HOLLY, NO PRETENDER SHE

So I click on Facebook to wish my friend, student, and fellow playwright a Happy Birthday. And on her page, I see:

Happy Birthday, Holly, in Heaven.

And I think to myself: well, shit. 

I met Holly in my first ever playwriting class at DCPA, which somehow was years ago, even though it feels like only a blink of the eye to me. 

Of late, pretty much everything that has ever happened to me feels like it was just yesterday. 

And also forever ago.

Holly had signed up for my class to finish a play she had been working on for quite some time. She had taken classes on playwriting at DCPA before my class, and several of her classmates that first session had taken those classes as well, and I got the impression she had been working on her play for quite a while. 

Her play was titled The Great Pretender, and it was a sort of kitchen sink realism piece set in the 1950s, all about a family dealing with a son who had a tenuous relationship with the truth. It felt to me like the sort of thing a young Paddy Chayevsky would have written and had done on Playhouse 90. She brought new pages every class. Took every note I gave her. Worked and reworked and reworked yet again moments and sections, always seeking to find that right balance. At the end of the session, we had a night of readings of everyone's work.

It was a magic night for all of us, I think. 

I was fortunate enough to be asked back to teach another session at DCPA. And Holly signed up for that class as well. And she continued to work on her play. Scene by scene, character by character. A lot of it changed, as she got deeper and deeper into it. We had another reading at the end of that session, and that too was magic. I strongly believe there is something mystical and wondrous in people sharing themselves through their writing in front of strangers. 

I got asked back again, and Holly followed. 

This cycle continued. Class, reading, new class, Holly back, and so on.

And lo and behold, a day came, after a few years of the class, when Holly's play was done. 

By then, I had a fairly consistent group of students in my classes, and most of us knew Holly and her work. 

And we were ecstatic. 

Holly beamed with pride. 

And something in her changed. A power filled her, a glow. 

The night she brought in the last bit of her play, we all cheered her like the rock star she was. And always will be. 

And on the way out of the building that night, she gave me a million dollar smile and said "Thanks, Kid".

One of the best things I've ever had said to me, really, because it was full of... well, everything. The play, the time, the work, the laughter, the frustration, and the joy.

The joy.

Here was a woman who had lived a full life, who late on decided to write a play. And she did. And I got to be a part of that. A small part, to be sure. But I'll take it. 

And cherish it. 

Holly didn't give a shit about her age, or how long it took her to get her play done, or anything other than working on what she loved.

She was a tough, funny, wonderful woman, and I shall miss her.

I the photo below, Holly is the woman on the left, with the glasses and blue top. That's us at class, in the library at the education building of the DCPA. A room full of giants.

Here's a song for Holly. It's The Great Pretender, of course.

PS - if you feel like taking a class, click HERE.