Elevator Repair Service, after delivering every word of Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby in Gatz, and following that with the first chapter of Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury, is completing its literary theater trilogy with Ernest Hemingway's tale of young American ex-pats, drinking, fighting and loving their way through Europe after WW I. I spoke with ERS' director and co-founder, John Collins.

Hi John.  What does the title refer to?
 
It comes from the name of one of the main settings of the novel, the Café Select, where the characters spend most of their time in the Paris section of the book.  We wanted to give it a name other than the title of the book, since it's not exactly the book; also because our set is kind of a universal bar/café.  Everything takes place inside this bar that David Zinn, our designer, created.  That's how we do it.  We create a singular setting, this bar, which is sometimes a perfectly appropriate setting, and sometimes a perfectly inappropriate setting.  We do everything inside the café; they drink and eat there, they sleep on the tables.  There's even a bullfight that happens there.
 
One of the things Hemingway is known for is his crisp dialogue.  Will it be all his lines?
 
It's all text taken directly from the book.  Like the other two shows, you're only going to hear words of the author, Hemingway.  Nothing is re-written; the difference about this one from the other two is that we allowed ourselves to edit the text this time. This is an adaptation. That was a departure for us.  And we did that because what we were most drawn to in this book was the dialogue. We did want to tell the entire story of the book, and what the project came to was to pare down Hemingway's words, so that they would air theatrically.
 
Tell me a little about how the story goes.
 
You start in Paris, and after Paris, the two men go off on a fishing trip.  Jake Barnes, played by Mike Iveson, and Bill Gorton, played by Ben Williams.  And  then they go to Spain.  We like to show the specific scenic elements, so we needed to find ways to make the tables and chairs become the Irati River, for the fishing scene, and then later, the feria and bullfights of Pamplona.
 
Isn't Jake Barnes the main character?
 
Jake Barnes is the narrator.  We focus on his dialogue, and he delivers a lot of Hemingway's narration; he is the audience's guide.  This is a group of people who go on a trip together, basically.  It's very sophisticated storytelling that Hemingway is up to.  In the end, after we see them through all their travels and drinking, it's about the chaos in the aftermath of WW I, and in the aftermath of a relationship that has ended even before the story started.
 
Jake Barnes and Lady Brett?
 
Yes.  And that became one of the more tragic parts of the novel. I think people will see this and be surprised.  Because a lot of people have an idea of Hemingway and they think of him as hard and macho and humorless.  But I think that, in seeing it, you hear Hemingway's wit, which is very sharp, and he's very funny.  There's a lot of subtlety and nuance to the psychology that he portrays; and I think the story is a lot of fun.  He had a great sense of humor, and it's a very beautiful telling of a very sad and truthful story.
 
New York Theatre Workshop, 79 E. 4th St., (212) 279-4200. Previews Aug. 19, opens Sept. 11-Oct. 9. Tues.-Sat., 7 p.m.; Sun., 1 & 7 p.m. Tickets are $70 and available here.

Photo by Mark Burton