interview with linda hartinian and frier mccollister about their play flow my tears the policeman...

8/6/2019 Interview With Linda Hartinian and Frier McCollister About Their Play Flow My Tears the Policeman Said

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Interview with

Linda Hartinian & Frier McCollisterAbout Their Stage Play Flow My Tears The Policeman Said

Transcribed and edited by

Frank C. Bertrand Note: Linda Hartinian is the author of the the stage play Flow My Tears the Policeman Said based on the Philip K. Dick novel. The play was firstput on in New York by Mabou Mines in 1988. Linda was also a closefriend of PKD. Frank Bertrand transcribed this interview from a 1999 radiointerview with Linda and producer Frier McCollister.

[source: Cartoon Pleroma , KUCI, 88.9 FM, Irvine, California, May 3, 1999] Robert Larson: Welcome to Cartoon Pleroma on KUCI, 88.9 FM in Irvine. This

is Robert Larson on your Monday evening, May 3rd, 1999. What've we got linedup for you this evening? Well, I went and saw this play the other evening that justwas really really wonderful. And this is playing at the historic Ivy Sub Station inCulver City. It's called Flow My Tears The Policeman Said . And it's adapted froma Philip K. Dick story. As we've discussed here in the past Philip K. Dick storiesmore often than not make you question nearly all assumptions about what is real.This stage version is definitely true to that form. So we've got lined up for you thisevening the producer, Frier McCollister, and on the line from New York, LindaHartinian, who adapted this story for the stage. We'll have them up for you in justa moment. First I'd like to remind you that the opinions expressed on thisprogram are not necessarily those of the KUCI staff or management, or the UC

Board of Regents. So, Frier, do we have you hooked up?Frier McCollister: Yes.RL: Welcome to the show.FM: Thank you Robert for having me.RL: You're quite welcome. And, Linda, we got you hooked up?Linda Hartinian: Yes sir.RL: Okay. Speak up just a tad.LH: Okay, how's this?RL: Yeah, that's better. And welcome to you.LH: Thank you.RL: And so, Frier you want to tell us a little bit about your background before we

get into this?FM: Well, sure I'm an independent theatrical producer and manager based in LosAngeles right now. I've been out here for four years and came out here from NewYork where I had the privilege of working with the Mabou Mines TheaterCompany, a very well established avant garde company, with which Linda has along association. And her adaptation of the play that we are currently presentingwas originally adapted and presented by Mabou Mines, first in Boston and thenin New York. Linda can sort of give a little bit more background in terms of that



production history. And I had the privilege of working with Mabou Mines as acompany manager in the late 80s and worked very closely with Lee Breuer,who's one of the founding members, both as a manager and as an assistantdirector. Came out here in 1994 and began following the work of a local theatercompany called the Evidence Room, which is the company that's

presenting Flow My Tears in Los Angeles right now. And I had of course seenMabou Mines' production of Flow My Tears in New York, in I believe it was 1988.I was very impressed with it and was very impressed from a producing point ofview with the fact that it sold extremely well and was very popular and had greatappeal among the fans of Philip K. Dick.

Since arriving in Los Angeles and following the work of the Evidence Room andgetting to know the artistic director Bart DeLorenzo, I had gotten wind that Bartwas looking at Flow My Tears as a possibility to present in an upcoming season,and talked to him about it and encouraged him in the idea and expressed mydesire to be involved with it. And this is the first production that I've worked withthe Evidence Room as producer. I am hoping to continue that association. But

that's pretty much my background with the piece.RL: Okay, and Linda you want to give us a little of your background?LH: Well, I met Phil years ago when I was in my early twenties, before I went towork for Mabou Mines. And he was a wonderful person who meant an awful lotto me. So I was in my early twenties and I met Phil and we became friends. Ibecame friends with him and his wife Tessa. And then I went to work in NewYork and I met Mabou Mines and I started working with them. I wanted to getthem together and I wanted Phil to write a piece for Mabou Mines. Andunfortunately he died before he could do it. So my idea was to make a kind ofmemorial to him by doing the piece anyway, and doing the best that I could inadapting it myself. And that's what we did.RL: Well, we'll get into your relationship with Phil a little bit more in just a little bit.But first I want to talk about the play that's currently running now. Frier that'sgoing to be going on until May 16th?FM: That's correct. Runs through Sunday, May 16th. We're currently runningThursday through Sundays at eight o'clock and we're selling quite well, so if thelisteners are interested in coming they should make the reservations soon.RL: Okay, and the phone number for that?FM: Phone number for reservations is XXX-535-4996. Just tell us how manytickets you need and which day your interested in coming and we will return yourcall to confirm the reservations.RL: Frier I want to ask you, was there something in particular about thestory Flow My Tears that really spoke to you, that made you want to produce thispiece?FM: Well, there's sort of a two-fold motive going on with me in that. And first of allis my interest, my very sincere interests in the writings of Philip K. Dick. I wasfamiliar with him and his writing, actually prior to learning that Mabou Mines hada production of Flow My Tears . And then seeing their production and seeing howpopular it was, again from a producing point of view, really intrigued me, frankly,of the commercial viability of doing his work. But first and foremost I find his



writing particularly compelling and my interest honestly in his writing came lessout of any orientation toward science fiction writing for the most part as in myhappening to stumble on his personal story of the sort of religious visionaryexperiences that he had commencing in 1974. And the story of that episode andthe influence that it subsequently had on his writing compelled me to begin

reading him.So when I learned that Mabou Mines had a production of this piece I becameparticularly intrigued with it. And then in seeing how popular it was I became veryinterested in the idea of the possibility of remounting it and had actuallydiscussed that, before actually coming out to Los Angeles, with Bill Raymondwho is the director of the piece in New York. That never transpired in New York,obviously, and then by coincidence I happened to become acquainted with theEvidence Room and Bart had expressed interest. So, but you asked mespecifically in terms of what it was about this piece. In general, again, it wasinformed by my interests in his writings as it was colored by my fascination withhis personal story. And then...RL:

As Phil Dick in general...FM: As we began preparing in the very initial stages of pre-production for thisshow I began doing a little bit more research on Flow My Tears specifically andhow it fit into Philip K. Dick's framework and sensibility of his own worksubsequent to what has become known as the February 3rd '74 episode. And infact it turns out that the book figured quite significantly in how he sought to makesense of his experience essentially. And, yeah, I can go into that a little bit more.But honestly as I began to learn a little bit more about sort of the significance ofthe novel to him it became that much more compelling and interesting to me aswe approached mounting the play.RL: So there was this in general real fascination with all of his work, but Flow My Tears seemed to have a lot of things built into it that made it a very viable projectfor you.FM: Well, again, there was a bi-fold sort of motivation. And again it was, for me,principally informed by my fascination with the work and my own specificinterests in Philip K. Dick's writing which really stems from his own personalexperience, his series of visions that he experienced in 1974, which occurredactually one week following the publication of Flow My Tears in 1974. And Flow My Tears becomes sort of the initial text that begins the series of his later workthat all has to do with basically the content of his visions and his efforts at makingsense of them. And then, as I also indicated, from a producing point of view I wasparticularly interested in mounting this piece because it, number one, is the onlyauthorized dramatic adaptation of a Philip K. Dick piece. It is also obvious, as I

just indicated a very significant work in his oeuvre and beyond that, from aproducing perspective, I felt that it was potentially a very popular piece. And infact that's proven to be the case.RL: Linda, you wrote this adaptation of Flow My Tears several years ago andthere've been several different productions of it in different cities over the years.How did you come to actually write the adaptation?LH: Well, we just sat down and we started. What I tried to do, because I'm not



really a writer, is I tried to just take Phil's words right out of the book. And so byand large every single word that's in the play is right out of the novel. Once in awhile I had to cheat a little bit and I had to glue a couple of sentences togetherhere or there, but basically it's all Phil's words. And then we just tried to find waysto make it dramatically viable on the stage. It was a hard thing to do but we

decided that we wanted to bring a novel on to the stage, and that's what we did.RL: When I was watching it the dialogue just seemed, wow, that's definitely PhilDick dialogue. There wasn't a lot of added sort of modification interpretation. Andit worked quite well.LH: No, absolutely not. We tried to stick to Phil's words. He wrote beautifuldialogue. At first I thought there would be trouble because of that but as it turnedout every time we would deviate from it I'd have to go back and pick up the bookand find out what he said because he always said it better. He was reallywonderful.RL: I want to get into your relationship with Phil. You actually knew him quite welland I believe your description on first meeting him was that he was, all at the

same time, vulnerable, ingenuous, and egotistical.LH: Absolutely. I had some free time back in the early seventies one day and Iwent out to see an exhibition of a friend's paintings that were being shown at ascience fiction convention, which was something I would never do. I was neverinvolved in science fiction and I'd never go to a place like that. But I justhappened to be there. And I was walking down the hallway of this big hotel andthis man sort of started to flirt with me, and started to try to talk to me. He said,you know I'm a famous writer. And I remember laughing, going well that's nice.And he said, no, no, here come with me and I'll show you my books. And hedragged me over to a table filled with books that he had written. Then he realizedthat his fiancé, Tessa, was there so he introduced us. And we just the three of usgot along from that point on. We just became dear friends. And it was kind of anamazing moment for me. All of the time that we spent together, Phil and Tessaand I, all I can say is that he was like a father to me. And that he was like anartistic father to me and a real mentor. I really didn't have a father that I could goto. And they provided a lot of support for me, that continues to this day, yearsand years later. Thirty years later I still think of what Phil would want me to do, orwhat Phil would think of something.RL: And sometimes do you feel that you actually get a message just, I don'tknow, we can call it synchronicity?LH: Well, once, I mean after he first died I did have some dreams where Philwould come to me, during times when things were tough, and he would saythings to me. I think it was Phil. And now that time has passed I think that Phil stillwatches over me some way, for every once in a while something great happenslike this show that Frier put on in Los Angeles. I think that he's out there for meand I think that he cares about me.RL: Well, I know that he was just a very important person in your life and not justfrom reading his books because you did know him personally.LH: No, I'd never read one of Phil's books. And he was right, I didn't know that hewas a famous writer. He was just a person to me and in fact when I would go to



visit them he would give me books of his to read. And then we would talk aboutthem afterwards. Sometimes I didn't understand them and I would have to go andtalk to him. I was, I'm not an educated person, really, and he was alwaysinterested in what I was thinking or what I got out of the books or what I didn't getout of the books. And he use to give them to me as gifts, and they were really

wonderful gifts. Now that I'm older, I look back at the books and I read the booksand it's different for me. But I've sort of come a long way since those days withPhil. And it's just, when you think about it, that's the kind of a person that he was.What he was was an incredibly generous human being who could see anordinary young person, who wasn't special, who wasn't interested in sciencefiction, and wasn't a fan and be interested in her and be interested in what shehad to say and what she thought and to give her advice and help. And I don'tthink there are very many famous authors that are like that.RL: He was a real regular guy in a certain way.LH: Yes.RL: And do you think it was possibly your either open-mindedness or curiosity

that he really appreciated?LH: Ah, I don't think so. I think that he was that way with everyone. And I thinkthat he was open and generous with every human being that he met, and inevery situation that he met, and that some people were more able to follow hisinstructions. For instance, he told me - I was a grocery checker - and he told meto go to New York and that that would be a better thing for me to do, is to go toNew York and get some experience. So I went to New York and I got someexperience and I came back the next summer, and I came back with sort of myreport, what I did over the summer. And I said, well, I went to New York, I joinedan experimental theater company, I went on tour with them in Europe and I metSamuel Beckett. I remember his mouth dropping open, and he realized that Iactually did what he told me to do. And I guess not everyone would do what hetold them to do, but I did. And I guess hearing that people would do that. I thinkPaul Williams also got a lot of good advice from Phil. And he's a wonderfulperson, too, Paul.RL: Yeah, we had him on the show.LH: But I guess he got different advice than I did because I think Phil told him togo up to Petaluma or something.RL: How many people went on adventures based on Phil's...LH: What Phil would tell them to do. And then he would tell people to do thingsand they wouldn't, or they were not able to accept this advice from this wonderfulhuman being.RL: You made a major life change just based on his suggestion, you had thatmuch respect for him.LH: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I did. I had that much, but by that time I really didthink of him as my father. And I had asked him if he would act as my father...RL: Wow...LH: So I just followed through with that and I just figured it was my father tellingme to do that. I also brought him the man that I married, Bill Raymond, that Frier

just mentioned, who directed the original work with Mabou Mines. I was married



to somebody else. It was not a happy marriage and then I met Bill, and the firstthing that I did was, when I was serious about Bill, was that I brought Phil out tomy house. And I introduced him to Bill to see whether he thought that Bill wouldbe an appropriate husband for me. Phil gave me his blessing, and told me, hesaid, Bill he's the nicest man in the whole world. You'll never find anyone nicer or

better than he is. He's the one that you should marry. And so I did and we'vebeen happy ever since. So everything I ever did that Phil told me to do was agood idea.RL: Wow, so almost like a spiritual advisor, you might...LH: Absolutely.RL: So, Frier, let's get back into a little bit talking about the play currently goingon now. Were there any special challenges in making this happen the way youwanted it to?FM: Well, certainly. It's a very large cast, first of all. We have, if I counted them allup, about eleven, twelve actors. The set design for this production, which wasconceived by Jason Adams, who I must say has done a superb job, is very

complex and involves a mechanized turntable, among other things, as well asvideo design, which incorporated a large sort of improvised screen, by AdamSoch. So as these elements began piling on, it quickly became apparent that thiswas the most technically complex production that the Evidence Room had everattempted. And inevitably when you take on a project of this size the rehearsalprocess becomes increasingly challenging as you approach opening night. It wascertainly the case with this show. Technical rehearsals for this show wereexhausting for everybody and entirely nerve wracking for me. They did not goparticularly smoothly and we weren't frankly sure whether we were going to getthrough the entire show cleanly on opening night. Thank god that everything infact went fine and everything has been going quite well since then. But it's a largetechnically complex production and that presented probably the biggestchallenge for us.RL: I've found nothing to complain about. I love the video bits, the music at thebeginning is just really nice, sets a good tone. The acting, all the performances Ifound just great. It was really a joy. I was on kind of a high for a couple of daysafter seeing it.FM: Well, that's good to hear. And you remind me to credit our sound designer,John Zalewski, who did quite a number of sound cues as well of all varieties. Andhe's done an excellent job. He designed the sound for the Evidence Room'sprevious production, One Flea Spare , that just won a L.A. Weekly theater awardactually for his sound design for that, and has done an excellent job for us withthis show as well, as well as our lighting designer, Rand Ryan, who is alsodealing with a variety of challenges in terms of creating isolated stage space withlights alone pretty much. So all of these guys worked very hard, as well, and Ialso have to credit Ann Closs-Farly, who is our costume designer, who I mustsay on a budget of about five dollars managed to come up with just an excellentexcellent work for all of the characters.RL: Yeah, definitely. It's just about time for our musical break. So we're going toget to that and I'd like to remind you all that we're speaking this evening with Frier



RL: That's strange...LH: And I was very firm that it had to be mentioned at least once. So that's what causedus to split over it. But I know that people liked the music very much and I didn't see it. Itwas done in Paris and I think it was done several other places too, but I never saw it.But I know he did remove God and he wasn't interested in that aspect of it.RL:

Sort of theophobia there?LH: Well, actually, I asked him that during our working, and we had another partner,Catherine Ikam, who was the person who actually, to be honest, was the one whothought up the project. And she's a French woman, a very well respected video artistwho was fascinated with Phil's work. She was the one who hired Tod and, ya know, Todsort of took it over from all three of us and went on with it in his own way. And she wasinterested in that aspect of it. I mean she wasn't a closed off person when it came toreligious concepts. But I just couldn't, I was unable to conceive of VALIS without theword God.RL: It's a little difficult for me too. God is sort of a major component of a lot of Phil'sstories...LH:

Right...RL: Or at least a few.LH: And also Tod continually, I mean I don't know what he came around to after I left,but we put in weeks and weeks, separated by a few months, and then some moreweeks of constant every day ten hour sessions. So it wasn't just a few loseconversations. But he said that he thought that the book was about Phil's personalitybreaking up and that it was about Phil's being a psychotic. And since he didn't knowPhil, and I did, I just had to say I didn't think that Phil was a psychotic, not as I'd knownpsychotics. And I have known psychotics.RL: Does that really bother you when people put that label on him?LH: It absolutely infuriates me to have to listen to that, because I know it's not true. AndPhil was not always an easy person, but then who is an easy person? I think that youcould certainly say he was neurotic sometimes, or compulsive sometimes, but he wasnever crazy. He was just interesting, just a person who had a very wide, wide mind, avery large way of thinking. And that's certainly not what a psychotic is. I know, becauseI've studied them, and I've seen them in action every day on the street here in New YorkCity. So I, I just, I don't know why Tod felt that way, but that he came from a differentbackground than I did. And also I think because he didn't know him. So he'd read thisbook and he made this decision and he was very much, at least at that time, an atheist.I said I'm not asking you to believe in God, I'm asking you to understand that the wordGod appears about twelve million times in his book. And that I don't think it's ethical todo this.RL: Well, I think there are many people out there that have this sort of fear of religion,but I think what is so, one of the things that's so wonderful about Phil's work is that it'sabout religion, but it's presenting this whole different take...LH: Exactly...RL: On religion, and it's just like, it needs to be about religion. Here's a different view ofreligion, this is much more expansive...LH: It's a discussion of religion. It's not a religion. I mean even if you just look at thatone book, it's about a lot of religions all at once. But you can't, you can't just be, well,



Tod was also very upset because Bob Dylan had done his born again Christian albumand he felt betrayed. And so its music and in a funny way, Tod, it's none of yourbusiness. If you don't like the music, okay, but you can't get hysterical becausesomeone said the word God. I mean they're not trying to hurt you or to upset you onpurpose. But you can see that it just cranks me up all over again...RL:

Well...LH: I know you can't put everything, you can't take everything that Phil put in a book,because he put so much. There's never been anyone, I think, who wrote about so manythings at once. It's so hard to sort it out when you try to do an adaptation. If you look atthings like Blade Runner , or you look at something like Total Recall , you can take justthe tinniest fragment of one of his works and that's enough for a major motion picture.RL: Oh, yeah...LH: So you can't put everything in. But I thought with VALIS that that was important.And also because we had so many conversations about so many aspects of so manyreligions that I felt that it was a disservice to the person, to my friend, to not say. I had itdown, I had the libretto down to one mention of God. I don't even remember the line that

said the word God. And when he just sat around and looked around and he put thepencil through that and said I think we have to remove this, we have to cut this line, Isaid I think you have to cut me...RL: You've gone too far...LH: I have to leave the room and I have to leave this piece.RL: Yeah, it's a, I mean, I think many of us have...LH: Like a knee-jerk reaction...RL: Well, I think we have a righteous, maybe, aversion to organized religion, zealotry,religious zealotry...LH: Right...RL: But at the same time you don't have to go to the other extreme and say that we aregoing to exorcise this from reality...LH: Yeah, the very word, it reminds me of that, the work that Lenny Bruce did about thatother word, the N word. And you can't just disappear an idea by removing the word...FM: Uh huh...LH: It's just not possible.RL: Go ahead Frier.FM: This raises, I'm curious to I guess point out, to ask Linda, and point out the fact thatthere is in your adaptation of Flow My Tears appended at the end of the piece what isknown as the Tagore Letter ...LH: Right...FM: Which, I must admit, we had have excised from our production, which wassomething that I frankly protested, but was overruled on. It is not something thatappears in the text of the novel, but does in fact address Dick's preoccupations with hisreligious and mystic concerns specifically. Linda can give a far better background to itthan I can. But it came up again and it was a similar type of argument that occurredwithin the company about how to deal with this particular piece of material. And again itinvolved people's relative discomfort with dealing with religious issues and the conceptof God. And not being able to really reconcile this idea that Philip K. Dick was, may wellhave been functioning as something of a religious mystic, first and foremost, particularly



in his later writings.But it does, this whole discussion, definitely brings up for me one of the struggles that

occurred with us in pre-production in terms of how to present this particular adaptationof this piece. And the fact that in the public forums, entertainment, like movies andtheater, where you're presenting something to a public audience essentially, the people

become very skittish over things that are potentially controversial. I also think that thereis a certain innate bias within academic intellectual circles against bringing in thesetypes of ideas. And it's something that we dealt with. But Linda could explain I think alittle bit better than I can what the Tagore Letter was and why she included it in heradaptation.RL: Yeah, what is that, Linda?LH: Well, just before Phil died, a few days before he died, he sent out a letter to a shortlist of friends, and it's commonly referred to as the Tagore Letter . And everyone got thesame letter. So he sent me a cover letter asking me how I was and the rest of it, andthen sent this letter that he said he was sending around to everyone who was importantto him, and important in general. And I felt that because this was a memorial to him, and

because I was writing it for him, and because I was grieving for him, and because thenovel as I see it is about grief and about dealing with grief, that that was my way ofgrieving. We had a lot of difficulty and discussion with it also. And I think that whenpeople saw our version of the play, that they understood the letter and that they thoughtit was beautiful. In sort of a strange Philip K. Dick event, there would be this person,sitting in this little chair. When we first did it, I read the letter to me first and then I readthe letter in general. And it's edited somewhat. And he asks me about my son. In thefirst version that we did my son was still small and he sat on my lap. And I read theletter out loud to him, this letter from Phil, asking about him. And I had told him aboutPhil and he knew about Phil, but he had never met him. Then I went on to read thisspecial letter, this mystical letter, this last letter that he wrote, this last public statementthat he made. And I think people enjoyed it, and they understood it, either from thestandpoint of artistic revelation, or the people who came in who were involved inphilosophy. Or people who were very literate, from the professors of English whocommented that it was so wonderful the way that you did this, and that you includedthis. So it wasn't just the religious nuts that could understand it, but people who were...RL: Maybe struggling with what is reality...LH: Or people who knew a lot about philosophy, who knew what he was talking about.RL: Yeah, the whole...LH: Yeah, the whole thing. It was a very complex letter. And it covered a lot of ground. Itonce again said God a couple of times. It wasn't about being a born again Christian oranything like that. It was so much more complex than that, that they could understand it.But when you dramatize something and you put it out into the world, what I have here inthis little booklet is an artifact. And there's a great many things that we did that anothercompany either wouldn't understand how to do, or wouldn't have the people who knewhow to do it, or who wanted to do it, or time has past, the generation, 1988 is differentfrom 1999, so these things don't resonate the same way. There's a lot of reasons whyyou wouldn't want to put it, and most of the people who do it can't manage the letter...RL: Yeah...LH: They just can't do it, because it's not just the God stuff, it's the how do you tag on



this letter. It's like out of nowhere...FM: Right...LH: It's like the way that the play is it's got five endings.RL: And isn't there a weird thing too of, when Phil wrote this book, he wrote it in, whatyear was it?LH:

I don't remember what year, what year...FM: He wrote the book in 70, it was published in 74...RL: Okay, but it was about, the story takes place in what was then the future...LH: Right...RL: Which was, what was the date, it was the 80s?...FM: 88...LH: 88...RL: Which is now, for us, the past. And so, actually, that's kind of like a Phil Dick story.You're trying to write, adapt a futuristic story that's about a future that is now actually thepast. It seemed to me that with a weird sort of mish mash of styles, clothing andotherwise, in the play that I just saw, Frier, I was wondering was that a thing that you

were striving for?LH: Yeah, I can't wait to find out how you handled that. It was hard enough back in 88...RL: Is that a thing you were striving for, like okay, we want it to look kind of like thefuture, but kind of like the past?FM: Well, yeah. I mean in a way I guess I've been calling it sort of a retro-futurism. Tosome degree, I think, I guess it's probably depicted most clearly in this production in thecostumes that Ann Closs-Farly came up with. It's sort of a depiction of a what someonein the '70s may have projected to be 1988, essentially. And I think she's done a reallyreally interesting job, specifically in the costumes, and how she managed to do that.That's, again, probably the most obvious thing, although there are elements in thescenic design and some of the props we use, as well, that are sort of similarlyconceived, in this sort of retro-futuristic style. But in point of fact, the play and the realityof the play is an alternate reality essentially...RL: Right, I mean it comes off as, to me, confusing and well, it should be. That is howPhil Dick stories are. Do you agree with that?FM: Oh yeah, definitely...LH: Absolutely...FM: And I mean I think we do a pretty good job of keeping the audience guessingthrough most of the evening. Thankfully, most everybody stays with us, although thereare a few who walk out of the theater deeply disturbed. But everybody for the most partseems to have a pretty good time with it.RL: Yeah, there are times when you're kind of scratching your head, well, what exactlyhappened. That's it, that's the vision, I think, of what we get from Phil, is that we just gothrough life so often with all these assumptions and never like stop, or maybe are forcedto, go wait a minute, things are not exactly as I thought they were...FM: Well, exactly. And I must say that having to present a novel like this, within adramatic format, within a span of roughly two hours, is a supreme challenge at best.And I think Linda's done a brilliant job in adapting the novel. As she has indicated, PhilipK. Dick did have an extraordinarily broad mind, and the concepts that he juggles in anyone novel are pretty extraordinary, and to be able to attempt to boil down the essence of



some of these ideas within the span of specific dramatic scenes, is really difficult. And Ithink Linda has done an amazing job with the adaptation. I can only hope that we comeclose to doing it justice in our production. But there is an awful lot to digest...LH: There's an awful lot. And I'm so grateful that people want to try to do it. I think it's sowonderful that people would do that. And the thing that I didn't mention that I don't think

Frier mentioned it either is that Phil gave me years ago he gave me a manuscript. Ihave the manuscript of Flow My Tears ...FM: Is that right?LH: And he gave it to me as one of those gifts, when he wanted to give me a presentand he didn't have anything, so he just handed me these typewritten pages. And soyears later when I was looking for what to adapt, that's what made us choose that book,was because he gave it to me as a gift. He said I don't have anything to give you, I wantto give you a present, so, oh I have this, I'll give you this. And then also because it doesdeal with grief and love. When we got all the paperbacks, and we were reading thepaperbacks, then for some reason I was reading the typewritten pages. And I found thatthe work that he gave me included about ten, I can't remember the exact amount, about

ten or twelve pages that were cut from the book as it was published. And those extrapages, in the Ruth Rae scene, it's just long ten pages on different kinds of love, and allthe different kinds of love that humans are capable of. I guess that his publishers didn'tthink that that was, that that should be in the finished book. That it was too long and itwas too strange to be in there. One of the...RL: Linda, we're just about out of time, if you could wrap it up real quick...LH: And he said that one of the ways that the kinds of love is about is loving an author.And he says, I think that's the coolest thing that could happen to the author of a book.To live on after his death in the book and somewhere, say, somewhere be loved bysomeone who read the book. Of course it would have to be a very super far out book, Idon't mean just any book. Counter-Clock World was not that kind of book. And that'sfrom one of these lost pages, and that's what I think of when I think of Phil, that he'sliving again. Every time we do this he lives again, some place, in some little town orsome big town, like LA.RL: That's a nice thought to kind of wrap this up. Ah, Frier, real quick, could you giveout the information on how people can go see the play.FM: Absolutely, to reserve tickets to see Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said at the IvySub Station in Culver City, please call XXX-535-4996, XXX-535-4996, and we will berunning through May 16th only, so please call now.RL: That's at the historic Ivy Sub Station?FM: In Culver City, exactly, 9070 Venice Boulevard.RL: Frier McCollister, thanks a lot for being with us this evening.FM: Thank you so much. I wish we had an another hour.RL: I do too. And Linda Hartinian, thank you.LH: Oh, absolutely, thank you so much.RL: Okay, no problem. We'll be talking to you again some time, okay?LH: Okay.RL: Alright, that just about wraps up Cartoon Pleroma . This is Robert Larson. You'relistening to KUCI, 88.9 FM in Irvine. Don't forget to catch me next week. I'm going to



have Philip Farber, he is a master occultist. This is serious stuff, but funny stuff at thesame time, so you'll want to be tuning in for that.

interview with linda hartinian and frier mccollister about their play flow my tears the policeman...

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