Ever been in a dead end job and it seemed like you were going nowhere?  Everyday the same routine?  Well the title characters of the play Ye Elizabeths have been doing just that for the last several years – and they couldn’t be happier.  They work as reenactors for the Old Salem Township Living History Museum, and are very content  (at least in a superficial way) with the set routines and repetitive but amusing dialogue they have as historical figures.  They also find comfort in the predictable ways their friendship plays out.  But what happens when the perfect job (dead-end or not) goes away?  Who will they be then? 

As the lights dim and then the spot lights come up again, we are launched suddenly into the world of Ye Elizabeths with a fun musical number outlining the premise of the story.  The two heroines (both named Elizabeth) introduce themselves and their world with expert piano accompaniment by Evan Gregory.

We’re reenacting history
From the 17th century
Through our characters we live vicariously
Because we don’t have lives of our own …

They have adventures (like the time when blood from the chicken slaughterers got in their eye and didn’t go away for a month), and gossip about the newbies.  They endure the curse of Wilawamat, and drool over (or disparage) the popular “Pilgrim Plantation” (a reality show about reenactors of the Pilgrim era which we get to see snippets of via a multimedia component of the show expertly and entertainingly done by Jeremy Mather). They also have numerous competitive verbal jousting matches about who is more desperate in one way or another.  Oh and there’s running. “Running’s our favorite”.

Mockucomedramady should be a term made especially for this show.  It quite successfully walks the fine line between slapstick and broad humor, highlighting the special tension between the two Elizabeths played by  Erin Leigh Schmoyer and Alicia Barnatchez.   One such moment is captured perfectly in the song Break-up which they perform in the climactic scene of the show.  With belting power ballad performed by Alicia  interlaced with the beating drum of Erin eviscerating her with rapid staccato in between her notes, we all hold our breath waiting to see how long the spell of their banishment from each other will take to weave. This is a really fun piece showcasing the talent of all three performers – Schmoyer,  Barnatchez and Gregory.

There are at least 3 strong threads weaving through this play.  There is the musical, which in and of itself is very catchy.  Then there is the mockumentary aspect which follows the same vein as Christopher Guest films.  The final and most thoughtful thread is the actual theme: What does it mean to have “a life”?  If you are feeling trapped, maybe you are.  It’s good to be good at what you do and be comfortable, but sometimes you just need to try something else if you’re going to get anywhere.

Alicia Barnatchez and Erin Leigh Schmoyer (Photo by Mike Gregoreksm)

One of the duo is dubbed “Elizasmith” for her aptitude for historical re-enactment of copper smithing and other tinkering, and the other is called “Elizabox” since she is an oxen interpreter who stands upon  a wood box  for the tourists who come through the stations each day.  She relays what the oxen are trying to communicate (“They don’t speak English”).

Elizasmith (Schmoyer) was born into the job being a “duo” with her mom since she was a baby.  In a way, Elizasmith is the more bitter of the two, but also sharper in many ways usually winning the verbal jousting matches the Elizabeths have with each other.  However, she is definitely much less worldly.

Elizabox (Barnatchez) is passionate for her work, and just wants to be the best at it what she is doing.  She wants to stay happy and stable with her friend who seems even more lost than she is.

One humorous meta-comic joke that recurs is simply the style of acting.  Even though the characters are in love with the idea of living in the times of the Pilgrims, in many ways they would fit more in the times of Vaudeville, what with their slapstick antics. It is almost a neo-Vaudvillian style taking the best of slapstick and inserting other more modern improv techniques.  Director Leah Bonvissuto’s hand is well played as she seamlessly moves from one form of story telling or multimedia expression to another while never missing a beat.

In terms of multi-media, the film clips range in style from that of reality show to classic silent movie which illustrates the duo transitioning from the world of Old Salem Township to the more alien outside world of imaginary motel rooms.  The two co-musical directors, Sarah Gregory and Evan  Gregory incorporate a diverse score – one that includes everything from the classic show tune to a smoky jazz song sung by the piano player during a scene change to a power ballad or two.

Erin Leigh Schmoyer and Alicia Barnatchez (Photo by Mike Gregorek)

Though there were a few rough edges in the production Barnatchez and Schmoyer do a great job showcasing the fun of this show, and Evan and Sarah Gregory have written some charming and amusing songs.

The ending might have been a little too pat, but for Ye Elisabeths it actually worked.  It drove home the message that maybe we can’t expect a perfect happily-ever-after for ourselves like we see in Ye Elizabeths, but we can sure try.

If you’re feeling down, this show is just the thing to perk you up.  It’s definitely funny and energizing, and it’s a little like hiding spinach in brownies: you get something good for you in what you though was just something basic and sweet.

~~~

Ye Elizabeths
Benefiting: Girls, Inc.
Produced by Easter Punny Productions
Written & Performed by Alicia Barnatchez and Erin Leigh Schmoyer
Directed by Leah Bonvissuto

$18 General Admission
$9.00 for Film/Music Participants
FREE for Theatre Festivity Participants

Saturday 6/2/12 – 5:00pm = Performance #1
Thursday 6/7/12 – 7:00pm = Performance #2
Friday 6/15/12 – 8:30pm = Performance #3
Saturday 6/16/12 – 3:00pm = Performance #4
Tuesday 6/19/12 – 8pm = Performance #5

50 minutes

At Bleecker Street Theatre (Upstairs)
45 Bleecker Street, New York, NY 10012
Conveniently located near:
Bleecker St (4 & 6)
Broadway – Lafayette St (B, D, F, M)
Prince St (N, R)
click here to purchase tickets

Related Posts:

• Ye Elizabeths – 5 Things To Know About The Show Before You Go (2012 Planet Connections Festivity)
• Pageant Princess – Music, Make-Up And Meltdowns (2012 Planet Connections Festivity)
• Cake: When All Else Fails, Eat It (Planet Connections 2010)
• What The F* Is Going On? F*It Club’s Spring Fling!
• The Extraordinary Fall of the Four-Legged Woman: 10 Things To Know About The Show Before You Go (2016 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)

Ye Elizabeths

Benefiting: Girls, Inc.
Produced by Easter Punny Productions
Written & Performed by Alicia Barnatchez and Erin Leigh Schmoyer
Directed by Leah Bonvissuto

“Elizabeth and Elizabeth are historical re-enactors, on a low-rent version of Plimoth Plantation. When it goes the way of the buffalo, they must learn how to marry their Pilgrim lives to modern times. Their answer? Reality TV. So, update your smallpox vaccine, hop aboard this multi-media Mayflower, and prepare to get colonized…again!”

Show Times:

• Sat 6/2/12 – 5:00pm
• Thur 6/7/12 – 7:00pm
• Fri 6/15/12 – 8:30pm
• Sat 6/16/12 – 3:00pm
• Tue 6/19/12 – 8pm

Answers by Alicia Barnatchez & Erin Leigh Schmoyer (writers/performers/producers)

Karen Tortora-Lee’s Question
How did you come up with the title for your show?
Alicia & Erin Leigh:  The title came from our protagonists both being names Elizabeths, (as was true of many a Pilgrim lady settler).

Diánna Martin’s Question
If you were going to invite 5 people (from the past or present) to see your show – who would you invite … and why?
Alicia & Erin Leigh:  William Bradford to see if he enjoyed the way we repped his pilgrim people.  Beatrice Arthur, Estelle Getty, Rue McClanahan & Betty White, because they’re the golden girls.

Antonio Minino’s Question
What is the biggest sacrifice you’ve made for your art and was it worth it?
Alicia & Erin Leigh: We feel like any sacrifices we may have made along the way pale in comparison to those of our Pilgrim settlers, who risked everything, including their lives to find new hope for freedom in the new world.

Geoffrey Paddy Johnson’s Question
Was there any unexpected discovery made during the development of this production and can you share it with us?
Alicia & Erin Leigh:  We were surprised and psyched that we were able to write songs without the ability to play musical instruments.

Michelle Augello-Page’s Question
What do you hope the audience receives from the experience of seeing this show?
Alicia & Erin Leigh: A reminder that even in your bleakest moments, the ability to laugh can give you hope, and that you should let your best friend know just how much she or he means to you.  You’d be a quivering mass of jello without her!

___

Planet Connections runs from May 30 – June 24 at The Bleecker Street Theater located at 45 Bleecker Street, New York, NY. To purchase tickets to this or any of the shows click here.

Related Posts:

• Ye Elizabeths: Living Vicariously Because … (2012 Planet Connections Festivity)
• Bubby’s Shadow: Whose Shadow Is It? (2012 Planet Connections Festivity)
• The American Play (2012 Planet Connections Festivity)
• Scene/Unseen – 5 Things To Know About The Show Before You Go (2012 Planet Connections Festivity)
• Coyote On A Fence – FREE Staged Reading – 5 Things To Know About The Show Before You Go (2012 Planet Connections Festivity)

Marie Antoinette is famous for the saying, “Let them eat cake!”

Whether she actually said it or not doesn’t really matter in the face of history or the minds of the people whose rumor-mill worked overtime and managed to get her head in the guillotine anyway.

Cake (written by Felipe Ossa and directed by Leah Bonvissuto) helps us to imagine what would happen approximately 200 years later if  - instead of a monarch – we get someone like Dana Dunnigan (Ramona Floyd) who lives on the conservative right and has a radio talk show where her celebrity and the power of her notoriety among her detractors very well might lead to her beheading too.  It’s the glorification by an adoring fan-base, determined to save her,  that helps keep her around.

We enter the story as Dana replies to people calling into her radio show. Dana seems to have a barb for all – friend and foe alike. We get the impression that, to her, it’s more important to be notorious than well-liked.  Not to mention the fact that she always knows how right she is about everything. Regardless of whether people love her or hate her, she seems in her element and in control.

Dana believes all the wrong things for all the right reasons and aggressively grates against all of our revolutionaries-in-training: Emily Richardson (played by Erin Leigh Schmoyer), William Devita (Dan Shaked) and John Mulcahey (Samuel Adams) among others.

Cake is about a similar transformation as that of Alice In Wonderland who ate cake and was able to then leave the purgatory of the bottom of the rabbit hole – finally able to enter Wonderland itself.   Throughout Cake Dana’s path follows a similar coarse as she finds herself wanting to actually do something in the world rather than just continuing to be the pundit she has always been, at the end after she falls through her own rabbit hole of being abducted.

Ramona Floyd, Samuel Adams, Dan Shaked, & Erin Leigh Schmoyer

On the opposite side of the fence, but with a similar journey,  Emily and her cohorts also change from being caricatures of the standard “socialist proletariat revolutionary” wannabe that can be found on any college campus into true adventurers ready to take their special talents and make a difference.

First we meet Emily, who tells us she goes into Corporate America with her camouflage of a smart pant suit and blouse, and that her training as an actress has always stopped anyone from believing she was anything else than what she appeared.  “It’s what I do.”she says.  She has a strong dislike for Dana which makes her personally invested to lead the kidnapping of Dana for the plans of her group.  Schmoyer as Emily artfully acts a character within a character able to convince Dana as well as the audience that she really is “one of them”.

Then we meet John Mulcahey (Samuel Adams) who is trying to compile all the philosophies of all the great (but terribly obscure) revolutionary writers of the 20th century into his “late, great” polemic. Late because “All the great {socialist} writers wrote their first polemics by the time they were 22…and I’m 24″. Great because he believes by doing such large amounts of time researching the obscure foreign books of as many of the brightest social theorists as possible, he could produce such a compelling argument against the old system that no one of any sense would be able to resist it and…as Marx would say the “State will fall away” at last.

And William Devita (Dan Shaked) seems at first simple: he wants John, and more importantly he wants John to want him in return.“I just want to jump your bones…Texts for sex has always been our contract”. He reads and translates aloud (“Always first in the mother tongue,” John insists) page after page and book after book of those obscure texts in Spanish, in French, in Italian, in Portuguese. William is definitely a polyglot among other things, but doesn’t seem to have the marketable skills as John and Emily have. Clearly William is the symbol of the noble proletariat, the everyman that everyone can aspire to be. He always smooths things over by being the least extreme but most capable of the bunch.

Leading this band of activists is a man referred to as “Che”(real name: Patrick Strife played by Arthur Aulisi) who is not as together as he seems.  His style of leadership is actually quite subtle, and he skillfully gets what he wants by making people think that what he is getting them to do was their idea all along.  It is he who comes up with the plan to abduct Dana Dunnigan . . . we find out the “why” later on in the play and it doesn’t quite match up with what we’ve been lead to believe.

In the end everything turns out for the “better” for everyone, just not what any of the characters would have expected at the beginning.

The twists and turns of this play will keep you riveted not just to find out what is coming next, but how it will happen.  Set in the 1990s, scene changes and climactic scenes are often accompanied by driving house music.  That and the unique flavor of those times at the end of the millennium are artfully captured by both the writer Felipe Ossa as well as the set designer (Dan Soule), stage manager (Megan Jupin) and fight choreographer (Ian Roettger) and others work together to make a really exciting play that will make you want to talk about the good old days “before the bubble burst” if that’s your cup of tea — or your piece of cake.

~~~

Related Posts:

• Ye Elizabeths: Living Vicariously Because … (2012 Planet Connections Festivity)
• Ye Elizabeths – 5 Things To Know About The Show Before You Go (2012 Planet Connections Festivity)
• Planet Connections Q&A: Cake / Revolution!
• The 2012 National Newborn Festival Is Almost Here!
• That’s Quite A Story – The Tragic Story Of Doctor Frankenstein