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eb In his play, Fool for Love, where the guy kicks chairs; all over the stage--he and his sister are incestuous . . .
RF I haven't seen all of his plays, so . . .

eb The Steppenwolf Theater did a version. The point is, all the frenzy and anger is happening on the stage. And beyond the footlights, we're all safely getting this voyeuristic thrill. You've worked with some actors I know, Rocko Sisto and Will Patten, who appear to be aggressive, but in fact it's the play that's aggressive, it's the situation you put your audience in that is difficult. We are not witnessing violence going on up there.
RF No, I am not really good at physical violence. In the early days, people used to complain that just as a moment of emotional identification, a nice dance--something they could get into--would start, it would stop. And they were frustrated. And that frustration, the strategy of frustration, is terribly important to me. It is only through frustration that conscience comes into play, and man transcends a slothful animal state--which I certainly have a fair portion myself. So the aggression is that. The aggression that occurs when you are writing at your typewriter, alone in your house, and you force yourself to say: Now wait a minute, I am falling into habitual patterns, I am doing what's easy. Mentally slapping yourself in the face, and making yourself try something else. That is the program, that's the idea. Of course, most of the time, I fall into patterns like anybody else. And like anybody else, especially now that I am getting older, I see how often I'll rely on a mastery that I have developed for dealing with some problem aesthetically. I hate that mastery, and I would like to cast it out. And hopefully, in each new play there is an inch more of giving that up.

eb You are very good at choreographing clumsiness, creating these moments. When I watch one of your plays I go in and out of an ability to concentrate. I get led down a path with you, I think I know what's going on, and then find that I am looking at something else. And while all that is happening, you're being very funny. Your work is extremely exciting to watch because of your ability to choreograph invention. I'm always surprised. That happens when I listen to Mozart as well.
RF I am, essentially, a comic artist. You know, I am hysterical at rehearsals, directing these people. It's comedy, but complexities probably exist that stop people from laughing more than they might otherwise. We are always happiest when people are laughing a lot, even though I have some friends who get very offended when people in the audience laugh.

eb Yeah, that happened to me at your last show. I'm sitting there laughing and laughing, and somebody kept turning around to give me dirty looks. This brings up a question: Who are these people in your audience? I mean, is your theater crowd an "in crowd?" Who do you think is sitting out there? Who do you hope is sitting out there?
RF Oh well, you know I am an asocial person. We see very few people. I rarely go out. If it was not for theater I would probably see nobody, so I can only fantasize who is actually there. I am always depressed, because I would like to think that I am involved in a dialogue with the other artists and thinkers of the world as it is today. And I guess some of them come, but I can certainly think of thousands who are not coming.

eb Don't you think it's an economic grouping? When we say "intellectual" in this country we are also talking about people who fall into a clan. I can see them at your shows. They work very hard at cracking your code . . .
RF It still remains that I am making the piece only to satisfy myself. Your analogy to Mozart, how exciting it is when he shifts to a different mood, that is the excitement I am looking for in my work. When I make pieces for myself I am able to sustain that intensity of response to my own process of making, but I don't know if the audience does that or not. My interest lies inthat step-by-step playfulness with all the ideas that are in the air, all the references, all the allusions. To me, that is the potential delight of art, and all other meanings that can be abstracted are forced because any conceivable meaning is qualified by some other meaning that somebody proposes. I am not interested in making plays that say, Here is the message. I am interested in plays that put into play in exhilarating fashion, all of the different meanings circulating around us. Art is a place where you don't have to make life's desperate choices, but can enjoy their interplay. Many people confuse art with life.

eb Yes. That happens with my stuff. If we were walking around inside a model of Richard Foreman's head, what's changed over the years? For instance, I first saw your shows when I was twenty-three. At that time, there were all these great looking babes onstage with no clothes on. It did all kinds of things to my head to see how you used nudity. You'd have other performers onstage looking at them--and then the buzzer would go off, and formations would change, and I was forced to look at me looking at them. You also used people who weren't trained as actors. In the new show, I saw what appeared to be trained actors. What kind of performers are you using now?
RF My interests have changed. So at this moment, I am using trained actors, exclusively.

eb Starry-type trained actors, who are known, or. . . . ?
RF They don't have to be stars to be known. In New York, in the actual community, they are relatively well-known. But that's not why I chose them. I used a girl last year who was very talented, who had never done anything onstage before, but I felt that she had the quality of a trained actress even though she was not.