Playwright’s role results in understanding
By Laureen F. Guenther Times Contributor
Laureen F. Guenther Photo
But since 2000, Libby Skala herself has performed the original one-woman show Lilia! about 350 times in North America and Europe. Writing the play and performing her roles has resulted in her developing a deep understanding of her grandmother and her remarkable life.
Lilia Skala was the first female architect in Austria and was also a professional actress. When she and her family fled to America during the Nazi regime, Lilia’s first job was in a zipper factory, but within two years, she was performing on Broadway. Over the next several decades, Lilia Skala performed in numerous Broadway, movie and television roles. She was nominated for an Academy Award for her role in the movie Lilies of the Field with Sidney Poitier. She passed away in 1994.
About a year after her grandmother died, Libby Skala attended an improvisation workshop where she was challenged to perform the role of someone inspiring, compelling or fascinating. She performed the role of her grandmother working in that first humbling job in the zipper factory. The workshop instructor loved that performance and encouraged Skala to develop the story of her grandmother into a one-woman play.
Over the next four years, Skala worked with teacher-playwrights Gary Austin and Carol Fox Prescott to develop her memories of her grandmother into a play.
“In those years of performing (my grandmother) and walking in her shoes, I’ve come to understand why she did things and said things,” she said. “I’ve come to appreciate her point of view, and I’ve come to admire her even more, I guess, and realize that everything she said and everything she did was out of love.
“In her day, love was expressed through correcting someone and helping them be better, improve themselves and whatever that took to be tough. They didn’t hug their children ever. They didn’t say, ‘oh you’re so wonderful.’ They didn’t compliment them. The way to express your love was to point out what needed improving. They didn’t coddle them at all. It wasn’t a warm and fuzzy thing.”
Skala now appreciates that in a way she didn’t as a child and teenager.
“How wonderful having someone in your life trying to shape you. I value so much that someone poured her heart into shaping me.”
Lilia would also tell her young granddaughter to “write a part for me.” She said Hollywood writers didn’t know what to do with an old woman with an accent.
“(Hollywood producers) could see she was teeming with so much talent and vitality and life and exquisite sparkle; and charisma and depth and humanity,” Skala said. “But who? Who can you play when you’re a woman in your late ’60s that can be a leading lady?
“She always attributed (her talent) to God. So, she had this almost divine mission. She felt she had to express her talent. She just had to. It was God-impelled.”
Rosebud Theatre’s production is the first time the play has been performed by two actors, and the first time anyone other than Skala has performed it.
In July, Skala visited Rosebud to see Holt and Schmidt perform Lilia! Before seeing the performance, she said she was “full of excitement and anticipation to see the show for the first time and to fill the role of playwright watching her own work.
“When (Rosebud Theatre’s managing director Mark Lewandowski) proposed licensing the play and having two actors do it, I was… I don’t know if the right word is flattered that he would find the script by itself worthy of producing,” Skala said.
“I think of a script almost as a child. You raise your child and at some point, your child has to leave home. I wanted to know whether the child could survive independently… whether there’s enough substance in there for it to live on without me.”
Skala noted there were moments when she thought actress Elinor Holt was her grandmother, “same figure, hair, facial structure and movements. (And) I was so endeared to Cassia’s (performance of) Libby that I want to expand her role to see more of her.”
Lilia! runs on Rosebud Theatre’s BMO Studio Stage until Aug. 31. Tickets are available at rosebudtheatre.com or 1-800-267-7553.