Translated by Liv Schøyen
Directed by Henrik Rafaelsen
Set and costume design: Veronica B. Vallenes
Cast: Janne Formoe, Henrik Rafaelsen
An Unfulfilled Love Story—Told Through Letters and Notes
"Love Letter" is a story about two people who were truly meant for each other, but whose lives took them down different paths.
The story is told exclusively through letters, postcards, and notes that the two characters have sent to each other over the years. The actors, Janne Formoe and Henrik Rafaelsen, read the letters aloud to each other and to the audience.
Andrew and Melissa meet when they are seven years old and start in the same class. Their first correspondence is Andrew’s reply to Melissa’s birthday invitation, dated April 19, 1937. We follow the two characters over a period of nearly 50 years—through their time at boarding schools and college, and through their marriages and careers.
We humans have been writing love letters to one another for centuries. The format has changed drastically, from the clay tablets of Mesopotamia 400 years before our era to today’s heart emojis on Snapchat. Love letters have always said a lot about the era in which they were written, while at the same time embodying something timeless—namely, the human need to share our innermost feelings, passions, and longings with another person.
In an age of fleeting messages sent digitally via social media, a letter represents something lasting and nostalgic. Perhaps it's time to start sending letters again?
"Love Letters" was written by the American playwright A. R. (Albert Ramsdell) Gurney Jr. (1930–2017). He is known for his sharp, satirical take on the declining white upper class in America.
The playwright describes the play as follows:
This is a play—or rather, a sort of play—that requires no theater, no lengthy rehearsal period, no specific set design, no memorization of lines, and no emotional investment whatsoever from the two actors, apart from the performance itself. It is written to be read aloud by a male and a female actor of roughly the same age.
