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Before Siri, There Was Mabel: An Exchange of Ideas in New Theater Work

How does a theater company create a work about communication?

First it listens.

That was the approach for A Broken Umbrella Theatre, the New Haven-based nomadic theater company known for creating works inspired by the many inventions, “firsts,” and unique aspects of the community, including re-imagining the beginning history of bicycles, girdles, matches, try-out musicals, and the Erector set, among other subjects.

This time out, the ensemble company is focusing on the special relationship New Haven has with the telephone.

The first telephone exchange, switchboard, telephone book, and telephone subscription system happened in New Haven in the late 1870s. (The first wrong number, too, no doubt, but that’s another story.)

“We take our inspiration for our work from New Haven history and the community’s shared history,” says ensemble member Aric Isaacs. “What we’ve done in the past is take an invention and inventor and tell that story over 90 minutes.”

But the theater company found that New Haven telegraph office manager George Coy, who created the first commercial telephone exchange, wasn’t really that interesting.

“He was a fairly unremarkable fellow,” says Isaacs. “He was basically a man who got out there and hustled to get people to subscribe and to invest in the exchange.”

So the theater company decided instead to talk to people of all backgrounds, ages, and neighborhoods in the community about their experience with the telephone—and the telephone company here. (Southern New England Telephone for most of the 20th century.) They spoke with many former employees of SNET (now Frontier), who all referred to the company as “family” and how civic-minded it was to the community.

“We also wanted to explore what that initial invention wrought, all the way up to now and look at how we deal with communication technology and each other today,” says Isaacs.

The oral history project began in January and continued throughout the year, ending this summer as the creation of the theater piece began, inspired by those stories,

The result is Exchange, which is being presented in partnership with City-Wide Open Studios, the New Haven art scene’s festival of visual arts. Exchange is a theatrical work with music and a Foley (sound effects) artist that features a half dozen vignettes. The show will be presented on site during three City-Wide Open Studios weekends in October at Westville (Saturday, Oct. 7 and Sunday, Oct. 8), Goffe Street Armory (Saturday, Oct. 14 and Sunday, Oct. 15) and Erector Square (Saturday, Oct. 28 and Sunday, Oct. 29). New Haven’s Open Studios will be celebrating its 20th year.

Isaacs said stories people told were personal, nostalgic, and tender. People talked of rotary phone on the kitchen walls “and you had to stretch the cord around the corner and down into the basement or the closet if you wanted to get some privacy” or of multiple phones “and your mother was always picking it up and yelling at you to get off the phone” or party lines “where everyone knew each other’s business.”

They talked of memorable phone calls, joyous and tragic ones, too.

“We talked at Tower One/Tower East retirement community and several people there talked about not having a phone so they had to go to a convenience store or a soda shop and use the phone there.”

Talks with elementary school kids at Cold Spring School showed how technology is taken for granted, he said.

“There was one little girl who talked matter-of-factly about how her family talked regularly to relatives in Pakistan.” He contrasted that with an era where talking internationally was a big deal “and cost a fortune.”

People talked about the time when there were operators who were real human beings, “and who were almost always women. When the exchange first started the telephone company initially hoped teenaged boys—many who worked delivering telegraphs—would work the switchboards, but they found too many of them played pranks. It soon switched to more trustworthy female staffing.”

These operators would talk to the lonely, the desperate, and those looking for all kinds of information.

“They could get a call from someone who would say, ‘Hey, I’m in Hamden and I can’t think of the name of that pizza place, but it’s near the park...’”

There were many commonalities in the story-telling the theater company heard, but there were some divides, too, and one was generational, says Isaacs.

“The Baby Boomers invented the technology, the Gen X-ers were the guinea pigs, and the Millennials are living it,” he says of the cell phone. “I love having the world in my pocket, but I still feel it’s intrusive at the same time. But for those 10-years-old and younger, it’s so ingrained into their being and it’s such a part of their daily existence that they don’t see it as invasive.”

If he had to choose between Mabel the friendly operator or Siri, which would he pick?

“I’d probably choose”—and here he takes a long painful pause—”Siri, only because the information you need is going to be faster. And that’s too bad. But it’s like the disappearing clerks at the grocery store—it’s just not where we are anymore.”

Exchange runs three consecutive weekends on Saturdays and Sundays, Oct. 7 and 8 at 12:30 and 4:30 p.m. at 446A Blake Street, New Haven; Oct. 14 and 15 at 12:30 and 4:30 p.m. at The Armory, 290 Goffe Street, New Haven; and Oct. 28 and 29 at 12:30 and 4:30 p.m. at Erector Square, 315 Peck Street, New Haven. Admission is free; donations are accepted.

Frank Rizzo is a freelance journalist who lives in New Haven and New York City. He has been writing about theater and the arts in Connecticut for nearly 40 years.