Word count: 295
Paragraphs: 6
Foreman and Valk after Symphony of Rats (2024). Photo: Charles Bernstein.
The time he was in my dreams. He offers me a tall plastic container filled with sliced carrots and celery and says: “Eat this! You will achieve spiritual enlightenment.” I eat the contents of the container down and wait. A swell of nausea but then on the verge of vomiting I wake up. Richard once told me he considered himself a religious writer.
The time in 1988 when we went to Barney’s to buy costumes for Symphony of Rats. Serious suits for Ron Vawter and Jeff Webster, ladies wear for Peyton Smith and myself. Hard not to make him the father figure (Blue Angel vibes) as we modeled dresses for him in the fitting area of the women’s section. For me he chose a modest silk dress with a little flare at the skirt and a tie at the neck. The best part of the show for me was running around in that dress, offering Resusci Anne’s crowned head up to the puppet robot with the video head of Richard himself. “Go to the idiot, I scream!”
The time we bought him a tie as a gift after the run of Miss Universal Happiness (1985).
He bought us all books specially selected for each person by him. Peyton got a travel guide to China. I got The Edie Sedgwick Story.
The time in 2020 when it came to me while driving along the Balkan coast that Liz [Elizabeth LeCompte] and I should do a new production of Symphony of Rats. Back in ’88 I never understood what the text was about yet it had hid like a jewel in my subconscious all these years. How amazing Richard lived right up the street from us and gave us his text so freely.
Kate Valk is a founding member of The Wooster Group. Since 1979 she has co-created and performed in all of the Group’s productions including the two co-productions with Foreman’s Ontological-Hysteric Theater, Miss Universal Happiness (1985) and Symphony of Rats (1988).