Samuel D. Hunter's Proof of God at Theatre Rotterdam: "Since I'm a father, I have to be hopeful, I can't be cynical anymore."

"In America, when you put two guys on stage, the audience expects them to beat each other up, or fuck each other. In this play, neither happens, but in the theatre it's almost always about two men fighting or fucking." Legendary words from Samuel D. Hunter. He wrote the play 'A Case for the Existence of God', which premieres in Rotterdam on Friday 5 January, directed by Eik Whien. After the final inset performance on Thursday 4 January, he was in the foyer for a short Q&A. 

The question-and-answer session was quite useful, as it added something to the five-quarter-hour piece of chamber theatre, in which we see two men, one black, highly educated and gay, the other white, practically educated and straight, talk a lot about extraordinarily earthly matters such as mortgages, a divorce and custody issue, an adoption procedure. 

Optimistic tone

As it was a try-out, you won't find a review of the evening here, which, by the way, I did experience as highly entertaining, and at times heartwarming. In keeping with the current January feeling, in a world that seems completely unhinged, there was a lot of darkness, but you can feel an optimistic tone coming through. A tone that some may perceive as proof of God.

Erik Whien, as a specialist in this kind of chamber music, added enough theatricality to keep it from derailing into endless babble. He, too, along with his actors Bram Suiker and Emmanuel Ohene Boafo, initially struggled with the lack of fucking and fighting in this piece, he told us in the afterword. "But gradually we discovered the very special flow that you can just let it wash over you."

Untranslated title

Hence that title: A Case for the Existence of God. Theatre Rotterdam left it untranslated, which is perhaps a pity. In Dutch, you could choose: 'an argument for the existence of God', or the shorter 'Godsbewijs'. That would create less distance, and might also allow for a bit more debate here. Because here, too, a battle around religion lurks, even if a shrinking minority still identifies as religious in the Netherlands. Those that remain are often extra fanatical. 

At his house, all this is much more upbeat, Samuel Hunter told me: "In the US, religion is completely politicised. That's why the title of the play was controversial from the start. That you should already have an argument for the existence of God is unthinkable."

From mortgage to mystery

While the play contains no theological discussion. "You see two guys on stage talking about mortgages for the first 20 minutes. Then you start thinking: what is this play about? Hopefully, by the end, you experience the grandiosity of the title. In a spiritual way, not literally. We find God in hope, in time, history. The played time of the piece spans a few months, but the spiritual timeline runs from the year 900, with the first early religious music, to the year 2100."

It is funny to see a religious playwright for once in the otherwise very a-religious Dutch theatre. You could experience it as an almost anthropological encounter with a culture we have left behind in our theatre for a few decades anyway. 

Hunter grew up in Twin Falls, Idaho. That is also where the play is set, although Theatre Rotterdam has chosen to remove any reference to a recognisable place. 

Biblebelt

Again, the translator could have chosen to include a Dutch equivalent like 'Ermelo'. The similarities are striking, listening to Hunter: "As a teenager, I went to a very conservative Christian school, but I also knew I was gay. I also knew I wanted to be an artist, preferably a writer. At the same time, I was working in a Walmart as a cashier. So while I was developing as a writer, I was behind the cash register in a Walmart as much as 20 hours a week. So the idea of seeking God in a fluorescently lit box was completely natural to me."

Like Chekhov - to draw a comparison - Hunter does choose a realistic setting, but avoids realism. "People often think my plays are naturalistic, and I do use realistic elements, but it's not Kitchen Sink realism. There is a deep American tradition of hyper-realistic theatre, with extremely real characters doing intensely real things. I'm adding to that. So even though it uses this realistic container of two guys in a small town, Twin Falls in Idaho, which is an incredibly isolated part of the country, with no culture of its own, that's precisely where you go looking for god, for meaning. You can then have that play out in a monastery, but I prefer to do it in a supermarket. You need a god more when you work in a Walmart than in a church." 

Fatherhood

The two characters find each other in a shared grief around fatherhood, which is not really off the hook for either of them. The subject matter is not autobiographical for Hunter, but the fatherhood theme an sich is: "Before I became a father, I didn't really care if it died or not. Now I think: there is a human being that I am sending into this extremely complicated world. So now there is a conflict between my fatherhood and my apocalyptic disposition. Since being a father, I have to be hopeful, I can't be cynical anymore."

"Most of my plays end with a moment of hope. They are often about people suffering extreme isolation, but in the final moments, a faint light shines in the darkness. I don't allow myself to go completely black. With this piece, I wanted to go back to the essence more, less cynical and theatrically simpler. I wanted to make a piece now that you can fully perform in your own kitchen. That was also because of the pandemic. It must have been the same here, but I shared with all my friends and colleagues the fate that our industry disappeared before our eyes."

Social contract

Finally, Hunter gave the assembled audience some of his optimism: "For the last few years, I've been working mostly on characters who are on the short end of American existence. Especially in the isolation of Twin Falls, idaho. American society is in such a terrible state, you guys in the Netherlands are lucky that it's not as bad as there. You guys are doing so well! There is a social contract here that is totally absent in the US."

"At the same time, I love America immensely because I see so many people there who are trying terribly hard. One example: right now, the governor of Texas is sending every immigrant straight to New York, to overload the city. There is now a woman in New York who is ready every day to greet those people, give them drinks, comfort them and offer help. People like that make me continue to believe in the experiment that is America. We can see very well what goes wrong, but let us also realise that hope and love exist."