I had seen Rabbit Hole Ensemble’s The Tragic Story of Doctor Frankenstein (written by Stanton Wood and directed by Edward Elefterion) just a few short months ago  and was so deeply impressed with the way it was presented that I was eagerly anticipating the second of the series  Doctor Frankenstein’s Magical Creature.   Another joint venture between Wood and Elefterion, Magical Creature tells both the same tale as Tragic Story as well as a completely different one; in a Rashomon type undertaking it retells the events from the perspective of the creature. Fear not – while you’ll recognize the bones of the original story (if you saw it) you most certainly are in for an entertaining evening as you watch the events unfold from the other side.

Having seen part one will give you a richer relationship with Magical Creature but it is by no means required in order to enjoy the piece; this production is as visceral, terrifying and heart-racing as its companion play.  Those familiar with part one will be glad to see that the wonderful Emily Hartford reprises her role as the reanimated being who becomes “the creature”.  Ms. Hartford is a powerful actress, deeply moving as this creature who is emotionally and physically spent with the daily struggle of simply existing.  As a matter of fact, so heavy is her burden that her role is divided and played by two actresses – Ms. Hartford often acts as narrator as an earlier incarnation of herself played by Jocelyn O’Neil  does a superb job of laying bare the absolute fear, isolation, need, and dread that the creature faces as she is thrown to the wilderness to fend for herself.

Elise Knight once again reprises her role as the brilliant but misguided doctor Victoria Frankenstein who gave life to the creature – and she is as compelling as she was in the story which highlighted her own dark journey.

Arthur Aulisi plays all the male roles – he is Victoria’s father as well as her husband  and also breaks your heart as the blind man whom The Creature initially begs for friendship.  He handles all these roles masterfully, and with grace – weaving in and out of the tapestry of what is really a woman’s story.

Once again, the use of Nikki Dillon and Rachel Pearl as Kuroko is amazingly effective and utterly necessary to the piece.  By this second installation they have mastered the skill so fully that I couldn’t imagine this performance happening without them.

With just two performance left of Magical Creature now would be the time to go.  However, the good news is that if seeing the second makes you wish you had seen the first you’ll be able to see both halves united as a whole later in the year as Rabbit Hole Ensemble completes their year of Frankenstein with a full production that features both sides of this amazing story.  Personally, I can’t wait to see it all again.

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Related Posts:

• That’s Quite A Story – The Tragic Story Of Doctor Frankenstein
• Two Themes For The Price Of One: “Before Your Very Eyes”

There is a very good reason why some stories are told under the cover of darkness – hidden from the world and everything that takes place during the mundane trivialities of the day.  Because some stories aren’t meant for the daylight.  Only a blanket of blackest night will give some words that extra visceral thrill, only the the anonymity of the night can help create that tension that starts racing along every nerve ending – only darkness will give some stories the ability to make your heart race . . . will draw your lips together – will make you believe that the words are true.

The Tragic Story of Doctor Frankenstein (written by Stanton Wood and directed by Edward Elefterion) is just one of those stories – a tell-it-in-the-dark story: so when it starts in the dark, crackling terrifyingly to life before remaining partially hidden, a little chill of anticipation runs up your spine.  You may not know what to expect from this story – but your racing heart is telling you all you need to know about how it will end.

Elefterion frames this work organically – the stage is bare and everything that is necessary to tell the tale is crafted and created from the people who creep about the stage.   The lighting design is reminiscent of campfire ghost stories – strong lights beaming hotly and casting shadows – carving faces into ghoulish masks.  The sound design is equally unprocessed – hisses of train breaks, whispers, crackles, and every sound both necessary and nightmarish are the product of two very talented women -  Lauren Cook and Nikki Dillon who also act as props when necessary.

Beyond the staging, there’s another reason this Tragic Story pulls you in.  It is completely unexpected – though not without precedent.  For the Doctor Frankenstein is Doctor Victoria Frankenstein (Elise Knight)  – a brilliant , beautiful, tortured doctor who lives in a world she creates from her mind, with mostly herself for company.  So much so that she’s splintered herself off – and a second Victoria (Jocelyn O’Neil) exists to aid when necessary, to take over when necessary . . . to help support the enormity of the weight that’s on this fair doctor’s shoulders.  After all . . . she did manage to reanimate a lovely dead body – only to then find herself horrified by her own actions.  She’s got to be able to share that burden with someone – even if the other person is just an offshoot of her insanity.  In effect, this trio  becomes a strange family unto itself – Victorias 1 and 2, with the “Child” (Emily Hartford)  acting as the completion of this unholy trinity.

Emily Hartford as this reanimated corpse had me frightened beyond belief.  For much of the beginning of the play she does little besides lurk and lunge, and – without that wall of protection (a movie or TV screen) the immediacy of her terrifying presences was a little too much to bear.    A few times the lights went out completely and I was grateful that I’d chose to sit in the last row up against the wall  – knowing that she couldn’t pop up behind me.  Slowly, however, this monster/child’s terrifying persona goes from merely a grunting, gasping, groping thing to an eloquent being who explains her torment to her creator in heartbreaking detail.  She’s almost more frightening when she can put words to the barren emptiness she’s doomed to exist in.

Arthur Aulisi is the lone male of this production – he plays Zachary (Victoria’s long-suffering sweetheart who doesn’t fare well by the end) in addition to the other male characters of the play.   He is particularly touching as Victoria’s father who stands by the sidelines and suffers as he watches his daughter disintegrate.

Ultimately, however, this play belongs to the women – the two tragic sides of Victoria who create a shattered tableau and become more seamless as the play moves on – and their unfortunate creation, the unwanted Child who Victoria can neither liberate nor obliterate.  She has started this – and she must see it through till the tragic end.

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Related Posts:

• Doctor Frankenstein’s Magical Creature – Cries In The Dark
• Two Themes For The Price Of One: “Before Your Very Eyes”
• A Wonderfully Flat Thing – Or A Journey Into Your Imagination
• Cake: When All Else Fails, Eat It (Planet Connections 2010)

How you feel about Before Your Very Eyes (Written and Directed by Edward Elefterion) depends very much upon the person you are, what you believe about the events of 9/11, and whether or not you are a person who trusts what they see and takes it for truth, or if you are a person who needs evidence to support everything before you’ll believe it.

Before Your Very Eyes starts off as a piece about raw emotion – but quickly becomes a piece about something quite different.  For the rest of the play it vacillates between moments of poetic beauty and moments of uncompromising activism.

Bobby Abido, Damon Pooser and Sanam Erfani

The play begins with a scene that brought an event that happened almost a decade ago right back to the present day – two woman: Kate (Elyse Knight) and Evonne (Diana DeLaCruz) waiting in hyper hysteria for word from their husbands, John and Erik.  The disembodied voice of Erik’s cell message (Arthur Aulisi) is ghastly and a little too vivid; Kate is almost burned by what she hears Evonne’s husband Eric yell into the phone.  And hearing the last words of this desperate man only makes her believe more strongly that her own husband, John, will be coming home safely.

When John (Damon Pooser) actually does walk through the door it’s a relief, but a short-lived one.  Now begins the story of how tragedy effects people differently, and how people can abandon each other emotionally when what they’re really trying to do is find one another in the ashes.  The point, and theme, illustrated most poignantly by John and Kate and even Evonne’s story is that the people who were left to deal with the emotional fissure of 9/11 often felt most abandoned not by those who died but rather by those who lived and could no longer connect with each other.

Before Your Very Eyes quickly folds in a second story thread; that of Amir (Bobby Abido) and Lakshmi (Sanam Erfani) who also lost someone during the World Trade Center collapse.  Amir, an inquisitive person by nature, spends that fateful September day snapping photos of what he sees, including people jumping from the buildings.  Confounded by the pieces that don’t add up to him, and wracked with grief over the loss of his brother, Amir begins to amass information he concludes is evidence that the World Trade Center event was an inside job.

At first Lakshmi is terrified by what she perceives as Amir’s crazy ranting.  But soon enough she too becomes convinced that there are a few too many things that don’t make sense to her.  Together they build a website, and eventually a documentary using user-submitted information as evidence to strongly build their case. They address in conversation their need to separate themselves from the “crazies” who are coming up with such ridiculous theories as the event being caused by “Reptilian shape-shifting aliens”.  Amir’s ardent research brings him in contact with both Evonne and John and one by one,  the stories start to go deeper.

If  you are someone who refuses to sit by and be told what to believe, then the Amir character will resonant very strongly with you.  Bobby Abido plays Amir with an anxious energy, he is in constant motion both physically as well as mentally.  As Amir he knows that time has run out and he must do what he can to show people that there is a story that they’re not being told.

Elyse Knight and Damon Pooser

If you are someone who believes the inward journey is more important that the events around you,  then the Kate character will be your strongest guide through this play.  Elyse Knight takes Kate from panicked to grateful to confused to frustrated, and when she delivers a line to her husband that says (paraphrasing) “Last year I couldn’t wait for you to come home.  Now I wish you never had!” you can feel the anguish she’s going through – as if the World Trade Center spit back a husband from its depths that resembled the man she loved but one who acted completely differently and couldn’t connect with her in the same way ever again.

I”m not sure how I feel about these two themes being mixed together.  Do I think they can co-exist within the same conversation?  Yes.  But do I think they can exist equally - plot-wise  – in the same play?  Not as much.  Each topic is weighty, therefore each carries the mark of a main plot.  Two very strong themes seemingly fighting for the spotlight, neither being relegated to the role of sub-plot does not always equal a play that finds that sweet spot.  While the character of John seems to be the true thread that ties both ends of the story together, I’m not sure that the character creates enough of a balance between the two worlds.  While Damon Pooser does an excellent job with the character of John, there is a large responsibility put on that character’s shoulders.   Overall, I felt Before Your Very Eyes was too sentimental to be strong cautionary tale, but then it was too radical to be an emotional story.  And yet, for some, that may be the perfect way to tell a 9/11 story – for that may be exactly where their own feelings of 9/11 come to rest.  In that respect then this play is a great voice for those who are still confused by the events.

The good news is, if this subject intrigues you, but if you feel puzzled, or driven, or emotional, or anything at all after the performance, you can stick around for a talk back with the ensemble and explore your own feelings with some lively discussion.  Additionally, some  special post show panels will be held:

Friday June 11th: “Historical Events and the Media” – MJ Robinson, Ph.D.

Saturday June 12th: “Memory, Media and Misrecognition” – Marion Wrenn, Ph. D.

Related Posts:

• Doctor Frankenstein’s Magical Creature – Cries In The Dark
• That’s Quite A Story – The Tragic Story Of Doctor Frankenstein
• It’s A Triple Play For Natalie Menna!
• Every Dog (Act) Has Its Day – An Interview With Playwright Liz Duffy Adams