The Happiest Medium » Fringe 2010

Gate B23: Getting There Is Half The Fun And Double The Heartache (Fringe Festival 2010)

Stephen Tortora-Lee — Thu, 19 Aug 2010 12:33:52 +0000

What do you do when you’re waiting….And waiting….AND WAITING….

At Gate B23 (written and directed by Debbie Slevin) we watch as 7 people try to figure out what to do when they are forced to look more deeply into their lives – because this time they’re not allowed to just gloss over all the situations as they normally would. The escalating tension turns to transformation again and again, as being forced to actually talk with those you’re with pushes everyone to make decisions they never would have otherwise. Whether new bonds are forged, burst asunder or reinforced to stay the same, the play is always moving along as it focuses on the different people who are waiting – so it’s really like several small plays wrapped into one.

Before the play begins we are swept into the mood by many fun, introspective travelling songs like Leaving, on a Jet Plane and I’ll Fly Away. The scenery is a perfect representation of what you see when you go to an airport: chairs and a small table at an airport bar on the side. Thanks to Crystal Johnson the stage manager for really putting us in the midst of it all.

Awkwardness abounds at Gate B23

Our story begins as Heather Gilbert (as the Gate Agent) makes the announcement that Flight 7051: Palm Beach to Newark is DELAYED (along with many other funny little announcements of various things the passengers should not do). Meanwhile, a Teen-aged Girl (Gina Marie Jamieson) rebels against her terrible ordeal of being bored in the airport by gossiping on the phone the entire time with and about her best friend.

Lilah (Jody Lyn Flynn) is a middle-aged divorcee who on her way back “home” to New Jersey after 10 years of self-imposed exile. She is found by Zach (Scott Morse) an irrepressible twenty-something year old who is certain that Lilah is the one for him. He’s just charming enough he might just pull it off getting her to love him back before the flight takes off. As the plane keeps getting delayed further, his changes look better and better.

Bertha, played by Sue-Ellen Mandell, is a rascally old lady who has had several husbands and many quirky adventures over the years in her home in New Jersey. Her daughter Lotte, is unfortunately the only one who’s still willing to help care for her as Bertha’s memories are slipping away and muddling together as her continuity of existence is disappearing. Lotte is taking her mother back home to New Jersey because they just can’t afford to let her live in her Florida retirement community anymore. This tragic situation replays itself over and over again as Lotte keeps having to remind her mother in bits and pieces of what is going on and what has been going on for years.

Finally we’re introduced to Walter and Travis, played by Bill Fitzburg and Alex Adams respectively. Walter is Travis’ stepfather and is there to bring Travis back home to a mother who (it is alluded to) is gravely ill. Travis seems to be at first to be a sullen ornery teenager just trying to run away from home, but we find out a number of causes of his estrangement from his stepfather and home as the play progresses.

The moral of the story is that you never know who is waiting with you in the airport. Prepared to be surprised and deeply touched by the powerful twists that weave through this play. Thanks to writer/director Debbie Slevin for creating such a provocative play about what happens when we’re forced to pay attention to our lives. And for working with the cast to really make this such a tightly performed and and emotionally charged play.

~~~

Gate B23

Writer: Debbie Slevin
Director: Debbie Slevin
1h 5m
web.me.com/greyslev/GreyMatters_Productions/GATE_B23_FringeNYC_2010.html
VENUE #8: Tom Noonan’s Paradise Factory

Click on a date to purchase tickets:
Thu 19 @ 5:15 Fri 20 @ 9 Sat 21 @ 9:30

Happy Birthday Mom – Her Daughter Would Not Have Approved (Fringe Festival 2010)

Lina Zeldovich — Tue, 17 Aug 2010 14:52:51 +0000

Pictured: Kristen Rozanski, Michelle Glavan, Zack Gold, JR Davidson, Jacob Crumbine, Janice Lynde (Photographer: Carly Kennelly)

Dressed in leather, excited and nearly flying around her house, Elizabeth (Janice Lynde) is setting up her living room with candles and flowers in preparations for her fifty-fifth birthday date, when her college-age daughter Olivia (Michelle Glavan) unexpectedly shows up. She has flown in to celebrate Mom’s special day, only Mom’s not excited one single bit! On the contrary, she’s shocked, constantly checking the time, and suggests her daughter spends the evening at her friend’s place.

“It’s good that you’re having a date,” Olivia says with no intention of leaving – and starts prying Mom for information, unaware that she’s about to crack open the worst Pandora’s box. After using up her arsenal of elusive answers, Elizabeth reluctantly concedes: “I met him on Craigslist… This morning… He’s twenty six.”

Upset and disgusted, Olivia lashes out at Mom with a lecture on moral values and self-image, driving her to tears (and into the bathroom) just as her date shows up. Elizabeth refuses to come out leaving Olivia to deal with Thorn (John Roderick Davidson), who is polite, courteous, black and with a sense of humor. “I’m not being paid for this,” Thorn tries to placate the raging Olivia, “I just like to have sex with different women.”

The idea of a birthday surprise occurred to Olivia’s brother Tim (Jacob Crumbine) as well, who has flown in with his girlfriend Sarah (Kristen Rozanski). Mistaking Thorn for Olivia’s boyfriend, Tim demands to know what Olivia “has done this time” to get her mother to seek refuge on the toilet. The entire family history unwraps in front of your eyes, including Elizabeth bitter divorce, the runaway father, Tim’s echelon of girlfriends and Olivia’s talent for saying the wrong thing at the wrong time. But just as we think we can be shocked no further, there comes another birthday surprise in a shape of male stripper (Zack Gold) who Sarah hired for Elizabeth’s entertainment. Apparently everyone has their own idea how to celebrate Mom’s birthday,while her own wishes are pushed to the very bottom of the list.

The semi-dysfunctional family where everyone seems to know what’s best for others, has a long way to go to settle their arguments, but there is one thing they can surely do today: grant Mom her birthday wish. Are they smart, considered and open-minded enough to do so? See for yourself.

Engaging, emotional and challenging societal norms, this modern drama will certainly get a few blushes out of you and probably more than a strip show. Plus, this was the best acting I saw at Fringe this year. “That was excellent!” a woman with a slight German accent breathed out behind me as the troupe bid farewell and left the stage. I couldn’t agree with her more.

~~~

Happy Birthday, Mom
Writer: Meghan Gambling
Director: Meghan Gambling

0h 55m
www.happybdaymom.biz

VENUE #14: The Cherry Pit

Click on the dates to purchase tickets:
Tue 17 @ 8:45 Wed 18 @ 2 Thu 19 @ 9:45

Driving The Saudis – How It Nearly Drove Her Crazy (Fringe Festival 2010)

Lina Zeldovich — Tue, 17 Aug 2010 13:13:55 +0000

Jayne Amelia Larson (Photographer: Eric Swarz)

“The worst job I ever had,” is how writer and actress Jayne Amelia Larsen describes her staggering experience of being a driver for a Saudi family on their Beverly Hills vacation. The family (along with their entourage) took up several floors in a luxury hotel, keeping one room as a tea room, and embarked on their escapade of shopping and plastic surgeries.

Jayne wears many hats, or rather veils, abayas and hijabs during her one-woman show as she portrays a spoiled teenager, an old nanny and a sad young bride who has to marry her father’s colleague and “make her family very proud.” Switching from the narrative monologue to portraying the actual characters, she relates the customs, the psyche and the lifestyle as foreign to us as Martians’.

“I have three cars back at home,” Jayne imitates a teenage princess chirping from the back the back seat of her car. “My brother has twenty five.” It may sound like a five-year-old’s power talk, but it wasn’t. That princess cleaned out Rodeo Drive boutiques day after day, never worrying about prices. A different princess asks to be driven to the beach – only to look at it from the back seat of the car. She’s not allowed to leave the limo, let alone appear on the beach in a bathing suit.

“We are temptresses,” Jayne mimics one of the Saudi women’s explanation of their dress code. “It’s our nature. We never know when a curve of a cheek, a glimpse of a wrist or twist of an ankle may tempt a man. Therefore we must cover.”

The nanny has her own vision of a hijab. “A salad is good with just olive oil, but there’s one thing that makes it special. Lemon. It’s the final touch. It makes the salad complete. That’s what a hijab is. It makes me complete.”

Jayne humorously recalls speed-shopping for sixty bras of size D, ransacking Pathmark to get twenty seven bottles of hair remover and having to transfer a sedated princess from a wheel chair into a car after she had a butt job. Yet, the work was far from fun. She drove eighteen hours a day, dealt with moody royals, their insolent staff and rude security guards. The servants, she says, were nice, to the point that she formed a bond with some of them.

“Don’t buy that!” she recalls grabbing a can of Spam out of a servant girl’s hands. “You don’t want to eat that. Why? It’s pork, you know – pig. Oh, you don’t know what’s pig? Oink-oink!”

The royal’s entourage came to like Jayne especially after learning she had no husband. They promised to pray for her to find one, and, when they were leaving, asked her to visit. “Me, visit Saudi Arabia?” laughs Jayne. “Are you kidding me? I’d be beheaded.”

She puts on a short film interview with the Saudi’s executioner, telling us how be-headings are done with a sword. Unbelievably, the man does not look like a sociopath and he even has a spark in his eyes. He says he felt very proud when he was offered the job; it’s an important post after all.

If nothing else, after an hour and half of the multi-media Saudi briefing, you will have a very different perspective on how your gas money makes someone’s fortune. The word Saudi, by the way, means fortunate. Yet, even the Arabian sheiks can be cheap. For the seven weeks of the royal nightmare, Jayne expected a good tip – which typically ranged from five to ten thousand dollars. Hers, however, came to a thousand only. She was a woman, after all.

The princess’s nanny had taught Jayne an Arabic proverb, “Do not use all of your upset at once. Save some for later.” That’s how I felt when I left the theater. The Saudis ain’t going nowhere, and we will continue making them fortunate… until the oil runs out.

~~~

DRIVING THE SAUDIS
Writer: Jayne Amelia Larson
Director: Charlie Stratton

1h 30m
www.drivingthesaudis.info

VENUE #16: The SoHo Playhouse

Click on the date for ticket information:
Thu 19 @ 3 Sat 21 @ NOON Sun 22 @ 9:15 Fri 27 @ 3:45

Classically Trained, Practically Broke – Beautifully Done (Fringe Festival 2010)

Karen Tortora-Lee — Tue, 17 Aug 2010 00:12:40 +0000

Get seated early to see Classically Trained, Practically Broke (Franca Vercelloni’s solo show, directed by Myrna E. Duarte and John David West) and you’ll get an earful of what Franca is subject to on a nightly basis – the caterwauling of half drunk patrons who gather around her piano at the bar she works at and who beg for show tunes - blithely singing in their own key and verbally abusing her at will as if she’s worth nothing.

But she’s not nothing. Franca Vercelloni is Classically Trained – not only a proficient pianist but a soulful and interpretive one as well, one who throws herself (as well as her Self) into her music and lives there; it’s where she celebrates the good times and waits out the bad times. Franca, you see, is so much better than this dingy piano bar with its smelly keys (no telling what’s wedged down in there) and its drunken patrons. Ms. Vercelloni is living just a short distance away from her dream – 88 keys away to be exact, and her talent is both her blessing as well as her curse. Yet she doesn’t give up this thankless job because ultimately - she’s terrific at it.

Watching Ms. Vercelloni’s fingers fly across the keys is like watching FloJo run the 100 meter dash – only with this specific blur of motion comes the most wonderful music – a Bach Fugue, A Beethoven Sonata, a Gershwin Tune.

Between dazzling the audience with brilliantly played songs, Ms. Vercelloni gives her life story in the same carefully crafted notes and meters – and always punctuated by a piano chord. She tells of being a piano teacher to snotty, precocious, over indulged children with equally annoying parents. She reminisces about playing the church organ and sneaking in a few secular songs during communion. Ms. Vercelloni even brings out the ole accordion and plays a catchy song about “Walmart At Midnight”.

A lively tune called “Extra Medium” addresses the specific challenges of being a gal who is considered too large to play the ingenue, but too pretty to be a character actress. Too tall to be petite, but too short to be tall . . . you get the picture. Problem is, changing one aspect of her appearance would cut off particular opportunities and paths in another area. What’s a girl to do?

Franca Vercelloni

As Ms. Vercelloni continues to break it down for us the situations get funnier and funnier – “I’m playing Evita, you’re singing Cole Porter” she points out in her rousing singalong “Shut The Fuck Up and Sing With Me!” all delivered with a manic smile but a smile nonetheless. And gosh darn it – we sang along! When told to!

Talent just keeps flowing out of her as she laughingly illustrates the fights she must break up “Do Judy!” . . .”No! Do Sondheim” . . . and then grandly manages to do a mash up worthy of Glee – “The Man That Got Away” to a signature Sondheim score. Of course, eventually the mania builds up, the poking and prodding and little voices and booming voices and off-key voices all manage to create a terrible storm that brings poor Ms. Vercelloni to “The Last Midnight“ . . .

Silence.

And in that moment without music . . . what a terrible void.

Soon enough, though, Ms. Vercelloni finds her happy place and her anthemic “Living It Day By Day” (“I can’t be mad because I didn’t take an express route . . .”) melds into a heartfelt - and heart melting – “A Song For You“.

Part concert, part comedy act, part real life, part hyper real, Ms. Vercelloni finds the truth and shares it with those who listen along with her in the dark . . .”we’re alone now, and I’m singing this song for you . . .“

It’s what she does – and she does it beautifully.

~~~~

Classically Trained, Practically Broke
Writer: Franca Vercelloni in collaboration with Myrna E. Duarte and John David West
Director: Myrna E. Duarte and John David West

1h 15m

www.classicallytrainedpracticallybroke.com
VENUE #6: The Club @ LA MAMA

Click below to purchase tickets:

Mon 16 @ 9:30 Thu 19 @ 5:45 Fri 27 @ 10 Sat 28 @ 5:45

Ruby Wilder – The Wilder The Better (Fringe Festival 2010)

Karen Tortora-Lee — Mon, 16 Aug 2010 20:41:45 +0000

I hadn’t intended to see Ruby Wilder, but boy am I glad that I mistakenly stood in front of the wrong theatre for 20 minutes waiting for my show to begin; it gave me an opportunity to meet and chat with a terrific new talent – Eric Hoff – who I hope I can interview in the future. Turns out, missing my show was fortuitous because it led me right to the unique, eerie, funny, sleazy, rip-roaring world of Ruby Wilder. And what a world that is.

Ruby Wilder (written by Brooke Allen and directed by Eric Hoff) starts with a bang . . . or the promise of one. Soon enough though, more than you expected begins to happen – Ruby (Julie Cowden) could be a victim or she could be the victimizer, people in the room could be part of her life as it’s happening, figments of her dreams, or even elements of the story she’s piecing together – - a story which may or may not get to play out. There’s even The Ghost of Sister Past – Junebug (Jennifer Incorvaia) who shimmies and twirls her way around the floor like a strung out tutu clad effigy of childhood lost.

This tightly directed story is a ballet of pain and of promise, and despite the inclusion of an ironic Narrator (Derek Czaplewski) who can’t be shushed aside, there’s no telling where this story will end up.

Coming at you from all sides emotionally, mentally and even physically, the story of Ruby Wilder can’t be told linearly and therefore it isn’t. In Ruby’s world the present interacts with the past by way of a metaphor and the “ah ha” moments are so frequent that you lose count.

Ruby Wilder grabs you with “eerie”, then smacks you across the face with “funny” and does it all without sacrificing tone, plot, or story arc. In my book, that’s just about as perfect as a show that comes in just over 1 hour can be. In fact – although it’s compactly written and economically directed – the balance of humor, violence, pathos, humanity and rapture are so equal that there’s hardly a tremor as it swiftly skates from sadness to seductive to scary.

To even begin to explain the plot would be to give away too much – and this gal has already had too much taken from her. This is her story to tell and I’ll be fair to her and let her deliver it to you.

But I will say this – spend one hour with this gal, her sister, her devoted, sweet, but ever-more-frustrated fiance Harper (Neal Starbird), and her mysterious stranger who can charm you and horrify you in the same moment (Josh Odor) and you’ll be haunted by her story for a long, long time. With just one show left, clear your schedule and see for yourself how the story ends.

~~~

Ruby Wilder

Writer: Brooke Allen
Director: Eric Hoff

1h 10m
VENUE #9: The Robert Moss Theater
Click below to purchase tickets for the final show.

Wed 18 @ 9

SHINE: A Burlesque Musical With A Story To Tell (Fringe Festival 2010)

Lina Zeldovich — Sun, 15 Aug 2010 21:07:20 +0000

Shine Mionne (Cass King) runs her operation on a corset string, but she stands by her ideals: a true edgy burlesque show with no glitzy Broadway feel. The roof leaks, lights break, the performers don’t get paid sometimes, but everyone is family and a star, including the real big girl Lucy Von Doozy (Andra Boo Green), a little wildcat Feral (Roxie Moxie), who hisses and bites along with the janitor (John Woods) who never says a word.

Shine is busy changing stocking, gluing on pasties and avoiding calls from Chad-The-Douche-Bag, a financial officer from a Nuntucket bank, who is chasing her to collect late loan payments, when two newcomers show up at her door: an aspiring actor Frankie (Scott W. Abernethy) who claims being hired at a party last night and an NYU student Grace (Gemma Isaac), who is writing her senior thesis on “the challenging dominant gender convention of the 20th century alternative performance modalities” and wants to be an intern. “You don’t have to pay an intern,” she tells Shine, and gets hired on the spot. No sooner does Frankie find himself sweeping floors that horrified Grace pops out of the changing room in a costume made of pink balloons that, once popped, reveal silvery pasties the burlesque girls glued on her to start her burlesque internship. Of course, the two fall in lust with each other – and with Lucy Von Doozy, who teaches Grace how to be a strip star: “Everyone is sexy, everyone is a star. What makes us powerful is who we are.”

But even the fresh young juices can’t rejuvenate Shine’s troubled operation – the shows don’t sell and it’s clear that she can’t run her troupe the old-fashioned way. So when Richard Suit makes his second appearance (Shine threw him out the first time), she is inclined to listen to his proposition. The two strike a deal: she directs, he produces, she handles the talent, he takes care of advertisement – and they split the profit. That may sound good, but soon Richard starts coming up with his own ideas: Lucy’s too fat, the soundman is incompetent, and the show needs a midtown facelift. “This is burlesque, not a Broadway production,” Shine declares as she ditches Richard’s new numbers done in the best traditions of Britney Spears. “But your Wall Street types will run away the moment Lucy takes off her first glove!” Richard insists. Shine’s phone bursts out with Chad (the douche bag) custom phone ring – and she finds herself cornered. Will Shine and Richard manage their irreconcilable differences or will the last burlesque standing crumble to be consumed by urban gentrification?

Written by Cass King, John Woods and Sam Dulmage, The Shine Burlesque truly shined once it got over a few minor technical difficulties with uneven sound, a few wrong cues and sometimes uncooperative props (which, given the fact that Fringe only gives the performers 15 min to set up, is totally understandable). The saga is compelling, the costumes hilariously ostentatious, the lyrics funny even if sometimes silly, and the pasties tantalizing. If you enjoy striptease with a story to tell, definitely see it after a coupla drinks – and your burlesque experience will be completely authentic.

~~~

SHINE: A Burlesque Musical
Writer: Cass King, John Woods (The Wet Spots) and Sam Dulmage
Director: Roger Benington
2h
www.shinemusical.com
VENUE #7: The Ellen Stewart Theatre @ LA MAMA

Click on a date for ticket information:
Fri 13 @ 8:15 Sat 14 @ NOON Mon 23 @ 9:45 Thu 26 @ 2 Sat 28 @ 2

The Happiest Medium » Fringe 2010

Gate B23: Getting There Is Half The Fun And Double The Heartache (Fringe Festival 2010)

Related Posts:

Happy Birthday Mom – Her Daughter Would Not Have Approved (Fringe Festival 2010)

Related Posts:

Driving The Saudis – How It Nearly Drove Her Crazy (Fringe Festival 2010)

Related Posts:

Classically Trained, Practically Broke – Beautifully Done (Fringe Festival 2010)

Related Posts:

Ruby Wilder – The Wilder The Better (Fringe Festival 2010)

Related Posts:

SHINE: A Burlesque Musical With A Story To Tell (Fringe Festival 2010)

Related Posts: