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On one particular day five years ago, in a cabin in Maine, there was no consoling Loudon Wainwright III.
He was seated in an upholstered easy chair in the middle of the living room, sobbing over the family dog he once loved, and the memory of putting him to sleep, as written in 1,200 words by a man he once loved, too: his father, the late Loudon Wainwright Jr., who famously penned the column “The View from Here” for Life magazine from 1964 to 1972.
“I was terribly moved,” Mr. Wainwright said. “Obviously I knew the dog and the guy who wrote it, but it was so beautifully written. I got this idea that I would take some of his work and connect it and combine it with some of my songs, so it would be a ‘posthumous collaboration.’ And that’s what I’ve done.”
The musician and actor calls it “Surviving Twin,” a one-man theatrical hybrid of story, picture and song—and a far cry from any of his 27 studio albums—which will stage on Friday and Saturday, September 15 and 16, at Bay Street Theater in Sag Harbor.
“I live in the area, and I’ve been to the Bay Street before, so I thought I would give Scott Schwartz a call and see if there was any interest over there in me doing it,” Mr. Wainwright said. “And there was.”
Considering the show’s relatively limited run in New York, Los Angeles, Chapel Hill and London, Mr. Schwartz said he was immediately intrigued.
“It is an exciting combination of theater, family history, music and journalism,” said the artistic director at Bay Street Theater. “It’s a thrill for us to get to share Loudon’s story, told with such originality, with our audience.”
For those expecting a full evening of warm and fuzzy tales about father-son bonding—don’t. Growing up in the renowned writer’s shadow was not easy, his son explained, and it often brought him an unwanted kind of attention.
“Since I have the same name—and it’s a rather unusual name—people would always remark, ‘Oh you must be related to the LIFE magazine writer,’ which was great but also kind of annoying if you’re a teenage boy,” he said. “My father and I had an interesting, somewhat competitive relationship, I guess you could say. I didn’t read a lot of his columns growing up.
“It’s been a great experience for me to work on it as a piece and also to share my father’s work with people who might not have appreciated it before,” he added. “Including me.”
In the hundreds of columns he wrote, Wainwright Jr. explored politics and current events, the biggest happenings of the day—the majority of which did not interest Wainwright III in his rereading. He instead grasped onto the personal anecdotes and family stories, which informed “Surviving Twin” and his songwriting process.
“My dad actually gave me my first guitar. He had a guitar, which he didn’t learn how to play, and he actually gave it to me. I was 13, so that’s 57 years ago. And that was kind of the beginning,” Wainwright said. “I think he enjoyed aspects of it and liked some of my songs and didn’t like other of my songs.
“We worked really close as father and son,” he said. “But now, more than 25 years after his death, we’re kind of closer than ever.”
Loudon Wainwright III will perform “Surviving Twin” on Friday, September 15, and Saturday, September 16, at 8 p.m. at Bay Street Theater in Sag Harbor. Tickets range from $35 to $55. For more information, call 631-725-9500 or visit baystreet.org.
on Sep 12, 2017