New York City is host to two concurrently running productions of Shakespeare’s Macbeth this Spring: Aquila Theatre‘s presentation at the Gym at Judson (April 18th – May 6th), and Epic Theatre Ensemble‘s interpretation at the 47th Street Theatre (April 20 – May 26th). A stable of many a theatrical company’s portfolio, apart from its matchless, vivid language, Macbeth as drama has much to attract aspiring ensembles, not least the challenge presented in portraying two of Shakespeare’s most unsympathetic lead roles. We watch as Macbeth and his wife are enticed into evil by the lure of power and then, as good stage villains, are punished for their crimes. The trick, however, is in making them into more than stage villains, for in that resides the case for tragedy and its capacity to ennoble human existence. It is a tricky bit of the equation as both of these productions can testify.

Aquila Theatre is devoted to the classics of western theatre, in restating their claim to preeminence as timeless pieces, triumphs of human artistry and culture. As such they tend toward language focused productions that are light on the use of contemporary stagecraft elaborations. For their Macbeth Desiree Sanchez wears both directorial and production designer hats. She is spare in her approach. A minimum of props are deployed in the expansive and lofty space  Judson’s Gym theatre offers. There is an economy and subtlety at work in the way she groups the action about the squared arena. An innovative, momentary introductory prelude scene which highlights a blood-soaked, battle worn Macbeth in one corner, and a bereft Lady Macbeth on bloodied bed sheets following unsuccessful labor in the opposite corner, acts as a startling, punched signature of this director’s suggestion for the fatal couple’s motivations. The Macbeths are traumatized people, destabilized, estranged, in search of a project into which they can pour themselves, erase the past, and reunite. This prelude dispatched in an instant, there is little other tinkering with the body of the play and all unfolds to order.

The performances are vigorous, emotive, well spoken and, most importantly, psychologically grounded. If you have an ear for Shakespeare this is a wonderful production to hear his words delivered eloquently and with conviction. Rebecca Reaney as Lady Mabeth is nuanced and bold, spectacularly benefiting from Peter Meineck‘s well-judged lighting, which is at once lavishly theatrical and self-disciplined. Guy Oliver-Watts, working to uncover an aspect of post traumatic stress disorder in the role of Macbeth, has a more complex part. He is thoroughly convincing, but in so doing projects a weakened, dependent quality in the man who would be king and, strangely, this deflates the character somewhat, puncturing the fullness of the play’s tragic reach. He is doing well what he has been directed to do but herein lies the rub, and a very fine rub it is for the measure of what might be deemed tragic theatre. The rest of the cast are for the most part assured in their roles, with Peter F. Gardiner, (Banquo), James Lavender (Macduff), and Rachel Barrington (Lady Macduff) especially commendable.

Coincidentally the notion that the Macbeths, and especially Lady Macbeth, are grieving former parents, is made central in Epic Theatre’s version of the play. This idea is evident in the presence on stage of a small shrine with a framed photograph of a toddler, to which Lady Macbeth touchingly returns for some of her scenes. Also, it is manifest in the large projected photo image of the Macbeths, tenderly converging about a drowsy infant, which is thrown up on the broken surface of the rear wall. This projection is relentless, hanging like a grey cloud above the proceedings, at once lugubrious and sentimental. Interpretation, with a capital I, is the strategy of this production. Set in a more contemporary world, we are treated to off-stage electronic voices in ear pieces, and a video screen displaying action elsewhere. The Weird Sisters are a heterogeneous mix of sexes and ethnicities, and hang about the stage throughout the action on overhead ladders and walkways, like jaded demi-gods, stonily unmoved by the unfolding drama below. Innovation appears one of director Ron Russell‘s chief concerns with his production. In the banquet scene where a guilty Macbeth is plagued with visions of the murdered Banquo, the bloodied apparition is suddenly encountered in a dance embrace by the newly crowned king. This shift works dramatically, as do some of the other re-imaginings. Richard Easton as Duncan, hailing from the video monitor, is a treat as a telegenic royal talking head, at once hammy and calculating. However, a growing awareness dawns as it becomes plain that Russell as director, engaged with innovation it seems for innovation’s sake, completely loses the plot in the finest sense. This might have been more immediately evident if I had read the production’s publicity notes which describe the play as “a brutal and darkly funny exploration of the banality of evil.” Really? Macbeth? Funny? If the line had been offered by Mel Brooks I might have taken closer note, but otherwise it seems merely, but utterly, wrong-headed. And how wrong-headed becomes dismayingly clear in due course as Russell stokes up moments of sour humor (one of the witches sings her lines in a borrowed tutu as a karaoke turn) and rubbishes any solemnity. It’s as if the idea of theatrical tragedy is unknown to him. The most damaging turn occurs amidst some rapid fire scene shifts toward the conclusion which require one actor to change swiftly between two characters. This is done on stage by the actor (James Wallert) taping and un-taping a fringe of hair to his brow to distinguish between roles. In the duration a cry is heard off stage. Jumping from left to right, Wallert, fringed one moment, un-fringed the next, delivers the news of Lady Macbeth’s death. It is, richly, a Mel Brooks moment, and there was more than one chuckle in the audience.

Can Russell actually hear the language Shakespeare is putting in his characters’ mouths? The evidence is scarce and the actors suffer from the inability to sound as if they mean their words. Who is to blame them if the director has no feeling for the real emotion of the play? Apart from Easton in the role of Duncan, and Julian Rozzell, Jr. (with presence to burn) as one of the witches, everyone seems merely focused on unburdening themselves as rapidly and succinctly as possible of their Shakespearean metre. Russell is not the director who can marry them to their lines. As Macbeth, Ty Jones actually commences the soliloquy – “Is this a dagger I see before me?” – with his back to the audience. No chance here for an actor to convey facially the extremity of the moment. Russell, it seems, is not interested in psychological subtleties (witness the never-changing backdrop projection) merely the chance of creating something different. Well sad to say, something different definitely this way comes, but you’ll be lucky if the pricking you feel is confined to your thumbs.

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There’s a reason that the second rule of Fight Club is the same as the first rule of Fight Club.  Because Tyler Durden (and by extension, author Chuck Palahniuk) understood that it’s human nature to break rules.  First rule of Fight Club – don’t talk about Fight Club.  Second Rule of Fight Club:  DO NOT talk about Fight Club.  So what did people do?

What does this have to do with August Schulenberg’s new play DEINDE?  Simple.  DEINDE – a sci-fi story of quantum biologists who use a  Dineural Entangled Intelligence Network DEvice [a "clumsy acronym, really, not even a real E at the end"] to “loop in” in order to juice their brains so that they can be smart enough to cure a virus that has been killing the world’s population – begins with four simple rules:

1. When using DEINDE do not think of anything other than work.
2. Do not keep the connection to DEINDE live outside of work.
3. Do not use DEINDE to communicate with each other.
4. Do not use DEINDE to accss the world online.

Sounds so easy to follow, right?  So did “Don’t talk about Fight Club” and we all know how that turned out.

The rest of the play is about how those looped in to DEINDE systematically break the rules as they find themselves becoming addicted to the unnameable and unbelievable power that overtakes them, courtesy of this strange and wonderful and terrifying new level of understanding.

The play itself begins with a chess match – a conventional one –  which then thematically unfolds throughout the entire play, on a much more subtle level.  In the first scene the game is being played on a recognizable board and the notion of checkmate has no hidden meaning or agenda. On one side of the board we have Cooper (David Ian Lee) who plays a very analytic and thoughtful game where he tries to see every available move before he proceeds. However he doesn’t have the intuitive leap to be able to move beyond what is in front of him in order to win the match.  On the other side of the board there is the older, wiser Malcolm (Ken Glickfeld) who is the embodiment of 95 years of trial and error.  This dictates not just how he plays a chess match, but how he moves through life.  While it seems that he is using intimidation and brio to distract his opponent in actuality he doesn’t need this slight of hand – he’s won the game anyway, based on his innate knowledge which comes from something that can’t be taught – something that can only be experienced.  By zeroing in on the fatal flaw of his opponent rather than relying on the limitations of his own body of knowledge, he is able to win the game.

DEINDE featuring Isaiah Tanenbaum, Ken Glickfeld, David Ian Lee, Rachael Hip-Flores, and Nitya Vidyasagar (Photo credit Justin Hoch)

DEINDE works with this theme throughout the play;  constantly pitting two sides against each other with much higher stakes, and a checkmate which implies not just the end of a game but perhaps the end of human progress.  The battle is between information vs. intuition, intelligence vs. maturity, wisdom vs. knowledge.  If you’re paying attention it’s easy to see how the moves will play out – but nonetheless thrilling to watch as they unfold.

There’s a lot of science here – this is, after all, a sci-fi tale, but it’s laid out in a way that is conversational, interactive and engaging.  If some of it goes over your head, well, that’s almost the meta-point.

DEINDE is what would happen if Charly and Sybil had a love child who evolved at the speed of light.  If you remember your high school reading assignments, Flowers For Algernon dealt with Charly (or Charlie), a learning-disabled man who is chosen by a team of scientists to boost his intelligence.  As Charly becomes self aware, and soon hyper-intelligent he becomes disenchanted both with his former self as well as those around him whom he once admired.  Similarly, Jenni and Mac – the young, eager (already brilliant) quantum biologists who undergo the DEINDE process find themselves on this same road – unable to return to the blandness of the existence they had before they looped in.  So they simply don’t.

As they further break the rules they become reliant upon the technology, even as they surpass it.  Those around them,  once considered mentors, colleagues and advisers are now considered troglodytes.  Speaking with them is like ”talking through tar” to Jenni and Mac who are on an accelerated path – always.  Further, as they break rule number 3 they find themselves justifying their own behavior to (and with) each other, as they now are “one person in two bodies” who still speak out loud to each other, but in unison because it “feels grounding, like we’re still human in some meaningful way”.  Further they decide they are there “not … to abolish the law but to fulfill Man’s destiny”.  Yes.  They are THAT GOOD. Or so they think.

But there are consequences for breaking the rules.  Not punishments.  Consequences.

Throughout the play in every way director Heather Cohn balances precision with chaos.  Will Lowry’s set and scenic design is awash in mathematical equations, written in a steady hand and proving the undeniable.  Electronic devices are clear lucite and allow for anything since they are beholden to nothing.  Martha Goode’s sound design brings scenes crackling to life with music that is classical, indicating moments which are very calculated and decisive, straightforward and blunt.  This makes the dischord which begins once the rules are broken all the more salient and pronounced – where things once were clear and ordered they are now explosive and uncontrollable.

Similarly the acting is in perfect balance; a composed and measured Nabanita (Nitya Vidyasagar) is in perfect counterbalance to the (at first) bouncy, youthful, Mac (Isaiah Tanenbaum) and Jenni (Rachael Hip-Flores) who move quickly to manic and frenzied.   Cooper and Malcolm do fantastic work in the middle ground, showing both compassion and tolerance in the face of a technology that is terrifying, wonderful and unquantifiable.

Another strong Flux Theatre Ensemble production which melds science with sentiment and allows the “what if”s to paint a picture of possibility.  Beautiful and meaningful – not to be missed.

~~~

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Actress and Comedian Livia Scott hosts this monthly variety show, where dead celebrities are brought back to life and stellar guest performances contribute to the experience of Livia’s Castle of Enchantment at the UCB Theater East.

I attended Livia’s Castle of Enchantment on Tuesday, April 24, and was pleasantly taken on a whirlwind as Livia morphed into the dead celebrity of the evening: Mike Wallace. Livia’s portrayal as Mike Wallace was as respectful as it was funny and had the crowd laughing throughout the show, highlighting her skills in stand-up, improv, and impersonation.

Livia (ahem … Mike Wallace) was joined by three special guests: Mike Milazzo, Bamboo Silva, and Seaton Smith. These acts were woven throughout the show, giving each performer a space in which to shine, while being incorporated into the total experience of the evening’s enchantment.

Seaton Smith did a riotous comedy set, enthralling the audience with his edgy humor, thoughts, and observations.  Mike Milazzo and Bamboo Silva rocked the theater with solo acts, and then collaborated in an improvisational jam that had the audience shouting with excitement and electric applause. As Livia said, “the ferociously heartbreaking guitarist + Bronx beatboxer beyond Thunderdome = together they’re unlike anything you’ve ever seen.”

Overall, Livia’s Castle of Enchantment is a fun, organic variety show. Each month brings a new dead celebrity host via Livia and amazing guest acts to round out the experience. The show starts by 7:30 and lasts about an hour. At only $5, you won’t want to miss this kind of enchantment.

More about Livia Scott:

Livia is an actress, comedian and character powerhouse who’s appeared on Law & Order, Late Night With Conan O’Brien, the Comedy Central series Honesty, the upcoming feature film Snatched as Andrew McCarthy’s nurse and she pulls a Peter Sellers by playing about 7 different roles in National Lampoon’s Dirty Movie directed by Christopher Meloni.

She’s an ensemble player in The Shushan Channel by writers from The Daily Show With Jon Stewart with guest appearances by Will Forte, Scott Adsit, Rachel Dratch, John Oliver and Joel McHale, and MEAT, the critically acclaimed all-female sketch phenomenon hailed as “One of the nation’s best groups” by THE ONION.

Livia also writes for MIRTH Magazine, hosts the celebrated variety experience Livia’s Castle Of Enchantment at UCB and is a double ECNY Award nominee for Best Emerging Comic of the Year and Best Solo Show for Goodnight, OJ, her adaptation of real letters written to OJ Simpson which ran for a year at UCB and was directed by Baron Vaughn.

She’s been featured in The New York Times, Backstage, The New York Post, The NY Daily News and The Apiary.

Livia won the 2011 Channy Award for Best Villain in a Web Series & the 2010 Channy Award for Best Actress.  She was recently named “One Of Our Favorite 53 Female Comedians” along with Tina Fey, Amy Poehler & Sarah Silverman by THE HUFFINGTON POST.

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There is a very telling moment which comes two thirds of the way into Mariah MacCarthy’s play The Foreplay Play which is currently being produced by CAPS LOCK THEATRE  at a site-specific location (WAY off-off Broadway) in Williamsburg.  This dramedy about the tension which builds between two couples as they tentatively (and sometimes not so tentatively) lay the foundation for a night of orgiastic bliss has many titillating moments, but the one which encapsulated this show for me was probably the least sexual of the night.

After a series of awkward missteps, false starts, jumping the gun (but not without a few hot hot, drrrrrty, breathtaking, throw-you-up-against-the-wall, take-you-right-now-on-the-kitchen-counter moments) Kyle, the sole male of the intended foursome is strumming a guitar and the quartet has just finished a rousing rendition of Springteen’s Hungry Heart.  In and of itself  Hungry Heart is a beautiful moment – each character singing with completely different motivation: some with actual hunger in their heart, some with nothing more than Springsteen Joy, and others with the taste of a memory, perhaps.  Regardless of subtext, the four voices blend beautifully, and yet perfectly naturally – the way any four people with decent singing voices might automatically take the harmonies.  They all know the words, they understand the nuances, they enjoy the camaraderie the singing produces, and the moment is binding.  The telling moment comes right after, when three of the four decide to launch into Since You’ve Been Gone.

Nic Grelli, Lindsey Austen,Diana Oh and Parker Leventer (Photo by Kacey Stamats)

“I don’t know this song,” pouts Anika (Lindsey Austen) and soon her pout erupts into full-on anger.  She has a tantrum, runs from the room, and leaves the others feeling awkward, embarrassed, perhaps guilty, but – let’s be honest – a little smug.  We know something you don’t know.

Herein lies the key to good group ANYTHING – but for the purposes of this review we’ll stick to group sex.  In order for it to work, everyone has to be in harmony.  Everyone has to feel comfortable.  Everyone has to know where to pick up, where to leave off, where to come in, and when to hold back.  Moving forward when someone clearly doesn’t “know the words” to a certain song (read – doesn’t know the rules of a certain situation) is only going to lead to tantrums.

What The Foreplay Play illustrates and illuminates beautifully is that bringing the fantasy (again, of anything, but specifically group sex) into the real world is a daunting process even if all the clothes are laid out neatly on the bed for you beforehand.  Just because you have a piano and ten fingers doesn’t mean you’ll suddenly sit down and start playing Mozart.  Even further – simply because you can play the piano doesn’t mean you’ll be able to play a complete performance of all the Chopin Etudes.  And so – just because you like sex doesn’t mean you can have it with three other people you’re fond of without someone hitting a harsh note.  Perception is easy.  Reality is hard.  Or … let’s go with “difficult”.

The foursome of The Foreplay Play is made up of  Kyle (Nic Grelli) who is sweet, earnest and charming.  He’s manly and studly but he’s gentle enough to break down and fall apart when emotions overwhelm him.  (And this night is rife with overwhelming emotions of all types).  Kyle’s girlfriend is Anika (Lindsey Austen) - a yearning, tentative girl who fancies herself experimental but, when push comes to shove, can’t get out of her own way far enough to move past “vanilla” (which, to this crowd, is more of an insult than a subtle flavor choice).  They are hosted for the evening by Anika’s co-worker Isabel (Diana Oh) who is a power house of sexuality and seduction.  While Izzy doesn’t actively set out to seduce everyone in the room she is somehow the center of the sexual vortex here as both Kyle and Anika find themselves longing for her in ways that (if you’re an audience member with any sort of pulse) will have you catching your breath.  The quartet is rounded out by Isabel’s live-in lover Kelly (Parker Leventer) who is sure of herself, a self-professed Dom who dominates in rooms other than the bedroom and enjoys making others feel uncomfortable, even as she insists on ground rules and guidelines for the evening.

Throughout the evening of foreplay each gets their turn to take a spin in front of the mirror, as it were.  On display this evening for all of us (and for each other) to see are each character’s most charming qualities, their most annoying habits, their sexiest urges, their most awkward discomfort.  Separately and together they all find themselves acting out, taking the lead, taking a backseat, or simply bobbing along as they watch the inevitable happen.

The cast is strong, each delivering a nuanced performance which gives you an opportunity to side with them or against them depending on the flow of the evening.  Under Leta Tremblay’s fine direction the night is hyper-real.  The play is, as I mentioned, site specific – so this Williamsburg apartment (big by New York standards but rather intimate for a play) creates an immediate fly-on-the-wall scenario.  (Be warned that seating is limited and, like a game of musical chairs, there’s a rush for seats once the apartment door opens.  Latecomers will be sitting on cushions up front.  Those with knee problems who are loathe to sitting on the floor are, unfortunately, SOL).

The intimacy of the space allows Tremblay to give the characters a whole host of real-time actions to work with – actual dinner to be prepared, actual exits from the apartment to be made.  Tremblay also deftly balances all the craziness (Twister! Knife play! Costumes and fake accents! Spin the bottle!) with a solid anchor of gravitas so that rather than feeling MacCarthy is throwing a lot at the wall to see what sticks in terms of theme this feels much more like four actual people who are twisting and turning their way through a strange encounter in order to make it fit for all involved.  Unfortunately no matter how many games of Twister they play the right combination just won’t fall into place.

MacCarthy aims for – and delivers – a night of questions rather than answers.  A night of seeking rather than finding, and a night which flips over the rocks to explore the grime underneath.  While no one gets very naked, emotionally the cast strips bare and the four individuals share intimacies on a level much deeper than the simple exchanging of bodily fluids.  Ultimately sex is besides the point.  MacCarthy, in her Playwright’s Note, admits that the play “ends up being a celebration of love, not sex”.

CAPS LOCK THEATRE, on their website, states, “We like plays where people are at both their worst and their best; where people screw each other–or themselves–over, and have to find a way to deal with it; where people’s hearts hurt, or open, or blossom.”  I’d say that The Foreplay Play does all of this – and perfectly.

~~~

THE FOREPLAY PLAY

A new play by Mariah MacCarthy
Directed by Leta Tremblay
This play takes place at a site-specific apartment in Williamsburg - Brooklyn, NY
Location will be disclosed to audience members upon ticket purchase

Thursdays-Sundays at 8pm

April 19-May 6, 2012

Click here for tickets

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Lovecraft Festival (Photos by Aaron Pachesa Photography)

THE OLDEST and strongest emotion of mankind is fear,

and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown.  

- H.P. Lovecraft, Supernatural Horror In Literature

When I think of Howard Phillips (H.P.) Lovecraft’s Weird Stories I think of very intelligent people, facing the unknown. An unknown that is not known for a reason, as if we as human beings had evolved a blindspot to these things in order to protect our sanityand allow us to keep functioning as a society – especially after the world turns out to be different than we had ever imagined it. The truly alien nature of the entities that cross the paths of the protagonists (as opposed to “heroes”, as they rarely have a resounding victory) of these stories reminds us of the fragments of dreams we might have which don’t make sense, but disturb us greatly for reasons we don’t quite understand.

RADIOTHEATRE has taken Lovecraft’s stories in this 3rd edition of their regular Lovecraft Festival, and made them more horrific by performing them as a radio play – where we are forced to believe the unbelievable because the story is being told to us aloud – instead of just letting us process the strange visions of Lovecraft only in our heads.  Unlike most of Lovecraft’s stories, which are generally written in the style of a tortured lone soul chronicling his story, the tales being told are split into 3 voices (or in the case of The Horror On Martin’s Beach, a town) so there is always someone we can truly connect and sympathize with – even as the monstrous consumes them (and us) with fear.

Frank Zilinyi (Photo by Aaron Pachesi Photography

As a radio play, the dramatic storytelling of the actors (R. Patrick Alberty, Kevin Gilligan, and Frank Zilinyi), the eerily accurate sound effects (designed by Dan Bianchi with Wes Shippee as Engineer), and moving music (by Dan Bianchi and Kevin Macleod) allowed you to just close your eyes and be swept up in the engrossing story.  However with expert subtly as well as extreme lighting effects pulling us into the other-worldliness of the stories as well as the animated actors who reflect every emotion from happy and adventurous to confused or crazed to saddened or terrified, we the audience gets further drawn in.  By the time the hour and fifteen minute show was done I was somewhat drained, but very touched by what the different characters had gone through.

Frank Zilinyi’s direction and adaption by Dan Bianchi are definitely to be credited: to be frightened by horror is one thing, but to be moved by it is a much greater thing, and that is what this production of The H.P. Lovecraft Festival has accomplished.

This Festival comes in two Programs of stories.

Program A includes The Moon Bog which is a story what happened when someone decided to drain a very special bog and the residents of that bog came out of obscurity to stop him, and The Shadow over Innsmouth  which is a tale of an Irish town mostly inhabited by beings who are half human and half “deep one” (of the Cthulu stories).

Program B has 4 tales including:  The Lurking Fear which begins with 3 men spending a night in an old isolated mansion to investigate disappearances nearby, and ends with the main character learning the horrible truth behind it all, Statement Of Randolph Carter  in which a man in an insane asylum is interviewed by Randolph Carter, and his story changes Randolph forever, The Horror at Martin’s Beach  where a local group of fisherman bring in a “sea monster” 50 ft long and sets up a museum around it’s corpse to gain a profit from it.  Biologists investigating it determine this is a juvenile speciman of an unknown species.  Later it appears it might not be alone…, and finally The Evil Clergyman where a package is sent to a man who is lead to the room of  a deceased priest who was a leader of  strange cult.  He is warned by the landlords of the room not to touch anything, and not to stay there at night.  He doesn’t listen.

In RADIOTHEATRE’s adaption, we particularly see the strength of the ensemble. Instead of a single speaker in The Lurking Fear and The Horror at Martin’s Beach it is more of a greek chorus. The camaraderie of the characters in The Lurking Fear and the diversity of personalities, makes the horror that is felt seem more human because we identify with them more than in the original story.  Particularly in our hero, it makes the story sadder when he realizes the secret behind it all, the madness that caused the disappearances that set them out to investigate in the first place.  Hearing them all tell the tall tales they heard from various people made it make more sense how it could have been ignored so long by the people in the surrounding areas.  How the horrors of a living tree, a snake, a demon were all more acceptable answers to the human mind than the misfortune of evolution that was faced in the end in his narrow escape with the truth.

In The Horror at Martin’s Beach  instead of being told in a dryer, more journalistic sense, as is the original, the cast tells us the story of the events leading up to the horror in an enjoyable dialogue among people of a small town who recount a turning point in their community.  Even in describing the emptiness and desolation left in the aftermath of the story, there is still a bittersweet tone of  appreciation of the beauty of the stark emptiness of the sea on a moonlit night after the horrific events of the story unfold.

The text is basically the same as the original, with slight editing by Dan Bianchi. Frank Zilinyi really shows a great deal of thought and consideration in the direction of this piece, making us feel less alienated by the otherworldly parts of these stories.   The focus seemed much more on being part of community even if the characters involved tended toward isolation in the end.

H.P. Lovecraft had a unique way of seeing the world that helped pave the way for later thoughtful types of almost every other horror/speculative fiction narrator.  We see his influence in works by Alfred Hitchcock and shows such as The Twilight Zone.  As is the moral in many of Lovecraft’s stories, often it is knowledge that is the most damaging element, and while a horrible death may await, there is always a hint that some fates are much, much worse.

What RADIOTHEATRE has done is not so much brought back an ancient artform, but rather redefined it and made two classics better by their reinvention.  If you have the chance (and the gumption), I definitely think it would be worth your while to see one or both of the nights of theatre in this festival while you can.  It’s an experience you won’t soon forget.

~~~

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There’s much more than a touch of Raymond Chandler’s Philip Marlowe in the character of Katharine Sherman‘s Christopher Marlowe in her new play, Christopher Marlowe’s Chloroform Dreams, running at the lower east side’s The Red Room. The time-and-smoke shrouded legend of the Elizabethan playwright hangs over the proceedings and propels the story all the way, and then nearly, to its end. Familiar tropes from classical mythology and fairy tale erupt everywhere in a noiresque style tale of a femme who is at once fatale and in flight. Mix in more than a strain of poetic patter and the result might be ponderous, over rich and over-reaching if it weren’t from the pen of a careful, gifted playwright who has a sharpened sense of when to call off the big thunderous themes to allow the smaller human story to breathe. Sherman is excellently served in this production by director Philip Gates who has done a great deal to let this highly theatrical, complexly structured drama flow. And flow it does, like silk, like smoke.

Gumshoe Marlowe (the playwright, not the fictional detective) is on the case and it’s a case of love’s labor’s lost as the gal he pines for, Daphne Fairchild, has a problem with the needle. It’s somewhere, sometime in the eternal noir of Hollywood’s 1940s and the environment is murky with urban underbelly, its sinners, and its saints. Daphne has taken up with contraband king Ingram Frizer, who keeps her in morphine embrace. Marlowe tries to cut a deal with Frizer to release Daphne, and Frizer, like the southern drawling megalomaniac he is, perversely agrees. Confident of the weakness of the human spirit Frizer is sure of Daphne’s faithlessness, or rather as he would have it, faithfulness to the true church of humanity – what he has to offer. The narrative evolves in non-linear fashion, jumping between episodes of elation and degradation, hopefulness and despair. We pretty much all know in what direction the story is heading and this disrupted sequencing brings a freshness to the unfolding, allowing us to see the tale as if shot from diverse angles. Clever staging and ingenious scenic design (Joshua David Bishop) work to brilliant effect in keeping the tempo up while contributing to a sense of layered story and hidden motives.

A polymorphous narrative builds in a polygeneric world. Marlowe, playwright/detective, is in search of his muse/dame, herself enthrall to intoxicating sensual abandon, emotional numbness. She is at once the mythical Daphne, in flight from the god of poetry and his promise of ennoblement, and the Sleeping Beauty, in love with a solitary dreamworld. The excellent Sheila Joon, as a supporting actress, plays three roles that give a sense of the multi-dimensionality of the story. She is Eleanor del Toro, a hardened habitue of Frizer’s drug world, with yet a pulse of sympathy for its entrapped denizens; Nicholas Skeres, one of Frizer’s goons, and the name of one of actual playwright Marlowe’s dodgy comrades; and The Ferryman, a sleazy guide in the city sewers, who takes payment in coin and conducts Marlowe to the underworld drug den where Frizer holds Daphne captivated.

In synch with this variegated narrative, and part of the torrent that carries you headlong through the performance, Sherman’s vibrant language shifts and morphs from hard-boiled, snappy Bogart/Bacall banter, through rhythmic Beat poetics, pulpit fire and brimstone, to gin-soaked Tom Waites-ian monologues, complete with the whine of a bruised melody off in the distance (wonderful sly sonics by Will Fulton). Opening lines intoned by Marlowe, characteristically slouched against a wall, collar up, hat brim down, run:  Once upon a time there was a habit. A habit’a mine. For a time. A time. And once upon a time she hadda have it – the girl she had a habit she was mine. This sort of linguistic bravado might be annoying if it didn’t intimately serve the themes in the piece, echoing the broken time line the play deploys. Harmonious with the whole production, it’s vividly alive to its own artificiality, risking boldly, yet never quite overplaying itself, anchoring in small moments of naturalism that draw you back in. In the play’s intriguing, only pastoral moment (Chris Marlowe did after all bequeath us the lyric poem, The Passionate Shepherd to His Love), Marlowe, Daphne, and side-kick Tommy the Kid (Thomas Kyd? wink, wink, nudge, nudge!) share a star lit night by a campfire. Relaxed for once, Daphne observes – there’s a beam of light coursing through the trees. You can only see it if you blow smoke on it. I wanna live here forever. This eloquent line speaks volumes about Daphne’s character, as well as the play’s central themes.

But wait. Lunar Energy Productions (both Sherman and Gates are founding members) have to mix it up that one notch further. If you think you know everything that can happen in a noiresque rendering of a tale of dark addiction dovetailed with classical allusions and historical references, you might yet be surprised by a sudden eruption of ensemble dancing. Honest to god in-synch dance movements that might happen at a Madonna Super Bowl performance break out, complete with the skeevy, strung out, I-got-the-needful-jones jitters.

The laurels should be lavished, and shared here by all involved in this courageous production. Detailed attention has been paid in every department: scenic (Bishop), sound (Fulton), costume (Kalere Payton), and lighting (Alana Jacoby). The hard working actors deliver handsomely. Compelling leads, Christopher Fahmie and Valerie Redd, are squarely matched with supports Sheila Joon, Michael Markham, and Curry Whitmire. In her conflation of characters Christopher and Philip Marlowe, Sherman is really on to something. This is a hero that could go almost anywhere, uncovering nasty secrets; theatrical gold dust. We would all be lucky to have another installment. Meantime, Chloroform Dreams is knockout.

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While there’s nothing to indicate that Sondheim influenced Larry Kunfosky’s Your Boyfriend May Be Imaginary in any way (in fact, extensive interviews with Larry Kunofsky beforehand never once included references to The Man or the the musical I’m about to cite) we all have our own personal archives.   To me, there was an undeniable Company element (albeit an updated one) which manifested early on and lingered for most of the play.  Perhaps unintentionally Kunofsky has, in Your Boyfriend, offered up the city which Another Hundred People paid (somewhat contemptuous) homage to – the “city of strangers” with the people who “meet at parties through the friends of friends who they never know”. And as main character Marci spends the night living out the line: “I looked in vain”, another hundred people just got off of the train.

In other words – New York and its parties and crowds and social pecking order hasn’t really changed much in the 40 years since Sondheim wrote of the swarming masses of New Yorkers who gather and pretend to socialize when really they’re just desperately trying to be seen, and be seen being seen.   Your Boyfriend tosses main character Marci (an absolutely perfect Darcy Fowler) into this muddle of humanity although (by her own affectation and admission) it’s the last club in which she’s interested in truly having membership.  She’s only out on this buzzing Saturday night because it’s her six month anniversary with her boyfriend and (despite plans) he’s MIA.  His lack of phone, real address and other oddities give her little choice but to brave a tenuous labyrinth of  parties in order to seek out acquaintances who may or may not know where her “off-the-grid” boyfriend may be.  However, since Marci herself is a bit off the grid no one quite believes that this relationship exists – even as one character, Beth, concedes “Her story is elaborate.  Even if it’s fictional it’s layered … and that in and of itself is a feat.”

Clearly Marci’s not a party girl, so these parties are more hostile than hospitable to her skittish temperament.  She tries to remain as invisible as possible (“I’m not here” is her mantra of the evening) … the idea is to just get what she needs and get out. In fact,  she’s so out of her element that it hadn’t even occurred to her to dress for her destinations.  She’s wearing what she slept in, which is what she wore the day before, and she has no compunction admitting that she hasn’t showered.    This is just one of the quirks which sets Marci apart from this writhing mass of cell phones and hot music and cool eccentricity she continually encounters which hums and babbles and hugs and waves and clumps together and breaks apart but does little to actually connect on any level that matters.

“It’s kind of like Alice in Wonderland,” Kunofsky had said in his interview with me, “if Alice were an adult, had a boyfriend, couldn’t find him, and jumped into the Rabbit Hole that is all the parties that people are having in the Big City on a happening Saturday night.” And while there is a fish-out-0f-water element that parallels Alice’s there is also no denying that the “other”ness of Marci is an echo of what so many city-dwellers feel and have felt since … since they began admitting their feelings to their therapists.  But not to their friends.

Your Boyfriend May Be Imaginary featuring Zach Evenson, Debargo Sanyal, & Darcy Fowler Photo credit Meg Sturiano

Marci is one main character – the other main character is not so much a person but The Crowd itself which surrounds her.  This crowd of ubiquity babbles random things, snatches of which can be heard during scene changes, and it’s the random stuff that’s funny and inconsequential and yet somehow very important; because in this miasma of humanity where Marci is sifting and searching, these snatches of words are as valuable as anything else she will hear.  In other words: not very valuable at all.

Sometimes bits of the crowd break off to interact with her, but for the most part The Crowd remains a solid mass of something she not only cannot penetrate but – more importantly – something she wishes to have no part in.  While she’s present she’s certainly not included.  Those giving the parties would have her believe otherwise; there’s the self-centered Cassandra who - surprised to see Marci – greets her with a “Marci! I’m sorry I haven’t called or seen you or kept in touch with you in any way.  I’m so glad you’re here.” It’s like this everywhere she goes: she keeps being assured that she was invited … informally of course because really the process is so random.  More of a “you know you’re always welcome, even though we actually haven’t talked to you in … what?  Four years?” And another hundred people just got off of the train.

Cassandra (played by Risa Sarachan)  is vain and self-centered, she preens and pouts and simultaneously demands your attention while dismissing you. She has nothing to offer Marci except a lamp which Marci then carries with her throughout the play.  What seems like an odd and superfluous gesture is really a symbol of all the empty, unnecessary (and useless) pieces of comfort New Yorkers so often exchange – it’s an “OhMyGodI’mSoSorryYou’reGoingThroughThis” and a “LetMeKnowIfYouNeedAnything / WhatCanIDoToHelp?!?” empty token that, once offered, alleviates the giver of their guilt but is about as useful as … an unplugged bedside lamp in the streets of New York.

Marci, however, dutifully carries this pointless gift which serves partly as a talisman, partly as a flashlight which (unplugged after all) only underscores how useless it is at illuminating her way.  It is a metaphor for all her friends who don’t know how to help her becuase they can’t understand how she needs to be  helped.

Director Meg Sturiano makes some terrific choices that keeps the crowd feeling alive and pulsating while never being overwhelming for the small stage.  Sturiano keeps the pacing quick and energetic – allowing the surreal to coexist in the same arena as the real, which is the perfect way to encapsulate the New York scene. With repetitive moves that are distinctly choreographed to encompass everything an evening out might require (from “come here” to “go away”) Sturiano has the crowd speed up, slow down, and do exactly what Kunofsky requires of them without pulling focus from whatever may be going on at any given moment.  When necessary they fulfill the requirements of a Greek chorus, and even when not “in use”, they are never underutilized.

Characters bubble up from the crowd, distinguishing themselves, in order to move the plot along.  Besides the self-centered Cassandra there’s Toddwhatshisname (Debargo Sanyal) who is a Chelsea boy and comes complete with a trademark phrase and an inability to know his boundaries. Paul and Paula Paul (Jordan Mahome and Danielle Slavick)  make a charming couple who are just contentious enough to make you understand why the party they’re throwing is to celebrate their divorce, but just amicable enough to make you believe that they’d feel the need to celebrate this moment together rather than apart.  It’s here where Marci bumps into Hunky Dave (Quinlan Corbett) the man she’s been accused of stalking and the base-note that creates the whiff of “why don’t I believe you?” when it comes to Marci’s story about her missing beau.  Marci – so misunderstood by her “friends” – reads as desperate enough to concoct someone rather than live in the tragic wake of the rejection of a (hunky) man.

Ultimately this long evening wraps up with a shift in tempo and tone; Marci escapes the frey of the scene which exists OUT THERE and exchanges it for the one that exists IN HERE.  While the final scene serves as a calming ballast to the hectic frenetics which came before it, and while the conversation between Marci and her (perhaps only true) friend Denise (Maya Lawson) is sweet, endearing, and realer than any moment of the play, it does threaten to stretch out longer than a production of this length can handle and borders on overkill.  But then, just in time, the truly charming last few lines exchanged keep the play from toppling over.

In the end, You Boyfriend May Be Imaginary is a perfect reflection of the missed opportunities an overly social life can create.  It  illustrates the ironic fact that no matter how many people you surround yourself with, if you don’t make that connection on a deep level the person you’re telling everyone you are may as well be imaginary.

~~~

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HA! is a trio of Rich Orloff’s most popular and acclaimed one-act comedies:  Oedi, a parody of Oedipus Rex, The News From St. Petersburg, a Chekhovian spoof set in 1905 Russia, and The Whole Shebang which portrays the entire universe as just a college student’s masters thesis on another dimension.  What they all have in common is a talented cast, and a base-note of comedy which ranges from the absurdly silly to the thoughtfully facetious giving audiences an opportunity to indulge in every kind of laugh from the titter to the snort to the guffaw. Coincidentally all three plays just happen to take place at 4:00 in the afternoon.

Each member of the talented cast has an opportunity to play multiple roles throughout the evening as they traverse from ancient Rome to the well appointed living room of the Russian Aristocracy, to, ultimately, some nebulous region that sits high above the universe we call home.

Gerrianne Raphael, Mike Smith Rivera, Evan Thompson and Jarel Davidow

Oedi takes us to the land of Thebes, where the king is meeting with his advisor (and brother-in-law) Creon as well as the blind old seer, Tiresias.  As delicately as possible they are trying to explain the situation Oedipus got himself into when he fulfilled the prophecy.  No spoilers here – poor Oedi killed his dad and married his mom, Jocasta.   While he’s devastated and trying to deal with this news it seems Jocasta takes it all in stride.  In fact, she wasn’t in the dark at all – and sees marrying her son as simply in keeping with tradition.  ”Look at the Gods,” she proclaims. “The immortal Zeus has slept with his half-sister, his quarter-sister, his sixteenth-sister. If our own immortal gods get to diddle their relatives, why can’t you?” When Oedi protests Jocasta remarks, “Must you make everything so complex, Oedipus?”

Oedi is filled with rim-shots and one-liners; broad humor which swings wide and never fails to telegraph a wink to the audience.  This serious story is all in good fun, and with Mike Smith Rivera playing Oedi as an overblown comical fist-shaker the audience can’t help but laugh their way through this one-act.

The News From St. Petersburg finds the landowner Fyodor and his wife Anya, discussing what passes for the important matters of the day: does the sky turn black or does it turn a dark blue towards evening? The rest of the conversation is a delightful poke at Chekhovian text as neighbors with multi-syllabic names are referenced.  Aekseyevich Kulibin and Semon Penteleyevich Rogov and Ivan Konstantinovich Begushkin just to name a few. After which Fyodor muses “I hear that in America, there are people named Bob.”

Into this discussion comes their friend, the good doctor Nikolai who is there to deliver news of revolt and uprising and revolution.  Sasha the servant tells of freedom marches, and the entire household is turned upside down by the news.  At least, it appears to be.  By the time the good doctor leaves fact is separated from fiction and we find that the news which traveled through the lower ranks was more idealization than realization. Fyodor and Anya are as they were in the beginning, completely unaffected by the events and, just as when we met them, riding out the late winter afternoon until dinner.

The final piece of the evening is The Whole Shebang – a clever situation that gives us a student delivering his master’s thesis. Without fanfare he explains that he devised a “self-sustaining and self-evolving, matter-based ecosystem in a universe of three dimensions. And so I created the heavens and the earth.” From here the entire act fashions this nerdy, eager student as The Almighty Creator who must now define and defend all he has created to his two professors.  While discussing various aspects of the universe, ultimately the entire success boils down to the creation of human beings.  Two people are brought in as examples and even though somehow they’re the wrong 2 subjects (and don’t give as exemplary a picture as the student would have hoped) the conversation which ensues is both amusing as well as clever and a great fable that holds up a mirror to humanity and speaks to our reliance as a species.

Jarel Davidow, Anne Fizzard, Gerrianne Raphael, Mike Smith Rivera, and Evan Thompson play well off each other and create a wonderful atmosphere where Orloff’s lines are able to zing and bounce for best comic effect.  Each actor does a solid job of bringing new spark to each role; every time the lights come up they have completely transformed themselves and yet  consistently  deliver  laughs.

Just as thoughtful as it is funny, HA! is a well staged show that features a terrific cast.  Definitely a great night of theatre that has as many lessons as it does laughs.

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The Real Thing featuring Synge Maher & David Nelson

Art imitates life.  Life imitates art.  Often times -for the life of a playwright- the lines are so blurred that it’s almost impossible to distinguish realism from hyper-realism or acting from genuine feeling and emotion.  When fact and fiction can no longer be untangled it isn’t always easy to recognize if the words you’re hearing are being spoken from the heart or simply being recreated from a scene plucked from the past.   Somewhere amid all this, one would hope to find The Real Thing.

Written by Tom Stoppard and first performed in 1982 The Real Thing hardly shows signs of being a 30 year old play; in fact Boomerang Theatre Company’s production directed by Cailin Heffernan now playing at The Secret Theater in Long Island City is vibrant, cunning, engaging and smart.  It brims over with the kind of energy that makes live, independent theatre so absolutely vital and important, and throughout the 2 hour show everything comes together to make what amounts to a gift to the audience.

The play centers around two British couples who are bound by marriage but straining against those binds.   Who exactly is married to whom isn’t directly obvious at first as Stoppard creates a slight of hand by giving us a play within a play as the first scene.   It’s enjoyable and weighty with plummy words and an idiosyncratic male lead, but it does teeter dangerously close to having the ability to turn grating should it go on for too long.  No sooner does the needle veer into the red does the scene end and the next scene reveals (slowly at first, which is the charm of it) that what was just witnessed was a play written by Henry (Aidan Redmond), one which is then poked at by his wife Charlotte (Valerie Stanford) and Max (David Nelson) who only moments before played husband and wife.

Max’s wife Annie (Synge Maher) soon arrives to round out the foursome and as the two couples chatter and regroup it becomes clear that Annie and Henry have been having a searing love affair, one which Annie insists they make public so that they can move on and be together.

What ensues over the next hours is a clever weaving of pure human need at it’s basest.  Love rises and falls, and with it – trust.  Marriages unform and reform, strong, then weak as passion is no longer enough to keep nagging thoughts away.  And, as promised, the first scene is played over and over again in various forms as each character finds themselves imitating the art that was either a foreshadowing or an homage to these lives.

The Real Thing featuring Aidan Redmon & Synge Mager

Through it all, Stoppard finds ways to display wonderful moments of thoughtfulness that come across as neither pedantic nor preachy, simply as the kinds of conversations people have when they are at the crossroads – not once but several times over.

Cailin Heffernan’s direction is marvelous; so many of the defining traits of the main characters are unpleasant, and their motives are selfish, however Heffernan summons a duality in each character so that they are always understandable, always relatable – if not in deed then at least in motive.

The entire cast is amazing. Aidan Redmond’s Henry is absolutely fantastic. Here is a man who struggles with his inward demons, often casts them off onto others, and yet still has the ability to take a moment and guide his daughter through the minefields of early adulthood.  Redmond plays Henry with the kind of sneer that makes you want to leave your phone number tucked into his back pocket – even as you walk away muttering about how conceited he is. Synge Maher as Annie and Valerie Stanford as Charlotte play their parts perfectly – each wed to him and wife to him — differently because they themselves are as different as can be.  Yet each the perfect balance to Redmond and just what he needs at a particular moment of his life.

Special mention goes to Zach Calhoon who plays Billy – he plays the young man vying for Annie’s affections with all the acting back-flips that any actor would use when trying to impress his co-star; and while the part is meant to be showy Calhoon pulls it off without overdoing it.  He is a joy to watch.

With just a few shows left, The Real Thing should not be missed.  Playing at The Secret Theater, don’t let this show be a secret too long.

~~~

Boomerang Theatre Company presents
THE REAL THING
by Tom Stoppard; directed by Cailin Heffernan

The Secret Theatre
4402 23rd Street
Long Island City, NY 11101

Click Here for tickets

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The Thing About Dan, which ran last month, was the first play mounted by Slightly Altered States Theater Company,  written and directed by Sari Caine Glickstein, created in collaboration with actor Michael Hurst (Paul) and improviser Louis Kornfeld ( Zip).

The production was very warmly received and many of the nights the cast was playing to sold-out houses.  Talking with Sari Caine Glickstein before the show she said, “We want to show a reality that’s a little to the left — to show that everyone’s particular reality is questionable.”

The Thing About Dan is a very good  first show to highlight Slightly Altered Productions mission and niche, in that it is all about us asking ourselves “What is really real in this play?” and more than that, what is truly real in our beliefs, and in our interactions with others?  Though subtle at times, it is nevertheless very clever  and well-intentioned in the final calculation.   Sari’s vision brought to life with the help of the rest of the newly formed company has helped Slightly Altered Productions receive 501c3 status quickly and they have an exciting lineup of plays in the pipeline for the rest of the year.

The Thing About Dan was a very interesting play in that the two characters are quirky and amusing to watch.  They give us some insightful ideas to think about, but their Swiss cheesed personalities make it difficult to figure out what is really happening versus what they believe is happening.  The main theme of the play is – What do you do when you life suddenly “falls apart”?  You rely on your friends to help you find meaning.  But what if one of them helps you find out how little meaning  your life might actually have?

The play starts with two old friends waiting for Dan.  This is to be a special weekend of roasting a pig together while watching football – real guy time.  But what’s keeping Dan? We start to see the particular quirks that bind Zip and Paul to each other and alienate them from their wives.

Zip is quirky and almost insane in an eclectic yet friendly way.  He’s sincere and loyal to a fault, just passing through life.  This makes it so that the things which are important to most people – like intimacy  and normal social interaction – are left by the wayside as he focuses instead on his over-elaborate thoughts.

Paul by contrast seems remarkably normal until he starts bringing up his news about Dan.  Apparently Dan has been sleeping with both of their wives for the better part of a year and apparently these wives are leaving (or may have already left) their husbands for Dan on this very day of the big pig roast.  One note to each husband is offered as proof, and this prompts both men to conclude that the logical thing to do now is to wait in the empty house, both armed and ready to take out Dan once he arrives … if he arrives?

In the end we have two notes that seem to tie the unreal to their victims like some sort like of Waiting For Godot except instead of waiting for meaning to come to them, they are trapped by their meanings, their roles, their abilities to achieve what doesn’t need to be done.

The Thing About Dan poses an existential quandary, one in which Dan really doesn’t actually need to exist at all.  His friends could decide to blame him for their issues or they could choose to please him.  Who Dan is and what he does is actually besides the point.

We can see a lot of ourselves in the two characters we see on stage both from who they are as well as from the mirror of who they are.  What this play illustrates so specifically is that if two people aren’t talking about the same thing there’s no real meaning between them. Do you really have a problem if no one sees it?  Can you make a problem not a problem if you deny your own need to change so much?  Does it make sense to blame everything on someone else?

Dan could be whatever cypher we decide to place on him.  It’s an interesting play that makes you think hard about how well you might know anyone (even yourself) because the perceptional filter is skewed just enough to make us want to figure out what is wrong or right about their plight.

Before the play began a live  musician (Roosevelt Dime but others played on different nights) played the blues.  He sticks around in the corners of this drama – an observer who makes the story (a story where no one is sure of what is actually happening) True.   Dime did a great job imparting meaning to the audience with various ambient strums  and picks on the guitar which tell about the characters’ internal workings more than their words did.

Effective sound and lighting design (sound by Gary Ferrar and lighting by Derek Wright) created realistic tones of weather which helped the audience to perceive the environment Zip and Paul find themselves in.  Seeing the actors react at one loud crash or the wind or other noises makes us truly feel the isolation they feel both externally and internally.  The picture is rounded out by the great set design of Willie Groom, depicting an ideal bachelor pad. It included a variety of  strategy games like Risk and Settlers of Catan and other diversions we can tell the guys have spent many hours puzzling out together in the many years of their friendship both before and after meeting Dan.

If this play is remounted I urge you to go and see it, in order to see a new thing about yourself as Paul and Zip try to figure out The Thing About Dan in this punchy story about the hidden recesses of our friends.

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