Sondheim’s the quintessential man of the theater, and he just believes in it so deeply and he’d seen some of my work and kept prodding in his own way.
What made you think, This is my next play? I knew immediately it was a play and not a screenplay or a teleplay or an opera or a libretto for a musical. As soon as I started learning a little bit about Mark Rothko and the creation of the Seagram murals, I very quickly imagined it as a two-hander, as a work of theater.
Those characters are also reaching back toward something that’s lost. Well, I don’t know. I turn 50 this year, so maybe—[laughs]. Believe me, nothing was conscious. I’m never conscious when I write. I just let the characters—I do the research, I do the outline, and I just let them go. I never think about themes or trying to communicate anything. I just try to tell the story in a dramatic, entertaining, provocative way.
Yeah, you can see Rothko reeling even in the text. It’s like a fight movie. I hope so. It’s a two-character play. If it’s not like you’re watching a fight, you’re in trouble.
Previews Sat 9/17-Sun 9/25. Opens Wed 9/28, 7:30 PM. Through 10/23: Tue-Sun, Goodman Theatre, 170 N. Dearborn, 312-443-3800, goodmantheatre.org, $34-$84.
