Liz Douglas, Lori E. Parquet, Becky Byers, & Chris Wight

A few weeks ago when I interviewed playwright Liz Duffy Adams about her new play, Dog Act, now playing at the Flamboyan Theatre, she told me “I love stories about how people recreate social/political systems and civilization in the midst of catastrophe, and protect human culture through the darkest of times. So having the central characters be performers who are the sole source of art in a very dark future seemed exciting to me, and potentially theatrical.”  In a nutshell, this is what Ms. Adams set out to do, and it is exactly what she did.  Under Kelly O’Donnell’s masterful direction Dog Act manages to artfully combine the darkness and desolation of a lost world with the lightness and hope that is the very spirit of the theatre – be it vaudeville or otherwise.

The advantage of creating a world which no one has ever experienced before is that there are no rules which can be broken.  And so, in this world of Adams’ we have a society where it’s possible for a man to exist in servitude as a dog, a society where a Vaudevillian is as sacred and off-limits to the tribe of cannibals as the cows in India, and a world where seasons change at whim, in no particular order, and with no particular pattern.   Tribes have aligned themselves according to rules which simply worked out that way.  Although alliances may be forged quickly, with very little to base them on, you’re playing fast and loose with your future by choosing to trust the hand that is stretched out  before you in friendship.

When we come upon Zetta Stone (played with sparkle, charm and just a bit of mischief by Lori E. Parquet) she is with her Dog (Chris Wight) travelling along the desolate roads on the way to what they hope will be their salvation – in this case: China.  Through conversation we find that their troupe was bigger at one time but the harshness of the wandering life caused their company to splinter; now all that remains is Dog, Zetta, and their determination to get to China.  Zetta is unflinching in her quest, and it is here where she resembles a Don Quixote of sorts (albeit far less mad), not so much tilting at windmills but rather tapping across plains, playing the spoons, and singing upbeat songs of high-hoped hereafter.

Of course, into each life a little rain must fall – and this rain comes in the form of Vera Similitude (Liz Douglas) and her wild companion, Jo-Jo the Bald-Faced Liar (Becky Byers) who are obviously not Vaudevillians but are passing themselves off as such in order to keep moving safely.  Stir these four together, each with their quirks, habits and secrets and the plot begins to bubble up, revealing hidden forks in the road.  Ultimately, where they all end up is precisely where they were meant to be.   But how they get there . . . well, that’s the Dog Act.

Adams’ script, as well as her story, have an innate rhythm and melody which is captured uniquely by each member of the cast.  Whereas Parquet’s Zetta is the smooth, flowing underscore which unites the scenes and holds the play together, Wight’s Dog provdes the deeper, more mournful tones which bring you to the dark spots of this land’s history and culture.  His story is aching and bittersweet – a good man with a bad past.  Douglas’ Vera provides the dissonance – alluring and proud themes covering a side to her character which is not so much evil as it is bent on survival at any cost.  If this means a bit of deception, or even a bit of dissection – well, what’s a woman to do?  And Byers’s Jo-Jo crackles throughout like the crash of a cymbal – she is electric not only when performing her monologues, but even when sitting to the side, muttering.  A bit like Lord Of The Ring’s Gollum, she is the young product of what this new world has created.  Kelly O’Donnell’s intuitive direction intertwines these melodies to orchestrate the landscape of Adams’ Dog Act and deliver a fully realized, perfectly created piece of theatre.

Capped off by Lara de Bruijn’s costumes, which manage to both mimic and create fashion simultaneously, and Jason Paradine’s set design – which includes a wagon that, at times, nearly steals the show – the universe of Dog Act is complete.

For any of you who keep wondering – Is there a Dog? The answer is: yes. Dog does exists. Go to the Flamboyan Theater and see for yourself.

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Becky Byers as Cynthia in The Little One

A somewhat hackneyed vampire genre gets an absolute and terrific makeover in James Comtois’s play, The Little One (directed by Pete Boisvert).

Cynthia (Becky Byers), a young, recently “turned” vampling, faces challenges in her new life after being bitten by a troubled male vampire who liked to “play with his food before he ate it” and who puts a wood stick through his heart shortly after, committing  vampacide.

Marie (Rebecca Comtois), a seasoned motherly vampiress takes Cynthia under her wing to teach the girl about rights and wrongs and dos and don’ts of her new brutal and biting world. After a short crash course on the holistic approach to hunting, feeding and survival, Marie sends her fledgling off to be presented to Gogol – a tattooed, mean and nasty skinhead, who governs the vampiredom by his own rules. Gogol plays a cruel trick on Cynthia, telling her she failed the test and would be put to sleep. Scared, Cynthia puts up a furious fight, suddenly discovering how strong she is even by vampire standards, breaks a leg off an old wooden chair and kills one of Gogol’s goons. Gogol cites Cynthia her rights as “Thou should not kill thou’s own kind,” and puts her in the vault for two years – a relatively mild misdemeanor- type rebuke for an immortal creature who despises light and doesn’t know what to do with all that lifetime she’s got on her hands.

Marie patiently sits outside the vault until Cynthia’s sentence ends – she once had been in a vault herself for twenty years so she wants her unfortunate juvenile delinquent to know there’s a kind soul waiting for her. But when Cynthia is released, she angrily refuses Marie’s support and takes off on her own. She misses her old life so she tries to return to her mother and friends, but she can only see them after dusk, she doesn’t do too well within the proximity of her mother’s crucifix, plus refrigerated blood tastes horribly. No wander Cynthia finally gives up and returns to her adoptive Mama Vampiress.

The play cleverly educates us about the challenges and dilemmas of a vampire’s life, which, by Marie’s definition are nothing to be ashamed of – “It’s just biology.” Some of Marie’s friends have a different opinion. Sergei (Christopher Yustin), a typical intellectual Russian with a philosophical bent (who has his Russian act down to a tee – the accent, the demeanor, and even the way of standing too close to the person he talks to) argues that while vampires are indeed evil creatures, “they are not noble, but not un- noble either.” The meaning of that statement becomes clearer as we learn more about this peculiar blood-sucking nation that battles its own political issues, greed and quests for power, some of which are solved by a wooden stick through the heart. As time goes on and centuries fly, Cynthia finds out that in addition to the long chain of corpses left behind, vampires also have bodies in the closet – Gogol and Marie including. And when things suddenly take an unexpected turn and she looses her guardian vampiress’ protection, she realizes she may have crossed Gogol’s path simply by being Marie’s little one.

With professionally staged fights by Qui Nguyen, beautifully implemented ominous lighting by Daniel Winters and portentous Goth-style costumes designed by Betsy Strong this two-hour show ends too soon, like a good book that you wanted to keep reading. Beautifully incarnated by the entire bloodthirsty cast, the alternate reality unwraps itself, pulling us into Cynthia’s journey, a mix of sweet innocence and vicious temper, acted so wickedly well that we root for her rather than our own kind. The Little One is a play that kidnaps you from modern day East Village reality and drops you into the vampire’s den with total immersion – similar to how J.K. Rowling throws her readers into her mysterious and magical universe, parallel to yet interconnected with our own.

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