Paula Vogel the personal is political

"Paula Vogel radiates enthusiasm. In her 58 years, she has achieved much. She is an acclaimed playwright (How I Learned to Drive won a Pulitzer Prize for drama in 1998). She is a successful university professor. She has served as a mentor to a host of award winning playwrights, including Nilo Cruz and Lynn Nottage, (they both went on to win their own Pulitzers). And she is joyous about her play, A Civil War Christmas, which is currently playing on the Huntington’s B.U. Theatre in Boston through December 13.

Vogel bursts into warm and infectious laughter one minute when she tells a story about her family that strikes her fancy. But her joviality vanishes quickly the next minute when the subject turns to a discussion about gay rights.

We chatted before rehearsals at the Huntington Theatre, the day after the decision by voters in Maine on November 3 to strike down a law allowing same-sex couples to wed.

The vote in Maine troubled her deeply.

"I woke up at five o’clock in the morning and heard the depressing news about the vote in Maine," Vogel says. Her tone is somber. As she speaks about it, she sounds personally wounded."

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