“To understand that piano, you have to go back to the time of slavery...”
Having read and seen on stage several of the other plays in August Wilson’s cycle of scripts touching on each decade of the African-American experience in the 20th century, and knowing that “The Piano Lesson” netted Wilson his second Pulitzer Prize, I went to Penumbra Theatre’s production Thursday night expecting a powerful drama, but not entirely sure what else to expect. Not knowing anything other than the barest bones of the plot, I certainly didn’t expect it to be as funny as it was. Nor did I expect a ghost story. Oh there was drama, and lots of it. But I was reminded again by “The Piano Lesson” what a remarkable storyteller August Wilson was - and continues to be through the plays which outlive him. He uses all the storyteller’s tools - humor, music, romance, spirituality, the list goes on - and uses them all to great effect. Penumbra’s production of “The Piano Lesson” is a stellar showcase for a brilliant story.
In many ways, “The Piano Lesson” is the quintessential August Wilson play. It embodies nearly everything he was saying in all his other plays, all the key elements and subject matter - family and history both central among them. Here the story revolves around the conflict between a brother and sister who view the value of their family’s history very differently. In 1930s Pittsburgh, Berneice (Greta Oglesby) is raising her young daughter Maretha (Natalia Gaston) alone after the death of her husband, living under the same roof with her uncle Doaker (James Craven). Berneice’s brother Boy Willie (Ansa Akyea) returns home loudly at the crack of dawn one morning, after several years’ absence, with his friend Lymon (Thomas Ashford) in tow. Boy Willie has plans in motion to raise money so he can go back down south and buy land of his own to farm - land which used to belong to the family who held his ancestors as slaves. Central to these plans is selling off the family piano in the Pittsburgh house - a piano carved with faces and images from their family’s past. Long ago, the piano was first bought in exchange for two slaves, family members whose faces now adorn the front of the piano. Berneice has no intention of selling the piano, of which she owns half, and has no intention of allowing Boy Willie to sell his half either. The battle lines are drawn early, and brother and sister face off throughout the play. Guns, knives and even frying pans are raised on either side of the squabble. The fact that a gun never goes off is something of a miracle, and a source of constant tension.
But the piano is more than just a musical instrument, or a visual reminder of the family’s past as slaves. The piano is the focus of some potent supernatural energy, both positive and negative. A strange red light emanates from the piano, the regular lights flicker, and a low rumble shudders through the entire house in times of conflict centered around the instrument. It could just be the train going past on the tracks nearby, but nobody on or offstage fully believes that explanation. The silent prologue to the play, in which cast members take on the roles of a previous generation of the family, ends with the piano playing by itself. The mysterious death of one of the descendants of the slave owners, a death which paves the way for Boy Willie to buy their farm land, is blamed on the Ghosts of the Yellow Dog - another tragedy tied to this family, and slavery, and this piano. The spirit of the recently dead landowner makes appearances to several different family members. Berneice refuses to play the piano, even for church, because she doesn’t want to rouse dark spirits. The climax of the play involves an attempt to exorcise those spirits. Ultimately, to drive out the dark spirits, someone has to take a seat at the keyboard and invoke the help of some better angels.
For all the conflict and dark undercurrents of the past, Penumbra’s production of “The Piano Lesson” - under Lou Bellamy’s assured direction - is also full of hearty good humor. The laughs are plentiful, and based largely on the network of family, friendly, and romantic relations which tie all the characters together. These people know how to push one another’s buttons, and they do, with loving and jovial frequency. In addition to the brother-sister-uncle-best friend shenanigans, also drawn into the fray are Doaker’s traveling musician brother Wining Boy (Dennis W. Spears); Berneice’s persistent suitor, the newly minted reverend Avery (T. Mychael Rambo); and Grace (Lerea Carter), a local young woman who has caught the eye of both Boy Willie and Lynton, and who gets off one of the bigger laugh lines of the evening walking into the middle of the exorcism action and proclaiming that “something is wrong with this house” before making a hasty exit.
The music, in all its forms and colors, which peppers the telling of this family tale is fantastic. It opens up these sometimes quiet characters and reveals new depths. It demonstrates the strength of their relationships to one another, and uncovers the pain they can’t bring themselves to speak directly. The music, like the poetry of the language of the script throughout, doesn’t slow down or derail the story. It drives it more surely and quickly toward its goal. The music allows the story to make leaps it would not otherwise be able to do. It is part of the blood and bone and muscle of this family, and is a large part of what helps them survive, and rise above their past.
The cast is excellent without exception. Special attention must be paid to Ansa Akyea as Boy Willie. From the moment he bursts onstage until the final moments of the play, Akyea raises both the energy and the decibel level of the entire production tenfold. He is a force of nature. One can understand how he has managed to charm and cajole, and sometimes forcefully push, his way through life. Only someone with the determination of Greta Oglesby as Berneice could stare this Boy Willie down, and she does. Her quiet reserves of strength are always evident. She raises her voice when necessary, but she doesn’t need to do so to make you realize you had better not mess with this woman. I am quickly coming to the conclusion that I could watch James Craven (Doaker) in anything. His no-nonsense style was one of the main joys of Penumbra’s production of “Red Shirts” earlier this season, and his turn here as Berneice and Boy Willie’s reluctant referee (and protector) is full of the same dry wit, intelligence, and world-weary charm. Dennis W. Spears makes Wining Boy an endearing old rascal. T. Mychael Rambo makes Avery’s newfound religion seem not only entirely believable but fully human, and quite moving. Thomas Ashford’s character Lymon may not be too bright, but in Ashford’s hands, you can’t help liking the poor guy. He also makes an unexpectedly suitable suitor for Berneice (nice to see the woman has options). And though the role of Maretha may be small, the reality Natalia Gaston brings to her is key to making the overall dynamic of the family work. There is another generation already in place that needs to be planned for, and protected, and all the characters are aware of that because of Maretha.
The design work is impeccable. Ken Evans scenic design has maximized the Penumbra stage space so that you truly feel the house extends beyond the limits we see - upstairs, down the hall, outside both front and back. It’s a great piece of design work, well-excuted by the Penumbra team of scenic artists. Steven Horstmann’s work as properties master fills in all the necessary details around the edges, making the world of this family’s home seem truly lived in. The lighting (Michelle Habeck), costume (Edward Summers), and sound (Malo Adams) designs all do their part as well to create the feeling of stepping completely into another world, another time.
The ensemble of “The Piano Lesson” received a well-deserved standing ovation on opening night. Their work is powerful, funny, and extremely moving. If this is the way Penumbra kicks off their five-year project staging all ten plays in Wilson’s “20th Century Cycle,” I can’t wait to see what’s next. (We won’t have long to wait - “The Gem of the Ocean” takes the McGuire Proscenium Stage at the new Guthrie Theater complex starting April 22nd this year). But whatever you do, do not miss “The Piano Lesson.” It’s one of the best marriages of script and theater company that I’ve seen in a very long time.
Very Highly Recommended
“The Piano Lesson” runs through March 16, 2008 at Penumbra Theatre (270 North Kent Street in St. Paul). For tickets and more information, call 651-224-3180 or visit www.penumbratheatre.org
Cross posted to www.myspace.com/matthewaeverett and archived on my site www.matthewaeverett.com
Saturday, February 23, 2008
Review - The Sign In Sidney Brustein’s Window - Starting Gate Productions - 3 stars
“There are two kinds of loneliness in this world - with a man, and without one. I picked. And let’s face it, I can’t type.”
This is a tough one.
So, three sisters walk into a bar, er... a Greenwich Village apartment in 1960s New York - a housewife, an actress/waitress, and a whore. Guess which one has the best set of coping skills?
After seeing the Starting Gate production of Lorraine Hansberry’s play “The Sign In Sidney Brustein’s Window,” I don’t feel like I need to see this play again. I don’t believe I’m going to see it done better. Director Lynn Musgrave and her team take what could have been a very static, talky play and manage to keep the thing moving. Definitely an “A” for effort here. The problem is that the play itself is a trainwreck.
“Sidney Brustein” is both a product and a victim of its times. It is a deeply, and unrelentingly, cynical play - often jaw-droppingly racist and sexist. At the time it was originally produced in 1965, Hansberry herself was dying (taken to and from many rehearsals in a wheelchair). Though many great upheavals and disappointments of the decade were yet to come, JFK’s recent assassination and the escalation of the war in Vietnam would probably have gotten even the most dogged optimists a little down. Still, the crushing of nearly every character’s dreams and spirit in this play seems a bit much.
That doesn’t mean that the play is without its bright spots and humor - far from it. Hansberry, even here, has a great love of and way with words. They tumble out of her characters’ mouths in torrents. In fact, there are so many clever people on display that it is often a lot of fun just to watch them spar with each other.
Trickiest of all is the title character, and Rob Frankel as Sidney anchors the play and production in a way they both very much need. Sidney is a bastard. A clever bastard, sometimes sweet, often charming, but still a bastard. He is mean to family, friends and neighbors alike, but most of all to his long-suffering young wife Iris (Bethany Ford). The fact that Frankel makes Sidney watchable over the entire three hour span of the play is something of a miracle, and he deserves a tremendous amount of credit for helping hold the whole thing together. The one satisfying comeuppance Sidney gets by the play’s end is that each and every thing he thought he knew, even about the people closest to him, turns out to be completely wrong.
The biggest applause, however, has to go to Jean Salo as Sidney’s sister-in-law, Mavis. Hansberry obviously loved this character because Mavis gets nearly all the best lines in the play. Salo takes full advantage of each and every one of them. Mavis at first appears to be an object of mockery, the safe little housewife in her suburban existence, trying to force her taste and standards on everyone around her. As the play goes on and Mavis’ life is revealed to be anything but what it seems, Salo’s performance takes on unexpected depth and even nobility. The chief joy of her appearances, however, is watching her lay out the hypocrisies of the supposedly caring and compassionate left wing nut jobs she’s inherited from her sister’s marriage. Mavis is also hypocritical, and outrageously racist about almost everything and everybody, but in Salo’s hands, she becomes a character we deeply miss when she vanishes from the play for the final act.
There’s a lot of vanishing and sudden resurgences going on, in fact. It’s one of the many things that makes the play so structurally baffling to watch. Iris’ other sister, Gloria, the much-whispered-about whore, doesn’t appear until the final act and never crosses paths with either of her sisters, or the man she supposedly loves and plans to marry. Rachel Finch as Gloria is wonderful. She has a lot to live up to after all that build up in the previous two acts, and Finch delivers. She also makes us regret the many missed dramatic and comic opportunities her character might have had, were the play different. As she made her final exit into the dark, I found myself thinking, “What a waste of a perfectly good whore.”
Oddly dominant in the play’s closing scenes was Wally O’Hara (Dale Pfeilsticker) as the dark horse candidate for election who Sidney backs to unexpected victory. More Trojan Horse than dark horse after all, Wally is supposed to become the embodiment of “the system” at the end. But the political windmills that Sidney is tilting at are always so vague in the script, and Wally has been so largely absent for the bulk of the play, that it’s hard to work up any sadness or indignance at “the man” stealing back the power from the people right under their noses. Pfeilsticker does his best to inject good-natured Wally with some menace at the end, but the play doesn’t give him a lot with which to work.
Just passing through for reasons unclear in the text - hippy artist Max (Tom Emmott), who Sidney’s wife rightly pegs as self-consciously arty; and gay playwright next door David (Clarence Wethern), a confused and confusing closeted character with his pre-Stonewall, pre-Boys In The Band love interest kept conspicuously offstage.
The person with the toughest mountain to climb is Bethany Ford as Iris, and she succeeds as much as the play will let her. Ford is saddled with so much contradictory exposition and so many wild mood swings, it almost makes you forget that Iris is not just the worst, but also the very best, actress Sidney has ever known. Onstage, Iris’ talents are meager, but in real life, she pulls off the biggest masquerade of any of the characters, fooling the smug Sidney completely. It is an irony that the play and production don’t get enough of a chance to explore and appreciate fully. The dated nature of the play is never more apparent than in Iris’ agonies over her sham of a career, as she has been forced to lower herself to doing commercials. Oh no! Paid work as an actor in commercials?! The horror! I know a dozen actor friends off the top of my head that would gladly take Iris’ work opportunities off her hands for her.
Another character you wish would return rather than vanish for the final act is Alton Scales - activist, journalist, and would-be Prince Charming for Gloria the whore. Alton is also African-American. Though light-skinned, he’s also pretty thin-skinned about racial issues. As portrayed with a lot of easy-going charm by Santino Craven, Alton is sometimes so laid back, the audience can forget how deeply he feels things. One of the biggest opportunities the play fails to capitalize on is the romance between Alton and Gloria. The courtship takes place completely offstage. We are told, rather than shown, everything. Alton discovers Gloria’s unsavory career offstage - from who, we never know, even though every other character in the play but Alton seems to be aware of it - including minor characters like the gay playwright next door. Both sides of the big break-up take place in isolation - Alton gives Sidney a letter which is then turned over to Gloria later. It is only because Santino Craven and Rachel Finch individually convey their anguish so heartbreakingly - to Sidney (?!) - that we understand how much the loss of the unseen relationship means to them both. A lot of credit needs to go to Craven and Finch for delivering what the play fails to - emotional investment in characters that makes you want to see more of them - you know, onstage, as a couple. Another head-scratcher of a missed opportunity. But again, the play’s fault, not the production’s.
The expansive set by Michael Hoover gives the characters a lot of room to roam, and Musgrave and company put it to good use. It’s a little rough around the edges, but I was never able to make up my mind whether or not that was a deliberate choice. Gregory Johnson’s props filled out the world of the play nicely without overwhelming it in random “stuff.” The costumes from Mandi Johnson were great. Mark Webb pulled off another lighting design challege in the Mounds Theatre quite handily. The sound design, by director Musgrave, was good, but had me more than a little confused at the one point in the play where fantasy and reality were at cross purposes. Under the circmstances, I’m willing to lay more of the blame at the play’s feet, however.
“The Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window” was a bold choice by Starting Gate - the last major play from an important theatrical voice silenced too soon. It’s unfortunate that all the characters and multiple plot threads here didn’t add up to anything in the end, despite a lot of artists’ significant efforts on its behalf.
Starting Gate’s production of “The Sign In Sidney Brustein’s Window” runs through March 16, 2008 at the Mounds Theatre (1029 Hudson Road in St. Paul). For tickets and further information, call 651-645-3503 or visit www.startinggate.org
Cross posted to www.myspace.com/matthewaeverett and archived on my site www.matthewaeverett.com
This is a tough one.
So, three sisters walk into a bar, er... a Greenwich Village apartment in 1960s New York - a housewife, an actress/waitress, and a whore. Guess which one has the best set of coping skills?
After seeing the Starting Gate production of Lorraine Hansberry’s play “The Sign In Sidney Brustein’s Window,” I don’t feel like I need to see this play again. I don’t believe I’m going to see it done better. Director Lynn Musgrave and her team take what could have been a very static, talky play and manage to keep the thing moving. Definitely an “A” for effort here. The problem is that the play itself is a trainwreck.
“Sidney Brustein” is both a product and a victim of its times. It is a deeply, and unrelentingly, cynical play - often jaw-droppingly racist and sexist. At the time it was originally produced in 1965, Hansberry herself was dying (taken to and from many rehearsals in a wheelchair). Though many great upheavals and disappointments of the decade were yet to come, JFK’s recent assassination and the escalation of the war in Vietnam would probably have gotten even the most dogged optimists a little down. Still, the crushing of nearly every character’s dreams and spirit in this play seems a bit much.
That doesn’t mean that the play is without its bright spots and humor - far from it. Hansberry, even here, has a great love of and way with words. They tumble out of her characters’ mouths in torrents. In fact, there are so many clever people on display that it is often a lot of fun just to watch them spar with each other.
Trickiest of all is the title character, and Rob Frankel as Sidney anchors the play and production in a way they both very much need. Sidney is a bastard. A clever bastard, sometimes sweet, often charming, but still a bastard. He is mean to family, friends and neighbors alike, but most of all to his long-suffering young wife Iris (Bethany Ford). The fact that Frankel makes Sidney watchable over the entire three hour span of the play is something of a miracle, and he deserves a tremendous amount of credit for helping hold the whole thing together. The one satisfying comeuppance Sidney gets by the play’s end is that each and every thing he thought he knew, even about the people closest to him, turns out to be completely wrong.
The biggest applause, however, has to go to Jean Salo as Sidney’s sister-in-law, Mavis. Hansberry obviously loved this character because Mavis gets nearly all the best lines in the play. Salo takes full advantage of each and every one of them. Mavis at first appears to be an object of mockery, the safe little housewife in her suburban existence, trying to force her taste and standards on everyone around her. As the play goes on and Mavis’ life is revealed to be anything but what it seems, Salo’s performance takes on unexpected depth and even nobility. The chief joy of her appearances, however, is watching her lay out the hypocrisies of the supposedly caring and compassionate left wing nut jobs she’s inherited from her sister’s marriage. Mavis is also hypocritical, and outrageously racist about almost everything and everybody, but in Salo’s hands, she becomes a character we deeply miss when she vanishes from the play for the final act.
There’s a lot of vanishing and sudden resurgences going on, in fact. It’s one of the many things that makes the play so structurally baffling to watch. Iris’ other sister, Gloria, the much-whispered-about whore, doesn’t appear until the final act and never crosses paths with either of her sisters, or the man she supposedly loves and plans to marry. Rachel Finch as Gloria is wonderful. She has a lot to live up to after all that build up in the previous two acts, and Finch delivers. She also makes us regret the many missed dramatic and comic opportunities her character might have had, were the play different. As she made her final exit into the dark, I found myself thinking, “What a waste of a perfectly good whore.”
Oddly dominant in the play’s closing scenes was Wally O’Hara (Dale Pfeilsticker) as the dark horse candidate for election who Sidney backs to unexpected victory. More Trojan Horse than dark horse after all, Wally is supposed to become the embodiment of “the system” at the end. But the political windmills that Sidney is tilting at are always so vague in the script, and Wally has been so largely absent for the bulk of the play, that it’s hard to work up any sadness or indignance at “the man” stealing back the power from the people right under their noses. Pfeilsticker does his best to inject good-natured Wally with some menace at the end, but the play doesn’t give him a lot with which to work.
Just passing through for reasons unclear in the text - hippy artist Max (Tom Emmott), who Sidney’s wife rightly pegs as self-consciously arty; and gay playwright next door David (Clarence Wethern), a confused and confusing closeted character with his pre-Stonewall, pre-Boys In The Band love interest kept conspicuously offstage.
The person with the toughest mountain to climb is Bethany Ford as Iris, and she succeeds as much as the play will let her. Ford is saddled with so much contradictory exposition and so many wild mood swings, it almost makes you forget that Iris is not just the worst, but also the very best, actress Sidney has ever known. Onstage, Iris’ talents are meager, but in real life, she pulls off the biggest masquerade of any of the characters, fooling the smug Sidney completely. It is an irony that the play and production don’t get enough of a chance to explore and appreciate fully. The dated nature of the play is never more apparent than in Iris’ agonies over her sham of a career, as she has been forced to lower herself to doing commercials. Oh no! Paid work as an actor in commercials?! The horror! I know a dozen actor friends off the top of my head that would gladly take Iris’ work opportunities off her hands for her.
Another character you wish would return rather than vanish for the final act is Alton Scales - activist, journalist, and would-be Prince Charming for Gloria the whore. Alton is also African-American. Though light-skinned, he’s also pretty thin-skinned about racial issues. As portrayed with a lot of easy-going charm by Santino Craven, Alton is sometimes so laid back, the audience can forget how deeply he feels things. One of the biggest opportunities the play fails to capitalize on is the romance between Alton and Gloria. The courtship takes place completely offstage. We are told, rather than shown, everything. Alton discovers Gloria’s unsavory career offstage - from who, we never know, even though every other character in the play but Alton seems to be aware of it - including minor characters like the gay playwright next door. Both sides of the big break-up take place in isolation - Alton gives Sidney a letter which is then turned over to Gloria later. It is only because Santino Craven and Rachel Finch individually convey their anguish so heartbreakingly - to Sidney (?!) - that we understand how much the loss of the unseen relationship means to them both. A lot of credit needs to go to Craven and Finch for delivering what the play fails to - emotional investment in characters that makes you want to see more of them - you know, onstage, as a couple. Another head-scratcher of a missed opportunity. But again, the play’s fault, not the production’s.
The expansive set by Michael Hoover gives the characters a lot of room to roam, and Musgrave and company put it to good use. It’s a little rough around the edges, but I was never able to make up my mind whether or not that was a deliberate choice. Gregory Johnson’s props filled out the world of the play nicely without overwhelming it in random “stuff.” The costumes from Mandi Johnson were great. Mark Webb pulled off another lighting design challege in the Mounds Theatre quite handily. The sound design, by director Musgrave, was good, but had me more than a little confused at the one point in the play where fantasy and reality were at cross purposes. Under the circmstances, I’m willing to lay more of the blame at the play’s feet, however.
“The Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window” was a bold choice by Starting Gate - the last major play from an important theatrical voice silenced too soon. It’s unfortunate that all the characters and multiple plot threads here didn’t add up to anything in the end, despite a lot of artists’ significant efforts on its behalf.
Starting Gate’s production of “The Sign In Sidney Brustein’s Window” runs through March 16, 2008 at the Mounds Theatre (1029 Hudson Road in St. Paul). For tickets and further information, call 651-645-3503 or visit www.startinggate.org
Cross posted to www.myspace.com/matthewaeverett and archived on my site www.matthewaeverett.com
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Review - The Underpants - Workhouse Theatre Co. - 3-1/2 stars
I’ve been having a hard time wrapping my brain around the Workhouse Theatre Co.’s production of “The Underpants.” (And no, I don’t think it’s because I have to keep constructing sentences with the word “underpants” in them due to the title. A play called “Moist Panties” maybe, but just underpants, not so much.)
Let’s start with the basics. It’s a comedy. Is it funny? Very much so.
The script is comedian/playwright Steve Martin’s adaptation of the 1910 social satire by German playwright Carl Sternheim. In the play, unhappily married wife Louise Maske (Lindsay Timmington) has just had the misfortune of having her underpants fall down about her ankles in public just as the King’s procession is parading by. Her boorish husband Theo (Dan Peltzman) is convinced his own reputation will be ruined.
Instead, the room the Maske’s have for rent in their home gets its own parade of would-be renters, most of whom just want to get a little closer to the infamous woman of the moment. There is Frank Versati, the poet (Dan Hylton); Benjamin Cohen, the closeted Jew (Jason Vogen); and Klinglehoff, the bewildered man who just wants a room and has no idea what the heck is going on. Even the King (Jeremy Motz) makes a last minute deus ex machina appearance. Louise’s upstairs neighbor and partner in crime Gertrude (Shana Eisenberg) is more than happy to encourage Louise in plotting an affair - or two.
So what’s my hesitation? Probably just one of expectation. While this is a script by Steve Martin, writer of such plays as “Wasp” and “Picasso at the Lapin Agile,” (both of which I liked quite a lot), “The Underpants” isn’t the same kind of play. Rather than being a Martin original, this is instead Steve Martin’s interpretation of Carl Sternheim’s play. It’s clearly a good match of source material and adapter. It’s easy to see why Martin was drawn to it. One can see Martin’s style, intelligence, and signature brand of humor peaking through all over the place. But while the play takes swipes at things like objectification and oppression of women, and the overall hypocrisy of the system of gender roles, “The Underpants” is essentially a bedroom farce. Though a lot of the issues addressed are just as relevant today as in 1910 when it was first presented in Germany, it’s not the usual Steve Martin play of ideas masquerading as entertainment. It’s simply entertainment. Does it succeed on that level? Most definitely.
Workhouse Theatre Co. is settling nicely into their new home at The Warren. In a former garage bookended on either side by a photography studio and an art gallery, Workhouse’s small triangular stage tucked in the corner utilizes the space remarkably well. The set design by Sarah J. Leigh makes the most of a snug situation. A set with walls and three frequently used doors wedges into a space I wouldn’t have thought possible. The architectural logic of the set sometimes made me scratch my head a little, but the use of those three doors was consistent, and extremely funny. Suspension of disbelief applies to buildings, too. The props in such a tight space need to be well-chosen and not too numerous. Norma Peterson and Jane O’Brien’s work with prop design added just the right accents to help define but not overwhelm the space, or slow the action between scenes.
In a comedy as broad and bawdy as this, the supporting players wind up with a lot of the flashier scene-stealing moments. Shana Eisenberg as the naughty instigator Gertrude is a lot of fun to watch in action. Gertrude cares for her friend and wants Louise to stand up for herself, but that doesn’t mean she can’t have a good time living vicariously through her friend’s sudden glut of romantic options. Dan Hylton as Versati the poet is delightfully over-the-top with his persistent wooing of Louise. Benjamin Cohen is one of the worst liars ever, but Jason Vogen makes you believe that he somehow pulls off his masquerade in spite of himself through sheer determination. Of course, it doesn’t hurt that the people he’s trying to fool aren’t all that bright themselves. Robert Larsen gets a wonderful supporting role in Klingelhoff. He gets to walk in and reap the benefits of all the lunacy that has gone before, and Larsen works it for all its worth, nearly stealing the show in its closing minutes.
It is sometimes a thankless task to be placed in the center of such a whirlwind of silliness. Every story needs a character to act as an anchor, but that role isn’t always quite as fun to perform. Lindsay Timmington does a good job of eliciting sympathy for the put-upon Louise. Timmington’s portrayal of a woman slowly coming to grips with her newfound status as the town’s unwitting sex symbol - and all the opportunities it presents - is amusing to see unfold. It is at the very end, however, when Louise is putting one over on the befuddled Klingelhoff, that Timmington really comes into her own. Using her assigned place in society - as the meek little woman - to throw a potentially troubling tenant off guard and take the upper hand in the situation, is a nice payoff to Louise’s journey. As Louise’s insufferable husband Theo, Dan Peltzman is unrelenting in his portrait of one of the most selfish husbands ever. The only good thing you can say about the man is that he doesn’t beat his wife - physically anyway. While he doesn’t get the full comeuppance one might like to see onstage, it is satisfying to know that his world is nothing like he actually believes it to be in his head.
Director Chris McGahan really puts his cast through their paces. A production like this succeeds or fails based on whether or not it can keep moving at a brisk clip. McGahan and his crew wisely keep the action going almost non-stop, with just the briefest of pauses between scenes. Having a small space to fill with a half dozen characters works to the production’s advantage. Everyone is always just moments away from being caught - well, with their pants down, sometimes quite literally. One wrong move and the whole thing could come undone. It is most entertaining watching them all walk the tightrope together and try not to fall off. The preshow music of the soundtrack from old cartoons is especially apt. “The Underpants” is a solid production of a very funny play.
Highly recommended.
“The Underpants” and Workhouse Theatre are well worth the trip. And really, it’s not much of trip outside the usual downtown theatrical haunts. I tend to get lost at the drop of a hat, and I found The Warren with no trouble at all. A quick hop on and off 94W, and you’re practically there. The Warren is on the corner of 44th and Osseo (4400 Osseo, Minneapolis). The production continues through February 23, 2008. Evening shows Thursday through Saturday this week (2/14-16) and Friday and Saturday next week (2/22 & 23) at 7:30pm. For reservations and more information, call 612-386-5763, or visit www.workhousetheatre.org
Cross posted to www.myspace.com/matthewaeverett and archived on my site www.matthewaeverett.com
Let’s start with the basics. It’s a comedy. Is it funny? Very much so.
The script is comedian/playwright Steve Martin’s adaptation of the 1910 social satire by German playwright Carl Sternheim. In the play, unhappily married wife Louise Maske (Lindsay Timmington) has just had the misfortune of having her underpants fall down about her ankles in public just as the King’s procession is parading by. Her boorish husband Theo (Dan Peltzman) is convinced his own reputation will be ruined.
Instead, the room the Maske’s have for rent in their home gets its own parade of would-be renters, most of whom just want to get a little closer to the infamous woman of the moment. There is Frank Versati, the poet (Dan Hylton); Benjamin Cohen, the closeted Jew (Jason Vogen); and Klinglehoff, the bewildered man who just wants a room and has no idea what the heck is going on. Even the King (Jeremy Motz) makes a last minute deus ex machina appearance. Louise’s upstairs neighbor and partner in crime Gertrude (Shana Eisenberg) is more than happy to encourage Louise in plotting an affair - or two.
So what’s my hesitation? Probably just one of expectation. While this is a script by Steve Martin, writer of such plays as “Wasp” and “Picasso at the Lapin Agile,” (both of which I liked quite a lot), “The Underpants” isn’t the same kind of play. Rather than being a Martin original, this is instead Steve Martin’s interpretation of Carl Sternheim’s play. It’s clearly a good match of source material and adapter. It’s easy to see why Martin was drawn to it. One can see Martin’s style, intelligence, and signature brand of humor peaking through all over the place. But while the play takes swipes at things like objectification and oppression of women, and the overall hypocrisy of the system of gender roles, “The Underpants” is essentially a bedroom farce. Though a lot of the issues addressed are just as relevant today as in 1910 when it was first presented in Germany, it’s not the usual Steve Martin play of ideas masquerading as entertainment. It’s simply entertainment. Does it succeed on that level? Most definitely.
Workhouse Theatre Co. is settling nicely into their new home at The Warren. In a former garage bookended on either side by a photography studio and an art gallery, Workhouse’s small triangular stage tucked in the corner utilizes the space remarkably well. The set design by Sarah J. Leigh makes the most of a snug situation. A set with walls and three frequently used doors wedges into a space I wouldn’t have thought possible. The architectural logic of the set sometimes made me scratch my head a little, but the use of those three doors was consistent, and extremely funny. Suspension of disbelief applies to buildings, too. The props in such a tight space need to be well-chosen and not too numerous. Norma Peterson and Jane O’Brien’s work with prop design added just the right accents to help define but not overwhelm the space, or slow the action between scenes.
In a comedy as broad and bawdy as this, the supporting players wind up with a lot of the flashier scene-stealing moments. Shana Eisenberg as the naughty instigator Gertrude is a lot of fun to watch in action. Gertrude cares for her friend and wants Louise to stand up for herself, but that doesn’t mean she can’t have a good time living vicariously through her friend’s sudden glut of romantic options. Dan Hylton as Versati the poet is delightfully over-the-top with his persistent wooing of Louise. Benjamin Cohen is one of the worst liars ever, but Jason Vogen makes you believe that he somehow pulls off his masquerade in spite of himself through sheer determination. Of course, it doesn’t hurt that the people he’s trying to fool aren’t all that bright themselves. Robert Larsen gets a wonderful supporting role in Klingelhoff. He gets to walk in and reap the benefits of all the lunacy that has gone before, and Larsen works it for all its worth, nearly stealing the show in its closing minutes.
It is sometimes a thankless task to be placed in the center of such a whirlwind of silliness. Every story needs a character to act as an anchor, but that role isn’t always quite as fun to perform. Lindsay Timmington does a good job of eliciting sympathy for the put-upon Louise. Timmington’s portrayal of a woman slowly coming to grips with her newfound status as the town’s unwitting sex symbol - and all the opportunities it presents - is amusing to see unfold. It is at the very end, however, when Louise is putting one over on the befuddled Klingelhoff, that Timmington really comes into her own. Using her assigned place in society - as the meek little woman - to throw a potentially troubling tenant off guard and take the upper hand in the situation, is a nice payoff to Louise’s journey. As Louise’s insufferable husband Theo, Dan Peltzman is unrelenting in his portrait of one of the most selfish husbands ever. The only good thing you can say about the man is that he doesn’t beat his wife - physically anyway. While he doesn’t get the full comeuppance one might like to see onstage, it is satisfying to know that his world is nothing like he actually believes it to be in his head.
Director Chris McGahan really puts his cast through their paces. A production like this succeeds or fails based on whether or not it can keep moving at a brisk clip. McGahan and his crew wisely keep the action going almost non-stop, with just the briefest of pauses between scenes. Having a small space to fill with a half dozen characters works to the production’s advantage. Everyone is always just moments away from being caught - well, with their pants down, sometimes quite literally. One wrong move and the whole thing could come undone. It is most entertaining watching them all walk the tightrope together and try not to fall off. The preshow music of the soundtrack from old cartoons is especially apt. “The Underpants” is a solid production of a very funny play.
Highly recommended.
“The Underpants” and Workhouse Theatre are well worth the trip. And really, it’s not much of trip outside the usual downtown theatrical haunts. I tend to get lost at the drop of a hat, and I found The Warren with no trouble at all. A quick hop on and off 94W, and you’re practically there. The Warren is on the corner of 44th and Osseo (4400 Osseo, Minneapolis). The production continues through February 23, 2008. Evening shows Thursday through Saturday this week (2/14-16) and Friday and Saturday next week (2/22 & 23) at 7:30pm. For reservations and more information, call 612-386-5763, or visit www.workhousetheatre.org
Cross posted to www.myspace.com/matthewaeverett and archived on my site www.matthewaeverett.com
Monday, February 11, 2008
Thursday, February 07, 2008
Ridiculous Amounts of Theater This Weekend...
Man, my February is just not conducive to theatergoing at all. Which is a darn shame, because there's tons of it, particularly kicking off this weekend and stretching out for weeks beyond...
For instance, you ask?
Well, how about the first annual Chekhov Festival over at the Bryant Lake Bowl? If you want to see a whole bunch of great theater people doing a whole lot of different things with our favorite Russian playwright and short story writer - comedy, cartoons, drama, faithful productions and completely random adaptations - it's all here baby. Check out their website - www.chekhovfestival.com- and get all the lovely details for yourself. You could fill a month of weekends just with that - and they'd certainly like you to do so. (Plus, who doesn't like food and drink during the show? And bowling and a bar just outside when you're done? Ideal.)
There's also a well-regarded and popular Fringe show, Same Difference, being remounted at the Illusion for a two week run.
Fringe vets Walking Shadow offer up the regional premiere of Naomi Iizuka's 36 Views.
Scrappy new theater group Workhouse brings us the area premiere of Steve Martin's comedy The Underpants
And a bunch of familiar faces can be found involved in the production of Theater In The Round's Henry V - including beloved Fringe favorite Craig Johnson in the director's chair
And really, that's just for starters. If none of those strike your fancy, there's at least one more new production starting, five more productions heading into their final weekends, and nine or so continuing their runs.
Links for all those and more can be found about halfway down the front page of my website - www.matthewaeverett.com - in the Theater Recommendations section.
I will likely be looking on longingly from afar for most of it. Next weekend I head out of town to join the family back east celebrating my father's 80th birthday. And last weekend of the month I'm back east again celebrating not only mom's 70th, but her well-deserved retirement party after thirty years on the job at a place she loves. Plus grandma's turning 95 next month, so we'll get in some celebrating for her as well. But it means I'm not going to be around much, and the time I am, well, I kind of need to work my two jobs so I can afford the trips home. Thus the Guthrie box office will be the lion's share of my theater-related contact for February.
So break a leg, everyone.
And those not in shows, by all means, see what everyone else is up to. It's the usual embarrassment of riches. Whatever your choice, you're bound to be happy.
For instance, you ask?
Well, how about the first annual Chekhov Festival over at the Bryant Lake Bowl? If you want to see a whole bunch of great theater people doing a whole lot of different things with our favorite Russian playwright and short story writer - comedy, cartoons, drama, faithful productions and completely random adaptations - it's all here baby. Check out their website - www.chekhovfestival.com- and get all the lovely details for yourself. You could fill a month of weekends just with that - and they'd certainly like you to do so. (Plus, who doesn't like food and drink during the show? And bowling and a bar just outside when you're done? Ideal.)
There's also a well-regarded and popular Fringe show, Same Difference, being remounted at the Illusion for a two week run.
Fringe vets Walking Shadow offer up the regional premiere of Naomi Iizuka's 36 Views.
Scrappy new theater group Workhouse brings us the area premiere of Steve Martin's comedy The Underpants
And a bunch of familiar faces can be found involved in the production of Theater In The Round's Henry V - including beloved Fringe favorite Craig Johnson in the director's chair
And really, that's just for starters. If none of those strike your fancy, there's at least one more new production starting, five more productions heading into their final weekends, and nine or so continuing their runs.
Links for all those and more can be found about halfway down the front page of my website - www.matthewaeverett.com - in the Theater Recommendations section.
I will likely be looking on longingly from afar for most of it. Next weekend I head out of town to join the family back east celebrating my father's 80th birthday. And last weekend of the month I'm back east again celebrating not only mom's 70th, but her well-deserved retirement party after thirty years on the job at a place she loves. Plus grandma's turning 95 next month, so we'll get in some celebrating for her as well. But it means I'm not going to be around much, and the time I am, well, I kind of need to work my two jobs so I can afford the trips home. Thus the Guthrie box office will be the lion's share of my theater-related contact for February.
So break a leg, everyone.
And those not in shows, by all means, see what everyone else is up to. It's the usual embarrassment of riches. Whatever your choice, you're bound to be happy.
Wednesday, February 06, 2008
Pong Pong Ball Party Time
Just got an email from the Fringe, and they've updated the front page of the website thusly...
"The applications are in.
The ping pong balls are in their cage.
Coco Fondue is readying her best fake eyelashes.
It's time for the Fringe lottery.
Reunite with your Fringe family for the first taste of the 2008 Minnesota Fringe
Witness the majesty of Coco Fondue and the Fringe staff as they randomly draw ping pong balls to determine the 2008 Minnesota Fringe lineup!
WHO'S IN? WHO'S ON THE WAIT LIST? COME TO THE WEST BANK TO FIND OUT!"
(Blogger's note - OK, I'm coming. No need to shout :)
"2008 LOTTERY
7 p.m. at Mixed Blood Theatre
1501 South 4th Street, Minneapolis
AFTER-LOTTERY PARTY
9 p.m. at Bedlam Theatre
1501 South 6th Street, Minneapolis
Drink specials at Bedlam + free pizza for early birds from Pizza Lucé
And if that isn't reason enough to come hang out, we don't know what could be.
Monday, February 11 Lottery at 7, party at 9
Woot!"
(Blogger's note - Woot, indeed :)
And so, my obsessive-compulsive disorder reasserts itself - six months early.
Sigh.
"The applications are in.
The ping pong balls are in their cage.
Coco Fondue is readying her best fake eyelashes.
It's time for the Fringe lottery.
Reunite with your Fringe family for the first taste of the 2008 Minnesota Fringe
Witness the majesty of Coco Fondue and the Fringe staff as they randomly draw ping pong balls to determine the 2008 Minnesota Fringe lineup!
WHO'S IN? WHO'S ON THE WAIT LIST? COME TO THE WEST BANK TO FIND OUT!"
(Blogger's note - OK, I'm coming. No need to shout :)
"2008 LOTTERY
7 p.m. at Mixed Blood Theatre
1501 South 4th Street, Minneapolis
AFTER-LOTTERY PARTY
9 p.m. at Bedlam Theatre
1501 South 6th Street, Minneapolis
Drink specials at Bedlam + free pizza for early birds from Pizza Lucé
And if that isn't reason enough to come hang out, we don't know what could be.
Monday, February 11 Lottery at 7, party at 9
Woot!"
(Blogger's note - Woot, indeed :)
And so, my obsessive-compulsive disorder reasserts itself - six months early.
Sigh.
Labels:
Fringe blogging,
Ping Pong Ball Awards
Tuesday, February 05, 2008
Vote (er... Caucus, er... State Your Preference...)
Heck if I know, I never caucused before.
But for a change, the whole thing isn't decided long before they get around to asking us in Minnesota.
So I've found out where my polling place (er... caucusing place) is, and off I go tonight.
It's a tiny window of opportunity - 6:30pm or 7pm until 8pm, depending on which party you want to influence - but worthwhile.
So, Democrat, Republican, Independent, doesn't matter. Get out there and vote, my friends.
For the first time in a while, they actually care what we think. Might as well tell them, huh?
It always kind of blows my mind that people fought and bled and died so I'd have the right to stroll down the street to an elementary school and help decide who the next leader of the free world's going to be.
It's all so damn civilized.
You can get information here, here and here - plus all the major candidates seem to have caucus finders on their websites as well, so it's ridiculously easy to find the place you need to be.
Let 'em hear it.
Happy Super Tuesday, everyone.
See you next Super Monday for the Fringe Lottery
(The lottery will take place at Mixed Blood Theatre (just like last year) - 1501 South Fourth Street, Minneapolis, MN - on Monday, Feb 11, 2008 at 7:00pm.)
But for a change, the whole thing isn't decided long before they get around to asking us in Minnesota.
So I've found out where my polling place (er... caucusing place) is, and off I go tonight.
It's a tiny window of opportunity - 6:30pm or 7pm until 8pm, depending on which party you want to influence - but worthwhile.
So, Democrat, Republican, Independent, doesn't matter. Get out there and vote, my friends.
For the first time in a while, they actually care what we think. Might as well tell them, huh?
It always kind of blows my mind that people fought and bled and died so I'd have the right to stroll down the street to an elementary school and help decide who the next leader of the free world's going to be.
It's all so damn civilized.
You can get information here, here and here - plus all the major candidates seem to have caucus finders on their websites as well, so it's ridiculously easy to find the place you need to be.
Let 'em hear it.
Happy Super Tuesday, everyone.
See you next Super Monday for the Fringe Lottery
(The lottery will take place at Mixed Blood Theatre (just like last year) - 1501 South Fourth Street, Minneapolis, MN - on Monday, Feb 11, 2008 at 7:00pm.)
Sunday, January 27, 2008
Review - Looking For Normal - ARTisphere Theatre - 4-1/2 stars
This show is one I very highly recommend, but if you're looking for still other options, you can find links here or here...
I've been accused recently of loving everything I see. To which I reply, really? Look at this, this, this, this, or this. For starters.
That said, let's get onto something I enjoyed...
Review - Looking For Normal - ARTisphere Theatre - 4-1/2 stars
“All this so my grandson can go to the grocery store wearing a dress, and not be killed.”
If it’s possible for a theater production to be 100 percent heart, ARTisphere’s “Looking For Normal” would come darn close. It’s not that it doesn’t also have a brain, and a very active and challenging one at that, but the sheer volume of emotion is almost overwhelming. That doesn’t mean “Looking For Normal” is overly sentimental. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. The emotion is so honest, and genuine, it’s breathtaking.
Given its history in getting to the stage, this shouldn’t have surprised me. The whole production is a labor of love, and it shows. “Looking For Normal” is a script that husband and wife team Frederick Wagner and Sally Ann Wright have been hanging onto for several years now. The desire to tell the story, and play the characters of Roy and Irma, was so great, they teamed up with director Terry Lynn Carlson and company manager Elizabeth M. Desotelle to start a brand new theater company in order to help make it happen. Partnering with Torch Theater was the final piece in the puzzle to get ARTisphere Theatre and “Looking For Normal” on stage and in front of an audience.
What’s so compelling about this story? Looking at it on paper, it might have been a trainwreck. After twenty-five years of blue collar marriage in Ohio, John Deere quality control manager Roy (Wagner) confides in Reverend Muncie (Garry Geiken) that he is convinced he was born in the wrong body. Roy intends to get a sex change operation and live the remainder of his life as a woman. Right after he tells his wife Irma (Wright).
As a drama, this idea could have been hopelessly earnest and preachy (especially with a pastor in the cast of characters). As a comedy, it could have been all cheap shots and easy laughs. What makes “Looking For Normal” work is that it treads that middle ground between the two, and ARTisphere’s production plays to that strength for all it’s worth. The laughs are plentiful, but they come from character and situation, not one-liners, and most importantly, not at any one person’s expense. Jane Anderson’s script shines a light on everyone’s failings and foibles equally. Everyone’s discomfort, including the audience’s, is acknowledged, but not coddled. The play turns the status quo inside out without being disrespectful.
Roy’s choice means a great deal of adjustment for all those around him - his elderly parents Em and Roy Sr. (Anita O’Sullivan and Larry Roupe), wife Irma, teenage daughter Patty Ann (Taylor Bolstad), grown son Wayne (Randy Schmeling), boss Frank (John Middleton), and his church, led by Reverend Muncie. In fact, the only one in his life who might understand, is his long-dead grandmother Ruth (Mo Perry), who appears throughout the proceedings to prove that gender-bending and unconventional couplings have run in the family for a great many years.
Ruth, for all her insights, felt she had to run away to live her life fully. Roy’s challenge, and ultimate salvation, is that he wants to continue living where he is, surrounded by the people he loves. However, this isn’t easy for anyone, Roy included. One of the reasons Irma won’t believe in Roy’s female identity is because, “Only a man could be this selfish.”
Denying his identity has led Roy to the brink of suicide, more than once. It is only after seeing this for herself that Irma realizes Roy can’t go it alone. She lets him move back home, and struggles to come to terms with what their family is becoming. Even has her husband is trying to turn himself into a woman, Irma’s tomboyish daughter Patty Ann is trying with all her might not to turn into a young woman herself. Bolstad’s work as Patty Ann is delightful, verging on scene-stealing. Her presentations on a woman’s menstrual cycle and her father’s impending gender reassignment surgery are hilarious, and practically show-stoppers. The bonding that occurs between Patty Ann and her ever more female father figure, built upon a barrage of questions which opens the second act, is funny and heartwarming in equal measure. But at the same time, the audience sees the toll this shift in the home dynamic is taking on Irma.
This double edge to a scene or relationship is something which the script sets up time and again, and the production delivers on - all the laughter, all the good feeling, has behind it a foundation of reality, and that reality is hard, even painful, for the other people watching someone find a little happiness. There are trade-offs. For everything gained, something is lost.
Geiken’s minister struggles mightily to understand and help Roy. At first, he tries to push Roy, and even Irma, back toward what he considers normal, what he truly believes would make them most happy. The reverend isn’t judging them. He has faith that if he can guide them back toward the life they’ve always lived, things will sort themselves out - despite all evidence to the contrary. Later, because other members of his congregation are uncomfortable, just as he is, he retreats from these two people who have done so much for his church. Though there is no face-to-face reconciliation between Muncie, Roy and Irma, the pastor’s final sermon shared with the audience, deeply conflicted over a complex issue of faith, shows that his search for a new normal continues. Where it ends, for anybody, we don’t know. But the intelligent grappling with faith as well as sex and love and family, is a welcome added layer that most plays don’t touch.
Roy’s father, abandoned by his own mother Ruth, and stung by his son’s refusal to take over the family farm, is kept in the dark about that son’s transformation. Wife Em feels this is for his own good, since Roy Sr.’s condition is deteriorating. He himself is transforming into something no one else recognizes. When father and new daughter are finally able to meet, a great deal has been lost. Thanks to Anita O’Sullivan and Larry Roupe, two characters who started out almost as comedy stereotypes end up being very, very human.
John Middleton, as Roy’s supportive boss Frank, and Randy Schmeling, as Roy’s son Wayne, each serve up a different slice of what it’s like to be a man in the 21st century with its suddenly fluid notions of gender. Frank is drawn to Irma’s sanity, a quality he doesn’t find in his own wife, who keeps leaving him and returning. His hopes of becoming Irma’s new husband when Roy makes his transformation are dashed in ever more awkward and amusing ways as Irma’s true feelings slowly make themselves known. Wayne is almost more disturbed by his father’s newfound sensitivity and emotional openness than the fact Roy is wearing women’s clothing and makeup. Sometimes a good fist fight is the quickest way to clear the air. Middleton and Schmeling take what could have been louts and turn them into hapless souls we come to care for, in all their confusion and bungled attempts to make a connection with others.
As a gender warrior ahead of her time, you could say grandmother Ruth gets a lot of the play’s best material, but that would be giving short shrift to a play chock full of good material. Mo Perry, however, makes it tempting to make such pronouncements. Each time she takes the stage as Ruth, Perry acts not only as connective tissue between scenes, but as a solid foundation for the other characters and themes of the play to build upon. Her performance of Ruth’s ode to the various people she has loved in her travels around the globe throughout her life is a beautiful evocation of the idea that love often doesn’t care what the person looks like. We are more than the sum of our imperfect body parts.
This central tenet of the play is given fullest life in the peculiar romance of Roy and Irma. After a quarter-century of life together, they are only just now beginning to appreciate each other fully. All of this at the same time the traditional roles of husband and wife are being turned on their head.
Frederick Wagner as Roy has the flashier of the two roles, and the one in which an actor could probably get in the most trouble. Wagner has to tread a very fine line as his character evolves into a woman over the full span of the play. At rise, he’s a “regular guy.” By the end, visiting his parents, he is a woman in appearance and behavior, just waiting for the final surgery to complete the process. There is a lot of ground to cover in between, sometimes in increments, sometimes in great leaps. Just as Roy always felt like a woman inside, there is always a man inside the woman that he becomes. Wagner himself is an imposing presence onstage. Getting an audience to buy into this transformation without it seeming like an awkward drag act is a big task, but Wagner pulls it off. The script helps by allowing the audience to see the missteps along the way, as Roy learns what this new body and way of life are all about, and the adjustments they will require of him. Wagner’s portrayal of a human being on a journey from tormented soul to joyful new life is fascinating to watch.
Just as tricky, in a much quieter way, is the journey Sally Ann Wright must take as Irma. It often seems as if for everything her husband Roy gains on his quest, Irma loses something equally important. Wright does a wonderful job of taking the material the script gives her and creating a fully human portrait of a woman who sees her whole life being torn apart, forcing her to find the strength to build a new one. Irma is the one who holds the family together. Irma is the one with equally big decisions to make. Everyone around Irma is giving her permission to move on. She could cut ties, leave her husband of 25 years or kick him out, and no one would blame her. At first, that’s exactly what she does. But just as Roy still carries a tremendous love for his wife, Irma also can’t shake Roy out of her heart. Wright shows us that, even though it is costing Irma a great deal in terms of her own personal dignity and the loss of a life she loved, she cares deeply for this man. He is lost. He is in pain. She loves him, and wants to help. It is far from easy, for either of them, but the struggle also includes a lot of laughter, and a lot of heart. In Wright’s hands, Irma’s final words which close the play not only make this strange journey understandable, they are also quite moving.
The only thing that keeps this production from being damn near perfect is the pacing. While the individual performances and scenes are all wonderful, getting from one part of the story to the next often seems needlessly labored. This is perplexing, since the script presents a structure which could easily flow from one scene to the next. The set, designed by Erik Paulson, who also designed the lights, seems ready to reinforce the smooth flow of the journey. There are multiple platforms, plus the space across the front of the stage, all of which are used well. There are multiple doors across the back wall of the set, which is a cornfield and sky all painted on scrim which, depending on the light, one can see through. This trick of the light could have gotten more use, but that’s not the main issue. Even with other actors on stage, ready to go, or others who could easily bound into view and keep the action going, the production feels compelled to give the audience unnecessary blackouts and sound and music cues. This has the unfortunate effect of killing any overall momentum the production might have. Scene. Stop. Scene. Stop. Actors are allowed to speak while walking in from offstage. They are allowed to walk onstage or across the stage while the lights are shifting. They are even allowed to walk out of one scene into another. It’s a pity this production didn’t allow them to do so.
However, the script is so good and the performances so winning, the audience is willing to forgive the production any clumsiness. After seeing this production, I find myself wanting to seek out the movie version as well. While it certainly won’t be exactly like the play, the experience of ARTisphere’s “Looking For Normal” makes me want to spend more time with these characters. When you see it, and you should, you’ll want to do the same.
Very highly recommended.
There are still two weekends of “Looking For Normal” left, including this one. The production runs Thursday, Friday and Saturdays at 7:30pm and Sundays at 3pm, now through February 3, 2008. Performances are at the Minneapolis Theater Garage, 711 West Franklin Avenue in Minneapolis (just off the corner of Franklin and Lyndale). For reservations and further information, call 612-788-3639.
I've been accused recently of loving everything I see. To which I reply, really? Look at this, this, this, this, or this. For starters.
That said, let's get onto something I enjoyed...
Review - Looking For Normal - ARTisphere Theatre - 4-1/2 stars
“All this so my grandson can go to the grocery store wearing a dress, and not be killed.”
If it’s possible for a theater production to be 100 percent heart, ARTisphere’s “Looking For Normal” would come darn close. It’s not that it doesn’t also have a brain, and a very active and challenging one at that, but the sheer volume of emotion is almost overwhelming. That doesn’t mean “Looking For Normal” is overly sentimental. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. The emotion is so honest, and genuine, it’s breathtaking.
Given its history in getting to the stage, this shouldn’t have surprised me. The whole production is a labor of love, and it shows. “Looking For Normal” is a script that husband and wife team Frederick Wagner and Sally Ann Wright have been hanging onto for several years now. The desire to tell the story, and play the characters of Roy and Irma, was so great, they teamed up with director Terry Lynn Carlson and company manager Elizabeth M. Desotelle to start a brand new theater company in order to help make it happen. Partnering with Torch Theater was the final piece in the puzzle to get ARTisphere Theatre and “Looking For Normal” on stage and in front of an audience.
What’s so compelling about this story? Looking at it on paper, it might have been a trainwreck. After twenty-five years of blue collar marriage in Ohio, John Deere quality control manager Roy (Wagner) confides in Reverend Muncie (Garry Geiken) that he is convinced he was born in the wrong body. Roy intends to get a sex change operation and live the remainder of his life as a woman. Right after he tells his wife Irma (Wright).
As a drama, this idea could have been hopelessly earnest and preachy (especially with a pastor in the cast of characters). As a comedy, it could have been all cheap shots and easy laughs. What makes “Looking For Normal” work is that it treads that middle ground between the two, and ARTisphere’s production plays to that strength for all it’s worth. The laughs are plentiful, but they come from character and situation, not one-liners, and most importantly, not at any one person’s expense. Jane Anderson’s script shines a light on everyone’s failings and foibles equally. Everyone’s discomfort, including the audience’s, is acknowledged, but not coddled. The play turns the status quo inside out without being disrespectful.
Roy’s choice means a great deal of adjustment for all those around him - his elderly parents Em and Roy Sr. (Anita O’Sullivan and Larry Roupe), wife Irma, teenage daughter Patty Ann (Taylor Bolstad), grown son Wayne (Randy Schmeling), boss Frank (John Middleton), and his church, led by Reverend Muncie. In fact, the only one in his life who might understand, is his long-dead grandmother Ruth (Mo Perry), who appears throughout the proceedings to prove that gender-bending and unconventional couplings have run in the family for a great many years.
Ruth, for all her insights, felt she had to run away to live her life fully. Roy’s challenge, and ultimate salvation, is that he wants to continue living where he is, surrounded by the people he loves. However, this isn’t easy for anyone, Roy included. One of the reasons Irma won’t believe in Roy’s female identity is because, “Only a man could be this selfish.”
Denying his identity has led Roy to the brink of suicide, more than once. It is only after seeing this for herself that Irma realizes Roy can’t go it alone. She lets him move back home, and struggles to come to terms with what their family is becoming. Even has her husband is trying to turn himself into a woman, Irma’s tomboyish daughter Patty Ann is trying with all her might not to turn into a young woman herself. Bolstad’s work as Patty Ann is delightful, verging on scene-stealing. Her presentations on a woman’s menstrual cycle and her father’s impending gender reassignment surgery are hilarious, and practically show-stoppers. The bonding that occurs between Patty Ann and her ever more female father figure, built upon a barrage of questions which opens the second act, is funny and heartwarming in equal measure. But at the same time, the audience sees the toll this shift in the home dynamic is taking on Irma.
This double edge to a scene or relationship is something which the script sets up time and again, and the production delivers on - all the laughter, all the good feeling, has behind it a foundation of reality, and that reality is hard, even painful, for the other people watching someone find a little happiness. There are trade-offs. For everything gained, something is lost.
Geiken’s minister struggles mightily to understand and help Roy. At first, he tries to push Roy, and even Irma, back toward what he considers normal, what he truly believes would make them most happy. The reverend isn’t judging them. He has faith that if he can guide them back toward the life they’ve always lived, things will sort themselves out - despite all evidence to the contrary. Later, because other members of his congregation are uncomfortable, just as he is, he retreats from these two people who have done so much for his church. Though there is no face-to-face reconciliation between Muncie, Roy and Irma, the pastor’s final sermon shared with the audience, deeply conflicted over a complex issue of faith, shows that his search for a new normal continues. Where it ends, for anybody, we don’t know. But the intelligent grappling with faith as well as sex and love and family, is a welcome added layer that most plays don’t touch.
Roy’s father, abandoned by his own mother Ruth, and stung by his son’s refusal to take over the family farm, is kept in the dark about that son’s transformation. Wife Em feels this is for his own good, since Roy Sr.’s condition is deteriorating. He himself is transforming into something no one else recognizes. When father and new daughter are finally able to meet, a great deal has been lost. Thanks to Anita O’Sullivan and Larry Roupe, two characters who started out almost as comedy stereotypes end up being very, very human.
John Middleton, as Roy’s supportive boss Frank, and Randy Schmeling, as Roy’s son Wayne, each serve up a different slice of what it’s like to be a man in the 21st century with its suddenly fluid notions of gender. Frank is drawn to Irma’s sanity, a quality he doesn’t find in his own wife, who keeps leaving him and returning. His hopes of becoming Irma’s new husband when Roy makes his transformation are dashed in ever more awkward and amusing ways as Irma’s true feelings slowly make themselves known. Wayne is almost more disturbed by his father’s newfound sensitivity and emotional openness than the fact Roy is wearing women’s clothing and makeup. Sometimes a good fist fight is the quickest way to clear the air. Middleton and Schmeling take what could have been louts and turn them into hapless souls we come to care for, in all their confusion and bungled attempts to make a connection with others.
As a gender warrior ahead of her time, you could say grandmother Ruth gets a lot of the play’s best material, but that would be giving short shrift to a play chock full of good material. Mo Perry, however, makes it tempting to make such pronouncements. Each time she takes the stage as Ruth, Perry acts not only as connective tissue between scenes, but as a solid foundation for the other characters and themes of the play to build upon. Her performance of Ruth’s ode to the various people she has loved in her travels around the globe throughout her life is a beautiful evocation of the idea that love often doesn’t care what the person looks like. We are more than the sum of our imperfect body parts.
This central tenet of the play is given fullest life in the peculiar romance of Roy and Irma. After a quarter-century of life together, they are only just now beginning to appreciate each other fully. All of this at the same time the traditional roles of husband and wife are being turned on their head.
Frederick Wagner as Roy has the flashier of the two roles, and the one in which an actor could probably get in the most trouble. Wagner has to tread a very fine line as his character evolves into a woman over the full span of the play. At rise, he’s a “regular guy.” By the end, visiting his parents, he is a woman in appearance and behavior, just waiting for the final surgery to complete the process. There is a lot of ground to cover in between, sometimes in increments, sometimes in great leaps. Just as Roy always felt like a woman inside, there is always a man inside the woman that he becomes. Wagner himself is an imposing presence onstage. Getting an audience to buy into this transformation without it seeming like an awkward drag act is a big task, but Wagner pulls it off. The script helps by allowing the audience to see the missteps along the way, as Roy learns what this new body and way of life are all about, and the adjustments they will require of him. Wagner’s portrayal of a human being on a journey from tormented soul to joyful new life is fascinating to watch.
Just as tricky, in a much quieter way, is the journey Sally Ann Wright must take as Irma. It often seems as if for everything her husband Roy gains on his quest, Irma loses something equally important. Wright does a wonderful job of taking the material the script gives her and creating a fully human portrait of a woman who sees her whole life being torn apart, forcing her to find the strength to build a new one. Irma is the one who holds the family together. Irma is the one with equally big decisions to make. Everyone around Irma is giving her permission to move on. She could cut ties, leave her husband of 25 years or kick him out, and no one would blame her. At first, that’s exactly what she does. But just as Roy still carries a tremendous love for his wife, Irma also can’t shake Roy out of her heart. Wright shows us that, even though it is costing Irma a great deal in terms of her own personal dignity and the loss of a life she loved, she cares deeply for this man. He is lost. He is in pain. She loves him, and wants to help. It is far from easy, for either of them, but the struggle also includes a lot of laughter, and a lot of heart. In Wright’s hands, Irma’s final words which close the play not only make this strange journey understandable, they are also quite moving.
The only thing that keeps this production from being damn near perfect is the pacing. While the individual performances and scenes are all wonderful, getting from one part of the story to the next often seems needlessly labored. This is perplexing, since the script presents a structure which could easily flow from one scene to the next. The set, designed by Erik Paulson, who also designed the lights, seems ready to reinforce the smooth flow of the journey. There are multiple platforms, plus the space across the front of the stage, all of which are used well. There are multiple doors across the back wall of the set, which is a cornfield and sky all painted on scrim which, depending on the light, one can see through. This trick of the light could have gotten more use, but that’s not the main issue. Even with other actors on stage, ready to go, or others who could easily bound into view and keep the action going, the production feels compelled to give the audience unnecessary blackouts and sound and music cues. This has the unfortunate effect of killing any overall momentum the production might have. Scene. Stop. Scene. Stop. Actors are allowed to speak while walking in from offstage. They are allowed to walk onstage or across the stage while the lights are shifting. They are even allowed to walk out of one scene into another. It’s a pity this production didn’t allow them to do so.
However, the script is so good and the performances so winning, the audience is willing to forgive the production any clumsiness. After seeing this production, I find myself wanting to seek out the movie version as well. While it certainly won’t be exactly like the play, the experience of ARTisphere’s “Looking For Normal” makes me want to spend more time with these characters. When you see it, and you should, you’ll want to do the same.
Very highly recommended.
There are still two weekends of “Looking For Normal” left, including this one. The production runs Thursday, Friday and Saturdays at 7:30pm and Sundays at 3pm, now through February 3, 2008. Performances are at the Minneapolis Theater Garage, 711 West Franklin Avenue in Minneapolis (just off the corner of Franklin and Lyndale). For reservations and further information, call 612-788-3639.
Thursday, January 24, 2008
Looking for theater this weekend...?
You're in luck. As usual, there's tons of it. It's kind of heartbreaking - after all, how do you hit it all? Still, a nice problem to have...
Something you won't want to miss - review to follow - is Looking For Normal from ARTisphere and Torch Theaters at the Minneapolis Theater Garage. This one was a really welcome surprise for me. I'd heard really good things, and knew the cast was great, but I wasn't prepared for how much I was going to like it. The script is really great, and the production mines its strengths - not preachy, full of laughs, very even-handed, often poetic, and the emotions run very deep. For a play about a man's decision to get gender reassignment surgery, and its ripple effect on his family and larger community, it's remarkably... well, normal. Don't take my word for it. Go see it yourself. Even in a town with this much theater, we don't get to see productions like this nearly enough. Two more weekends. Info here and by calling 612-788-3639.
Several shows are wrapping up this weekend as well - the latest barrage of new work from The Lighthouse Group at the Illusion, including Fringe fave Noah Bremer of Live Action Set fame; the end of the holidays for Brave New Workshop; a final bow for an intriguing production of "Blue Door" from Emigrant Theater; and an area premiere for a comedy over at Theater In The Round Players.
And of course I'm torn because there are three other productions looking ahead to their closing next weekend from Pendulum, Mu and Cromulent, plus the Walker's Out There series.
And four interesting shows starting up this weekend to boot at Bedlam, History Theater, Youth Performance Company, and Workhaus (not to be confused with Workhouse - which is yet to come)
And, as if that weren't enough, about a half dozen more shows that are in the midst of their runs, not quite the beginning, not quite the end. Check the links on the front page of my website for more (the theater recommendations stuff is about half way down)
Me, I'm getting ready for a road trip starting tomorrow, down to Baton Rouge to see a little play of my own being done. Enjoy it all in my absense, folks.
Something you won't want to miss - review to follow - is Looking For Normal from ARTisphere and Torch Theaters at the Minneapolis Theater Garage. This one was a really welcome surprise for me. I'd heard really good things, and knew the cast was great, but I wasn't prepared for how much I was going to like it. The script is really great, and the production mines its strengths - not preachy, full of laughs, very even-handed, often poetic, and the emotions run very deep. For a play about a man's decision to get gender reassignment surgery, and its ripple effect on his family and larger community, it's remarkably... well, normal. Don't take my word for it. Go see it yourself. Even in a town with this much theater, we don't get to see productions like this nearly enough. Two more weekends. Info here and by calling 612-788-3639.
Several shows are wrapping up this weekend as well - the latest barrage of new work from The Lighthouse Group at the Illusion, including Fringe fave Noah Bremer of Live Action Set fame; the end of the holidays for Brave New Workshop; a final bow for an intriguing production of "Blue Door" from Emigrant Theater; and an area premiere for a comedy over at Theater In The Round Players.
And of course I'm torn because there are three other productions looking ahead to their closing next weekend from Pendulum, Mu and Cromulent, plus the Walker's Out There series.
And four interesting shows starting up this weekend to boot at Bedlam, History Theater, Youth Performance Company, and Workhaus (not to be confused with Workhouse - which is yet to come)
And, as if that weren't enough, about a half dozen more shows that are in the midst of their runs, not quite the beginning, not quite the end. Check the links on the front page of my website for more (the theater recommendations stuff is about half way down)
Me, I'm getting ready for a road trip starting tomorrow, down to Baton Rouge to see a little play of my own being done. Enjoy it all in my absense, folks.
Friday, January 18, 2008
Looking for Something To See This Weekend? I Suggest...
If you're going to see one thing this weekend, it should be this, because it only plays this weekend, and it'd be a shame to miss it...
Who knew dance could be so funny?
Last night I saw the first performance of an evening of dance from choreographer Cade Holmseth (who dances with Stuart Pimsler, Jeffrey Peterson, Vanessa Voskuil, and, for the Fringe-ophiles among is, could be classed as Live Action Set-adjacent - all of which, very promising markers.) Cade and his fellow dancer/performers deliver on this promise and then some. Cade, along with Brian Evans, Bryan Gerber, and Mark Ruark, could not be more different physically, and yet their bodies and styles blend together beautifully to create some remarkable scenes of movement. Part slapstick, part romance, part streetfight. It's tremendously entertaining and engaging.
What is it? "Le Regard Feminin - Quatro Uomi" (or, for the French-impaired like myself - "The Feminine Gaze - Four Men"). Seriously, though, don't let the French in the title or the gender studies vocabulary of the subject matter scare you off.
I went to see good dance (and, let's be honest, nice-looking men dancing together is never a minus in my theatergoing book). I got so much more than the expected eye candy. I'll go on about it at length shortly, but since the run is likely to expire before a full review is posted, I felt the need to get a little blurb posted right away.
Anybody who reads this blog knows I have a limited vocabulary where dance is concerned anyway. Frankly, the good stuff always leaves me stunned at the kind of beautiful things the human body is capable of doing, both alone and in combination with others, onstage in the world of dance.
This is the good stuff. It's funny. It's sweet. It's gorgeous. It's thought-provoking. It's just a really great evening of sitting in the dark, drinking in one person's vision. Something you can let roll around in your head for a good long while.
It had a nice crowd last night when I was there. But something this good deserves to pack the joint.
So, go.
The remaining performances are tonight, Friday 1/8 and Saturday 1/19, both at 7:30pm, and a Sunday matinee closing peformance 1/20 at 2pm.
It performs at Red Eye - 15 West 14th Street, Minneapolis
There's also a slew of other stuff going on, and you can find numerous links to it all on the front page of my website - www.matthewaeverett.com
Just didn't want you to blink a miss this one. Good performances are better when shared.
Oh - addendum - I forgot because it always strikes me as a little silly we have to warn each other about nudity (the human body! how terrifying!). That said, though there is a lot of skin throughout the evening, there is one brief, tasteful moment of nudity that pulls off the neat trick of being both sexy as hell and simultaneously kind of hilarious. Enjoy.
Who knew dance could be so funny?
Last night I saw the first performance of an evening of dance from choreographer Cade Holmseth (who dances with Stuart Pimsler, Jeffrey Peterson, Vanessa Voskuil, and, for the Fringe-ophiles among is, could be classed as Live Action Set-adjacent - all of which, very promising markers.) Cade and his fellow dancer/performers deliver on this promise and then some. Cade, along with Brian Evans, Bryan Gerber, and Mark Ruark, could not be more different physically, and yet their bodies and styles blend together beautifully to create some remarkable scenes of movement. Part slapstick, part romance, part streetfight. It's tremendously entertaining and engaging.
What is it? "Le Regard Feminin - Quatro Uomi" (or, for the French-impaired like myself - "The Feminine Gaze - Four Men"). Seriously, though, don't let the French in the title or the gender studies vocabulary of the subject matter scare you off.
I went to see good dance (and, let's be honest, nice-looking men dancing together is never a minus in my theatergoing book). I got so much more than the expected eye candy. I'll go on about it at length shortly, but since the run is likely to expire before a full review is posted, I felt the need to get a little blurb posted right away.
Anybody who reads this blog knows I have a limited vocabulary where dance is concerned anyway. Frankly, the good stuff always leaves me stunned at the kind of beautiful things the human body is capable of doing, both alone and in combination with others, onstage in the world of dance.
This is the good stuff. It's funny. It's sweet. It's gorgeous. It's thought-provoking. It's just a really great evening of sitting in the dark, drinking in one person's vision. Something you can let roll around in your head for a good long while.
It had a nice crowd last night when I was there. But something this good deserves to pack the joint.
So, go.
The remaining performances are tonight, Friday 1/8 and Saturday 1/19, both at 7:30pm, and a Sunday matinee closing peformance 1/20 at 2pm.
It performs at Red Eye - 15 West 14th Street, Minneapolis
There's also a slew of other stuff going on, and you can find numerous links to it all on the front page of my website - www.matthewaeverett.com
Just didn't want you to blink a miss this one. Good performances are better when shared.
Oh - addendum - I forgot because it always strikes me as a little silly we have to warn each other about nudity (the human body! how terrifying!). That said, though there is a lot of skin throughout the evening, there is one brief, tasteful moment of nudity that pulls off the neat trick of being both sexy as hell and simultaneously kind of hilarious. Enjoy.
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
Logorrhea - The Most of Maximum Verbosity - 4 stars
Would it be easy to misunderstand the intentions of a production which features a female priest dragging a cross on stage and later repeatedly stabbing the baby Jesus?
Would it be easy to misunderstand the intentions of performers who portray a virgin suggestively stroking, and later fellating, the golden horn of a unicorn?
Would it be easy to misunderstand the intentions of a theater company that spotlights a man making out with, then humping, a small pink My Little Pony stuffed animal?
Uh... sure.
For the full review, go here or here
Would it be easy to misunderstand the intentions of performers who portray a virgin suggestively stroking, and later fellating, the golden horn of a unicorn?
Would it be easy to misunderstand the intentions of a theater company that spotlights a man making out with, then humping, a small pink My Little Pony stuffed animal?
Uh... sure.
For the full review, go here or here
Labels:
4 Stars - Excellent,
Theater reviews
Monday, November 19, 2007
Review - Anton In Show Business - Starting Gate - 4-1/2 stars
It's Pay What You Can Night tonight! Their special Monday performance. A great chance to see a great show. Enjoy!
"So, a production which on the surface I should have disliked, I loved. A production that I expected to find tedious, engaged me instead and just flew by. Theater is a very confusing thing sometimes..."
Full review of Anton In Show Business can be found here or here...
"So, a production which on the surface I should have disliked, I loved. A production that I expected to find tedious, engaged me instead and just flew by. Theater is a very confusing thing sometimes..."
Full review of Anton In Show Business can be found here or here...
Review - The Home Place - Guthrie - 5 Stars
The final weekend of performances is straight ahead, so there's still time to catch what I think is the best piece of work the Guthrie's done since it moved to its new building about a year and a half ago. Full review can be found here or here...
Thursday, November 15, 2007
Four Good Shows Closing This Weekend - Catch 'Em While You Can
Four things closing this weekend you really should see...
(two of the best things I've seen this year...)
War With The Newts
and
Frankenstein Incarnate - The Passions of Mary Shelley
plus the latest from 3 Sticks...
Melancholy Play
and the play I just reviewed -
The Young Lady's Consent - review here
(two of the best things I've seen this year...)
War With The Newts
and
Frankenstein Incarnate - The Passions of Mary Shelley
plus the latest from 3 Sticks...
Melancholy Play
and the play I just reviewed -
The Young Lady's Consent - review here
Theater Review - The Young Lady's Consent (final weekend)
Commedia Beauregard has had a most unusual and varied renaissance this year – which continues with their current production The Young Lady's Consent - now in its final weekend - full review here...
Labels:
3 Stars - Good Job,
The Short List,
Theater reviews
Thursday, November 08, 2007
And so, Fringe Encore weekend begins...
Friday, November 02, 2007
Thursday, October 25, 2007
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
Review - Sun Tzu's The Art of War - No Refunds Theatre Co. - 5 stars
Looking for something fun to see this weekend? Try this...
Saturday, October 06, 2007
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