Why did you want to work on “Burn This”?



ADAM DRIVER If I’m going to do a play, I like the idea of it being something contemporary, something American, kind of at a fever pitch. I knew this play from before, from Juilliard. I had played Pale, which is embarrassing, a kid in a costume at 23, being like, “I know what I’m talking about!” I had no idea.

KERI RUSSELL I hadn’t been actively searching to do a play. But I thought, I guess I’ll do the reading. And then it just felt like such an escape. We’re so inundated with all of this political stuff and obviously it’s very important. But it felt so nice to read something just about feelings. And it touched me. Everyone talks about the fireworks of Pale and how crazy he is. But there’s something about the relationship that really moved me. I cried.

DRIVER These people need to live gigantic lives in order to feel something. These people want to feel something big. We’re not often given that space to feel. Or probably we are, but we don’t take it. We’re too distracted by everything else.

RUSSELL Tanya Berezin, she holds the rights to “Burn This.” Before we started, she came in and said Lanford’s characters need everything about their lives to feel humongous. They wanted to do the best possible art, they wanted to fall in love in the best possible way. Everything had to mean something and it had to be huge.

And you sort of go, ‘Well, I did want to do that, but I guess I needed to make money, too.” Or, “I did really like that guy, but he was a lot of work.” Life moves in.

These characters are in so much pain. What’s the experience of rehearsing that kind of pain?

DRIVER The rehearsals are six hours long. You get in that mind-set for six hours and you go home, you’re still pumping, and it’s hard to not make everything urgent. My dog will do something pretty mundane and my first impulse will be like, “WHAT THE — ” [The rest of Mr. Driver’s sentence was too colorful for publication.] I’m not good at letting things go. Other people are and I envy that. I’m always working. It’s always in the back of my mind. There’s a benefit to constantly asking yourself questions about it. The disadvantage is you drive yourself insane.

In the play, Anna says that she and Pale are apples and oranges. I’m not sure they’re both even fruit. What attracts them to each other?