Press about Bitches, Bastards and Lovers

Chicago Sun Times

Marriage: getting your act together

Acting out typical marital conflicts helps troubled couples see new ways.

By Barbara Varro, Chicago Sun-Times

For a while Kurt and Freda Meyer become Art and Meg, a fictitious couple married for 15 years who have difficulty communicating. They begin a dramatization of a confrontation between the couple.

Meg: "Shut off the television, please."

Art: "What for?" (He takes a sip of his beer.)

Meg: "I want to talk to you."

Art: "Look, I'm tired."

Meg: "George [their son] got caught stealing."

Art: "No kidding."

Meg: "Don't you understand what I’m saying?"

Art: "Understand what?"

Meg: "That we can't let him get away with it."

Art: "What do you want “me” to do? You're his mother."

Meg: "Can't we just talk about it?"

Art: "We just talked."

Meg: "We did?"

"That is the type of conversation that leads nowhere," says Kurt Meyer, who has been a Chicago marriage counselor for 25 years. "Meg has not been able to deal with Art's non-involvement. She's afraid to risk getting him angry because she's afraid she won't be able to deal with his anger. The fact is, unless she can risk his anger, she will never make him listen to her."

Continuing their enactment of a confrontation scene between Art and Meg, the Meyers demonstrate ways the couple can resolve their conflict. They show how Meg can argue effectively with her husband to get him to pay attention to her and to help her deal with their son.

The Meyers call the play-acting they've developed "marriage verbatim." It is an approach that grew out of group sessions with troubled couples. The Meyers describe “marriage verbatim” as a method of "learning marriage skills and, at the same time, correcting mistaken concepts about marriage."

The Meyers took acting lessons to be able to demonstrate convincingly the interaction between a husband and wife, starting from a combative stance, then working through the arguments and reaching a compromise. Kurt wrote a series of skits they have enacted before groups of couples trying to shore up shaky marriages.

Skits covering such situations as arguments over sex, money and mothers-in-law are included in Kurt Meyer's book, Bitches, Bastards and Lovers (Libra Publishers 1984, reissued in 1999). The book, he says, is designed to give couples some of the tools needed to solve marital problems. "If people can learn to solve the smaller problems in a marriage, it's likely they can do the same when the big problems come along," he says.

The titillating title of the book comes from marital quarrels that often result in low-down name-calling.

"The title," Kurt says, "is about pain and hurt and still being in love."

As he sees it, the high divorce rate in this country is an indication that people are not willing to do the hard work required to forge a good marriage. "The age of narcissism—thinking about fulfilling yourself above all else—has contributed to the high divorce rate," Kurt says. "It is almost impossible for self-absorbed people to have a good marriage. They are not capable of putting time and effort into fulfilling their partner's needs."

Kurt says most couples seek counseling too late, when the deterioration of their marriage is in an advanced stage. "It's important to reach people earlier, before irreparable damage has been done to the marriage," he says. "Couples who are having a little difficulty can benefit from his approach because they can relate to some of the issues he brings up."

"It's verbatim therapy," Freda says. "Suggesting alternative behavior to people becomes easier if they see it demonstrated." Couples see themselves when common fights are dramatized

Freda, for instance, might play the role of a wife who avoids confrontations with her husband because she doesn't like arguments. Kurt acts the part of the husband who bosses her around, knowing she will not fight back. Through dramatization the Meyers show that the wife must stand up to her husband instead of bottling up her feelings of resentment and anger.

"People have to see that quarreling is a natural part of marriage, a normal process of adjustment," Freda says. "It is a way of clearing the air. Having a healthy argument is a way to communicate. If one partner is withdrawn and won't talk, it is up to the other to prod him or her into confronting the issues causing the problem in their marriage."