“Never be unkind or indifferent to a person others say is crazy. Often, they have a deep wisdom. We pay them a great respect in the old country, and we call them fairy people, and it could be, they are sometimes.”
– Irish wisdom imparted by Mary Coyle to her daughter, playwright Mary Chase.
Mary Coyle Chase of Denver, Colorado was considered by many to simply be a wife and mother of three boys who wrote plays on the side. She grew up on Irish folklore and was very familiar with stories of the mischievous yet ultimately benevolent “pooka”. Mrs. Chase said she knew from childhood that she had to be part of the theatre after seeing her very first show. She wanted to tell stories and create worlds on stage to bring joy to people. She said she had a dream of “a psychiatrist being chased by a giant white rabbit” and letting her imagination take hold led to Harvey. Her writing career started as a journalist for the Rocky Mountain News and ended with fourteen published plays, three screenplays, and two children’s stories all with the goal of uplifting spirits after the Depression and WWII. Three of her plays were on Broadway, with two running at once, and, amongst many writing awards, Harvey won the 1945 Pulitzer Prize for Drama that year, beating out Tennessee Williams’ The Glass Menagerie.
The two plays have similar themes in that they both explore the struggle with real world expectations and demands placed by society and the imaginative world of creativity and expression we often abandon in adulthood. Film star Jimmy Stewart once said that Josephine Hull, who won the Oscar as Veta, faced the hardest challenge as she had to “be ‘in between’. She couldn’t believe in Harvey, yet she couldn’t help herself for sometimes believing in Harvey.” As for Mrs. Chase, all her writing had what she called a “heart-line.” This play, therefore, is not just about the antics of an invisible white rabbit, it’s about the loveable eccentric Elwood and his kindness and heart. The character says his mother told him that “in this world, you can be oh-so smart or oh-so pleasant.” Elwood has decided to choose to be pleasant. He just happens to keep trying to be the best person he can be by befriending a six-foot rabbit. This is a play about kindness, humanity, tolerance, and love; Harvey is ultimately a story about loyalty, written at a time when people were trying desperately to cope after challenging times, just as many of us are today in our own times.
“If you possess a basic goodness, if you’re good at heart, you’re allowed to see certain things other people can't." – Michael McAloney, Irish-American producer of the musical Say Hello to Harvey
St. Ignatius challenges us to pray with our imagination. It is different than “imaginary”. In his Spiritual Exercises, he wants us to contemplate by using our senses and engaging the three faculties by seeing, hearing, and feeling the stories come to life. It’s a way to “make present what is not present.” And we in the arts like to point out that imagination isn’t just important in prayer! We don’t have to see white rabbits and pookas; we can use our imaginations to move through this world with kindness, we can choose to be pleasant. Perhaps the true importance of imagination is seeing the humanity in another person, respecting the dignity of another human being, and showing ourselves and others compassion.
There is nothing trivial in the themes of Harvey. In these modern times, it is often our inability to listen to each other and to judge those who don’t conform keeps us from an optimistic outlook on life… wherever we can find it. We hope you find our production leaves you feeling a bit more joyful and lot more pleasant.
Stay well! Thank you for supporting the entertainment industry arts at Jesuit!
Kate Arthurs-Goldberg, M.A.
