Libby Skala - Advocate and Greenwich Time Interview

"We wanted to get something special and we're just tickled to have Libby," says Kae Shields, executive director of the Darien Arts Center. "It's quite remarkable how she can play herself and her grandmother without changing costumes or makeup and just using her voice and body."

Darien is an apt location for "Lilia!" because Libby lived most of her life there, and says many of the conversations that formed the basis of the show are from monthly visits her grandmother made from Queens, N.Y. Although there was a generational tension between the two, Skala says the insight was priceless.

"She was constantly trying to guide me toward these Old

World values," she says. "She was very domineering, but yet this

delightful, wonderful person. Having someone want to invest them-

selves in me as a talent and family member was strengthening to

me, yet it would have been hard for me to fit into my generation if I

had listened to all of her advice."

Yet the elder Skala was thrilled that her granddaughter had an

interest in acting, believing that she would no longer be viewed as

the black sheep of the family. Naturally, she used all her resources

to get Libby on the right track.

"With the same shared passion [for] theater, acting and

self-expression, there was a common bond we had besides all

those other differences," Skala says.

Lilia Skala came to the United States in 1939. She landed

roles on Broadway within two years. Her film credits include

"Eleanor and Franklin," "Ship of Fools," "Roseland," "Testament"

and "Flashdance." She is best known for her Oscar-nominated

performance of Mother Superior in the 1963 film "Lilies of the

CHILDHOOD MEMORIES:

Field" with Sidney Poitier. Her career spanned five decades.

Libby Skala, [above], drew on

the talent she inherited from

"From the time I was a little child, people seemed impressed her grandmother in writing

(by her), but to me she was a grandmother who would write me

"Lilia!" the one-woman show

letters saying, 'I love you,'" Skala says.

that celebrates the elder

Skala's life.

"It was a five-year process to truly understand how she

thought and felt," Skala says. "Once I really let go of the idea that she's frozen in time in my memory, it really changed the whole show. It's not a memorial service to a dead person at all."

In the show, Skala plays herself from age 5 into her 20s and portrays her grandmother from her 70s until her death at age 98. Skala says her grandmother asked her to write a part for her shortly before her death. "Lilia!" is it.

The London Free Press last month called the show "almost too good to be true."

Martin Skala, Libby's father says that aside from feeling proud, he was able to gain insight into his mother through the show. "In the last scene, where she is having her last conversation with her grandmother who is in this retirement home -- I got choked up," he says. "It was very moving for me because these scenes are largely scenes that happened between grandmother and granddaughter so I wasn't a participant in them.

"She has a flair for dialogue on top of this acting talent," he continues "and given her very special relationship, she was able to tap this character and bring her alive on stage. She has the voice, the tone, and, most of all, the dramatic presentation to bring out some of my mother's attitude and her character."

The Advocate and Greenwich Time

FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 22, 2000

REMEMBERING 'Lilia!'

Actress creates one-woman show about her famous grandmother

By Ray Hogan, Staff Writer

While Libby Skala was studying improvisational acting in Seattle in 1995, she was asked to come up with a character scene.

She didn't have to look beyond her own bloodlines.

Her grandmother's story was waiting to be told. Lilia Skala was the first female architect in Austria, and a member of Max Reinhardt's theater before she fled Hitler's henchmen for New York, where she worked in a factory by day and went to school at night. And all that was before she became an Oscar-nominated actress.

Because Lilia Skala had died the previous year, she was fresh in Libby's memory. Only problem was, although Libby had a degree in English, she'd never written for theater.

Enter improv coach Gary Austin. "He said to go home and write down anything I remembered that happened between the two of us," Skala says. "I didn't know where to begin or whether to tell from my point of view or hers. He said 'If you did know those things it would be a dead piece of meat before you started it.'"

When she told him that her grandmother was the first female Austrian architect and a refugee, he was intrigued. When she let on that she was a famous actress, Austin said, "You might even be able to make money off this."

Over the past five years, the project has developed into "Lilia!," a one-woman show that's played in Los Angeles, New York, London and Canada. Skala brings it to the Weatherstone Studio tomorrow and Sept. 30 as part of the Darien Arts Center's 25th anniversary.

ALL GROWN UP: Libby Skala brings her one-woman show about her grandmother home to the Darien Arts Center this weekend.

Last Updated: 3/4/2009

LIBBY

SKALA

Performer Writer