The Happiest Medium » puppets

The Dick And The Rose – Some Say Love, It Is A Flower (Fringe Festival 2012)

Karen Tortora-Lee — Thu, 23 Aug 2012 20:41:41 +0000

Make no mistake, “the dick” of The Dick and The Rose (written and directed by Robert Biggs) is, in fact, a dick. Remarkably, he’s also a cock, of sorts. Ah, so much to explain, but trust me … it all makes sense in the end – as much as any story like this can make sense. You see, the seeds of The Dick And The Rose come from disturbing headlines: sad, brutal, tragic headlines that gripped a nation and didn’t make any kind of sense. Stories that didn’t just happen once, but stories that happened over and over again – stories that horrified us all. But on a visceral level, stories that made almost too much sense. But, enough with the metaphors. Let me tell you what’s going on here with this particular dick and this particular rose.

The Dick and The Rose begins with the forlorn, mourning wail of a euphonium (I’ll admit, it could have been a Baritone horn) which ripples the specifically tattered curtain and summons forth the players from behind the billows. A Crone comes forth and sings a bittersweet lullaby – sadly foreboding and gloomy yet in a voice that is gentle, comforting and sweetly mellifluous.

Scenes are announced from the side via the horn soloist “ME” (writer/director Biggs) who becomes the Master of Ceremonies of sorts, though he announces with a removed air and sticks to the side without comment, opinion or narration. As the story comes to bear and echoes of headline news become obvious it’s clear that Me is reporting the headlines, not much more (excpet of course providing the occasional musical accompaniment or song).

The cock I alluded to earlier is of the rooster variety – the first introduction we have to the main characters is is a lot of “Ta-DA!” and “Whoosh” and cock-a-doodle-doo!!!! and such as the Sleeper (Ron Botting) is urged awake by the crowing and flourishes of the bright, energetic, lively Circus Girl (Caley Milliken) who twirls on point and brandishes a parasol with grace and flair. Soon there is naughty giggling behind the curtain and not too subtle metaphors as The Dick makes its appearance in the form of a giant … make that GIANT hose which snakes its way through the various holes of the tatters much to the glee and enjoyment of the Sleeper (who is, by golly, wide awake now … but that’s his name).

The lovely Circus Girl, awash in red flounce (a rose if I ever saw one) is captivated by her new lover and with a bun firmly in the oven she sings of how she is enjoying not quite liking him, but liking how he makes her feel.

More twists of the fluttering curtain and soon after some good ol’ fashioned testifyin’ (Holy Moly!) looks like this Rose, thanks to simple eagerness and the natural tunes of life, has birthed a whole bouquet of kids who seem to be blooming up everywhere. Represented both in human as well as puppet form this brood slowly overtakes the couple, exerting the most strain on their overtaxed mom whose rose has begun to fade. Her voice cracks, her melody waivers, and not even the most desperate tango designed to re-woo her man can staunch the smell of sour milk which billows around her and trails behind her like a mist.

With the voices of her children ringing in her head she finds evidence which drives her to the brink of madness … and over it. The end is shocking – chilling – disturbing … but the matter is handled in a way that is not disrespectful or distasteful.

Ian Milliken as bandleader guides “ministering angels” (Gail Shalan, Kelsey Hogan, Jake Elitzer, Jennifer Vargas, and Evan Gambardella) through musical numbers which feature homespun instruments such as spoons, the recorder, and simple percussions as well as guitar, accordion and others. The group appears and disappears fluidly behind their billowing back curtain and all work seamlessly to present this story. As an ensemble they are moving, passionate, and even funny.

Robert Biggs has tackled a difficult topic and delivered it in a way that makes it easier to examine. By making The Dick and The Rose full of lively, sometimes moving, sometimes funny songs, and a presentation that lives between mime, clown and performance art, he has created physical poetry which allows the piece to breathe and invites the audience to take their own emotional journey. Neither Biggs nor the actors are presenting a judgement – merely a set of circumstances and by doing so they open a path to deeper understanding.

~~~

THE DICK AND THE ROSE
Outcast Cafe Theatrix
Writer: Robert Biggs
Director: Robert Biggs
Choreographer: Barbara Allen
An American Gothic Romance with puppets and stubbornly live music. Rakish Man meets Circus Girl. They mate. Make lots of babies. Darkness haunts this sideshow fantasy. Raucous. Bawdy. Lyrical. True. It’s a bumpy ride. Hold on to your heart.
0h 55m   National   South Lee, Massachusetts
Musical   Puppetry
Staycation: Family Vacation   Ride the Rollercoaster of Love
www.dickandrose.com
VENUE #12: Cherry Lane Theatre
Thu 16 @ 9:30  Fri 17 @ 4:30  Tue 21 @ 3:30  Thu 23 @ 2  Sat 25 @ 8

Paper Cut (Fringe Festival 2011)

Geoffrey Paddy Johnson — Fri, 26 Aug 2011 14:09:45 +0000

At the conclusion of Yael Rasooly‘s one woman “paper and object theater” performance, Paper Cut, the small stage at CSV Kabayitos is littered with piles of crumpled, shorn and torn paper props. This destruction is testament to the intensive, energetic and exhaustive show the actress has just presented in the past fifty minutes. It moves at a cracking pace as Rasooly acts, sings, animates, and shreds her way through a romance, set some time in the 1940s, about a solitary, put-upon secretary, who keeps one foot firmly in an escapist dreamworld. Well, maybe more than one foot. Ruth Spencer, a buttoned-up, bespectacled and be-bunned secretary is at her desk attending, with admirable efficiency, to her boss’s every request. This does not prevent her from plying the pages of her favorite reading, the celebrity movie magazines of the era. The latter say much more about the real Miss Spencer, who nurses a direct-from-the-talkies fantasy about one day catching the boss’s eye, and heart. Characteristically he – a disembodied smoothie-voice coming over her desktop personal address – sees her as nothing more than a utility. He has the insensitivity to consult her about composing a letter of seduction to another woman. And asks her what sort of gift he should get!

Spurned by the rest of the secretarial pool, who refer to her as the “bulldog”, Ruth is left alone to work late hours and day dream about better things. Here is the show’s magic. Rasooly brings these daydreams vividly to life in the form of paper cut out characters and props, all gorgeously loosed from the pages of Ruth’s movie magazines. Add in the use of period love songs and film themes coming over her small, bakelite radio, and ingenious deployment of office fixtures for atmospherics, and you have a marvelously innovative form of musical puppet theatre. The simplicity of the concept is as seductive as it is formally imaginative. We are treated to exquisite black and white photo stills of some of Hollywood’s finest – Dietrich, Bergman, Fontaine, Bogart, Boyer, and Cary Grant to name a few – hop-hop-hopping about on a desktop stage with magazine spread backdrops and lush musical swells.

Rasooly supplies all the voices while working the miniature mechanics and characters. It’s an inspired visual performance. To a movie-literate audience, it’s catnip. There are hints that Ruth’s (bull)dog’s-body demeanor veils a nature that is much more assertive, even violent. Witness how ruthlessly and crisply she tyrannizes anyone requesting an appointment with her boss. Her day dreams begin to tap into this passionate side, and when jealousy rears its ugly head, Ruth’s romantic narrative begins to swerve off-course, rushing headlong toward a scenario of victimization and murderous deception.

As her investment in her fantasy realm deepens, her halo as efficient secretary begins to slip, and everything surges forward to a hair-raising and clever denouement which delivers a bang, and not, I might add, from the paper cut out revolver that’s being brandished. Ripping!

If one had a churlish bone to pick with this otherwise delightful show, it would be about the somewhat unambitious scope the narrative holds. Rasooly and co-author Lior Lerman never quite allow anything to break the frame of their time-honored tale. The tone is strictly pastiche, played for light farce. When Rasooly vocally lets loose with excerpts from some torchy blues numbers, the emotional register shifts significantly. She is more than capable of delivering this feeling and it is in some regards a shame that the authors never explore this or permit their characters a sliver of depth. Who knows what might have been? As it is, all is preserved as flatly two-dimensional. Which I suppose, in another way, is the point; It’s Only a Paper Moon. Certainly the capacity-filled and highly appreciative audience did not feel the want of anything extra. This is light and crafty entertainment. At the end of the day, however slight, you don’t have to go deep to really feel a paper cut.

~~~

Paper Cut

Yael Rasooly

Writer: Yael Rasooly and Lior Lerman

Director: Yael Rasooly

0h 50m

www.yaelrasooly.com

VENUE #3: CSV Kabayitos

Sat 27 @ 3

Feeling the Chill? It’s FRIGID!

Karen Tortora-Lee — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 20:52:53 +0000

Gosh, it’s cold outside. Like, tried-to-dial-my-cell-phone-so-took-off-my-glove-and-immediately-regretted-it-because-my-fingers-froze-into-a-claw type of cold. But does it have to be frigid inside too?

According to this festival … yes it does! With January ’09 having the sad distinction of being the month that saw the close of such long running hits as Hairspray, Spamalot and Spring Awakening, as well as other fine productions (such as All My Sons, Boeing-Boeing, Dividing The Estate, Grease, Gypsy, and Young Frankenstein), 2009 is already turning into a sorry year for Broadway. But don’t let it get you down! Go catch one or two or five of these great shows at any or all of these cozy theatres: The Kraine Theatre, The Red Room or Under St. Marks. (And yes, I used “cozy” euphemistically the way those people do when they’re trying to get you to rent their “cozy extra bedroom” … come on, folks it’s obviously a closet!).

FRIGID is around for 2 weeks starting February 25th so I again ask you to DVR LOST, put on your mufflers and your mittens, steel yourself with the Luden’s cough drop flavor of your choice (nothing’s more annoying than having to listen to that annoying chick two seats away dry-choke her way through the show. Having been that annoying chick at three recent performances now, I can tell you — if spitballs were still popular with the over 4th grade set, my hair would have been littered with them) and get your little butts out to see one of these great shows!

And don’t forget, this is a theatre festival … just like those street fairs where endless booths of home made soaps and funnel cakes and throw-the-dart-to-win-a-prize games hold secret joys you could never predict … that’s what this festival will do for your mind. There’s Comedy at one theatre. Drama at another. Solo Shows. Poetry. Puppets. WHAT? Yes. I said it. PUPPETS. Real live (but not alive) puppets. And all tickets are between $8 and $15 dollars. That’s less than three rings in the ring toss game. (Because you know you need more than three rings if you’re gonna win, right?) And what do you actually win anyway? A Spongebob Squarepants doll? A Stewie Griffin doll? Something equally loseable-on-the-way-home-able?

But instead, for $8 – $15 dollars the Frigid Festival will give you all these words and thoughts and emotions and visuals. And … you know, like I mentioned before … puppets. Which are like dolls. Only dolls that stay in the theatre and don’t get lost on the way home. (Or, at least if they do, it’s not YOUR fault … it’s their own fault. And that, my friends … is just a little creepy.)

Look at this. Look at what you have to choose from.

Sorry. That was probably a little too overwhelming. Why don’t I give you a small sampler platter, a dainty dim sum platter, a tiny tapas bar portion of what you could see some time in the next 2 weeks:

The Dysfunctional Guide to Home, Perfection, Marital Bliss, and Passionate Hot Romance
This “How To” piece will use a blend of vintage and original writings to teach you how to be the perfect housewife (or househusband) – Dysfunctional style.

habeas corpus
“What would you like to be rid of?” Fueled by anonymous responses from all over the country as well as live audience responses within the theater itself, the real kim harmon performance collective creates a voracious and tender multi-media performance art experience.

Hysteri-Killy! A One Freak Show
A magical, multimedia march through the mad mind of a manic -depressive, cockeyed optimist.

The Expatriates-Liz Maher as Zelda Fitzgerald

The Expatriates
F. Scott, Zelda Fitzgerald, Dorothy Parker, and Ernest Hemingway are placed into a devilish purgatory to face their lives all over again. Flappers, booze, and jazz are the guides to untold wealth and unimaginable excess leading this fast paced show barreling towards certain destruction.

So, now … go grab your honey, or use this as an excuse to find a new honey … and go get Frigid.

The Happiest Medium » puppets

The Dick And The Rose – Some Say Love, It Is A Flower (Fringe Festival 2012)

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Paper Cut (Fringe Festival 2011)

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Feeling the Chill? It’s FRIGID!

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