Virginia Woolf's Other Couple Talks About Voices and Words | Playbill

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Tony Awards Virginia Woolf's Other Couple Talks About Voices and Words "That voice kind of arrived organically," said Mireille Enos, talking about the unusual pinched, clenched-jaws tone she uses as the emotionally unstable Honey in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?—a performance that brought the actress her first Tony nomination.

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Mireille Enos and David Harbour in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? Photo by Joan Marcus

"I didn't have any preconceived ideas about changing her voice and neither did [director] Anthony Page," the actress said. "I knew I wanted to place her regionally from the Midwest and she's a really different girl than I am. The need to remove her from myself kind of produced this voice. It helps to throw me into the world of the play."

Enos' on-stage husband, David Harbour, was also Tony-nominated. Harbour doesn't employ a stage voice very far from the one he uses in everyday life, so the question put to him was: What is your favorite line in the play? His answer was unexpected.

"I adore the third act, because I have so little to say," he replied. "When Kathleen Turner [who plays Martha] is talking about her child, there's a moment where Honey says, 'I want a child.' I have one line, 'Honey.' It's this bittersweet moment for this couple that's never been able to find happiness or anything. For her to say this was this mix of rage and hope. I think that 'Honey' is my favorite line in the play."

Both of Enos' and Harbour's co-stars, Turner and Bill Irwin, also got Tony nominations, as did the production as a whole and Jane Greenwood's costumes.

 
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