David Lawson’s solo show, VCR Love, had a limited engagement recently at The Brick Theater.  Bold and innovative, this show explored the consequences, both positive and negative, of the increasing availability of porn in American society as seen through his own experiences.

The story begins with Lawson’s first “exposure” to explicit nudity at the impressionable age of 11 (a quick calculation based on context would put the year at 1995) when Lawson saw his first pair of naked female breasts which made an appearance in the seminal classic Animal House.  The mental sensations of this discovery along with the struggle to replicate this initial thrill move him through the next few years of his life from stolen Victoria’s Secret catalogs to taping the “good parts” of MTV like Fiona Apple and Mariah Carey in there slinky skimpies.   “It meant more because of the time I spent waiting for those precious moments on tv, and it would now be preserved forever”. VCR love, indeed.

Lawson follows this up with the exploits he and his friends, Ben and Keith, went on at the age of 14 in search of the forbidden.  From stealing naked yoga videos, to waiting a few hours for their 56.6 k modem to download a 2 minute video on Ben’s parents computer, to calling as many random 1-800 sex lines they could think of  and listening before the charges would kick in.  Did this ruin them or did it lead them to appreciate things more in a simpler time? Because of the investment and the camaraderie of the shared experience something was present then that isn’t as common with porn in this day and age.

Lawson argues for and against the benefits of the modern ease of finding outlets for titillation by pointing at the diversity needed in order to stand out in a saturated marketplace.  It is this which has led to the rise of any imaginable niche through a few carefully crafted keywords at your favorite porn watering hole.  Be it ‘furry’, ‘she-male’ or ‘french threesomes’ the personalization of your predilection offers an ease and even the oddly solipsistic connection that being able to reach out anonymously can be.

For the uninitiated Lawson delves into the world of online porn with stories such as his friend’s “double reverse role-play” with his own sister as they meet in a chat room, each thinking the other is the opposite sex of what they actually are.  He includes anecdotes of viewing the masturbatory habits of strangers that is prevalent on a new social video network known as Chatroulette and other even more “interesting” sites.

Sasha Grey

In the end he advocates that all this is good, pointing to the benefits of becoming a better lover through being able to express more creativity by being truly open about what is most private with his new girlfriend  - who also has an interest in porn.  He relates a touching story of how he found out she liked porn – he said she looked just like Sasha Grey (a famous adult film actress) and she said,”That’s the nicest thing anyone’s ever told me.”  That she not only knew the name but also that she found it a complement was what opened a special time of sharing between the two of them.

Now they can talk about different things they’ve seen or would like to try.  Lawson sees this as a way we all could benefit from this modern anonymous catalogue of human sexuality that is available right in our own homes.  By using these tools we could all become better, more capable lovers, engaging in more educated and interesting conversations about sex.  We would not have to be as afraid to talk about these issues in mixed company and not have these barriers that are so strong between the sexes when it comes to … well … sex.

All in all, VCR Love is a good night of comedy.  It takes you from the past to the present with a lot of good storytelling.  Great for a one man comedy night (even moreso than perhaps a theatrical piece).

Since 2/3rds of the audience were women on the night I attended, I’d say Lawson’s prediction of internet porn creating more transparency and more exploration may already be coming to pass.  So go ahead and do your part to help make the world a better place and bring your mixed company to the next production of VCR Love on March 23rd at the Lounge at Dixon Place or perhaps David’s next play Turning Atomic Tricks playing at the Parkside Lounge (March 10) and at  Simplestudios (March 11).  Find out more information from his personal web site at dtlawson.com,

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Man Saved By Condiments by Mary Jo Pehl is a dramatization of the true story of a man whose car went off a bridge while he was on his way to work.  With a broke his hip, no cell phone and no one aware of where he was, he survived for five days by eating snow and the packets of condiments he found strewn around the floor of his garbage heap that passes for a car.

The solo show, directed by Bill Stiteler, starts off a bit clumsily as every thought is expressed aloud by Steve (Tim Uren) for the sake of the constructs of the play.  While the back story explains that in order to stay sane the man talks to himself the device is somewhat forced for the sake of theatricality.  It also doesn’t help that Steve is somewhat unlikable and not particularly introspective.  He’s got a chip on his shoulder and (as bits of his life are revealed through the various moments when he’s either talking to himself, chatting with squirrels or railing at God) there’s not much redeeming about him.

Middle aged, living with his mother, a fan of “my man W”, he can’t commit to his girlfriend, seems to think he’s better than his other security guard co-workers because he’s studying to be an EMT, and (though facing possible starvation) throws out international non-dairy creamer exclaiming “What am I, gay or something?  Better throw those out before the guys find me!” Let’s just be grateful that the icepick he used to scrape peanut butter out of the bottom of the jar of Skippy wasn’t a girly shade of pink or he might have thrown that out the window as well.  He is, of course, heterosexual enough to take the opportunity to try to “ease his pain” as he imagines Faith Hill approaching him in a see-through tube top and giving him mouth to mouth with her perfect lips … that is until he discovers that his broken hip keeps him from indulging in any type of self pleasuring.  Which I, for one, was grateful.

“This is way too long to just sit here and think,” he muses, and for a moment it looks like this one-note show is not going to provide anything more but this man sitting in his car, talking to himself in real time, with no particular story arc.  Things take a turn for the better when he begins to assess his life and we are given an opportunity to see the deeper notes of both this trapped man as well as Tim Uren who is finally able to imbue the unlikable Steve with some redeeming qualities.  Relating a story (to a passing squirrel) about how he almost choked on a piece of bacon gives Uren a chance to woo the audience.  Steve reflects on how, alone, he found himself choking and was terrified that he would die alone.  Attempting to give himself the Heimlich maneuver by throwing himself over a piece of furniture he finds himself hesitant to mar his mother’s Sears sofa.  Not only does the moment feel exquisitely ironic  -a man hearkening back to a moment when gluttony almost caused his death during a time when he now may die of starvation- but this also gives a richly colored snapshot into the life of a man who is terribly lonely, regretful at how things didn’t work out, and just not ready to die.

Once this scene happens and the wall comes down Steve as a character becomes far more accessible and Uren brings forth moments which produce a lump in your throat as the simple humanity of this man is coaxed out further and further.  However, it is not much longer after this moment when Steve’s car is found and a quick off-stage “Hey are you okay down there” soon lead to “What is this, non-dairy creamer?  What are you, gay?” It’s an unnecessary call back and only serves to remind the audience that whatever “ah-ha” moment may have happened to Steve during his ordeal is going to be left in the car along with the empty ketchup packets.

Although director Bill Stiteler does his level best to work with the obviously talented Uren to deliver as many emotional peaks as possible, the bottom line is that this is a rather slim story with not much bite.

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The 2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL will run February 22-March 4 at The Kraine Theater & The Red Room (85 East 4th Street between 2nd Ave and Bowery) and UNDER St. Marks (94 St. Marks Place between 1st Ave and Ave A). Tickets to all shows may be purchased online at www.FRIGIDnewyork.info or by calling Smarttix at 212-868-4444.

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• Big Girls Don’t Cry: Laughing On The Outside (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
• I’m Only Explaining This Once: 5 Things To Know About The Show Before You Go (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
• Little Lady: 5 Things To Know About The Show Before You Go (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)

The Happiest Medium review by guest contributor Katelyn Manfre.

Canadian import Rachelle Elie enjoys being a woman. She especially enjoys her run-of-the-mill feminine pastimes: trying on sparkly dresses with eye makeup to match, dancing seductively to Ke$ha on a fur carpet, and hydrating with imported bottled water. She’s married to an Obstetrician/Gynecologist, has two lovely sons, and is, for all intents and purposes, living the dream.

Served with a side of audience discomfort, Elie’s solo show, Big Girls Don’t Cry (playing at The Red Room), is an insightful, if slightly off-putting insight into the psyche of the Modern Woman. Elie appears in what looks like a doll’s dress that lost a fight with a Bedazzler, knee-highs and platform slippers. She gapes and gasps her way through her basic biography, stopping every so often to sing or dance in a non-sequitur celebration of her womanhood. Questions are posed to the audience, and as she stares hard into each person’s eyes, she dares us to not be jealous of her in all her sparkle, and the beautiful life she has.

Rachelle Elie in Big Girls Don't Cry (photo by David Leyes)

But Elie’s not bragging. She’s smarter than that. The comedienne, with a strong background in dance, drama, and clowning, is actually a social commentator. And though her thesis statement isn’t shared until well into the piece (followed, of course, by an in-your-face gangster rap), we are fortunate enough to watch her slowly unravel her vacant Stepford persona throughout. The moments where things come apart–noted easily by the rugged octave drop in Elie’s voice–are the most vibrant, the most alive.

This is performance art. Interactive and thought-provoking, Elie will get in audience member’s faces, crack jokes at their expense, and bring them into her wacked-out world. But it’s a world we are only too fortunate enough to be in. Elie’s message stems from her time working in Kenya, the founder of an artists’ collective. She slowly works these Kenyan women into her story, and they become the pin that finally pops the bubble. These are women that don’t get to worry about lip-gloss or Ke$ha. And while not beating us over the head with the message, Elie reminds us of our good fortune; how lucky we are to be big girls in the here and now.

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The 2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL will run February 22-March 4 at The Kraine Theater & The Red Room (85 East 4th Street between 2nd Ave and Bowery) and UNDER St. Marks (94 St. Marks Place between 1st Ave and Ave A). Tickets to all shows may be purchased online at www.FRIGIDnewyork.info or by calling Smarttix at 212-868-4444.

Related Posts:

• Big Girls Don’t Cry: 5 Things To Know About The Show Before You Go (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
• The Rope In Your Hands: Katrina, In Their Own Words (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
• Man Saved By Condiments: Some Time Alone To Ketchup (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
• I’m Only Explaining This Once: 5 Things To Know About The Show Before You Go (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
• Little Lady: 5 Things To Know About The Show Before You Go (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)

The Happiest Medium review by guest contributor Katelyn Manfre

It’s tough out there for a single girl. It’s especially tough out there for a single girl with a habit of substance abuse and an absent father. But Nicole Pandolfo bravely lays it on the line for us in Love in the Time of Chlamydia running now at UNDER St. Marks.

This Jersey girl has a lot of hilarious, ridiculous and oftentimes make-your-skin-crawl war stories from her wild single days in New York. There’s a lot of bar (and bed)-hopping, recreational drug use, parties with strangers, chance encounters, unfortunate moments, and one memorable trip to Paris. Despite all of the hardships and heartbreak, Pandolfo tells her story with a smile, a smug F-you to all of the guys who hurt her and let her down, namely her distant father.

Here is where the levity could use a bit of toning down. In her effort to remain sassy and humorous, Pandolfo glosses over the really tough stuff. Her relationship with her father was what pushed her into her habits of self-destructive dating and partying in the first place, and though she acknowledges it, she doesn’t fully flesh out her journey of self-discovery. Her ultimate decision to cut down on the excess and her eventual happy ending come too quickly and easily, without enough explanation.

Overall, Chlamydia is enjoyable, funny, and played without self-pity. Pandolfo’s wit and charm pair well with the bold, boozy subject matter. She’s uncensored and proud of it.

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The 2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL will run February 22-March 4 at The Kraine Theater & The Red Room (85 East 4th Street between 2nd Ave and Bowery) and UNDER St. Marks (94 St. Marks Place between 1st Ave and Ave A). Tickets to all shows may be purchased online at www.FRIGIDnewyork.info or by calling Smarttix at 212-868-4444.

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• Big Plastic Heroes: Good Things Come In Big Plastic Packages (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
• Blind To Happiness: To See Or Not To See (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
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To say I was “pleasantly surprised” by Slash Coleman‘s solo show Big Plastic Heroes currently playing at UNDER St. Marks as part of the FRIGID Festival is an understatement.  All signs pointed to this show being a raucous, self-aggrandizing narcissistic sausage-fest devoted to testosterone-ladened cultural touchstones and overblown Americana.  After all, the artwork for the show features Coleman not only as Evel Knievel, but as the Bicentennial edition of Knievel, bedecked in red white and true-blue … superhero cape included.  He’s even clutching a football helmet.  Yes, the show I expected to see was vastly different than the one which actually unfolded before me.  Within the first few minutes “pleasantly surprised” was overtaken by “completely mesmerized”.  From there, it only got better.

Writer and performer Slash Coleman is a born storyteller – he has a way of not only captivating his audience but virtually hypnotizing them as his style and cadence allows his story to spring up around him as if by magic.  Using no props, no sound effects, and only very subtle lighting cues Coleman seems to need nothing more than his chair and his voice to support his tale.

So what about the outfit?  Is this truly a story about Evel Kinevel?  Yes.  Of course it is.  Or rather, Kinevel forms the base-note for a series of events which Coleman relates – a time harking back to his childhood.  During the day 8 year old Coleman lived in a world consumed by the Bicentennial, preparing emotionally for the big jump his hero intends to make.  At night he gives himself over to innocent but romantic dreams where he is really old (13) and his 3rd grade teacher Mrs. Autumnbright is really young (12) and all signs point to him becoming her hero.

The story does not take a straightforward path — there are offshoots and byways; one moment we are with Coleman in his dream, pursuing the errant beach ball of his beloved (There was the breath of a beautiful girl inside that ball!) the next moment we are transported to the Moulin Rouge and it is 1937.  In between these jumps we are given snapshots of the people who populate his world. We meet his French mother who kept her Jewish roots in the closet, his Southern dad who made sculptures which consisted of a mash up of taxidermy and bread, his neighbors who hailed from Israel and kissed everyone on the lips (I counted 163 kisses before we got to the table!).  Coleman embodies them all, speaking their language for us, whether it’s the “intelligent but unintelligible” droning of Mr. Mermelstein or the strange clicks and pops his “circus freak” twin sisters used as they hid behind their idioglossia.

Coleman voices (and embodies) all these characters convincingly and seamlessly – moving effortlessly from deep southern twang when emulating his Virginian Dad to husky French when becoming his maternal grandfather.  He also does an admirable Howard Cosell.

But, good as they are,  it’s not the vocal calisthenics which grab you as you lean forward in your seat, captivated by this story.  It’s the charismatic way that Coleman is simultaneously humble yet self-assured.  He is more of a story-teller than an actor, and the cosy layout of UNDER St. Marks, which lends itself to the solo-show in general, services Coleman’s in particular.  He is a modern day Homer — no doubt had he lived thousands of years ago he would be holding crowds transfixed by firelight in a similar fashion.

Slash Coleman’s story ends not so much with a period or an exclamation point as with a comma – much like the comma-shaped mark that he traces along the surface of his X-Ray, the glowing reminder of his Gladiator moment when he went head to, well, jaw with a dog and received 144 stitches, a permanent tooth mark in his skull, and the opportunity to finally hold hands with Mrs. Autumnbright as she escorts him throughout the days after his accident.  The comma, he tells himself, is there to remind him to keep adding to his dreams … one after the other.  It’s a moment that is pure and honest.

At the end of Big Plastic Heroes I felt like I’d only just settled in, and could have sat through many more stories.   But I treasure that comma, for it means many more stories to come.

I went in expecting one thing – I left with quite another.  A hero.  A big  plastic hero.

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The 2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL will run February 22-March 4 at The Kraine Theater & The Red Room (85 East 4th Street between 2nd Ave and Bowery) and UNDER St. Marks (94 St. Marks Place between 1st Ave and Ave A). Tickets to all shows may be purchased online at www.FRIGIDnewyork.info or by calling Smarttix at 212-868-4444.

Related Posts:

• Love In The Time Of Chlamydia: Love And War Stories (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
• I Married A Nun! – And That’s Just The Beginning … (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
• Big Plastic Heroes: 5 Things To Know About The Show Before You Go (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
• Death: It Happens – Still Daddy’s Girl (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
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The Happiest Medium Review by Guest Contributor Katelyn Manfre

People are always telling D’yan Forest to “act her age.” For her, that is simply unacceptable. At 77 years young, when D’yan has seen, experienced, and gone to bed with so much of the world, she simply hasn’t been able to settle into her age. In I Married a Nun!, running at UNDER St. Marks, she has set out to tell her story, to explain and illustrate just why being a senior is not where she’s at right now.

For the record, she did, in fact, marry a nun. For 25 years D’yan was unofficially wedded to Mary, an ex-lady of the cloth with whom she travelled the world and shared a rather active sex life (don’t worry–she’s got props). While her relationship with Mary is the focus of a large part of her story, D’yan also goes into great detail about her exploits, dalliances, and experiments before and after. She has, it seems, been comfortable in her skin and up for anything since she was a little girl growing up in Boston.

D’yan Forest is charming, witty, and expressive as she moves through her deeply personal journey. She is entertaining and admirable in her brash, unapologetic discussion of the tawdrier bits of her lifestyle. She relishes in it, wishing, it seems, the same euphoria and freedom on her audience that has been granted to her in this life.

It is only at the very end where the performance needs a little bit of sharpening. The overall meaning of the piece is lost somewhere in her final anecdotes. She muses on the solitary place she finds herself in today, but rather than elevating these thoughts for a higher, more universal message, she quickly wraps it up. What was a story of joy and excitement and unbridled experimental risks becoming just another “hello this is me in 90-minutes-or-less” solo performance. And D’yan is far too fascinating and fabulous for that to be the final takeaway.

There is something truly special about seeing a woman who has so embraced herself and her body and her lifestyle with no hesitation. It’s inspiring, even. She’s up there, bearing her soul and telling her story, armed with nothing but a ukulele.  And a light-up dildo.

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The 2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL will run February 22-March 4 at The Kraine Theater & The Red Room (85 East 4th Street between 2nd Ave and Bowery) and UNDER St. Marks (94 St. Marks Place between 1st Ave and Ave A). Tickets to all shows may be purchased online at www.FRIGIDnewyork.info or by calling Smarttix at 212-868-4444.

Related Posts:

• Love In The Time Of Chlamydia: Love And War Stories (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
• Big Plastic Heroes: Good Things Come In Big Plastic Packages (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
• Blind To Happiness: To See Or Not To See (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
• I Married A Nun: 5 Things To Know About The Show Before You Go (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
• The Rope In Your Hands: Katrina, In Their Own Words (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)

Not everyone got the kind of name that looks good on a marquee or sounds good in the sentence ” … and the award for best actor goes to …”.  And let’s all just admit it now: no one really knew how to pronounce “Gyllenhaal” till several movies in, and even then it took TWO siblings to get the world to say it properly.  Twenty years later Demi Moore still has 50% of the population putting the accent on the wrong syllable.

So.  Now imagine that you’re not that famous at all.  Nowhere near.  And you’re given a name that everyone mispronounces or mistakes for another name upon hearing it. Wouldn’t you change your name too?  You would if you were Moe Rosen, writer and performer of I’m Only Explaining This Once, his solo-show currently playing at the Red Room.

Moe Rosen – that’s his new name, folks – seemed to have a long, uncomfortable relationship with his original name.  I will not rob future audiences the ah-ha moment of hearing Moe’s given name from his own lips, but I will go so far as to say it’s actually not as uncommon as, say, Rumpelstiltskin and if you’ve lived in New York chances are you’ve heard it before and may even know one or two of your own.  (I actually do.)  But Moe’s story isn’t so much about the name as it is about his family’s complete inability to actually zero in on where the name came from.

Rosen uses pre-recorded video interviews with his parents to start a dialogue.  Both mom and dad (shown separately) have their unintentionally comedic moments as they contradict themselves and each other.  Moe gleefully points these moments out as well as moves the narrative along.  Without a doubt Rosen’s father emerges as the star of the piece; Rosen Sr. waves away the past with a wry smile and -when pressed on how involved he was with choosing Moe’s name-  insists “Well I wasn’t really a part of that.  I just wanted a child”.  It’s rather adorable.

The convoluted back-story of Moe’s moniker has to do with being named after a great-grandfather who died in the Holocaust.  That name, however, was Hebrew, so Rosen’s mom went with the “English version” of the name … though that name turned out to be Israeli.  “It could have been anything,” the father insists, rattling off several (more common) similar “English versions” of the name.  “I just wanted a child” he repeats.

Overall Moe’s earnestness is sweet, the story is funny, and the filmed bit of his parents (which include further back-story about Moe’s grandparents) have unexpected moments of humor that are all the funnier for the gravity with which they are related.  The piece did, however, begin a bit slowly,  and much of the first bits of interviews consist of Moe asking the same question over and over again, as his parents give the same answer.  While it’s amusing, it starts losing its freshness after the 3rd, 4th and 5th repetition. (Asked and answered – counsel is badgering the witness.)

Soon enough Moe moves on and the pacing rights itself – but I would suggest trimming a little from the top, especially in order to stay true to the “once” of the title. I think this show could easily clock in at 35 minutes and still be as funny – if not more so.

Ultimately, Moe Rosen is a likable guy with a story to tell.  He comes from funny stock, that’s obvious, and he’s continuing the family tradition.  With a little trimming and  faster pacing I’m Only Explaining This Once is sure to entertain audiences for as long as Moe continues to explain.
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The 2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL will run February 22-March 4 at The Kraine Theater & The Red Room (85 East 4th Street between 2nd Ave and Bowery) and UNDER St. Marks (94 St. Marks Place between 1st Ave and Ave A). Tickets to all shows may be purchased online at www.FRIGIDnewyork.info or by calling Smarttix at 212-868-4444.

Related Posts:

• I’m Only Explaining This Once: 5 Things To Know About The Show Before You Go (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
• The Rope In Your Hands: Katrina, In Their Own Words (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
• Man Saved By Condiments: Some Time Alone To Ketchup (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
• Big Girls Don’t Cry: Laughing On The Outside (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
• Love In The Time Of Chlamydia: Love And War Stories (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)

The Happiest Medium Review by Guest Contributor Linnea Covington

Afternoon Tea With Jane Austen (Photographer credit: Chris J. Hing)

Most little girls grow up reading the works of Jane Austen, be it Emma, Sense and Sensibility, or Pride and Prejudice. Some boys also read her stories, but usually that’s a school assignment. But, no matter how you digest this early 19th Century author, one thing remains consistent – you never learn much about her actual life. In Tali Brady’s one-woman play Afternoon Tea With Jane Austen, the Montreal-based actress and playwright attempts to share this history with you.

It’s an excellent way to become acquainted with Austen, and while Brady wrote a wonderfully fluid play chock full of personal details, fetching narratives, and historical information about the author, she doesn’t always execute her role as Austen well. The show started out slow as she bumbled around the who’s-who in Austen’s family, and even though she said herself that it was boring, it still shouldn’t have been. This isn’t because of the subject matter but more of Brady reciting her lines like she’s dictating instead of storytelling.

Luckily, this vibe doesn’t maintain through the entire play. When Brady talks about Austen’s love life and the process she went through to write and publish her books, pure excitement shone through and Brady’s acting became convincing. The same thing happened when she spoke multiple characters’ parts and when she accompanied her tale with the few and far between sound effects—a tool I think would help calm her obvious nervousness.

Despite the energy fluxes in the show,  Brady earned kudos for tackling an hour-long play and taking the stage alone. She managed to perk up near the end and demonstrate the intriguing character that is Jane Austen without completely dulling the audience. For example, did you know Austen had been in love only once and later in life turned down a chance at a compatible marriage preferring to remain a spinster rather than marry without feeling? No? Neither did I. Bits of information like that tickled me.

Ultimately though, next time, given it’s about having tea with an author, I would like to see Brady actually drink tea out of the cup and do it like a lady instead of like someone doing shots. I mean, what would Mr. Darcy say?

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The 2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL will run February 22-March 4 at The Kraine Theater & The Red Room (85 East 4th Street between 2nd Ave and Bowery) and UNDER St. Marks (94 St. Marks Place between 1st Ave and Ave A). Tickets to all shows may be purchased online at www.FRIGIDnewyork.info or by calling Smarttix at 212-868-4444.

Related Posts:

• Afternoon Tea With Jane Austen: 5 Things To Know About The Show Before You Go (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
• Missed Connections: An Exploration Into The Online Postings Of Desperate Romantics (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
• Drowning Ophelia: She Gets On Swimmingly (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
• I’m Only Explaining This Once: A Rosen By Any Other Name … (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
• Christopher Marlowe’s Chloroform Dreams

Suzen Murakoshi‘s self-authored, one-woman performance, Breathe, Love, Repeat, presently playing at Under St. Marks as part of this year’s Frigid New York Festival, is an autobiographical recounting of her last days with her mother. For anybody this might represent a daunting theme, vast, self-examining, possibly too much. But Murakoshi has an imaginary alter ego to call upon in the face of such a challenge – a samurai super daughter – and unhesitatingly she jumps in and grabs the bull by the horns. Why or whence came this super daughter is never made clear, she just magically appears in the form of Murakoshi heroically brandishing an invisible sword above her head in full spotlight. She is the pluck, the resistance, and later the resilience that help carry the author through the ordeal of watching her mother gradually sicken and decline. She is some sort of Asian folkloric warrior princess, alive to the existence of a spirit realm, knowledgeable of the proper respects and tributes owed the demons that haunt us.

Suzen Murakoshi

Perhaps she springs from her mother’s early Buddhist-inspired tales of the kami spirits of the woods and the proper forms of address and appeasement. Perhaps she’s just an aspect of Suzen the snowboarding fanatic, addicted to the adrenaline rush of speed and movement , the one who seems merely distracted and impatient with her mother’s telephone revelation that she has been diagnosed with cancer. Whoever she is she doesn’t say very much or get into it, just poses heroically in the spotlight with her signatory sword salute after the manner of a manga champion, as undeniable and inscrutable as She-Ra. Correspondingly mother is appraised as Queen Supreme Buddha, a repository of old world wisdom, craft, forbearance and tolerance. We’re in a fantasy realm, whimsically pirouetting atop the darker, sadder world of human suffering and mortality. This is an elegant and fresh strategy for addressing themes of loss and dying.

In several compelling instances Murakoshi elects to turn her back upon the audience, drops into a slouch, and growls out some lines by Dylan Thomas or Shakespeare. Who this stage interloper might be is never addressed, but as a theatrical device it proves quite effective. She certainly can move about the stage in graceful or comedic manner – at one point effortlessly falling into a cartwheel – but when this theatrical persona is dropped, so that we can hear the author speaking in her own voice, there is a dramatic shift to, well, neutral.  One just wishes that Murakoshi playing Murakoshi were in some form more actually present upon the stage. The voice is problematic – vocal modulation is narrow and inexpressive, as if she were reading off a list of shopping groceries. There’s a rattling impersonal character in the way she imparts her unfolding story, almost as if she wants the whole thing to be over as soon as possible. The performance lasted just under 45 minutes. It isn’t helpful that Murakoshi seems very comfortable with linguistic and familial cliches such as – “more guilt Mom, pile it on”, and “You were the best Mom in the world.”

In the late stages of her mother’s illness the nurse at the hospice opines that they should administer a shot of morphine to alleviate pain. Mother has expressed the desire to live consciously to the end in the Buddhist tradition, not succumbing to the use of sensory- or pain-killing medications. Murakoshi and samurai super daughter wish to honor this request, and in order to convince the nurse there is no essential need, the author asks her plainly suffering mother to smile and not frown. Which she does. It is a chilling moment and one that touches on the greater theme of: Which reality are you living? Murakoshi appears fully given over to her imaginary universe, almost desperately so, which might rankle with some when the stakes are so critically high. Such audience members might even observe that she can’t fundamentally deal with “reality” and this performance is her apology for the fact. One is left with the sense that at no point has the author gotten out of her own way long enough to approach objectively her mother or, indeed, herself. The concluding mantra, offered as a gem of hard won understanding – Breathe, Love, Repeat – feels cosmetic, unearned, pat, and frankly senseless. A tingling note of emotional exhibitionism prevails which, alas, is the rout of any attempt at sincere understanding or illumination, theatrical or otherwise.

Directed with a light hand by Ching Valdes-Aran, the presentation makes effective use of some simple photographic back shot projections. The silent photo album slide show reserved for the ending is, however, a theatrical misstep, awkwardly lacing the harder stuff with a sentimental syrup at odds with the preceding, and betraying a greater need at work here: the formulation of a hagiographic postcard to the author’s much-loved, late mother. Plainly and simply, after all, samurai super daughter just doesn’t do grief.

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The 2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL will run February 22-March 4 at The Kraine Theater & The Red Room (85 East 4th Street between 2nd Ave and Bowery) and UNDER St. Marks (94 St. Marks Place between 1st Ave and Ave A). Tickets to all shows may be purchased online at www.FRIGIDnewyork.info or by calling Smarttix at 212-868-4444.

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• Love In The Time Of Chlamydia: Love And War Stories (2012 FRIGID NEW YORK FESTIVAL)
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Sanctuary

Susanne Sulby writer, actor, co-director,
Andrea Haring co-director

An exploration of the struggles and tragedies of war and our need for sanctuary. A fast paced energetic multi media exploration of the roles we have played in war throughout time. Multiple characters expose the connections of fear, bigotry, power and religion with war and how they find sanctuary from it.

Show Times:

• Monday, 1/16 @ 9pm
• Wednesday, 1/18 @ 6pm
• Friday, 1/20 @ 7:30pm

Answers by Susanne Sulby (writer, actor, co-director)

Karen Tortora-Lee’s Question
This is an international festival. What part of the world are you coming from … and will your show tantalize the NYC audience with a taste of your nation’s culture?
Susanne Sulby: Though this is an International show I am from the US. Sanctuary is about our Universal experience as women in relation to war. This Story is told through the eyes of the three main characters, the house wife, an international war correspondent and Sanja Sihilovic a POW in Bosnia. ‘Sanctuary’ exposes the connection of fear, bigotry, power and religion to war throughout history and across the world. Using multiple characters, Film projection, movement and sound, I explore the human tragedy of war as well as the roles and responsibilities of individuals in the conflict of nations. Sanctuary makes immediate on the stage some of the most pertinent issues of our time.

Dianna Martin’s Question
Who is the greatest inspiration to you artistically?
Susanne Sulby: My teachers have always been my biggest inspiration. Currently Andrea Haring, my director, and Master Linklater, teacher, has inspired me to create challenging and specific work. Kristin Linklater has also inspired me to understand the importance of my voice in the world! Theatrically, I am inspired by so many people; of course incredible actors like Glenn Close who is able to manage a stage and screen career with ease, but also incredible women writers like Theresa Rebeck or the incredible Wendy Wasserstein.

Geoffrey Paddy Johnson’s Question
What emerged as the greatest challenge during the development of this production?
Susanne Sulby:Time. Time is always the challenge. (And of course money!) When I found that I would be performing this piece it was early December and I knew that I wanted to rewrite some of it and explore the positive changes that have happened in the world since its first production. To discover more hope and beauty. So, much of our time was spent developing those ideas.

Antonio Minino’s Question
You’re in Times Square surrounded by the best Broadway houses and highest selling entertainment in the world. What resources are you utilizing to spread the word about your show and get butts in seats?
Susanne Sulby: We have used as many ways as we can afford, post cards mailings, and drop offs, PR contacts with local writers, the web, e-mails, social networking sites and word of mouth from friends.

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