As a longtime journalist, Walter Anderson knows a great story. As a former Marine, he knows the code. And as a playwright, he tapped those experiences to craft his latest work.
Anderson, the former editor of Parade, had been working on a play and stopped, feeling it wasn't coming together. Then, the jolt he needed came to him as he slept.
The result is "The Trial of Donna Caine." The world premiere opens the 43rd season of New Brunswick's George Street Playhouse, running from Oct. 16 through Nov. 11, with opening night Oct. 19.
Sure, Anderson had studied the events his courtroom drama is based on, but had decided against pursuing telling the story of Marines dying during a 1956 training exercise.
"I was going to do a docudrama play on the Ribbon Creek tragedy," he says from his home in White Plains, New York. "I spent two years studying it and reviewed all the evidence, and I came to the conclusion it was an extraordinary story but it wasn't a play.
"A year or two later I woke up and thought, 'What if Ribbon Creek hadn't happened and it happened today?'" he continues. "And what if it were five instead of six (Marines)? And what if the drill sergeant was a female? And I went downstairs and started writing the biographies."
Flor De Liz Perez plays the title character in 'The Trial of Donna Caine.'
Though the incident happened over 60 years ago, the tense situation is very much of today: women in positions of authority in the military.
"It is a very, very topical subject right now," says Playhouse Artistic Director David Saint. "Under Obama, the Marines were allowed to have women in combat and to have this mixed gender initiative, and under the current administration they are talking about rescinding that."
The plot revolves around an exercise that turned fatal. During a drill, intended to forge recruits into a unit, five Marines perish in a tidal basin off Parris Island, South Carolina. Staff Sgt. Donna Caine assumes responsibility.
The brass want to be done with this trial as soon as possible, and the assumption is Caine will go away for a long time.
"I have been secretly calling it a few good women," Saint says.
Cast to reflect diversity, a Latina, Flor De Liz Perez, plays the title role. Ryan George, who plays Caine's biggest fan and a gunnery sergeant, and the judge, Melissa Maxwell, are black.
The only role written with an obvious ethnicity was Caine's Jewish attorney, Emily Zola Ginsberg, played by Margarita Levieva. This gives the relationship between Caine and Ginsberg additional tension because Caine doesn't hide her anti-Semitism.
It's not the only reason Caine distrusts the crusading attorney.
Here's an early exchange between them:
"The Marines who came to see me said the word came down from on high. I'm on my own," Caine says.
"So much for esprit de corps," Ginsberg retorts.
"Those words have meaning. The way you say it ... never mind. The Marine Corps didn't drown five recruits. I did. I'm only trying to understand. Listen up: I am responsible. We're finished now. Guard!"
Margarita Leviviera plays the crusading attorney in the courtroom drama opening the season at the George Street Playhouse.
These tough women square off over Caine's defense and seem worlds apart.
"The real theme of the play is a courtroom drama, but the theme has to do with an individual's vulnerability," Anderson says. "Can I allow myself to be so vulnerable that I look past another person's visage?"
During the course of the play, it's revealed these two women may be far more alike than different.
It's so easy to make assumptions about people, based on where they are from. And Anderson knows that all too well.
A poor kid from Mt. Vernon, New York, where half of his street was the blue-collar Westchester city and the other half was in the Bronx, Anderson dropped out of high school, enlisted in the Marines and served almost five years in Vietnam.
Once he earned his GED, he was unstoppable.
"When I got out I had trouble getting a job," Anderson recalls. "It was '66 and Vietnam veterans weren't held too highly. I talked myself into becoming a trainee reporter in White Plains."
He then worked and attended college and rose quickly through the newspaper ranks. At 32, he was recruited by Parade as a managing editor and was then promoted to editor.
Under him, the Sunday magazine grew to a circulation of 82 million. Along the way Anderson wrote books and plays, and showed this one to producer Julian Schlossberg. The producer brought it to Saint, who has high expectations.
"I have found through my audiences whether '12 Angry Men' or 'To Kill A Mockingbird,' people love a good courtroom drama as long as it is well done," Saint says.
It's premature to consider where the play could go next. For now, Anderson's goal is that "it gives people hope, that we are not destined to always be polarized," he says. "It has happened through our history, and has been far worse. We did have a civil war and polarization. We had Vietnam for 10 years."
Tickets: Online at www.GeorgeStreetPlayhouse.org or by phone at 732-246-7717, running through Nov. 11.