15 months ago I had the opportunity to review 23 Feet In 12 Minutes as it premiered in the 2010 NYC Fringe Festival.   Since then this show has made it to New Orleans and back with some wonderful work-shopping in the Cape Cod Theatre Project along the way. It came back to New York as part of the All For One Festival and I was lucky enough to see the newly evolved work. While the show only had a 2 day run I thought I’d do an in-depth exploration of the piece highlighting the evolution from the version I saw 15 months ago. I hope 23 Feet In 12 Minutes will continue to be performed and developed in the future, and continue to have a wider and wider audience, because while it gives gripping stories of many of the tragic human consequences that happened following the touchdown of Hurricane Katrina, it also shows us the best of humanity.

Written by Mari Brown, performed by Deanna Pacelli, and directed by Pamela Berlin and David Travis this new revision moves from the free-flowing stream of conciousness writing and performing in the premiere version, to a well thought out piece where every action (or inaction) seems carefully weighted and balanced to tell a story with a beginning, a middle, and a NOW.  At the end I think anyone who sees this will want to do whatever they can to help prevent disasters – wherever they happen in the world – from getting this out of control again by emulating the people they’ve seen represented in this show.  Last time I wrote a review, I compared everyone to heroes.  This time I think it is more apt to compare them to saints both because the Saints are the New Orleans team, but also because I hope that these stories can help others learn to live by the examples given by Saints in the spiritual sense. The fact that all of these characters in 23 Feet In 12 Minutes came from interviews of real people makes it even more inspiring — and akin to the history of what elevates a person to sainthood.

In this new version, there is more of a sense of time passed than of time flowing.  It’s less frantic and more reflective.  We see a group of people who have been through a lot and had different ways of reacting in the end, all of them good, all of them bettering the world in small or larger ways, all seeing the world in a way that was transformed by the experience.

There seems to be more power done with less story, less scenes, giving the audience time to think and digest.  These silent omissions amplify the piece by giving us more time to think about what the story means similarly to the way the characters in this play had time to think since Hurricane Katrina.  An example of this is Robert, who lost 2 people in his family the night of the storm- his granddaughter and his mother.  The story is made some how stronger by the fact that this little girl is never mentioned after she is swept away; as if there is nothing more that could be said which could accurately sum up his grief.  Additionally, the urgency for the family to stay together and keep going is powerful enough to distract Robert, giving him no time to decompress and deal with the loss of his loved ones.  We just have just his own wonder at having arrived at his point in the future when he says in his last line:

If you had told me six years ago, when 85 % of the city was underwater that the Saints were going to win the Superbowl?  I woulda said ‘you crazy’.  But God is Good.

The recent Hurricane Irene is significant in the telling of this story in part because of its lack of significance.  Even though New York City has been hit by a number of hurricanes it has generally been very well prepared for themost contingencies with strong evacuation plans in place.  Looking at the history of hurricane damage in New Orleans, it seems it was truly a perfect storm due to the ill preparedness.

The character of Francisco seems like a perpetual tourist of sorts, so intoxicated is he by the beauty of New Orleans.  He’s never gone beyond the first dream of wanting to make it big taking pictures of the Big Easy.  This dream keeps him moving through all the odd jobs that he had to take to survive over the next 10 years.  He is so marginalized he can’t even afford  to evacuate on the $21 he has left in this world. So when the storm hits he interacts with some homeless people and is guided through the least quick way to get out of New Orleans.  Eventually he ends up as a refugee in San Antonio Texas and has lived there ever since.  Hearing how he kept a cool head throughout, and was ready to lay down his dream after surviving the nightmare is symbolic of many marginal people who either were native to New Orleans or who were attracted to its magic.

One poignant scene is when Francisco is in the airport, five days after Katrina struck.  He waits 3o hours to be evacuated with thousands of other people. Everyone filthy and exhausted by the horror of it all or running around like crazy in the ensuing anarchy.  He finds a guitar and takes it over to where a group of children are and plays “Happy Birthday” because it is the only song he knows.  The children laugh at the silliness of singing “Happy Birthday” again and again and it was the first time he laughed in a week.  Once they begin to board, everyone must go through security.  Seeing infants in dirty diapers being scanned by security greatly frustrates Francisco.  He says in his closing statement:

New Orleans is BROKE.  That’s what new Orleans is.  She is like a little old lady in a cheap fancy church hat who was walking down the street a little bit drunk who was carrying all her cash in her little white purse and she got attacked.  She got beat up.  They took all her money.  And now she has been begging in the street for six YEARS so she’s all dirty and smelly and people think she’s just totally BROKE.  And the irony is the only people who actually help are ALSO BROKE.

We can contrast Francisco with Max, our Saint of Charity, who came to New Orleans as just a tourist for his brother’s bachelor party.  The free living of New Orleans made him uncomfortable because of his devotion to being a strong Christian.  When they hear that the storm is coming they are evacuated in the first wave since they were affluent tourists with means to pay for alternate ways out.  As the disaster begins to unfold, a light dawns on Max that he should get back into the disaster.  What could he do to help?  WWJD? He stretches the truth and claims to work in Sanitation (he was in charge of trash at church).  He follows a somewhat crazed preacher, doing all matter of first aid to save those that are injured working as hard as he could to help as many people as he could.

I was scared.  The enormity of the situation was overwhelming.  But if you bring a prayer to God, you’ve got to be strong enough to leave it there.  You can’t keep running back to check on it, and ask God why he hasn’t done it yet.  You give him your burden and then you wait for his miracle to work.  That’s faith.

We see Louise, a doctor, who at the age of seven was on a ship in World War II which carried Italian soldiers whose wound were being kept open with plaster of Paris.  In her  we see a Saint of Vigilance.  Screams of agony made her very pragmatic, which she uses as her chief virtue in this story.  Whether working in a trauma ward for two days straight or arming the nurses to protect the children’s ward from looters, she is a tough character in this play.

New Orleans is my drug.  And like a junkie I will do anything to protect my stash.

Joseph and his wife made it through the initial storm surge by using a crow bar to hack a hole in their roof so they could be high up during the storm.  They are Our Saints of Collectedness (knowing when to rest). For the first days they walked with an overburdened garbage can on wheels.  They had to set it aside but were welcomed by a friendly stranger who they stayed with for the remaining days until they were evacuated to the Super Dome.  The conditions there were hellish – old people dying, rapes, lack of sanitation and sometimes children who had lost a parent.  A moment that Joseph sees as the defining moment of this time was after he put one of those lost babies onto an opened cardboard box to keep it safe. He and others surrounded the baby, added other babies, forming a ring of calm that spread out in waves throughout the whole place.  He says at the end:

And that’s what you should do if you’re in this situation.  Put a cardboard box on the ground.  You start the calm.  It’ll grow.

There is also Katie: an expert in mobilizing foreign aid, who want to go to New Orleans but is not allowed to go. She mobilizes aid which she is really good at, but is slowed down by all the layers of authorities.  She is our saint of the New Connections in a world too filled with the old and the stagnant ways of thinking.

I have ambulances from Tennessee, I have state troopers from Virginia, I have 15,000 MREs sitting in trucks outside a warehouse in Pennsylvania wating for a a fucking address from you people, I have France and Germany and SENEGAL calling me asking what they can do! BYPASS the fucking chain of command!

This emphasizes why much of the horror and deaths and damages could have been avoided by more efficient planning or by having more determined leadership.

Finally there is a singer, Delilah, who is the type of person you always expect to find in New Orleans, our Saint of Hope. Friendly, full of humor and ready to take on anything.  After she realizes no one is coming to help after  4 days waiting on their roof, and just seeing the helicopters fly by over head in reconnaissance missions, the band of people she was with decided to hotwire a bus and try to make it out.  Eventually they come to an area where there were hundred of reporters who don’t help her any at all, and clearly are there just to cash in on the misery of others.  This infuriates her.   A reporter who was drinking a bottle of water pointed refuses to share with the dehydrated people who haven’t had water in days.  “This is for me and my crew… I’m not giving you anything“. To this Delilah responded:

And you know, I had been really upbeat and trying to keep everybody happy, trying to make the kids laugh and trying to cook and feed people and do everything I could to stay positive, but when she said that to me, I lost it.  I COMPLETELY WENT MAD.

At this point a police officer, who was seeing the whole situation encourages her to go, because it is better to help save some of the people instead of being mad at others for inaction.  She just keeps driving, past  one barricade after another and sees other buses being guarded by national guardsman.  She drives and drives until almost out of gas and then finds a town, and another helpful police officer (showing again an ideal that people in authority should aim to live up to).  Finally she makes it to a place where she knows she’ll be able to start over.

The collaboration between Mari Brown’s writing, Deanna Pacelli expert portrayal of these characters, the new material added since work-shopping the piece, and the directors Pamela Berlin and David Travis have come together to create a strong piece of theatre — one that should continue to grow and evolve.  I could see 23 Feet in 12 Minutes being studied in ethics courses or being used to inspire those who feel like they are hopeless.  I wish the team putting this together all the best of luck and hope I can one day come up with a contribution to society just as good as 23 Feet in 12 Minutes. Many thanks.

~~~

23 Feet in 12 Minutes ran as part of the All For One Festival at Theatre 80 St. Marks.

23 Feet In 12 Minutes from Mari Brown on Vimeo.

Short

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• Virtual Solitaire (Fringe Festival 2011)

When is a tragedy not a tragedy? When we realize the Only Way Is Forward and healing takes place on a lot of levels.

In the folk-rock musical Pawn, by Karmia Chan Cao (playwright, director, and composer) we see a Canadian family split apart twice in 10 years, first by the oldest son being taken from them in the crumbling of the Twin Towers on September 11th and later on when the younger son volunteers to go overseas for three years to Afghanistan.   The eldest son, Kai, is now just a picture on the top of a shelf in the family’s convenience store (the picture is of Eric Tran who plays piano with the rest of the band).

Now their other son, Abraham Niu (Alex Kaneko) will be finishing his second and final tour of duty in Afghanistan in 5 days and the story of this play circles around the end of his journey home and how he he finds resolution from his brother’s death by making a the most important choice of his life. It is a lush play with many different layers: cultural, spiritual, and that of personal redemption … of many types. It has truly been finely crafted and I hope this play get to “make it big” and spread its message:  to accept the moment we are in and use it to make the future brighter to a larger audience sooner rather than later.

We begin with this family singing forlornly;  they miss their sons terribly. The family is made up of  the mother (Ma played by Sarah Guerrero), the father (Ba played by Julian Kusnadi), and the daughter (Shea played by Alicia Triana).

At the same time, back in Afghanistan, Abraham’s unit finds out that they will have to guard the perimeter of a village they have been working to establish friendly relationships with for several months.  They’ll have to guard to make sure that no one gets out of the village.  They feel like they will be betraying both the villagers as well as themselves, but those are their orders.

[AK featuring Gator (played by Sam Julian) and the ensemble (played by Karen Young, Anna Gu, Christian Ollano, Katherine Neubauer, Mark Hammer Johnson, Rachel Purcell, and Troy Yang) in the Fringe cast]

Abraham has misses his home and this causes him to have a change of heart and he begins trying to warn some of the villagers of the coming danger after comparing the desert with his snowy native land of Alberta, and wishing he could make himself pure again after his time as a soldier in Afghanistan. He finds some children in the targeted area which is to be bombed and tries to get them to call off the run, but he can’t get Gator to stop the run before the first barrage.  He is order to get out of the impact zone before the plane comes back for it’s second pass.  Abraham rushes back in to get the children out and a dying mother presses her baby in his arms.

At the same time his mother, sensing her child is threatened, reaches out with her spirit to protect him however she could. She chants a song of protection as the bombs are zooming in on their targets.

The lights go down and then Abraham finds himself in the Pawn Shop of Time confronted by a stranger.

Once in the Pawn Shop of Time he is approached by someone who introduces himself as Lego (played by Graham Roth), who in part looks like his army buddy Gator but in part reminds him of a childhood toy.  He finds himself surrounded by bits and pieces of memories from his life.  Lego is some cross between Puck and a guardian angel or some personal incarnation of intuition slowed down enormously.

Lego reads from a book, apparently Abraham’s Book of Life which seems to be set the form of a poetic play dialogue with Lego as   narrator.  It explains that Abraham is in the Pawn Shop of Time, where time has been stretched.  What will only be the last few seconds before the bomb above him drops will feel as if it takes up the length of a night.  In that time Abraham will have to make the most important decision of his life: will he run away from the blast site thus saving himself  but dooming the native children to death?

It seems that the metaphor of  Pawn Shop works to bring across the idea that it a place where we have all the forgotten things in our lives, as well as a place to evaluate and decide what can be traded for what.  It also underscores that this is the time for him to no longer be just a pawn, but to finally take control of himself and truly make a decision. But before he makes this most difficult decision, he must look back at his life and see what brought him here.

At the end everyone sees that – as the title says – the “Only Way is Forward”. We see Abraham’s vision of the future and funeral inspirations and how his family finds closure.

In this great musical by Karmia Chan Cao we see a triumphant journey from pain to redemption as a family steps out from under the shadow casts by prejudice in their home in Alberta.  Since the final show was cancelled due to the oncoming Hurricane Irene, instead of a regular review I made a more of a compilation in order to tell a lot of the story, so more people could get a chance to see this. These clips are from an earlier version of the show, with a more basic production.  The Fringe production was very smooth with great sound (sound design by Jason Fang and assisted by Tamarind King) and music (played by this talented group of musicians: Eric Tran playing piano; Nathan Heng-chi Cheung, playing Liuqin, Melodica, and Glockenspiel;  Sterling Camden playing electrical guitar;  Stephen Quiñónez on acoustic guitar, and Karmia Cao on drums) as well as lively dance (choreographed by Alisha Mitchell) beautiful costumes (by Leanna Keyes) and a set that pulls together the many different locations of this play (the convenience store, Afghanistan, Chinatown, New York and The Pawn Shop of Time) in a very balanced and meaningful way (set design by Michael Cohen).

This play has had a lot of world wide critical acclaim, and a very heartfelt and meaningful storyline and I hope it gets the chance to be in the Fringe Encore  Series so we all get another chance to see it again.

~~~
Pawn ran until August 26, 2011 as part of the New York International Fringe Festival.
~~~

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Schadenfreude, the German word meaning  pleasure derived from the pain and suffering of others could almost be a word to describe the dry, witty, quite thoughtful, and generally dark comedy of  74 Minutes of Stereo Radio Theater. This concept was wonderfully explained in Avenue Q  in 2003, but has been referenced in many other places including the Simpsons in 1991. However I think this play requires the audience to utilize schadenfreude differently – as rather a recognition or appreciation of suffering (which would be something like Schäden Anerkennung OR recognition/appreciation of pain).  Since there is always a lesson to be learned or an observation to be had by the characters in Stereo Radio Theater, it plays much more like a parable than a satire of people’s lives.

In 74 Minutes of Stereo Radio Theater, we have a couple playing off the different funny combinations and disasters that can happen when two people have some sort of relationship to each other in the form of eight short one-act plays.  The male roles are played by Andrew Shulman who is also the director, and the female roles are played by Maureen Fitzgerald who is also the writer.

One thing that is very tantalizing about this show is that there is a twist in each of the stories where the essence of the relationship changes so it is different than it started and that becomes the essence of the relationship between the characters in the next piece.

In the beginning of the first play The Essentials there is a change from a couple fighting with each other about every little detail in their lives to the end where they realize the most important thing each of them has is each other.

In the second play, I Have A Really Good Feeling About This, we start with two friends who have never been anything more than friends.  The man continuously goes through a cycle where, when single, he creates an image of the perfect woman.  This image, however,  is so high on a pedestal that when he finally meets someone who will take him (with his plethora of emotional hangups) they can never live up to the fantasy so he quickly drives them away. His friend always tells him it will be okay and then cycle repeats.  They explore the idea of becoming more than just friends, and cheerfully run through the litany of reasons why this idea is such a bad one.  He says that their “sexual miscalculation” will be as bad for them as “a repressed necrophiliac with a skull fetish”.  In other the really GOOD feeling is a very BAD idea.

The third play begins with an obvious visual connection to the former play by having a witch doctor with a large feathered headdress with a skull in the center of it.  The bad idea of the second piece is that the witch doctor – in his need to “appease” the gods – has had the habit of sacrificing a rather large amount of virgin maidens for more and more trifling misfortunes of the society he lives in.  So much so that his once thriving civilization of a quarter of a million brilliant and beautiful people has gone down to 83 old people and children and 7 goats.  This has all been enabled by chief’s advisor – a woman who he has mistaken for a man all these years.  She decides to take a stand against this…

But then something strange happens which twists the story again. I’ll leave you to see what happens while you still can.  You won’t be disappointed.

~~~

74 Minutes of Stereo Radio Theater

Writer: Maureen FitzGerald

1h 15m

www.stereoradiotheater.com
VENUE #18: The Studio at Cherry Lane Theatre
Sat 27 @ 5

Sun 28 @ 2 (FINAL SHOW CANCELLED DUE TO HURRICANE)

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• No Related Posts

As we get closer and closer to the futuristic realm of cyberpunk, that has been active in our collective imaginations since we first started understanding what computing was or what it could be, one has to ask the questions:

What about the people it could hurt?  Would we even know what it meant to feel that way?  Would dysfunction be the first glimpse into a greater ability to truly live on or beyond “the net”?  If the first person in this new space were alone, would he make friends with virtual projections of himself?

Virtual Solitaire written and performed by Dawson Nichols is a  fast paced drama which does an amazing  job of exploring these themes in a very real and human way — in an artificial world.

To be sure there have been a fair amount of stories written about this.  Perhaps one could say even a majority of cyberpunk stories have a character who has been “burned” by the system or who uses virtual reality as a refuge from a harsh external or internal reality.  We’ve seen this in everything from Mona Lisa Overdrive to the Matrix.  However, even if this theme has been investigated before, the story and performance by Dawson Nichols of Virtual Solitaire is a polished and well thought out investigation of the theme of redefining what is meant by a dangerous experiment in a world where the boundaries between real life and virtual reality become blurry.

Virtual Solitaire is some of the best cyberpunk I’ve read or seen anywhere (and I’ve read a pretty good percentage of the genre).  I would love to see a sequel based in the same world as this.  Nichols came up with a logically consistent and enticing plot angle which explains exactly why there is only one person represented in this one man show. Like most solo pieces, Nichols embodies a range of characters in order to change things up for the audience as well as show off his range. In this show however, this is more than just a device, as others have essentially taken over his brain and all the people have been routed through him for testing.  Thus, everyone is him.  The lighting design (design by Dawson Nichols with Eric Beauzay running the board) creates dramatic transitions from character to character that really sucks you into the virtual world that is being portrayed.

The story begins with main character Nathan stumbling about the stage full of various “glitches in his continuity”. It seems obvious he is a bit messed up as he begins mumbling rapidly and somewhat incoherently until we realize he is not crazy, but actually talking to someone else. He begins to talk to Clarence, a corporate technologist who is trying to “hire” Nathan to do some “extreme prototyping” of a virtual reality mystery game about a murder in an asylum. Clarence, over a private channel, converses with Stanley (Nathan’s boss) who is in charge of the project and tells him about the setup.

At this point Nathan takes us to the beginning of the story, looking at profiles of people involved with the case. Nichols does an amazing job of transforming from one character to the next. The plot is supposed to be displayed in a read-only format and be completely non-interactive with the character, bue due to previous damage to Nathan’s brain from his addiction to bandwidth and early childhood trauma there are numerous break-off points where events from Nathan’s life are being channeled into the story. We see a human drama in the synthetic world of Virtual Solitaire, and a wish to be able to show compassion for Nathan’s character after the world seems to fail at this.

This is a not-to-be missed cyberpunk drama helmed by one talented man who channels a multitude.  Be sure to see Virtual Solitaire while you can.

~~~

Virtual Solitaire
Writer: Dawson Nichols
1h 50m    
facweb.northseattle.edu/gnichols/mycelium/
VENUE #16: Players Theatre
Thu 25 @ 4 Fri 26 @ 8

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Photo by Chelsie Lloyd of Juliet (Kyra Corradin), Romeo (James Waters), and Rosaline (Katie Jeffries)

Just about everyone in Western culture has read or seen a rendition of Romeo and Juliet, and one thing that resonates most about this Shakespearean classic is the unfairness of the couple’s tragic ending.  But what if you could jump in at critical times and nudge the characters into making different decisions?  Would that be enough to uncross the star-crossedness of these famous lovers?  Would it at least be enough to pull one of them out of the the jaws of ironic death?  Or would all that meddling mess up the whole point of the story?

Romeo & Juliet: Choose Your Own Ending attempts to explore that question.

Here, like in many improv shows, there is a polling of the crowd to see what they think should happen.  This is explained in soliloquy by Romeo (played by James Waters) where he sees us as advisers, spirits, or coconspirators.  The script is enlivened with a few modernisms, as well as new scenes that happen when there is a deviation from the original plot, yet it all stays fairly true to a Shakepearean style of dialogue.  It’s a lot of fun to be the hand of fate and see what the rest of the audience votes (via raised hands) and very entertaining to see how the story divergences made every one of the different possible stories by Ann and Shawn Fraistat as delightful as the one I saw.  I’m going to give a quick synopsis  of the plot from the perspective of the choices our audience made.  Since the nights are always different, there’s probably little chance that your show will be the same.

Photo by Khelsie Kerl of Mercutio (Jayme Bell), Benvolio (Rob Mueller), and Romeo (James Waters)

We start with Mercutio (played by Jayme Bell) convincing his buddies Benvolio (played by Rob Mueller) and Romeo Montague to crash the Capulet  party just after Romeo finished writing love poems to Rosaline (played by Katie Jeffries) who does not return his affection.

The first choice was whether Romeo should stay in love with Rosaline or whether he should pursue this new unknown interest who happens to be Juliet (played by Kyra Corradin).  Our audience chose for Romeo to still fall in love with Juliet, but were willing to compromise Romeo’s morals  by allowing him to answer Tibalt’s (Matthew Sparcino) challenge instead of saying he could not fight because of his new marriage to Juliet.  Benvolio jumps into the fray to stop Romeo from fighting  and the struggle accidentally causes Tibalt to be killed by Romeo.

When the Prince comes around wondering who killed Tibalt, Mercutio, in this version now alive and still just as much of a charming trixter as he was earlier in the play, is able to cover up Romeo’s involvement in the fight (a certain horned African mammal was framed instead).

The audience was then able to give its input one last time.  Should Romeo allow the lie that Mercutio told to stand and not accept blame for the murder (accidental or not) of Tibalt?  Or just lie? The audience chose for Romeo to lie and the plot completely jumped the tracks starting with the Friar (played by Katie Jeffries) telling the young couple to both go to Mantua to lay low while the families were reconciled instead of just Romeo (who no longer had a death sentence waiting for him).

Then things jump back toward familiar territory after Benvolio becomes infatuated with Juliet. He seduces her with charm and as a means to invalidate her marriage with Romeo tries to consummate with her before Romeo can.  Eventually the ending of the tale of woe of Juliet and Benvolio ends with both of the new star-crossed lovers dying and Romeo living to love another day.

Mandy Yu who devised the clever props and scenery, especially fun was the mystery chest of anything that could possibly be needed that is used at many junctures in the show.  Lex Davis was fight choreographer for the scenes in our version of the play.  The fights were done humorously as well as excitingly.  Jason Aufdem-Brinke set the mood with lighting that changed our focus just when it was needed to.  And finally, thank you Chelsie Kerl for the great  costumes, that were stylish and a good representation of Verona of that day as well color coordinated by Family so we could know who was related to who.

Photo of Tybalt (Matthew Sparacino) and Nurse (Jayme Bell)

Seven other endings await the plot outlined above (with great comedy interwoven throughout regardless).  Last show is  Friday the 26th if you’ld like t catch it.  Oh, and if you see another ending please feel free to comment on this post  and tell us all about how your ending worked out.

~~~

Romeo & Juliet: Choose Your Own Ending

Writer: Ann and Shawn Fraistat (and William Shakespeare)
Director: Ann Fraistat
1h 30m
www.impressionableplayers.com
VENUE #1: Teatro SEA
Fri 26 @ 4:15

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Meet Anna.  In Anna & The Annadroids: Memoirs of a Robot Girl - an  interesting combination of modern dance, techno music, social commentary, science fiction, multimedia, and a bit of burlesque – Anna  is an android who is made of  ”pure synthetic organic flesh”.  So instead of being made only of metal with a “mind full of microchips” she’s got a heart filled with “…love…passion…confusion…pure sexuality”.  The dancing and aerial acrobatics of Anna Sullivan (Anna), are accompanied with ambient, driving techno beats created by various artists which she performs while wearing beautiful costumes created by Elizabeth Harzoff.  The acrobatics seem to correspond to times of dreams (whether regular or daydreams) as something seems to be making her concentrate on something other than reality.

The rest of Anna’s real life, including two other characters (the Doctor and Nurse) are represented by projected comic/graphic novel style drawings (expertly done by Natalya Kolosowsky and Grace Passerotti) and robotic sounding voices which lie in striking contrast to Anna’s very “human” sounding voice which we hear in the interludes between dances.

Coming of age for an organic robot with an increased capacity to dream can be quicker than expected, and can sometimes be dealt with cruelly.  During her few days portrayed in this show we see her cope with basic emotions of belonging and we watch her struggle with working in an ad business which requires her to “feel” what she doesn’t feel in order to sell products.  She can’t possibly live that type of lifestyle as she is an android living by herself most of the time.  It seems the main conflicts arise from the Doctor who created her.   (Or, more to the point, switched her on, as it is inferred that Anna is just one of the Annadroid models in a long android line).  He assumes she will think the way he thinks because he programmed her a certain way.  The sensual components seem to be a drawback for the owners of Amerifluff (the fictional company which created Anna), but are a great pro for us, the audience, because it powers Anna’s dancing … which is her way of exploring her struggle to understand what it means to be “human” even if it is only in her synthetically created way.

An Annadroid being born

Lighting  is very important in this show – whether a spotlight following Anna as she dances (or is in the air), or the subtle colors that complement the video projects on the screen,  lighting designer Michelle Marcus does an exceptional job at blending it all in.  There are a few art video components of the show (Plastic Pleasures, Touchy Buttons, and Love Dream were all done by James Tyler) which are high quality and deal with the  issues of consumerism as well as illustrate the emptiness of many modern relationships due to technology.  These videos help advance the plot along as we realize that Anna the Annadroid is becoming more and more discontent with the commercial culture in which she has become enmeshed via her creation.  It’s torturing her,  due to the emotions hardwired into her circuitry – ironically added to make her better connect with customers.

And she dreams … because it is so much more real than real life.  Eventually (2 days after her creation) she wanders into a club and leaves a “hot mess”.  This creates bad publicity for Amerifluff so it is decided to put Anna in the Annadroid dungeon for a bit.  Later she will be reprogrammed without the emotional capabilities she was originally bestowed because they only lead to “inefficiency”.

Annadroid in dungeon

There is then a very touching scene near the end called Rewind-A-Spine that documents Anna restitching her personality to deal with the madness that is the Annadroid dungeon but also represents the brief pieces of Humanity she has interacted with.  Much of the musical accompaniment is driving yet almost trance inducing techno by many artist including: David Morneu, Anna Sullivan, Jennifer Agnew, (and additional audio and sound design by Allen Dicenzo).

All in all it is well worth seeing if you like android fiction, thoughtful burlesque or simply beautiful modern dance.  Only a few more shows left to explore Anna live in New York, before she only becomes a virtual presence on the internet via the Amerifluff site.

~~~

Anna & The Annadroids: Memoirs of a Robot Girl
Writer: Anna Sullivan; Music, Forest Christenson and David Morneau; Illustrations Grace Passerotti and Natalya Kolosowsky; Videos, Brent Haley and James Pryor
Director: Anna Sullivan
Choreographer: Anna Sullivan

0h 45m

www.amerifluff.com/memoirs.html
VENUE #5: Dixon Place
Sun 21 @ 8:15 Mon 22 @ 5:30

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Once upon a time...  How that can roll off one’s tongue with a savor that is like the sun kissing your forehead on a sweet summer’s night, as the glowing orb burrows into its deep red cave in the sky.  This is truly storytelling (with properly credentialed and sincere storytellers from the world famous International School of Storytelling).  Michael & Caja based in The Hague make a great team telling this story.

Michael Driebeek van der Ven begins A way of Man by giving a brief introduction about the story and the nature of storytelling, including a note that – since the point of storytelling is to help us envision things in one’s mind’s eye  – if the audience wants, we are welcomed to close our eyes and no judgements would be made. Van der Ven is also is responsible for the very subtle yet dramatic dimming and brightening of the lights which help us move through the transitions of seasons and scenes and senses.

Caja van der Poel tells us an old story called De Kleine Johannes written in 1886 by a famous Dutch psychiatrist/writer Frederik van Eeden who coined the term “lucid dream”.  The English translation is called The Quest and while you can download and read it,  truly what you see at this performance is that storytelling truly is an art.

Asalia Khadjé made the beautiful dress that Caja wears in this performance.

This story is sort of like a science-fiction story where humans are the supernatural figure in a way.  We follow a young boy who makes his way to becoming a man, with all due reflection and curiosity and bravery that anyone could ask … And a love/hate/respect for Being Human.  Johnathan starts as a boy full of wonder.  So full of wonder that the fantastic reaches out to him and invites him to be their friend.  There is a prejudice against Humans but Johnathan still is curious enough, homesick enough, exploratory enough that he gets sucked back in as a teenager and has to deal with the complexities of learning how to be Human after being a changeling for so many years.

Because of the many influences that the author van Eeden had there are many layers to this story and it is still very relevant today as we traverse the new technologies that make us question what it means to be Human or to “grow up” (whatever that means).

Come see this show while you can, whether young or old, its a moving story that I think everyone needs to hear.  And Michael & Caja are some of the most emotive and sensitive storytellers I’ve ever met, and they’ll give you their card at the end to stay in touch.  So join the experience while it lasts.

~~~

A way of Man
Michael&Caja
Writer: Caja van der Poel, based on the book by F. van Eeden
Director: Michael Driebeek van der Ven

1h 25m

VENUE #3: CSV Kabayitos
Sat 20 @ 9:15 Wed 24 @ 8 Sat 27 @ 8 Sun 28 @ 2

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• Anna & The Annadroids: Memoirs Of A Robot Girl (Fringe Festival 2011)
• The Custodian (Fringe Festival 2011)

One thing about Fringe Festival is that it encourages experimentation among the already experimental crowd of off-off-Broadway and regional theatre troops from around the country.  You can read more about their developmental process here, really quite fascinating actually. This piece is interesting in part because of the comedy interwoven into the structure (a fun mix of parody and literary criticism), but more importantly the methodologies of how the story is told (using audience participation) are worth going to the play by themselves. Mercury Rep, a Madison, Wisconsin based company, has been a past fringe favorite, and  they get a chance to make their mark this year again.  You’ve Ruined A Perfectly Good Mystery! is truly is a good example of the type of theatre that the New York International Fringe Festival exposes to a larger audience.

In some ways this performance acts like your standard parody play where the characters in the play are aware that they are, in fact, fictional characters.  In this case the characters at the core of this play are Sherlock Holmes (played by Christopher Younggren) and his collegue in crime fighting Watson (played by Matthew Schrader).  To avoid copy-write infringement (and to add to the humor) they are referred to as The Detective and The Doctor as well as some long and convoluted silly sounding names.

But more important than the characters which are the raw ingredients for this play, the play starts with The Narrator  played by Jamie England.  She enters the play by introducing us to our heroes and informs the characters (and audience) that this will be a “chose your own adventure” adventure.  She’s (overly) enthusiastic, full of witty puns, and dedicated to the deepest conventions of having the story go exactly as she wants even if her own characters disagree vehemently.

The Detective would rather test his wits and figure out the answer instantly himself but is stopped by the narrator.

Add to the mix, Liz Angle as Lady Bosom-Heaving whose father Lord Heaving, a prominent inventor and scientist, has been kidnapped.  She asks our heroes for help and a romance begins to blossom between her and the Doctor.  The Doctor is dashing and charming very often you’ll find yourself rooting for him time and again. The villain of this story is Iago Von Evilton played by Matthew Korda -  a smart villain who has plans to take over the world via Mind Control, Ghosts, or Robots depending on how you choose.  He also interacts with the Narrator but as a villain doesn’t play as nice and usually does what he wants regardless of what the Narrator tries telling him.

There is an ensemble that plays everything from a sexy maid to kurukos of various sorts (there is a recurring role for a windy door in the play) or funny Irish and French characters, to the crazy Lord Heaving to whatever abomination Iago VonEvilton is destined to pit against our heroes.  This ensemble is played by Tim Irvin, Andrea Kleiner, Paul Milisch, Veronica Raulin, and Colin Woolston.

The costumes by Sydney Krieger are great at setting the period as well using flamboyancy to comedic effect.  The set by Tim Irvin, Bryan Streich, and Veronica Raulin is basic but extremely functional and with the actors versatility gives us a very real illusion of traveling the vast distances mentioned throughout the play.  The props by Kirk Stanti are laugh-out-loud funny, whether it is the giant magnifying glass or the various clouds and trees and bushes that are moved about via kuruko in various scenes.

Generally being part of the audience is fun, as you shout out your favorite direction at various parts of the show (Drugs or Sex, Ireland or France and a few more)  but other times a bit disappointing or maybe even a bit scary when we realize that we don’t have the control we thought we had, or when our choices have unexpected and unsatisfying results.  Various cult references, notably “walk this way” among others were scattered throughout and may very well be different on different nights due to the variance in plot from the “Choose Your own Adventure” angle.

When we the audience enter into a dialogue with live theatre, especially when the audience Chooses the Adventure, there often can be some rough spots.  And I think that some were purposefully inserted so we might analyze over what might be the best way to have an interactive play, or to get a groan rather than a laugh as something was pushed too far.  If there is any problem that I had with the performance I saw, it might have been that there was actually a few too many things to think or laugh about, that the plot was too overcome by the meta-narrative.  The advice I would give to the writers would be to tighten it up just a bit so that a few less jokes made a bit more impact.  The direction by Sam D. White is in general great at showing the confusion of the characters as they are overwhelmed with having to deal with plot forces they have not had to deal with before, but perhaps a moment or two more where when the actors are being emotionally moved by the events surrounding them among the flurry of gimmicks bombarding them, to have a moment or two more of conviction before being jolted back into frenetic action.

At the end the real question is who is the “You” in the title?  Who ruined the perfectly good mystery? Is it the Narrator or is it the audience?   Is a predictable plot better than an unpredictable plot?  Can you select the series of choices to get partial nudity on your night?  Can you make the Detective happy with your choices?  Who are you rooting for?  The “good guys” or the “bad guys”?

These questions and more may be answered if you go to see the final performance tonight at 8:30.  Will you go?  Choose your own adventure!

~~~

You’ve Ruined a Perfectly Good Mystery!
Writer: Christian Neuhaus and Rick Stemm
Director: Sam D. White
Choreographer: Rick Stemm
2h 0m    www.ruinedmystery.com
VENUE #4: Teatro LATEA

Thu 18 @ 8:30

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What’s the difference between a janitor and a custodian? It’s all about a sense of responsibility for what you care for.  The Custodian is a story about trying to find one’s way in the world, the complexities of love, and one normal man’s struggle to learn how to fight back against the messy carelessness of superheroes creating a codependent relationship with the regular citizens of New York by saying they need to save the world from disaster and then making the people trapped under the rubble of their battles beg to be rescued.

The Custodian (written and directed by Will Lacker) opens upon a messy apartment where a man is avidly playing a video game.  All of sudden another man (played by Kevin Alan) in a bright yellow getup comes out of the shadows.  Is this our first look at a superhero in this play?  We quickly find out he is announcing another tussle between super hero and super villain … and the effect it is having on traffic (this announcer’s specialty). Kevin returns time and time again as the voice of the world outside the apartment whether as announcer or as a trivia savant who gives the other characters special bits of information to help them understand more arcane facts that they (or the audience) need to know.

Kevin does a great job of conveying the excitement and investment the world seems to have in the exploits of superheroes.  He also gives the underlying fear of collateral damage that is unsaid but sometimes seen in his face.  Sound and lighting is done expertly by Matt Wharton who brings us deeply resonate thuds, thumps and crashes of the scary world outside the apartment which is never seen.

The clever costumes by Sara Lukasiewicz and Laurel Casillo (who plays Wanda) illustrate flamboyancy of the world outside in the glimpses we get.

In this story what our hero, Max (played by Eryck Tate), cares for is nothing less than New York City, and he isn’t used to having such large passionate feelings, so his transformation from a normal everyman to The Custodian is a tough one.  He has an eccentric roommate Remi (played by Nick Hepsoe), who has obsessions with trivia, Gina Davis and a “commitment” to video games, as well as a trust fund to support his habits.

His girlfriend Wanda (played by Laurel Casillo) is always being supportive and her father gets Max an interview which seems like it might be far up on the ladder of success (“data entry” – an exciting possibility to Max), but the job is of custodian.  He is sent home with a mop to work on his mopping skills.

Later Max wakes up to his “day off” and an urgent call from his supervisor Manuello that he’s “needed urgently” to help sweep up the four floors of smashed glass caused by a superhero.  Only you can save us!

Added to the mix is a story of an old yet mysterious friend of Remi’s named Fing (played by Adam Delia), a wild-man guerilla fighter just out of Uganda who will be staying with them for an “indefinite” period of time.  Wanda is at first repulsed by Fing, but soon a chemistry beginning to develop.

With disaster threatening to take down the city, and Wanda’s life in peril, what can they do to stop the careless rampaging of superheroes?  Then the answer comes in a flash (a muddled confused and almost incoherent flash) of mental agility.

Kidnap a superheroes sidekick!

It seems wrong and yet so right.   A plan is made and we see the wheels of transformation happen to all in this gang of would-be crusaders.

See the show while you can for a great mix of laughs, ethical dilemmas, and great chemistry both between and within the characters as they all change into something closer to their true selves as we see the birth of  The Custodian!

~~~

The Custodian
Five Flights Theater Company
Writer: Will Lacker
Director: Will Lacker

1h 45m

www.fiveflightstheatercompany.org
VENUE #6: The Living Theatre
Thu 18 @ 8 Wed 24 @ 2 Sat 27 @ 7

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Negative Space Sometimes Shows Us The Way Out

Sadness is a universal and necessary part of the human condition, whether you experience it from losing a job, a loved one or just find yourself at end of your rope.  But is “unhappiness” different than “sadness”?   Can lives be ruined when they are unhappy much more than when they simply have a neutral lack of happiness? Playwright Greg Kotis (who wrote the book for Urinetown as well this year’s Fringe runaway hit, the already sold-out Yeast Nation) examines these themes in 9 short dark comedies called  The Unhappiness Plays.

While on the surface many of these plays seem to be merely absurdest comedies if you look deeper into the core of these plays you’ll recognize yourself in the parodies of humanity playing out on stage.  Each actor does a great job portraying several characters and exploring feelings of conflict, solidarity, dismay, loathing, joy at causing pain, or sadness in something being lost forever.  Director Bob Fisher had his work cut out for him and he delivered marvelously – each play was consistent and distinct from the other plays yet held to the common theme.

The musical interludes by Michelle Edwards set the mood in just the right way during the interludes and transitions.

Sandwich Town begins the plays with the question: Is a sandwich a sandwich if its missing one of its ingredients? The great acting by Steve Wilcox, Richard Briggs and Shawna Franks helps us believe the insanity of this rapidly building play enough so that we can all feel the dismay that permeates the deli after the dissatisfied customer leaves.  Later in Ice Cream Man the clerk and the customer meet again, and instead of hurting him the  Ice Cream Man repays the customer with helpful insight and compassion.

In Asunder we see the vampiric hunger an identity thief  can feel and  how his faithful assistant does his bidding for herself as well.  After all everyone needs to learn a trade . . .

Sandal Man transforms class struggle into a farce so we can actually see how unfair the real thing is.  This short play in 4 acts, takes less than 5 minutes and shows a man’s whole life as he changes from a passive-aggressive counter-cultural, to one of the oppressed, to a political prisoner, to a “free man”.

Upsetting investigates when people say mean things without thinking of the implications.

And It Never Ends investigates health-care from the different aspects of doctor and patient in a never-ending purgatory of a waiting room.  But in looking at all the other options for Hell, “It’s better than the alternative”.

A Bit of Advice is a metaphor for what happens when you’re left alone and don’t know how to be with other people any more.

Hair Play is the finale play of this series and deals with some of the deepest “un”-happiness.  It begins with a son coming home from a haircut overwhelmed with anguish.  He approaches his mother and he tells of his horrible haircut.  His mother has a bright red hairdo and seems to agree his haircut is horrible and tells him it has scarred him for life.

Scarred her for life even!  Because it has so terribly permanently disfigured her son.  Mother gets son so riled up at how much the hairstylist had wronged them she convinces him to cut out the barber’s heart with her scissors and bring her back the heart for her to eat.  The thing is -   he has a perfectly normal haircut.

After a tangle with the police we find this has all been an elaborate plot to to get the son to kill the hairdresser in revenge for “bad” haircut many years before given to Mom  … In short it was all just a setup. What we see in this complex scenario outlines the deepest part of this whol series of plays: all unhappiness can be seen as unreal expectations.

Wonderfully done – thoughtful, entertaining and funny, The Unhappiness Plays is bound to make an appearance in the Fringe Encore series.  Its short run is over – but it’s got a long life ahead of it.  So keep watching for this one.

~~~

The Unhappiness Plays
Space 55 Theatre Ensemble
Writer: Greg Kotis
Director: Bob Fisher

1h 10m
www.space55.org/the-unhappiness-plays
VENUE #10: IATI Theater

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