Last Saturday night, Eva Marie Saint and her husband Jeffrey Hayden made a trip back to Bowling Green to help raise money for a scholarship bearing her name.
The couple performed A.R. Gurney’s “Love Letters” for the Eva Marie Saint Scholarship.
Saint, a 1946 graduate of the University, won an Oscsar for her performance in “On the Waterfront”.
Her performance Saturday night marked the first time Saint has performed at Bowling Green since her graduation. For Saint, as well as the University, the performance had special meaning.
“Love Letters” is a play that explores the relationship between Melissa Gardner, a free spirited artist and Andrew make peace Ladd III, a stuffy politician. The play is a bit unconventional because both characters perform the whole play sitting in chairs.
“That is one of the reasons I was drawn to the play, because it was challenging,” Saint said. “It’s one of Gurney’s best plays and I think the audience can get a lot out of it.”
The couple first thought of the idea of performing together two years ago on Valentines Day weekend.
After some encouragement from friends who saw the show, they decided to take it on the road, performing all over the country.
“I’m not an actor,” said Hayden, a well known director whose credits include the T.V. series Leave it to Beaver and The Incredible Hulk.
“I thought there was no way I could do this, but once we started rehearsing I felt really comfortable with the material,” he said.
Gurney’s play starts off with the couple as kids writing silly letters to each other and continues through their life. The character’s letters are rich with the feelings and thoughts that they have at different ages. Ranging from discussions of crayon drawings, sex, professional success and personal crisis’, the play demands a wide range of emotions from it’s actors.
“I connected well with my character,” Hayden said. “I love to write letters. Also, my father did die, like my character’s, so I immediately identified with him in certain ways.”
Although Hayden was able to draw a bit from personal experience for his character, Saint found she did not have as much in common with Melissa.
“I came from a stable family and we also weren’t fabulously rich like Melissa’s family,” she said. “However, I did have a very good friend growing up who was in a situation like that. So I used my friendship with her to get a better understanding of Melissa.”
After the show, Saint and Hayden were given a standing ovation by the audience.
Saint told the crowd that she was greeted with nostalgia when she was back in the dressing room and recalled her first show on the stage that is now named in her honor.
“When I first came to Bowling Green I was extremely shy,” she said. “However, it was a small college and I started to feel comfortable with the people. Bowling Green gave me a chance to blossom.”
