Wayland Patterson (Allen Cole) derides Lt. Col. Jack Hackett (Alan Sutterfield) for his gunfighter arrogance.
Unfriendly fire
Manoa Valley Theatre rarely uses its stage to address serious political issues and has had mixed success in years past.
Following on the heels of such thought-provoking productions as "Medal of Honor Rag" and "End of the World With Symposium to Follow" is Mark Medoff's 1999 play, "Gunfighter: A Gulf War Chronicle," which opens on Wednesday. The play addresses two contemporary and politically sensitive issues, but playwright Medoff promises that it is gripping theater as well.
'Gunfighter: A Gulf War Chronicle'
Presented by Manoa Valley TheatreWhere: Manoa Valley Theatre, 2833 E. Manoa Road
When: 7:30 p.m. Wednesdays and Thursdays, 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, and 4 p.m. Sundays, from May 19 through June 6
Tickets: $25, with discounts available for seniors, military personnel, and anybody under 26 years of age
Call: 988-6131
"As a live theater event, I think it runs on its adrenaline (and) in making the audience follow the story. It's plot-driven, like a good melodrama," Medoff explained earlier this week. The staging includes the use of video screens to represent the technology that made coverage of our first war with Iraq a live-action event. The story puts forth Medoff's claim that the Army closed its ranks to pin the blame on an unlucky officer after American soldiers were killed by "friendly fire" in 1991, as well as subsequently placing a low priority on developing technology that would reduce the number of such unfortunate incidents.
Veteran actor/playwright Alan Sutterfield stars as Army Lt. Col. Jack Hackett, a career officer seemingly on track for making general, until a helicopter under his command mistakenly fires on an American armored vehicle and kills two soldiers.
The experiences of Hackett are a fictionalized account of what truly happened to Lt. Col. Ralph Hayles after he was held responsible for a "friendly fire" incident that killed two American soldiers during the Gulf War. Hayles was piloting a helicopter gunship through a sandstorm shortly before 1 a.m., Feb. 17, 1991, when he was ordered to attack vehicles that had been identified as Iraqi. After firing two missiles on the vehicles, he then learned that he fired upon Americans and killed two soldiers.
Hayles was stripped of his command, ostensibly because he had disobeyed verbal instructions from the division commander that unit leaders not fly combat missions. (A reporter's subsequent investigation showed that one of his counterparts had been receiving medals for flying combat missions himself.) Hayles became the only American to be publicly identified by the military and the media as the guilty party in a "friendly fire" incident during the Gulf War.
HAYLES' STORY caught the attention of executives at Castle Rock Productions, who thought it would make a good movie. They contacted Medoff and asked him to work with Hayles in writing a screenplay. Medoff took the assignment, even though he initially believed that Hayles was guilty as charged. He changed his opinion after getting to know Hayles and his family, and delving more deeply into the facts of the incident.
Unfortunately for Medoff and Castle Rock, another film with a suspiciously similar theme, "Courage Under Fire," starring Denzel Washington and Meg Ryan, was farther along and was subsequently released in theaters.
"It was basically the same story, but with a tank commander firing on his own troops, and if I say what I really believe, I'll put myself in position for a lawsuit. It was an unfortunate series of events, and I find myself wondering about similarities between the two stories," Medoff says.
Castle Rock shelved the project, but gave Medoff permission to adapt the screenplay for the stage.
Medoff says he "started out with a ridiculous play of about 240 pages and close to 50 characters in it. At that time, my agent told me not to waste my time on it (because) nobody's ever going to do it in a commercial venue, and regional theaters can't afford to do it. I felt I needed to do it, and we've got it down to 21 actors playing about 26 roles."
MEDOFF AND Joyce Maltby are co-directing the MVT production. Along with Sutterfield, Tara Ziegler co-stars as the reporter who initially breaks the story revealing Hackett as the commander of the gunship, but who gradually realizes that there's more to the story than the military brass has led her to believe.
"The reporter is the narrator ... (and) goes on the same journey I did, except that it is much more dangerous. ... What she finds is that it was a very complex, slippery slope that people were on, where the culpability was spread but the blame was narrowed." (Hayles took responsibility for his own actions and raised no questions in his defense about the culpability of those above him in the chain of command.)
"(Ralph) was named publicly and, depending on how you look at it, either to his credit or foolishly, he did not go public with any effort to defend himself until (a group of articles) came out in the Wall Street Journal that began to open people's eyes to the fact that there were certainly mitigating circumstances," Medoff says.
Aside from the question of whether Hayles was solely to blame, Medoff says his play also addresses the perennial problem of "friendly fire" and the alleged reluctance of Pentagon officials to invest in available technology that would make it easier for American forces to identify each other. ("Friendly fire" reportedly caused almost 25 percent of Coalition combat deaths during the Gulf War, and continues to be a problem in Afghanistan and Iraq).
The play closes with a litany of friendly fire events. Medoff has been forced to delete some of the earlier incidents in order to make room for new ones as America's continues to battle in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Given that America is at war, is a play that questions the U.S. commitment to reducing "friendly fire" incidents inappropriate? Might it be bad for general morale? Medoff says he is trying to promote discussion on the importance of developing and deploying "friend-or-foe" technology.
"I don't expect to change the world ... but 13 years later, we are still haunted by the same errors. I think my role as a writer, when I'm dealing with issues, is to promulgate a dialogue. ... It is mysterious why, given the technology today, given what we can do with computers, what we can do with lasers ... why we can't figure out a way to identify our friends."
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