Two Doors Theatre

Life After Bush

2008-10-18T07:17:00.000-07:00

It’s no small coincidence that the stock market is plunging, the war is ongoing, and the scathing critiques of the current administration are all coming to a head currently. We are but a few short weeks from the 2008 Presidential election; with the lines between our nations free economy and the storied images of freedom blurring into nothing; it’s ever more important that we be paying extra special attention to this one people. So it goes that Nero Fiddled is spelling out their final chapter (one can hope) of the Bush Legacy with their latest work “Life After Bush” playing at hERE (145 Sixth Avenue) in Manhattan’s West Village.

This show could have easily been called “The Idiot’s Guide for Reasons to Vote Obama in 2008,” as anything else, but despite the play’s very left-leaning sensibilities, neither side was spared the rod. With Joe Biden dressed as Peter Pan, Hillary singing her “Evita”-laden concession, and Barack Obama done up in a Super-Bama outfit, even the democrats were not beyond caricature.

“Life After Bush,” was conceived in reality but written by cast members Noah Diamond and Amanda Sisk (who are also co-artistic directors of producing agent Nero Fiddled). The rest of the cast includes Kim Moscaritolo, Avi Phillips, Tarik Davis, and AEA members Brian Louis Hoffman and Sadrina Johnson. David Hancock Turner is listed as the accompanist in the playbill and he did a fine job playing DJ Thacker’s musical arrangements.

The real thing which this reviewer took away from this musical-comedy was actually the dire seriousness about this year’s election. There were a number of fun and funny moments like nearly every time the “McCain” or “Bush” actors entered the scene, with their military fatigued helmet and “Barney” the dog, respectively; the tune “Corporations Are People Too,” and Rudy Giuliani’s eponymous number. While all art is satire and life should never be taken too seriously, the fact is that for all its fun and bravado, “Life After Bush,” never strays too far from the actual reality of what has happened and the stakes which we all will be subjected to.

Two examples which stood out to me occurred at the beginning and the very end; “It’s Been A Bad Eight Years,” and “The American Dream.” During “…Eight Years,” there was a startling photo montage which came up along the back of the auditorium where we are reminded of all the horrific events which have gone on during this current administration: the levees in New Orleans, Terri Schiavo, Cheney grabbed his gun, the tragedy of Tony Snow, “shock and awe” in Iraq, the even sadder tragedy of America’s Mayor, Bush as “the decider” and so much more. These were all made fun of, yes, but the photographs actually were real; these events actually happened outside of the realm of The Soup; an unsettling realization, indeed.

The rest of the action in this musical includes things which we’ve all seen (unless you’ve been living underneath a rock since the late 1990’s) and swoops around full circle to the end. The cast of characters all come on in plain clothes during the stirring “The American Dream” and each take their turn at the mock voting machine, driving home the importance of every person doing their part. For a comedy piece, this song is a somber piece which tags the shows closing and tugs on all the right reflexes with lines like:

“The American Dream is starting with nothing, arriving at something, finding a way
The American Dream is faith in the future; The American Dream will be real someday.”

The show had its technical problems (in a space like hERE, especially when you’ve got such fun and cutting lines, everyone should have had mics) but the performances were all pulled off with an insightful amount of skill, humor, and attention to detail.

Many people have already had enough of this year’s election; they’d rather not consider the repercussions of the last eight years; they may just be ready to turn the page. However for others, all the psycho drama leading up to the events which will go down on November 4th and beyond, we geeks are totally jazzed and ready to roll. In “Life After Bush,” there is humor, there is pathos, there is reason to laugh, there is reason to cry, but most of all there should be reason to have hope. That was the driving message in this musical; that all we can hope for, for our future; is some kind of hope for some kind of change.

** Tarik Davis as Barack Obama, Avi Phillips as John McCain. photo by Tom Huben
**Brian Louis Hoffman as George W. Bush. Photo by Tor-Evert Johansen.

Ensemble Studio Theatre Marathon of One Act Plays

2008-06-23T03:41:00.000-07:00

Marathon Goes Gasping

by Jesse Schmitt

When I first attended a show at the Ensemble Studio Theatre more than 10 years ago I was dazzled at their wall of pictures of previous performers. One picture always caught my eye; a show at EST from 1986 starring Sarah Jessica Parker and Elias Koteas. The picture caught my eye not so much for her as, at the time, she was not nearly the superstar she is today (though, at the time, I was able to appreciate her performance in Steve Martin’s “LA Story”) No, it was for Mr. Koteas as he had starred as the renegade Casey Jones in the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie from my youth.

Another thing that I noted was the creaky, slow, small elevator, the tepid cough from the air conditioning unit, the cramped seating arrangements, and that big pillar which runs right through their second floor theatre.

I guess that was what was always impressive about the Ensemble Studio Theatre; what had happened there before. Being an eternal optimist when I first arrived here, I imagined some young scribe gazing up to the wall in the future and seeing a photograph of a show of mine and listlessly imagining themselves as I did before.

Time and experience changes a lot of things, but the spaces at the Ensemble Studio Theatre are a bit like Time in a Bottle. The elevator is the same, the waiting area is the same, the air conditioning is still lukewarm, the seating is still the same, and the same pictures still hang on the wall. Though the inside may have been moved around and the paintjob appears to be fresh, I wonder about what’s new that’s going on at EST. When I found out that the historic 30th Anniversary of their popular “Marathon of One Act Plays” series was taking place, I quickly jumped on board and made my way to series C.

Let me take a step back and say that the outgrowth from EST is really quite amazing. To think not even of Ms. Jessica Parker and Mr. Koteas, the list of those who the entertainment media have been or are currently associated with the popular off Broadway venue is awe inspiring indeed: Sam Shepard, John Patrick Shanley, Jon Voight, Cassandra Medley, Billy Aaronson, Leslie Ayvazian, Lewis Black, Leslie Caputo, Danny DeVito, Richard Dreyfuss, Christopher Durang, Horton Foote, Amy Fox, Richard Greenberg, Romulus Linney, William H. Macy, David Mammet, David Margulies in addition to the late Wendy Wasserstein, Shel Silverstein, and of course the former artistic director Kurt Dempster, among countless others. So it is not that a great many talented people are not regulars at EST. In addition, two very excellent playwrights with whom I studied; Christopher Ceraso and Edward Allen Baker regularly have their work showcased at EST and they may even still be teaching through the theatre.

So needless to say, more than 10 years hence and my being quite cynical about the state of things in general, the bar was set quite high in my mind for the caliber of work I would be seeing at Series C of the EST Marathon. I had been to the Marathon in years past and one thing which I was always impressed with was the brevity I felt in seeing the plays. 5 one act plays, some as short as 10 minutes, showcased with talented actors, minimal staging, few scene changes, and important themes.

The first play of the evening, “Piscary” by Frank D. Gilroy, directed by Janet Zarish was a relationship play set around a Scrabble board. The “He” character, played with nervous abandon by Mark Alhadeff was having second thoughts about his marrying the “She” character, ably played by Diane Davis. He starts the play zoned in on his fish tank, feeling like they should call off the wedding which is set to go down in three weeks. She reacts with an unreal amount of calmness in the eyes of this reviewer who was just married within the year (that, or my new wife is quick to pull her punches; the truth, I’m sure, lie somewhere in between) Maybe Ms. Davis’ character is used to this crazy talk from Mr. Alhadeff which would be considered by some a role reversal for genders, but who’s keeping track?

The embattled couple get down to brass tacks when he declares that she is no good at Scrabble; that’s the reason he wants to call off the wedding. They decide to square off in a mano-e-mano game of winner-take-all Scrabble, the house, the stuff, the fish tank. He is confident, she is cool. When she opens up her verbose vocabulary and takes him to the ropes, he is despondent. The ending is something of a compromise and really speaks to the amount of marriages that are rushed into by late in life couples (ugh! Late 20’s!)

The second play, “In Between Songs” was written by the popular comedian Lewis Black and directed by Rebecca Nelson. Starring Jack Gilpin as Chaz, David Wohl as Ed, and Cecilia DeWolf as Grace, this play stands as a trippy retrospective on a life lived. At the outset, the indistinguishable characters are all sitting, listening to a Bob Dylan record; then the song stops. All the rest of the action of the play takes place before the music gets going again.

This play really seemed more like an homage to how good life is (particularly when fueled along with cannabis) and how good their life had been. They all feel “interconnected;” Grace hits the bowl, literally, of some Stove Top stuffing, like it was like warmth for hypothermia sufferer and that was the whole point, I imagine. That we all need things, sometimes for much longer or much greater than we are conscious of; and when we get these needs fulfilled, we have a very hard time letting go.

The third play in the series, “Flowers” was written by Jose Rivera and directed by Linsay Firman. Starring Raul Castillo as Beto and Flora Diaz as Lulu this play is a fantasy trip of the imagination of children. Beto and Lulu are brother and sister and Lulu, slight elder, is 12. She has begun sprouting acne and she feels this is a revelatory event that her video game playing brother should take note of.

One thing that these two did in the play which really got to me was they addressed the audience directly. One thing I learned in my studies as a playwright (especially my more advanced studies at EST) was that breaking down that fourth wall should only be of absolute necessity and should be used sparingly. Every time the other character left the stage, the one left would talk to the audience and fill us in on all the back-story. If you can’t tell the story in the present moment and if what is going on onstage isn’t interesting enough for us to be engaged, then you probably shouldn’t be telling said story.

This was, by-and-large, the case for “Flowers.” Lulu’s acne began sprouting branches and these branches began flowering. This idea was a little strange premise for a play that otherwise seemed so real.

It was after this play that the intermission took hold. It was almost 105 minutes in! I deciphered my other obligations for the evening (I had to be at work at 11PM) and bolted during intermission. I hastened to even write a half-baked review of this series, but apparently I had a lot to say.

I do hope for the reinvention of the Ensemble Studio Theatre; I imagine a day when I can return there and see challenging work from unknown playwrights and be satisfied that the time spent there was at least thought provoking. However I have to say that this latest go-round, with three tapped out old stoners, two kids with wild imaginations, and a bickering couple, pre-marriage, is nothing all that new.

Ensemble Studio Theatre
549 W 52nd St
New York, NY 10019
(212) 247-4982
www.ensemblestudiotheatre.org

No More Waiting: A New Musical Comedy

2008-06-23T00:46:00.000-07:00

Musical Comedy With Legs and Arms Reaching

by Jesse Schmitt

There is definitely something to be said for a good ending.

In cinematic art, in television, in politics, in real life, and especially in the theatre, when there are unexpected, harmonious chords struck around the resolution to a situation, it is a gentle reminder of the true synthesis of life. Despite the fact that we’re all on this earth, searching, roving, digging, trolling, turning up the bottom feeding scum of said planet, in the hunt for that ever illusive intangible called “happiness,” or “fulfillment,” or whatever else; when there is a collective exhale of the crowd, when you can turn to your best friend of years and share an unspoken acknowledgement, when your pending doomsday ends up coming up roses of its own volition, there is that moment when the individual is reminded that the world does not always have to be such a predictably unfair or callously unfamiliar place.

So it is in the new show playing at The 13th Street Repertory Company (50 W 13th St. New York, NY – 212-675-6677) “No More Waiting,” which follows the lives of five waiter/actors as they seize opportunity when it is afforded them at the cabaret style venue where they serve. The talent for the evening has been stricken and the wait staff, through the coxing-cheerleading of one of their own, rises up and briefly overthrows the mantle of control for what the audience will see this night.

This is a show which may obscure some who are not at all familiar with the life of the New York City theatrical artist. While not too many passers by frequent the very local, Greenwich Village establishment (13th St. Rep is a destination, generally), the “in-talk” and some of the more subtle themes did not go unnoticed.

Many of the leaps the audience is asked to take with these performers are fantastical, exaggerated, or outrageous. For example, not that it hasn’t happened at cabaret style venues in the past, but the premise that the management of a dining/entertainment establishment would go off notice of what was going on at their business and five of their staff would go off the service floor for more than an hour is something of a cut at restaurant management of the world and not altogether likely. I’m sure I will get replies to my inbox, “this happens to me all the time!” – I’m just saying. Also the quickness with which Samantha (Jenny Paul), the Che Guevara of the group, is able to throw together costumes and such is a little far fetched. For that matter, their piano player was right in lock step with them, making the transition from non English speaking bus-boy to virtuoso musical theatre pianist at the drop of a hat (even thought they qualify the latter). However if you’re able to get beyond all that, you should have a good time.

This is a piece which operated in the “Kiss Me Kate” style of musical; the play-within-a-play thing has been done before, so it should not ring all that unfamiliar. There were moments when the narrative of the “story” and the “story-within-the-story” and the “story-within-the-story-within-the-story,” got a little fuzzy (thinking specifically about the elevator scenes) but, again, all that fell away in the end.

The musical begins with these five disaffected artists; drudging through their lives; feeling listless and needing something exciting to happen to them. This is not an uncommon theme in stories told ever, but it makes me wonder about expectation. It appears as though the subtext is “well, I’m doing this for now, but any moment from now my big break will come and I’ll be starring in a show at 13 St. Rep,” or something like that. The glossing over seems to be with the tough years that come before that and all the work that needs to be done after even your first successes.

Once the scenes got going, they reminded me often of a recurring vision of Patti LuPone to Peter Gallagher in the recent revival of “Noises Off” – “We’re putting on a show! We’re putting on a show!” There was bedlam after the waitering crew decides they are going to perform this night. The scenes switch often and while it’s going on, as an audience member, you aren’t really sure whether or not there is a running through line, but the viewer is brought into the fore at the plays end.

In terms of writing, many of the plays songs were cute. Many of the lyrics though, to this reviewer, seemed contrived. Lyric writing is not easy but there were occasions when I felt like the lyrics delivered took the easy way out. That said many of the actors seemed to take to their roles such that the character seemed to become the actor, so even though Chris Widney’s name is on the Book & Lyrics in the program, I’m not sure how much of a collaborative process this was or if and when the director took any creative liberties.

Brian C Curl as Robert took a very stylized approach to the character as well he should have. His performances were good; his timing was great, his delivery was funny, and he even did a little tap dancing for the room. But I might have made different directorial choices with him in instances where he operated outside the box. His performance shone when he was where he was most comfortable.

Dustin J. Harder was Steve and he was a riot. In general, he hit all the right notes in his portrayal of a perverted businessman and an aggressive go-getter who hides behind his own bravado. However his moment happened when he donned a mullet and became the leader of a rock and roll hair-band “Cujo” while at once trying to settle down to his suburban existence. The keystone moment for the lyricist in this show was right before the mullet comes off and the business suit goes on, the bandleader, singing about his wife/questioning his life: “She has an answer/Sometimes I hadn’t even asked a question/Have I ever made a right decision in my entire lifetime?” His pain was hilarious and his confusion was palpable.

Jeni Incontro as Jen was quite fetching. Unfortunately for her, she’ll probably be cast as the ingénue so long as she keeps her doe-like appearance; she should be vigilant against this, if she enjoys the ACT in acting. She had some moments in this show, whether it was her effortless Salsa dancing, her portrayal of the (eventually pregnant and bitter) love interest of Mr. Harder in the “Cujo” scene, or her turn as an older mother in a different scene where she was able to shine. Looking over her bio, she played Mae in Sam Shepard’s “Fool For Love,” which is a massive role in and of itself, so I have no doubt of her capacities.

Benjamin Mirman as Elliot was a very engaging character also. Mr. Mirman is still a little wet behind the ears as is evidenced from his sophomore year in college entry onto his bio, not that it translated in his performance. He is blessed with a certain Linus like quality which will always keep him employed so long as Charlie Brown is getting work. I thought the staging of his arc was good in that they kept the Elliot character restrained until the very end and his very sweet “Take A Chance” song, which was unquestionably the highlight of the show.

And of course Ms. Paul as Samantha. Her role was really underused, to effect; there was a moment towards the very end of the play when I realized I hadn’t seen her in a great many minutes. There was a reason for that and the beauty of live theatre shone through in her final moments onstage.

Mark T. Evans was the pianist as well as Vasily the busboy at the very beginning and Shannon O’Neil was the Voice From Beyond which gets these thespians rolling on their rollicking musical theatre journey.

The cast of “No More Waiting” may have a little more waiting while they earn their stripes but you have a few more days to head over to The 13th St. Rep and see these struggling waiter/actors reach for it.

“No More Waiting” plays at
13th St. Repertory Theatre
50 W 13th St.
New York, NY (b/w 5th & 6th Ave)
212-675-6677
http://www.13thstreetrep.org/
http://www.theatermania.com/

Running time is 90 minutes.
“No More Waiting” is performed without an intermission.

Music by David Christian Azarow
Book & Lyrics by Chris Widney
Directed by Samantha Saltzman

A Candid Interview with Alex Lyras, Star of The Common Air

2008-04-30T21:29:00.000-07:00

Picking the brain of the versatile solo performer

by Jesse Schmitt

Alex Lyras is as direct as they come. His handshake is firm, but easy, his temperament is relaxed, yet forward leaning, his message is direct, but coded. Alex Lyras is a performer. Artist. Actor. But he also has a very sensitive ear for things: words, inflection, intention. Alex Lyras is currently playing in a recently extended run of a show in Los Angeles called "The Common Air."

"The Common Air," is a very distinct, very original show. It's a show we've seen before because it's the story of our modern lives. However the distinct and original part of this show is not just in its telling but also in that it is told through the voices of many and the vehicle of one; it is a solo show. While many people, this scribe included, may recoil at the thought of a "solo show" and think only "Ego, indulgence, repeat;" the fact of the matter is that this is a very sensitive show. It is sensitive because it is in flux; it is moving it is pulsing it is changing. The show has undergone a number of small aesthetic changes which have made it even more powerful as it embarks on its second tour of duty in the perpetually bored, always changing market that is the Los Angeles theatre scene.

"The Common Air," had been playing for the last 12 weeks at the Lillian Theatre in Los Angeles on Mondays & Tuesdays and has recently been promoted! It has made the jump to The Asylum Theatre where it has received its own time slot on a pair of much more favorable nights; Friday and Saturday.

This is a show which has spent a great deal of time in the making. It is still being changed and altered and modified and upended and you, as an audience member, are all the more likely, on any night, to see a slightly different show then on the night before. This makes the tickets for "A Common Air" that much more of a highly prize item; the fact that whatever you're seeing may never be seen again. Mr. Lyras has been doing solo shows for years and this latest birth is a true gem which deserves your scrutiny and attention.

"The Common Air" tells the story of our modern dilemma; the fact that we can't walk past someone of a certain countenance without reflexively hearkening back and wondering; the fact that there can't be an "alert" without raising all kinds of red flags in our own minds which borders on psychosis; the fact that we as a society are having a hard time getting beyond certain generalizations which are corrosive, barbaric, obsolete and sad.

This is the world that we live in and Mr. Lyras is front and center with his astute commentary. But this is not a thing which is new for this seasoned performer; he's been doing this same sort of performance in production since 1999. Prior to that even, as a student of improv and of theatre he had decided he was going to write his own monologues for audition.

This is one of the things which sets Alex Lyras apart from a large majority of actors in the world today; he is participatory all the way up and through what he says, where he stands, and how he moves through the scene, through the story, and through to the end.

I recently had the fortunate opportunity to sit down with this versatile performer and pick his brain about the entertainment industry in general, his show in specific, and the way of the world which we are all constantly swaying every which way with every day.

As a child of parents from the Midwest growing up near New York City in the 1970's was a life altering experience, even if he wasn't aware of it. Born in the Bronx and growing up in Westchester, Mr. Lyras and his parents spent a great deal of time in the city as a youth; particularly the epicenter of avant garde live performance: Greenwich Village.

Alex Lyras is the son of a mother chef/author and an entrepreneur businessman who had very early exposure to the theatre bug: "I saw my first Broadway caliber show in London when I was five. It was Carmen."

Needless to say, this event had a large and decisive impact on the young man. Regardless, he went to college with the intention of becoming a business major. Fortunately for him he realized after seeing the course load that this was not what he wanted to do.

"I got there and seeing the course load, 'Business 101, Business 201; Accounting 101, Accounting 201;' I knew it wasn't for me." Making the life altering decision, he jumped ship and quickly switched majors in the Amish land of Bucknell, Pennsylvania in a Philosophy program.

When I asked how his college major affected his solo shows, he seemed hesitant.

"Philosophy is best for ideas." Mr. Lyras draws from the long tradition of our ancestors and subscribes to the storytelling aspect of the theatre. It's where he's gotten his best creations including the six characters in "The Common Air." But he didn't get here alone.

"Rob McCaskill is a coach I'd met and he's influenced me a lot." It is with the direction and co-writing of Mr. McCaskill that "The Common Air" has lifted off and appears destined for a long journey through the skies.

Mr. Lyras seems to be a realist about the current precipice theatre artists walk with their hesitant audience. "If you're going to bring people into the theatre and ask them to sit in the dark for 90 minutes, you have to give them more. They have to trust you; it has to be a journey, it has to be a story."

While the arc of the story is the beautiful dance in "The Common Air," the standout vehicle in this story is the performance of Mr. Lyras. When I brought that to his attention, he demurred: "It takes a long time for things to catch on...it's a faster world. So with email things spread and word spread."

Alex Lyras is a man who has had a great deal of success and his own share of failures. As is evidenced from his own work, it takes a great deal of trial and error. As he said regarding the work for his solo shows, "developing layers takes a lot of pictures and stories."

Alex Lyras doesn't claim to be any sort of sage. In fact, here is a full grown man who seems to still have the curiosity of a child. About his own travails he did tell me though that the "best advice for actors and writers is have some people who are honest around you."

Honesty is what has gotten this performer this far; his honest portrayal of these characters is illuminating indeed. Anyone interested in honest theatre in an apathetic world should make a point to see "The Common Air." While the east coast audience will need to wait for their fly-by, Mr. Lyras assured me, "the show is being developed for New York." In the meanwhile the skies the limit for this solo performer and folks out west should catch this bird before it's gone.

More resources

www.laweekly.com/index.php?option=com_lsd&task=theatersearch&letter=U&Itemid=108

http://www.calendarlive.com/stage/cl-et-common22feb22,0,6165896.story

VARIETY REVIEW http://www.variety.com/review/VE1117936875.html?c=33

Little Velvet Square: "Almost an Evening" Touches That Tender Little Spot...Almost

2008-04-20T00:11:00.000-07:00

Feeling Around With A Little Velvet Square:

by Jesse Schmitt

When F. Murray Abraham’s God (“Who Judges”) character begins his stumping about humanities perpetual misinterpretation of the Ten Commandments, it seems intended as an eye opening experience for the audience assembled in the theatre. It also is addressed universally towards the-audience-within-the-audience that his character is playing to. However a line is soon crossed which sets off Mark Linn-Baker (“God Who Loves”) and sends them off into a battle royal which could have only been punctuated by a Springer character running on with a steel chair. It’s the message that gets muddled for both Mr. Abraham and a pair seeing the show-inside-the-show, after their show, as they discuss the merits of Mr. Abraham’s God over dinner which sets off a disagreement which evolves into a fight which could only be punctuated by a Springer character running on with a steel chair. It is only then that Mr. Abraham the actor who had “played God” arrives at the very restaurant where these two audience members are discussing his performance from just previous…

And on and on it goes.

Perhaps the description of this closing piece “Debate,” from the playwright himself could have better prepared us for this circuitousness when in the playbill we are warned: “Cosmic questions are taken up. Not much is learned.”

This is the feel of the evening in the trio of short works from Mr. Ethan Coen which make up “Almost an Evening,” his current presentation of short works at The Theatres at 45 Bleecker Street, currently running in New York City. There is plenty of pathos, plenty of wrath, and plenty of humor in the nearly 90 minutes of stage time in the three short pieces. I dare not call them “plays” in the traditional sense so much as vignettes or scenes; pieces of human interaction strung together to take the audience on a fully self-aware evening of theatre.

Mr. Coen is one half of the Oscar saddled Coen brothers; the Hollywood dream team who are responsible for such instant classics as "Raising Arizona", "O’Brother Where Art Thou", and "No Country For Old Men" just to name a few. However far from the glitz of Hollywood Bleecker Street is, the playwright did not come to the party empty handed. Many may recognize Mr. Linn-Baker as “Cousin Larry” but there is a whole talented troupe including Mr. Murray Abraham, J.R. Horne, Jordan Lage, Mary McCann, Del Pentecost, Joey Slotnick, Johanna Day, and Tim Hopper; each under the watchful eye of director Neil Pepe.

However, much to the benefit of the audience, this is not some self-congratulatory Hollywood ‘in crowd.’ While George Clooney does make a brief appearance on a magazine cover in Hell, the location of his appearance seems not at all coincidental. No this group are ensemble performers and they all approach the words of Mr. Coen under direction of Mr. Pepe with careful consideration. Many of the players are actually members of The Atlantic Theatre Company (William H. Macy & David Mamet’s theatre school) who is a producing agent for this show.

And their performances were all generally really good. So I hesitate to say anything more about the evening...But I will.

Here's my biggest gripe. In “Almost an Evening,” the heightened reality and overall story arc are predominantly absent. I feel like many of the lines spoken in these pieces are done so into the mirror; as though Mr. Coen himself were onstage, feeling shy. This, from one of my favorite filmmakers is outrageous; I'd certianly expected a lot more "Pop!" Some of the scenes in this evening reminded me of Larry, Curly, and Shemp more than Coen Brothers favorites like "Fargo" or "The Big Lebowski." Heck, even "The Man Who Wasn't There," has a beginning, middle, and end; it's the "Almost" in this evening which was the biggest qualifier and, unfortunately, it is also the biggest let down.

But my tone is all off because the acting was great! There is a fun irony which the players are able to pull off with grace and elegance. Everyone seemed to hit their spots and they all remained largely connected. Still, the conflicted tenor leaves one exiting the theatre as a maudlin drunk. The banter the actors share is delightful, and while some of their phrasings are witty; the spectacle is apparent; the bickering, jarring; the dynamism, relative. “Rage Against the Machine: If That’s the Way You Feel.”

I get it that Mr. Coen didn't want to take any playwright's milk money; so much of what is said in the theatre has already been said before. But we come to the theatre exactly for that; why do you think Shakespeare is continually remounted? It felt as though Mr. Coen saw the vertical distance in the pole vault, set his bar down and just walked away rather than giving it a go.

That said, “Almost an Evening,” more than lives up to its name. There is a certian "yuck-yuckiness" to the pieces which, in the end, is disappointing. Mr. Coen even evokes Mr. Mamet at one point and like a damsel, tied to the tracks it seemed as obvious as the freight train’s coming in the distance. And to be there is exactly where I felt I was. What this show does have going for it is just about everything else; the players give it their all and each are able to shine at moments; the direction is snappy; the production is nice. While the endgame is par for the course, if you’re looking for an enjoyable, but not impressively memorable evening at the theatre in the Village, “Almost an Evening,” is as just as good an option as any.

Carnage: A Comedy

2008-02-09T20:42:00.000-08:00

I was pumped to go into The Actors Gang Theatre (9070 Venice Blvd - Culver City, CA) and see a really amazing evening of theatre with their current revival of “Carnage: A Comedy.” I felt like the show held promise and with a well respected name like Tim Robbins attached as one of the writers of this 20 year old satire, I knew I was in for the full treatment. I must say though it never quite congealed for me. When I was watching it, the acting was good and everything appeared to be as it should; upon further reflection, I have a few problems.

Perhaps it was the fact that, as Mr. Robbins, the artistic director, says in the liner notes “The play you will see tonight is the same play (which premiered in 1987). Except for one line referencing our current war in the first scene the play is unchanged.” Why would this be a problem? We’re still parsing our syllables over Shakespeare 400 years after the fact. To go back to the liner notes, “(When) we first performed “Carnage: A Comedy…we were a young and impassioned group and the play addressed issues that concerned us at the time. It was a vital and visceral experience…”

Okay. That’s fine. We’ve all had “vital” and “visceral” experiences which have helped to shape who we are today. But, haven’t you changed from those young minds at all? Yes, there are still hucksters telling us lies, trying to blow smoke back in the exhaust, turning water into wine and urine back into water; and yes, the sad but true fact is that statistically there is a sucker born every minute ready to buy what that shyster is selling, but really? Is that all there is?

We’re an educated group that goes to the theatre; what you’re telling us as an audience is that we don’t deserve any more nuance than one sentence from what you’d written twenty years ago when you were in your twenties yourselves! That’s not progress! I’d like to hope that everyone that was in that audience doesn’t still hold the same set of beliefs about people that they did twenty years ago. Yet, when Cotton Slocum gets into the cannon and the lights go black except for the little plastic action figure on a string lit up above the audience head by a spotlight to simulate “distance” I had a sudden realization that felt like Paul Reubens giving me his Big Top Pee Wee impressions of the way of the world. The Gospel According to Pee Wee. Let Us Pray.

More to the point of what your play was trying to say; Jerry Falwell is no longer with us; Pat Robertson is not nearly as relevant as he once was. We’re moving away from this type of thought into a more enlightened moment. With re-hashing of old stories and the airing of old grievances, we’re not moving the discussion forward in any kind of a productive manner.

Not to even get into the army segment of your show! I felt like I was in an Orwellian/Heller nightmare there for half of your play. But we can’t keep talking about the present as though the past were the only viable template. The Wild West, bible thumping, halleluiah that ya’ll were peddling is yesterday; let’s talk about right now. And tomorrow. That is our only course for safety and salvation on this earth.

I can’t go back to that place. I fell out with Pee Wee a long time ago. So, I think, did Reubens!

You Say "Anything" - Little Bit of Love

2008-01-30T03:16:00.000-08:00

A Sweet Piece of Humanity in a World Turned Asunder

by Jesse Schmitt

Many people who come into The Lillian Theatre (1076 N Lillian Way; Hollywood) to see the world premiere of Tim McNeil’s new play “Anything” may have some preconceptions for what is about to go down. They may think that they’ve heard this one before; the story of a reclusive, grief-stricken widower from the deep, deep south of Mississippi and a thrown out on her ass Hollywood transvestite who is one the brink of self annihilation can only mean one thing; porno.

In fact this premise can be something else entirely as Mr. McNeil and the players from the Elephant Theatre Company pull off quite well. With a little bit of theatrical magic they’ve created a sweet story of an older man looking for companionship and a tranny that is well beyond her years and is also looking for, well, companionship. This is the one piece which works like a charm in this small little story; it goes from being the premise for a smut video and becomes a story about two desperate people who have both hit their rock bottom and as a result are fully clinging to one another with nowhere to go but up.

The show starts us in a classically appointed apartment as our hero, Early Landry is just moving in following the death of his wife of years. Mr. Landry is not familiar with apartment life; in fact he’s not even familiar with this time zone as he’s from the deep south of Mississippi and he’s landed into the heart and heat of Hollywood. There are some things which he does take a storied hand at; for instance banging on the ceiling when his pair of upstairs bong-smoking neighbors are “rocking out” too loud, too long, or too late (ah! how I wish we all had such agreeable neighbors!)

Then there’s Freda. A beautiful and exotic transvestite who is found to be on the losing side of an argument for her boyfriend to stay with her. She’s jealous, he’s had it, and Early is there to peek in on what’s going on in the apartment next door. In typical nosey neighbor fashion he hears the whole disagreement and a bond is struck almost immediately.

Like Thelma & Louise for the apartment set, this is a story of two wildly different people who need to be able to trust in each other to save themselves. In doing so they are able to learn about themselves and save one another. Tender, touching, hilarious, and lovely; you only have a little while longer but if you get the opportunity you should certainly see Anything; a fairy tale love story for the 21st century.

www.plays411.com/anything
www.elephanttheatrecompany.com
www.myspace.com/elephanttheatrecompany

At Home OnStage: From the Frontlines

2008-01-27T03:03:00.000-08:00

(I don't often leave this open for others to post on; but my friend Josh Kauffman and his merry band of brothers & sisters did an amazing thing recently. This performance group put up a showcase event with New York City's homeless taking the mic and having a chance to get their story heard. I was so touched when I found out that another one of my good friends was involved with this, that I offered them this space to do some first hand reporting of how they thought the event went. What follows is Mr. Kauffman retelling his story. JS)

First Hand/Front Line

by Josh Kauffman

It started with just an idea, with someone telling me I should look deeper into my relationship with New York's homeless community. I'd been coming to terms with how jaded I'd been regarding the homeless, especially the subway and street corner panhandlers, and realizing how much I'd neglected the human being inside each of the people I'd been so successfully ignoring. I developed the idea to present these people with an outlet for expression, to allow people to see the stories they wanted to tell.

After circulating the idea among my friends and letting it take root, we generated a community of volunteers to start the project in motion.We were very improvisational as we developed our strategies and goals. We knew we wanted a show, we knew we wanted homeless performers; beyond that, we were forced to generate the questions that needed answers, and then generate those answers. We lost a few volunteers early on because of the spontaneity with which we approached the task, but the corps that remained was both dedicated and resourceful.

The plan was that we would create workshop teams of two to four volunteers. Each team would approach a community center, shelter, or some other service provider, and present our mission statement with an offer to conduct theater workshops in their space, for anyone who wished to participate. With enough teams at work, each with their own handful of participants, over the few weeks' prep time we allotted ourselves we would generate more than enough material to fill a sixty to seventy-five minute program.

While that part of the process was being developed, we were at work securing a venue and connecting all the other dots. We wanted to feed the participants and the audience, and we needed to start the publicity machine working, and it was a lot of balls to keep in the air at once. That we were able to do so, and that the people we approached for help were so accommodating and generous, were more than a minor miracle. A church in Midtown donated their space, two different restaurants offered food, Ben and Jerry's gave us ice cream, and a great photographer friend of mine recruited a friend of hers to put together some amazing publicity pictures. We're all flying high.

In the end, we had one team, usually a team of one person, working at Project ORE at a synagogue on 23rd Street. Instead of 'street' homeless, our participants came almost exclusively from shelter communities, though one of our poets had been on the streets for nearly five years. Both in terms of our volunteers and the participants we were courting, availability was always a sticky issue. The venues we approached were open for limited windows during the day, and most of the participants could only be there for those limited hours before they scattered to other obligations.

Right up till opening night, it wasn't fully clear who would be showing up to perform, or what they would show us when they did get on stage. Our commitment was to give a good experience to everyone who arrived, on both sides of the curtain, so we smiled and kept encouraging and working.We achieved our goals, for both performances, though very differently each night.

On Friday, we were short three of our expected performers, and one man came who wasn't expected at all. It was a bit of a shuffle to make sure the show was complete and on schedule, but we presented a complete program and had more than enough food afterward to make for a good reception. The second performance, we actually had two extra performers, and had to wonder whether the program would be too long. We fielded some hurt feelings and misunderstandings as we trimmed the bill a bit - we'd love to have a two hour show, but we can't overstay our welcome at our free performance space.

In the end, the church indulged us with extra time, we had a longer and better show, the audience was moved to laughter and tears, and the participants were stoically grateful and pleased.The greatest thing for me was to see the new connections that got made. Our team leader, Casey, made some fast friendships among the performers she'd been working with, which have endured even after the curtain came down on "At Home on Stage."

The audience engaged the performers, and without fail came away with smiles or looks of wonder on their faces. And to see new friendships formed, the excitement for what had been created and the energy it took to make it all work... I mean, it was totally worth it.

Here I am writing this book report or history lesson about How It All happened, but in a nutshell: We wanted to present an opportunity to perform, to people who have not been offered that opportunity, and perhaps didn't even know they could have it. We wanted to present these people to an audience of their peers and mine, to create new dialogues and levels of understanding. We did that. And then we fed everyone lasagna and salad and chicken fingers.

US Premier of Athol Fugards "Victory"

2008-01-26T02:32:00.000-08:00

Victory Lost at Fountain Theatre

by Jesse Schmitt

The title of the latest Athol Fugard work to hit the United States is “Victory” but all around these three characters lies the stench of failure. The US Premiere is presented by The Fountain Theatre (5060 Fountain Ave, Los Angeles) and is directed by the theatre’s co-artistic director, Stephen Sachs.

When you walk into The Fountain Theatre’s intimate 78 seat house, perhaps the first thing you will notice is how close you are to the stage. This is not unlike any other black box theatre which many of us have been to before; the difference here is the intricate detail that the set designer, director, and technical staff have gone over inside this space; literally throwing us into this world.

The setting seems pedestrian enough; a study and open dining area of a home; but everything, the floor to ceiling bookshelves packed tight with individually selected volumes, the inviting looking cushioned chair in the study, which you know has been sat in many times, the floorboards which extend all the way off the stage so it appears as though it never ends; none of these details were lost on this reviewer. But it wasn’t just the downstage dressings with some curtains haphazardly thrown up in the rear; there were windows, two doors leading to two other rooms, and a zigzagging hallway which takes us to the back. From the moment you walk in, you’re taken back through the looking glass; it was as though the show would begin, “Once upon a time…” and the front page of the storybook would turn. It was impressive indeed.

But there was still something else about this home. It felt empty, deserted, vacated. Lived in and still, not. There was this huge beautiful oak dining room table which had chairs askew as though there had recently been bodies there; but no other signs of life. There was no clutter; no juice glass, no newspaper; the books were all high up on the shelves, but the reading lamps were extinguished and all the pillows on the couch were neatly in place.

We quickly would learn why this was so; the house would not maintain its cool facade for too long.

The lights go dark; crickets begin their serenade on the quiet South African village of Karoo, and the first thing we hear is glass being broken into. Through one of the windows stumble Freddie (Lovensky Jean-Baptiste) and Vicky (Tinashe Kajese) who appear to be little more than two bumbling burglars. They race around the room, ravishing it thoroughly; as they keep whisper-screaming at each other that “they need the money.” Actually it’s Freddie who does most of the destruction and whispering; this is a house that Vicky has led him to and one she claims she’s seen great sums of cash on hand at before. Yet she can do little but light a candle, sit on the table, fend off Freddie’s lame sexual advances, and sing; all of which are much to the dislike of Freddie.

They move to a comfortable pace of pulling out drawers, tearing down books and urinating on them, and sharing stories when suddenly enters Lionel (Morlan Higgins) the aging Caucasian resident of this African nation. He enters from upstage slyly with a pistol in his hand and catches everyone by surprise. Lionel is a measured man but he’s immediately chagrin when he realizes that Vicky is on the floor.

The lights come up and the real story of this play is allowed to begin. This is a tale that many westerners wouldn’t really understand too well (or at least not the crowd the night I was there) Lionel was the employer of Vicky’s mother, as a housekeeper; and even though Vicky’s been filling his head in passing with tales of her bright future, in reality Vicky has been reduced to her petty burglary.

Moreover, Freddie has convinced Vicky that he is gong to find a better life in Capetown; where the living is easy and the money is there for the taking. While Vicky continually tells Freddie that she wants to “find her own road” she appears to be continually clinging to this guy who is not really all that nice to her, yet she can not let go.

Lionel enters and the verbal and physical jousting begins. He starts with the upper hand as he’s got the gun and the moral platitude to scream down from his bully pulpit; however the dynamic quickly shifts leading to a balancing act in the end which offers up deadly results.

Lionel is played with a kind hand and a meandering stoicism but even he is lost without the companionship of his wife. Freddie is played with a wild and hot intensity, reacting with split second judgment which can only lead to a bad end. Vicky is played like a little girl on a see-saw; sometimes she’s up and sometimes she’s down; this conflicted aching is her implosion; merely from her own inertia.

Vicky the child was born around the day Nelson Mandela walked free from Victor Verster prison. She was named Vicky not because of the name of the jail but because of the words that rang out from Mandela like a silver bell to her mother, to everyone in Africa, and all around the world on that day: “Victory!” But back in the real world and in the world that is the situation of this play, everyone loses. As Freddie tells Lionel, “You don’t know what it’s like for us…There is no hope here.” No hope for Lionel either as he is an old man who has given up on the life he once enjoyed.

“Victory” is a play about three people; three lost souls; and the cosmic convergence which brought them together in this way. They have all been dealt a bad hand against the stacked deck of life and each are, in their own way, inching toward their own self destruction.

Standing on My Knees: Falling Down

2008-01-20T11:10:00.000-08:00

The Impression That I Get

by Jesse Schmitt

First impressions are everything. They can make or break the dynamic of a relationship before you have even been able to fully form an opinion of someone. So making a good first impression is vital for the continued success of personal relationships; if you just keep going around, stoking everyone you meet, you will have a hard time forging lasting bonds, partly because people will never know what to expect from you and partly because many people shut others out if their initial experience with you is a negative one.

It is the same for me whenever I see a theatre show; I am always careful to have a good look around the theatre space and get as acclimated with it as possible so that I can understand where we are picking up in the lives of these people. However if I am led astray from the get go then it is often difficult for me to orient myself.

Playwrights are notorious for picking up wherever they feel is a good place to start; when you’re viewing the work of a seasoned professional, you will get acclimated quickly. Think about a play like “All My Sons;” you’re introduced to Joe Keller on the porch steps and he seems like a fine upstanding pillar of the local community. On the surface the biggest problem seems to be that this family needs to begin coping with the fact that their son, who has been missing for three years from the war, is dead. However there are steamier things brewing in the Keller home; all of which are spun out for us, throughout.

From the beginning of the current Los Angeles production of “Standing On My Knees,” (1501 N Gardner St) by John Olive (set in 1982) we are introduced to what looks like a very meager existence. A desk, a couch and chair, a fold out bed, and a bookshelf to the rear; we learn rather quickly that the desk and the bed and the couch/chair combo are really three distinct places. But for now the play has not even begun; so all we are left with is these disparate elements and a girl sleeping on the bed, beneath a blanket.

This girl is Catherine (Meg Wallace). Catherine lay there still and stiff as a board when I first entered the theatre and every occasion I looked over to her, she never moved. I felt it could either be a great exertion from this talented actor or she was just tired or a practiced sleeper. In either event I prepared myself for a thrilling theatrical adventure.

In the press release the play is described for us this way: “Catherine is a beautiful, young poet with two published books to her credit and a publisher who believes in her talent. But Catherine is also a schizophrenic, tormented by all the noise of the many voices in her head. Her therapist prescribes an anti psychotic which quiets things down. A young stockbroker falls head over heels for Catherine and they begin a serious romance.”

From my understanding of this play, my glance at the cast list, and the fact that her picture is on the postcard, I’d gleaned from that, that Catherine was the woman in question who lay down before me. She didn’t even appear to be breathing. A quick surveillance of the area showed that there were four books on the desk; two of indeterminate authorship (which ended up being Catherine’s) and Virginia Woolf and Emily Dickinson.

Finally when the action began, we quickly begin to feel as though we are in a Pink Floyd album. “Dark Side of the Moon,” specifically as there is hammering and clanking (which I still, after seeing the play and investigating upstairs during intermission, couldn’t decide if it was intentional or just from another show upstairs; we are inside of a basement space). However the sound designer and director do a great job in shooting around the voices that are both spoken and recorded and making them hauntingly visceral.

Catherine is apparently just out from the hospital and is having a difficult time doing anything. She looks as though she were just from the hospital as her eyes are heavy set and her entire demeanor screams medication. But then again, so does her therapist, Joanne (Barbara Keegan). While the affection from Catherine could be called dependent, the performance from Joanne is so monotone and glib; you’d wonder what Tom Cruise might have to say about her. But I wasn’t in a therapists office at the beginning of the therapy revolution of the late 70’s which continues on into today. While Joanne was no “Dr. Phil” you wonder if her portrayal was commensurate with the times.

Catherine dresses in all black and often slips easily to and from her bed; she seems to get comfort from sleep. She meets with her publisher, Alice (Rachel Hardy), who may be slightly infatuated with more than her talents (we learn that the stack of books; Woolf and Dickinson with Catherine’s two sandwiched between; are, in fact, Alice’s; that’s pretty imposing company for any author) or it may just be that the audience is seeing the world through the eyes of Catherine. In any event, Alice is the one who introduces her to Robert (Brian Barth), the young stockbroker, at a party.

This is one of the places where I had a hard time buying the story. I dated a schizophrenic girl, seemingly in another life, for more than a year. She was crazy. But she was very passionate in every sense of the word. We loved hard, we fought hard; everything was hyper-real with her; even when she was on her meds. So the fact that Catherine was so…self aware had me a little confused. I just didn’t get that she even liked this guy. A couple of quotes, in the text I found a little far fetched “Head over heels in like;” when Catherine’s talking to Alice and “You best stay away from me; I’m poison,” when Catherine’s talking to Robert.

I guess I just don’t understand where all this restraint was coming from! It wasn’t the acting or even the directing but the mere existence of the words which had me puzzled. I know this play is more than 20 years old, has numerous productions, has maybe helped in the understanding of schizophrenia as not an illness which requires a straight jacket, but deference and understanding, and has achieved the penultimate achievement for a playwright (before a Tony award/Broadway production) which is a Dramatist Play Service volume.

In the director’s notes, Trace Oakley says “I find the play just as relevant now as then.” Seriously? With all the knowledge we have at our fingertips at any moment, you think that placing the play in its original time and place somehow helps us understand the current climate, how? I guess I’d like to see more of a moving forward and less of a period piece; away from the discussion of “what was” and more to the point of “what’s next?”

Or the producers should call it what it is.

Stay With Me!

2008-01-17T12:40:00.000-08:00

Looking for Love in the Theatre? Stay With Me Is It!

by Jesse Schmitt

With a never ending writer’s strike and many actors and writers high off the cabana juice, there are some who have had enough! Many of the finest writers and actors have given up fully on the screen and returned to the stage. This is a bold move and one which is highly encouraged by this scribe (more/better shows for me to review) One of these shows which is an outgrowth of the writer’s strike will be beginning February 1, and plans to run until February 17 (but hey, who knows?!) It’s by David H. Rodriguez and is called “Stay With Me.”

Touted as a new piece about true love and pulling in to the Stella Adler Theatre (Studio C at 6773 Hollywood Blvd., 2nd Floor) in Hollywood, “Stay With Me” may just be the satisfaction for your craving. Brought to your stage by award winning talent, inspired by perennial favorites Woody Allen and Neil Simon, this is a sweet and careful exploration of true love.

Set in Chicago, a successful young man, played by Rodriguez, finally meets the woman of his dreams, played by Maria Musebrink. What follows is a sweet and careful love story that deals with the reality of modern relationships, including doubt, trust, sorrow, and loss, without losing the feelings of hope, happiness, and the sense of being complete that we all search for.

STAY WITH ME mixes old-fashioned love with the fast-paced, Starbucks-drinking-Society of today's world. According to Rodriguez, true love is dead!! "We live in a world where people don't believe in love at first sight anymore," says the playwright, "I'm hoping this story will awaken that teenage dream we all had."

In keeping with the spirit of true love there will be a special Valentine’s Day performance on February 14, at 8PM. Other shows will run Friday through Sundays with all shows also at 8PM. Tickets are $10 but there’s a break for students, seniors, and I’ll bet if you ask really nicely and you plan to propose to your sweetheart AT the show in front of the audience you could work something out with the producers of the show. I’m not guaranteeing anything; I’m just saying.

So if you are a romantic like me and you still believe in the healing, hopeful, amazing, wonderful power of love, you should run out to get tickets for the David Rodriguez (coinciding with) Valentine’s Day spectacular “Stay With Me.”

On Mamet & The Current Revival of Sexual Perversity in Chicago

2008-01-15T10:31:00.000-08:00

Seminal Work? Or Museum Piece?

By Jesse Schmitt

David Mamet has always been one of my favorite writers. More than the fact that he so ably and deftly carves out of his characters words, a sickening portrait of the Old West, Marlboro Man, American male machismo which has dominated this nation’s perception of reality and life and to a large extent for a segment of the population, still does.

I’ve known a less publicized and more intimate David Mamet; through his words, I’ve studied his teachings. Many people may know that he and actor William H. Macy began the world renowned Atlantic Theatre Company; what many do not know is that in addition to his writings for the stage, screen, and his directing, David Mamet is also a book author. I learned a lot about theatre and live performance from his books “Writing in Restaurants,” "True and False," and “Three Uses of the Knife.”

I learned what it meant to be an actor from a playwright’s position and what steps need be taken for a show to really gain traction and spread wings. David Mamet is the one whose words gave me courage to break out on my own and it is, in large part, due to his “it’s not going to be easy but this is how you do it,” approach which put the real world in real terms for me. His plain spoken attitude showed me that writing in itself is a job which requires a leap of faith and more importantly, a trial-and-error command of your own perception of yourself, even when others have written you off for dead.

Equally important, I’ve always respected his talent and his opinion; how could you not? Love it or hate it, the opinion in all of the cannon of Mamet shoots out like a lightning bolt; you are never at a loss for words as to where the artist’s voice is in his pieces.

So I have a definite opinion of David Mamet and his various works at various stages in his career. Many people know many titles in the Mamet catalog: “Glengarry Glen Ross,” “Oleanna,” “Speed the Plough,” “American Buffalo;” all of these plays and many more have helped us to define a writer who is still at his pinnacle of influence, has effectively and effortlessly crossed genres, and continues to pump out a respectable amount of work if for no one’s sake than his own amusement or his own outrage.

It is with the greatest amount of respect for the original playwright and for the artists involved in this most recent production of “Sexual Perversity in Chicago (The Flight Theatre 6476 Santa Monica Blvd. Hollywood)” that I say, I still have a tough time stomaching that play. I’d been lucky enough to see this play previously in Edinburgh Scotland at the Fringe Festival in 2001. I didn’t like it then and my opinion has not changed. I went into this show with an open mind; I even desperately wanted to like it; but time has not changed the core of this show.

Even Mamet’s own opinions on the work appeared bitterly laced with acid: “…as a callow youth with hay sticking out of my ears, I sold both the play and the screenplay for about $12;” this led to the majority of his subsequent productions being kept in check by his own production vehicle. Despite the fact that reference was alluding to the less than phenomenal “About Last Night” movie adaptation of this show; the subtext was clear. The artist did not want this to become his seminal work; he was much too smart for that. He knew that this tiny one act play which had helped propel him to prominence may be a step along the path but he did not want this to be the work about which his entire career was based and on which his name would be made.

Yet still, it is produced and still people take these four shallow characters down the road which was crafted for them and still it is troubling and missing the point and purely a vanity project.

Just ask Joe Kreimborg; the star and producer of this show. Mr. Kreimborg plays Danny Shapiro; an insecure office worker who is the morning after wingman of his more than outspoken co-worker, Bernie (Jeff Markey). Bernie tells the tales and Danny sits in awe. Even though we're introduced to him in the subordinate dynamic, Danny ends up hooking up with this woman, Deb (Agatha Nowicki) who probably sleeps with him because she is at a crossroads in her life. Deb is in a similar situation as Danny as she plays wing-woman to her spurned best friend. It may seem that this is the perfect situation for both Danny and Deb as they can help their friends come to terms with their insecurities. However this is not the case; Bernie has feigned interest in his friends real life relationships; Danny has just crossed Deb’s totally over the top best friend and roommate Joan (Necar Zadegan).

Such is the life of the dating masses; however it’s too bad that Joan and Bernie have their own ideas about losing their friends to the commitment and sacrifices which go along with steady relationships. Joan has been scorned; Bernie hyperbolizes his own sex life; neither one of them is comfortable losing their sounding boards to the “wah-wah” of pedestrian relationships.

In this production, Joan and Bernie seem to be the only one’s who have hit their stride. You always know what’s going on in their head; it could be the writing, which may be what Mamet was saying, but there seems to be another thing going on. Mr. Kreimborg, as the stated in the program producer, seems to have his own ideas about this character and hasn’t seemed to (I hope) listen to the director (Alex Feldman)

I can’t blame the director because when the star of the show is also the producer, they will do whatever they want. As a producer who has made a fool of themselves onstage before by not listening to a director, I know. However I can’t totally hold the director harmless; let’s just say that Mr. Feldman could have done more.

I understand that Danny is engendered in the text as “meek” and “shy” but the portrayal of Mr. Kreimborg of the character was totally obnoxious, unbelievable, and not current with the spirit of the times. It was the 70’s man! Their costumer, set dresser, and props person got things right; Mr. Kreimborg missed it. Specifically, he mumbled his lines, he talked to his shoulder, and there was this perpetual, effeminate, giggle which sprung up from his Danny which was his trademark sound and, in this text, gets a resounding thumbs down. Maybe if he’d “thrown it in” once or twice for effect; but it was like every other word. For Mr. Markey it must have been like yelling at a three year old!

Bernie was well played; his intensity transcended the babble; similarly with Ms. Zadegan; her portrayal of Joan as an untrusting, cynical, aggressive, and Girl-Power’ish woman, who is conflicted due to her overwhelming need for her friend, was well played. But Ms Nowicki was completely unmemorable. When Ms. Nowicki and Mr. Kreimborg were onstage together, it was like peeling back fingernails across a rusty chalkboard.

But maybe that’s the point. It seems like a young, inexperienced writer who would make observations and generalizations like this. So maybe, for all of our sakes, we had just better leave “Sexual Perversity in Chicago” on the shelf. As a period piece, it’s bearable. But even then, when we’re trying to move forward the discussion and get beyond certain stereotypes, it would seem necessary to leave certain works alone for a few hundred years, before we’re able to get to a point where revivals like this seem “quaint.”

Or you could just do whatever the fuck you want…heh-he!

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4159/is_20030504/ai_n12739273
http://www.plays411.com/newsite/show/play_info.asp

"The Common Air" Reaches for the Skies and Soars

2008-01-14T22:40:00.000-08:00

Alex Lyras Cruises the UnFriendly Skies

By Jesse Schmitt

Every sentence creates its own alternate reality. Every uttered word amounting to an individual interpretation can come up against someone else’s words, interpretation, and reality. This is our actual world as each sound heard has its own unique effect on an individual person; and so it is for the six characters in “The Common Air.”

“The Common Air” is a new show written and performed by Alex Lyras and written and directed by Robert McCaskill which features the thoughts, feelings, and intentions; deliberate or haphazard of six strangers told through the vehicle of one man. There should be no surprise when it's revealed that every one of the characters, like each one of us, have their own reason, their own logic, their own spin, their own justification for doing the things that they do regarding their ever lingering, ever intensifying airport delay of which they're a part.

This is the reality of which we have all gotten uncomfortably used to, where an airport delay can mean an impending weather crisis in a distant hub city, just as much as it could mean collisoin of taxiing planes on the runway, just as much as it could mean a thwarted terrorist plot. These reasoning’s would often come smack up against one another and the invocations from their sources were astute, ridiculous, prescient, understated, and understood in the hyper real world of modern fear that we all live.

Some of the spooky, rambling, point blank statements which some of the characters are credited draws them into immediate suspicion. The self involved, all too prepared, “hipster DJ” seems a little bit too attuned to what it is that is going on; so much so that he is able to rap about it; there is a professor who is battling his near ex-wife over custody issues on his cell phone which he seems a little bit too impassioned about for good taste in public. There is the perspective of an Iraqi-American who has just returned from Baghdad and of course the old man Iraqi cab driver and his prattling which all seem, upon first glance, a little too suspicious for comfort.

The one strain connecting all these varied characters is that they all share one body as they are all played by one single actor. This is the truly impressive statement about “The Common Air:” All these wildly divergent characters (as well as a gay gallery owner and a corporate attorney) are all played by one man in one show at one time.

From my description, it may appear that a show like “The Common Air” would be too cumbersome, too full of noise, too rife with self satisfaction and plainly just too much a problem. This couldn’t be further from the truth as Alex Lyras plays all the characters with a measured intensity and a brave cunning which is truly hilarious, moving, stunning.

It shouldn’t surprise anyone that Mr. Lyras has a long history in crafting these stories so effortlessly; as well it shouldn’t surprise anyone that this show is now headed for an even further reaching audience. Mr. Lyras is a versatile and uber-talented solo performer who aims to bring the art of story back into storytelling and is trying to reach this ground from the platform of our shared Common Air.

Talking With Angels at Ruby Theatre for Two Weeks Only

2008-01-14T13:24:00.000-08:00

Riveting Story told by Gripping Storyteller

By Jesse Schmitt

Opening up January 31st for a brief run is the Los Angeles premiere of “…Talking With Angels;” a story closely based on the diaries of Gitta Mallasz. Ms. Mallasz and three of her Jewish friends had a series of uniquely remarkable “visitations” by what they have described as “angels” for a period of approximately 17 months towards the end of World War II.

Deftly interwoven with their account of the tortuous and horrific experiences of life under Nazi occupation, these conversations are still resonant and relevant more than 60 years after they had taken place.

“…Talking With Angels,” is set to stay up until the 10th of February and is a theatrical experience not to be missed. The San Francisco Bay Guardian has likened this piece to the legendary piece of modern American theatre, Tony Kushner’s “Angels in America,” by calling the show both “passionately mystical yet remarkably lucid…the angels’ message applies less to history than to right now!”

Gitta Mallasz was actually an Austrian born in 1907 who had achieved some fame as an Olympic swimmer following her move to Budapest around the age of 15. In 1960 she moved to Paris and finally, after almost 30 years of silence in her former communist home, her story was able to be told. Gitta Mallasz’ diaries have been published into numerous languages and have touched hundreds of thousands of lives.

These diaries were even still banned in Hungary until 1991; now the solo performer Shelly Mitchell is bringing these valuable texts to light in the show “…Talking With Angels.”

Ms. Mitchell had first adapted the works in the year 2000 to be a part of the San Francisco Fringe Theatre Festival. Her work won “Best of the Fringe” and had an extended version of the show premiere at the San Francisco Magic Theatre in 2001.

Since opening as a one woman show in 2001, “Talking With Angels” has been shown more than 200 times at theatres all along the east and west coasts including spaces in San Francisco, Chicago, and Atlanta.

“Talking With Angels” is open from 1/31-2/10 at The Ruby Theatre at the Complex (6476 Santa Monica Blvd. in Hollywood) Performances are Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays at 8 PM, Sundays at 2 PM. Tickets are $25 Thursday – Saturday, $20 Sunday, with $15 rush tickets available 30 minutes before curtain. Running time is 120 minutes with intermission and wheelchair access available. There is valet and street parking available.

(323) 960-5774 or RESERVE ONLINE: www.plays411.com/angels

Opera Pacific Kicks Off #22 with "The Magic Flute"

2008-01-14T11:02:00.000-08:00

Sergstrom Hall at the Orange County Performing Arts Center (600 West Warner Avenue, Santa Ana, CA) has been the home to some really revelatory opera experiences in the past. Always looking forward is what they do in the Orange County and even though they are forward thinking, they can’t help but pay homage to their past.

So it was that “The Magic Flute,” with libretto by Emanuel Schikaneder and music by none other than one Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is coming to the Sergstrom Hall for four performances only at the end of the month of January.

Directed by Dr. Michael Hampe and conducted by John DeMain, this show kicks off the 22nd season of Opera Pacific with what many would be surprised to know was Mozart’s final opera.

“The Magic Flute” is a fairy tale struggle with symbolic “good versus evil” traits which opened up in 1791 to much critical success. This was a piece which also did the work of reviving Mr. Schikaneder’s failing theatre company, bringing new interest to the art form, and offering a great platform for the legendary composer to leave a lasting mark on the world.

“The Magic Flute” has played the San Diego opera stage in both 2001 and 2006 and is back again with an impressive cast. Nicole Cabell, the 2005 award winner of the BBC Singer of the World award will be in this production as will Uruguyan soprano Luz del Alba Rubio as well as Chad Shelton and Rod Gilfry.

From the Opera Pacific’s own literature:

“Celebrating its 22nd Season, Opera Pacific has established itself as one of the finest professional opera companies in the nation. Opera Pacific's main stage productions, extensive community outreach programs, and energetic Guild Alliance combine to create a cultural resource for all of Southern California. More than 670,000 people have enjoyed Opera Pacific's productions at the Orange County Performing Arts Center, while over 575,000 young people have discovered the world of opera through the company's in-school presentations, Student Previews, and nationally recognized Opera Camps.

In addition to the "grand opera" repertory, Opera Pacific has responded to the need for strong, professional productions of classic American musical theatre and European operetta. Under the baton and dedication of John DeMain, opera is an event with the honest communication of the stories and musical values of the works, combined with exciting singers, and major opera house scale productions. ”

If you would like to find out more information about this production or any other Opera Pacific show you can and should view the Opera Pacific’s website at http://www.operapacific.org/ or call their ticket ordering line at 1-800-34-OPERA.

A scene from Opera Pacific's The Magic Flute, playing January 23-February 2, 2008 at Segerstrom Hall at the Orange County Performing Arts Center.Photo Credit: Ken Howard

And All That Jazz: Open Chicago Again!

2008-01-13T00:23:00.000-08:00

Bringing Back the Years: New York, Los Angeles & Chicago

By Jesse Schmitt

Coming to Los Angeles from New York City, the transition has been rough. Everything is different out here and I'm naturally suspicious of people's motives. It is my experience on Broadway; working there for seven years; which has made me wary of bigger theatrical musical transfers. So before going to see the LA production of “Chicago,” I had to find out a little more about the who, what, and why of this staging.

“Chicago” is still playing strong on the Rialto; my good friend Josh Rhodes was with the Broadway company until recently defecting to “The Drowsy Chaperone”, there was the movie adaptation with Renee and Catherine which got a great deal of positive play, and there have been tours which have littered the US and the UK. So why then, I wondered, was this version of the Kander and Ebb musical here (Hudson Backstage Theatre 6539 Santa Monica Blvd) now?

This production of “Chicago” is directed by Jeremy Lucas a former player to the role of Aaron and understudy of Amos in the 2001 Broadway Tour of "Chicago." (I wonder if he knows either my friend Josh or Tim McGarrigal, another friend from one of the “Chicago” tours?) Before setting foot in the theatre I’d decided that something like a small theatre production of a heavily saturated, meticulously crafted, and very popular musical like “Chicago” is more a labor of love than a piece looking for critical analysis or audience engagement.

Allow me to be the first to stand corrected. But first-

“Chicago” the musical takes place in the city of Chicago of the 1920’s, in a women’s correctional institution, and in the mythical netherworld which can only exist on a musical theatre’s stage. It tells the story of Velma Kelly (who, in this production was played by Katrina Lenk) and Roxie Hart (Bonnie McMahan), two conniving murderesses, Roxie’s guilty by association, pushover of a husband Amos Hart (Jon Paul Burkhart), the women’s defense lawyer who is a seasoned pro at capitalizing from people’s sympathies, Billy Flynn (David Pevsner), the scratch my back warden of this facility, Mama (Cheryl Murphy-Johnson) and all of the rest of the cast of characters who pass in and out of these two women’s lives.

“Chicago” owes a great deal to the musical accompaniment of the live band. Anyone who saw the movie will know this; the way it’s done on the Great White Way is the band is not in the pit but on the stage; up on platforms, to the rear. I’d never been inside The Hudson Backstage Theatre but was almost sure it had to be some manner of black box, which immediately presents challenges for a dance and live music extravaganza like “Chicago.”

Many people, when they go to see a Broadway musical, are quickly fooled by perspective. They are either on the floor, in seats which may lean slightly back, and are below the stage so they’re looking up, or in the mezzanine or balcony, high above the stage, often sloped in the other direction leaning forward, looking down. With all the carefully constructed lights and sound and smoke and mirrors that has become the Broadway experience many people are surprised to know exactly how small a Broadway stage really is. Still, I’d gauge that the theatre area at Hudson Backstage was maybe half in width and 1/3 depth.

But none of this stopped Mr. Lucas and his troupe.

This show took use of all that Mr. Lucas had taken away from his time performing as well as his understanding of the legendary dance maneuvers of the incomparable Bob Fosse; director and choreographer of the first musical staging of this show in 1975.

One of my big fears was that this show was going to stay true to the Hollywood glamification they did in the cinema. The movie was nice and all that jazz, but really? You can take your Rob Marshall and give me a live show with competent performers any day. I was very pleased to see that many of the players in the show were of the Actors Equity Association; the stage actors union; this showed itself in their dexterous manipulation of that tiny space to make their magic happen.

On the day I visited there were definite issues, but that’s the risk you run when you’re doing a big show in a small space. For instance the microphones kept cutting out mid-song and once I heard noticeable feedback. But that's what you can expect with all the movement and interaction in a show like “Chicago.” Also someone should really have a look at the light choices or make sure people know their blocking because even though people seemed to be hitting their spot, there's a difference between a character being "in shadow" and a character being in the dark. There are also floor to ceiling pillars which can obstruct sometimes; however it all could just go back to having big ambitions and a less than ideal space for these ambitions.

All the technical issues aside, this production was a true joy. This show has already won it’s first extension but honestly, I see no reason why it should ever close! The audience on the day that I was there was packed in tight and they loved every minute of it. If there is another show coming in, taking that space, I say good! This cast could use a bigger space anyway, to much greater effect.

Ms. Lenk as Velma was spot on; her dancing and singing were in the pole position while made look like an afterthought. Ms. McMahn as Roxie, I thought, at first, I didn’t like. I felt like she was playing "Hollywood;" however her smooth singing and sultry moves won me over in the end; her voice growing stronger as the character developed. Mr. Paul Burkhart was very comical in a way unlike any I’d ever seen for Mr. Hart; entering with a Carrottop hairstyle, a vest and bowtie, he was refreshingly younger than other’s I’d seen and had me in stitches at his punchy joke lines. Mr. Pevsner as Mr. Flynn shone with his strong vocals and his straight talk. Ms. Murphy-Johnson as Mama was also quite funny and commanding whenever she started to belt. I was also pleased that this Hollywood production of the show kept the Broadway joke that Hollywood dumped when they hired Christine Baranski for the role of Mary Sunshine. Willam Belli doubled the role of the emcee and Ms. Sunshine with a rough conviction; he even gave me a sticker with his image and name on it with the press packet which was very nice!

In the programs directors notes Mr. Lucas says of his decision not to too greatly alter his staging “Part of me feels that if something isn’t broken, why fix it?” “Chicago” at the Hudson Backstage Theatre got it just right and hopefully you were able to be a part of their celebration before their floodlights went dark.

"Say You Love Satan"

2008-01-12T02:04:00.000-08:00

The Man in Red Descends on Tinsel Town

By Jesse Schmitt

The prince of darkness lives in Hollywood? While many would argue on the merits of this statement the truth is clear that the devil is out there and getting ready to make his move on the greater Los Angeles area, so grab your torches, garlic cloves, pitchforks, rosary, and the Good Book and hit the street!

And don’t forget your credit cards people; else you might miss the man of the hour as he steps downstage. I’m talking of course about “Say You Love Satan,” the new show which is all set to go January 18th through February 24th, 2008. Performances will be held at the ATTIC Theatre & Film Center (5429 W. Washington Blvd) this show looks to draw all types and you can bet that the crowds are going to be up for this. The show will play on Fridays and Saturdays at 8 PM, Sundays at 2 PM.

With successful runs in New York, San Francisco, and Chicago, this NYC Fringe Festival Excellence in Playwriting Award winner will be pleased to see you. The playwright, Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa is thrilled to be in LA and is quite excited to present the area debut of his gay occult comedy.

The press release puts it like this: “SAY YOU LOVE SATAN centers around Andrew, an affable graduate student researching the works of Dostoevsky, who meets a handsome stranger named Jack. The two start dating, despite the fact that Jack has the number "666" burned into his forehead. But as this seriously entertaining comedy unspools, Andrew begins to realize that Jack isn't the Devil's son at all—he's something far, far worse… truly, a boyfriend of the damned.”So if you feel as though you’ve had “The Boyfriend form Hell,” you really have no idea. For more information about this show or to order tickets:

Call:
323-525-0600 x2#.or

Connect:
www.plays411.com/satan

Because of Beth & Live! Nude! Girl! Hit the Street

2008-01-12T01:33:00.000-08:00

There is always a lot of buzz about the theatre scene in New York City; there are a pair of shows popping up in the next couple of days which you may regret not finding out a little more about when you had the chance.

The New York Premiere of “Because of Beth” is currently up at the Workshop Theatre (312 W 36th St 4th floor) and will continue its run until the 20th of January.

“Because of Beth” deals with familiar and very difficult themes that all of us will need to deal with at one point in our lives. Beth is a recently deceased mother, ex-wife, and fiancé. The problems here are a common one in any family who has gone through a divorce; her children are quarreling, their father, her ex-husband has been long estranged and is only reintroduced with the passing of Beth. Introduce the players who have been there the whole time with an outsider, in a sense, and you’ve got a powder keg which is just waiting to burst.

“Because of Beth” was written by Elana Gartner and directed by Clara Barton Green. If you’d like more info on this powerful show you can visit the SmartTix page for all ticket and scheduling information (https://www.smarttix.com/show.aspx?showcode=BEC6)

Another new show which is generating a lot of buzz is the Equity reading of “Live! Nude! Girl!” at the Bleecker Street Theatre (45 Bleecker St – Lafayette & Mott) According to the shows press information: "What if a 1950s Midwestern housewife got so sick of making meatloaf every Tuesday night that she snapped — and ran away to Las Vegas? What if her mother could drink like Dean and her daughter entertain like Sammy? And what if this housewife went from the silent and submissive bottom to the tough, impulsive and calculated top of the heap? Live! Nude! Girl! is an original musical that tells the story of a once in a lifetime chance for one woman to break out of her rut into something original and cool."

The show is at 7PM on January 14. With book and lyrics by Donna Kaz and music by Wayne Barker, there has been a lot of positive chatter for this pending showcase. For even more info check out (http://www.playbill.com/news/article/114058.html)

Three's Company Too

2008-01-11T02:08:00.000-08:00

Why "Big Baby" Needs Another Look

By Jesse Schmitt

As I stepped into the small black box space known as the Lounge Theatre (6201 Santa Monica Blvd Hollywood) I was immediately taken to a very at once familiar and inviting and frightening and uncomfortable place. At first I thought that perhaps the un-comfort came from the narrow rows of chairs (four and four, left and right) placed very close together through eight rows on a decidedly raked platform; the folks behind me were yelping in my ears the whole show. We were also down front which was fine until the old woman and her son started whipping the leather belt around. In hindsight though I’d been to more uncomfortable spaces and the fact remained that this was a black box so intimacy is all very well calculated and staged accordingly.

The thing, I think now, that had me most afraid was the parts that were also familiar. Plush, old pattern loveseat with a knit blanket, multi colored walls, and that little piece of something intangible (perhaps it was the shoe horn on the table) made me feel as though I were back in a home I’d been to years before; maybe an aunt or grandmother.

However this home also had a lot of stagnation inside of it. Mildew for mildews sake, a five bulb chandelier with two bulbs lit, a baseball in a baseball holder which appeared as though it hadn’t been touched in twenty years. This home made me feel very unsettled just because of it being there; this fact was not lost on me and these feelings did not go on unaddressed.

But back to the play. The press release calls “Big Baby” a “seriocomedy about a crazy Catholic mother living with her disturbed middle aged son who falls for the dominatrix next door;” if you are able to read that and picture what I did then you’ve passed and you may go home.

I’m not sure what a “seriocomedy” is supposed to be, but I don’t think that my read on this play is what the playwright was going for. The lead character and playwright (Joe Keyes) is Kile; the middle aged, conspiracy theorist, anti-religion, anti-government, mentally disturbed man who is usually afflicted with a noticeable tick when he’s talking with (yelling at) his mother June (Danielle Kennedy). He lives with mom and they bicker like a pair of ninnies over everything from their wildly differing recollections of the last forty years to their split opinion on the sexual orientation of their local priest.

That goes on for a while and I felt like I was in a jungle of drunken monkeys. None of the jokes were hitting their mark, for me, nearly as well as they were for the rest of the audience. “Maybe I’m just missing something?” I thought. I’d had this same issue at “A Tune Christmas” at first and that one ended up being great. But this is a thing I’ve noticed generally about Los Angelians or at least the theatre going set; there is an entirely different pace, tempo, set up, let’s call it patience in many of the places I’ve been thus far. People are willing to wait a lot longer for the punch line and they’re won over a lot easier than I’m accustomed to; sometimes the payoff is worth it; many times it just fizzles.

Be that as it may the very beginning of this show I thought was rude, crude, and mean. This mother and son are so totally rude to one another to the point of being offensive. While that was disturbing, there was something else nagging at me and I couldn’t figure it until I got out. I had decided it was the voice of the characters. In the beginning the mother and son are finishing each others thoughts and speaking in a sameness which sounds more to me like the rambling of a writers thinking conflicted thoughts at their typewriter (or the screaming guilty thoughts of an altar boy) rather than a writer who is using two people with different ideas and different feelings to convey a disagreement.

Enter Nancy (Chloe Taylor) their new neighbor who is introduced and promptly struck with a broom stick. The physical comedy of this show was another thing which could have been used to greater effect; much of the ‘action’ was committed offstage and we were only permitted see these folks in the living room. Nancy drags a trail of blood in and June insists she’s “Mary” (this joke has already been played out over the course of her and her sons interaction as she on numerous occasions invokes “the blessed virgin Mary”) Kile is interested but ashamed as June flogs out all the dirty laundry she’s had on her son all his life.

Rather than being repulsed, Nancy is for some reason intrigued and the three of them get into another round of like voiced characters; this time it’s “three as one.” My head was spinning and I was glad to see the scene end as all the noise was rather distressing.

Once the first scene is over (there were three scenes; the first is about half the 85 min play) the show starts to take wings. We learn that Nancy is a college student who is a dominatrix to pay the bills while she’s studying English Lit. This is a markedly different turn for June and Kile; mother would rather put on blinders (“sounds like she’s babysitting”) while son is aroused.

The acting is all good and I can’t fault any of them; they gave the lines as much as could be got; but the players seem listless; without any real passion. This speaks to the writing; I hope this show is able to go through a rewrite before they decide to stage it again. Everything in this show feels as though it’s a little too close to the chest of the playwright; he could use some objective eyes and ears to help make it more accessible.

I won’t go into detail on the remainder save to say that this play seems to end right before where it begins. We’re introduced to June and Kile on a cliff’s edge. The introduction of Nancy sends them careening and clawing and as all three push away and cling to each other for dear life. In the end though, they’re back on stable ground, but for how long?

“There’s something wrong with all of this,” says Kile just before the curtain drops, “I’m trying though; I’m trying.”

“You need to find some peace,” replies June.

If the show had ended there, I might have felt better about their prospects. But at the very last another element is thrown in which made me feel like we were watching an episode of “Three’s Company.” Jack and Janet have just unraveled one of their crazy adventures and then Chrissy comes racing in to send ironic hands up into the air and the audience laugh track on high.

I know a lot of adults live with their parents and I know that a lot of drama sometimes ensues. But is “Big Baby” real life, really?

"Thing to Thing to Thing" Takes It's Final Bows in Los Angeles

2008-01-09T16:16:00.000-08:00

When it Left We Were Sad to See it Go; Now it is Back for One Final Show

By Jesse Schmitt

"Thing to Thing to Thing: From Crazy to Sane with Biofeedback, Autism, and the Brain" is a truly special occasion and should be seen by everyone. This show is a rare bird as it is a one woman, musical, written by it's performer as she details her own struggle with her adopted autistic children.

With an amazing and insightful bit of heaven at her back, Lynette Louise brings back her three hour odyssey for the one show she's got left in her. This show started in Los Angeles and has traveled to San Diego, Chicago, New York, Boston, Houston and the Simi Valley and she's ready to take her curtain call at the Complex (Dorie) Theatre in Hollywood.

Lynette Louise is actually a mother of eight and she is a performer as well. But she had to put her performance career on hold while she managed to heal several of her kids who were afflicted with autism. This may seem like a fool's task but the lessons learned in this cathartic healing process actually empowered Ms. Louise to bring her story to the stage to share with the world.

Concurrent with her coping with this disease she began working with other families around the world trying to bring a little bit of peace, a little bit of compassion, and a greater understanding for the plight which these kids were living and the ways that collectively they could all turn their lives towards good.

According to recent press coverage, the changes "are amazing, and Ms. Louise is committed to bringing the information to the world." With one of the elements that are sadly too often missing in this day and age there is a lesson learned, there were undoubtedly mistakes made, but it is an incredible story with "an inspiring, happy ending."

Another tickling little fact about this show is that Ms. Louise is trying to incorporate those who are stricken with Autism as well; not just preach to people with no idea or vested interest. Disabled adults and Parents of Autistic children admitted to this show for free; there is only the need for the interested parties to "Call in" their reservation beforehand. A small service fee will apply.

Autism is a brain disorder which afflicts a great many more people than most are even aware of. When brave people such as Lynette Louise stand up and share their story we are that much closer to a broader outreach and greater understanding through the shared sacrifice and burden of caring for and making sure that all who need it are permitted treatment.

Summer Playwright’s Festival Goes “Public”

2008-01-09T14:44:00.000-08:00

January 7th, 2008

The Public Theatre Hosts Festival of New Works

By Jesse Schmitt

For playwrights all over the nation there is a great festival which anyone and everyone who is able should try to be a part of. The Summer Play Festival, which, this coming July, is celebrating its fifth anniversary, has recently went Public with its forthcoming information and with its locale.

Running for the first time this year at the legendary Joe Papp’s Public Theatre on Lafayette Street, the 2008 Summer Play Festival promises to be the most exciting event yet. Anyone who knows anything about the downtown theatre scene in New York City will tell you that The Public is one of those revered places which so many talented artists have passed through. Under the skilled direction of Mr. Papp and in his name since then you could say that The Public has shaped the landscape of plays, playwrights, and the theatre scene all over the world.

Bringing in challenging new works was a signature of The Public Theatre from it’s first production; the legendary musical “Hair” as well as the show which eclipsed anyone’s expectations, “A Chorus Line,” which went on to an uber-impressive fifteen year run on Broadway (and is currently back on the Rialto).

Papp is no longer alive and thus no longer running things day to day at the theatre; but his legend lives on. There have been a number of artistic and critical successes as of late including “Bring in ‘Da Noise; Bring in ‘Da Funk,” the critically praised but commercially unsuccessful “The Ride Down Mt. Morgan,” and one of the many riveting breakout works of Richard Greenberg “Take Me Out.”

So the fact that The Summer Play Festival is coming to The Public is a no-brainer pairing in many people’s eye. The Public Theatre has remained one of New York’s and the world’s preeminent cultural institutions; the pairing of The Summer Play Festival with the wide and varied selection of cutting edge writers and excellent new theatre only makes sense.

This year The Summer Play Festival will run from July 1 to July 27, 2008 in the East Village of Manhattan. While this year’s submissions have closed many people are getting very excited about the prospective lineup of new plays just due to the success of past participants in The Summer Play Festival. If you’d like more information about the upcoming festival or about other partnerships and events which are going on with The Summer Play Festival you should certainly check out their website. The site also offers you the ability to keep an eye out for their current and forthcoming news.

www.spfnyc.com

The Golden State by Dell'Arte Theatre Company Moves Downstate

2008-01-09T03:37:00.000-08:00

There are many things which are not praised enough in the world of live performance; events which are rehearsed and seemingly pedestrian in their execution but which can alter the viewer’s perception, shift consciousness, alter reality. Some performance is so beautiful, so eye-opening, so original and inventive that people walk away from performance more aware and fundamentally changed. So it is for the Dell’Arte Company; their internationally recognized brand of physical, ensemble theatre has earned their reputation the world over.

The Dell’Arte International School of Physical Theatre was founded in the early 1970’s and has been offering training in acting, voice, movement, and related physical skills with particular attention paid to mask, tragedy, clown, as well as the legendary commedia dell’arte.

The group is heading south from their home in Northern California down to present their interpretation of Moliere’s “The Miser” entitled “The Golden State.” Their show series begins at Occidental College’s Keck Theatre (1600 Campus Rd Eagle Rock CA) February 1st & 2nd. Then the show will move into a temporary home at the 24th Street Theatre (1117 W 24th St Los Angeles CA) February 8th- 24th.

Even though this is the Dell’Arte companies first visit to Los Angeles in almost 19 years that will likely soon change. According to Dell’Arte’s producing artistic director and the director of this production, “We want to make 24th Street our Los Angeles base so we can come down every year and people will know where to look for us.”

The humor found in Moliere’s cannon is not lost on this production and their modern spin on this classic text is emblematic. First written in 1667, this “incarnation of greed was a rich old coot named Harpagon, whose love for his cashbox eclipsed all other loves, even that for his children.”

Without the least bit or irony Dell’Arte have taken their “The Golden State”, adaptation and turned this premise around to the mirror. The people in California are heady, the people in California are into themselves, and this is where the humor takes off. According to their press release, this piece gets steam from “hedonisticSouthern California (and) also draws its inspiration from humanity's blinding and passionate lust for money. The Dell’Arte Company have taken Moliere's comedy of profit-driven family relations and turned it on its head, re-inventing the miser as an elderly California widow with a fortune stuffed in her bra and whose adult children are the desperate products of her fanatical hoarding.”

Ticket prices vary and there are discounts for students at both venues with valid ID. If you are looking for something completely different than you should check out Dell’Arte Theatre Company and their presentation of “The Golden State."

http://www.24thstreet.org/
dellarte.com/
www.oxy.edu/MapsDirections.xml

Frankie & Johnny Return to Tinsel Town–Screen & Stage Collide in Hollywood in Terrance McNally’s Classic

2008-01-09T01:44:00.001-08:00

January 4th, 2008

Frankie & Johnny In The Clair De Lune emerge from the vaults and make their move on the
Hudson Mainstage Theatre

By Jesse Schmitt

Who could forget Al Pacino and Michele Pfeiffer in the move of the same name? You don’t chose love, love chooses you; fuhugetaboutit! But the real truth remains still a mystery to many of those who were even familiar with the film. The fact remains that the 1987 play written by Terrance McNally originally starred not Michele Pfeiffer but Kathy Bates (!) in a dramatic departure from the film version and was much more stark than what Hollywood portrayed.

But as they say, everyone deserves a second chance and so under the associate production of renowned acting teacher to the stars, Larry Moss comes this exiting revival “Frankie & Johnny In The Clair De Lune.” Set to open in previews on January 17th & 18th with the official opening on January 19th for an impressive length run until March 1, 2008 at the Hudson Mainstage Theatre (6539 Santa Monica Blvd) in Hollywood, this production promises to be a gem.

Set around the adroit story of Johnny, a short order cook and ex-con who is able to con his way into the lonely life of drifter waitress Frankie, this is a timeless love story for our modern times. It would seem that all at once too many of us are too consumed by ourselves to see the bigger picture or too immersed in the day to day melodrama to not be able to see the next foot in front of the last or to even know where that next step may lead. This is the plight of Frankie and it takes a one night stand and a Romeo pose from Johnny to show her that the only thing stronger than her desire to be left alone is his will not to let that happen.

We are all asked in seeing this play to hold up the looking glass and peer inside of our own lives and try to piece together the missing links. Many times when people speak of “life imitating art” they are being trite and are ignoring the much larger point that all of life imitates all of art because art is created from life. But the characters in Frankie & Johnny In The Clair De Lune will still reach down to that most special, deepest part and the words of Mr. McNally will elicit both a laugh and a tear as you bring your hands together in applause.

If this restaging is anything like the recent revival on Broadway with Stanley Tucci and Edie Falco, then the Los Angeles theatre goers are in for quite a treat.

www.plays411.com/frankie

323-960-7863

Big Baby Comes to The Lounge Theatre in Hollywood

2008-01-09T01:42:00.000-08:00

January 3rd, 2008

Stick Your Head In Gravy

By Jesse Schmitt

Los Angeles likes to do things in high style and they are kicking off 2008 in such style with a number of exciting new theatrical openings which are taking shape as we speak.
One of these very exciting openings is “Big Baby,” which opens up January 10, 2008 and is slated to run through February 9, 2008. “Big Baby is playing at The Lounge Theatre (6201 Santa Monica Blvd; Hollywood).

This play was written by Joe Keyes, a playwright who has brought about such classics as “Bob’s Holiday Office Party” and “Pete’s Garage.” This show is one which has been cleverly directed by Matt Roth. Mr. Roth has a long and rich resume which includes his work as an actor, has appeared in many well respected circles such as Steppenwolf Theatre Company in Chicago among others. Roth has also been a star of the stage and the small screen in a number of situations.

Big Baby is the story of Kile. A mentally ill grown adult man, Kile lives in the mid-west; he lives in an apartment; he lives in drudgery. But this is not a drudgery of his own design, really, because he still lives with his mother. As stern as the day he was a boy, the mother keeps Kile in a regimented, restricted, abusive routine. Kile sees no end to his dreary existence; no end until a new neighbor comes in next door. Nancy is not only mysterious and exciting; she’s also a dominatrix.

Big Baby is a play which should keep you in stitches in spite of yourself. A common story told in uncommon tenor, Big Baby is about the fight we all fight all our lives; the search for companionship, the struggle for understanding, the quest for love.

With searing, swooping, epic themes, Joe Keyes touches on many of our most primal, gut issues including the mother son relationship, religion, sex, shame, gluttony, fear, the sadomasochistic impulse inside of us all and an addiction to baloney which could have you cringing in your seat.

Touted as a “funny, frightening, brutal and sad” story; Big Baby seems to be as much about the playwrights search for answers as it is about his characters. And in this world as we all struggle for meaning and grapple with these larger questions which plague us every day, an understanding of self is about as close as any of us should be able to get before we make that last great ascent.

plays411.com/bigbaby

Naked Yoga Bares All at the Unknown

2008-01-09T01:40:00.000-08:00

January 4th, 2008

Show Yours Naked

By Jesse Schmitt

Many people have opinions on alternative lifestyles, alternative diets, and alternative exercise methods. It’s actually sort of silly; where did we get the idea to eat cow and not decide that we needed to scour the Pacific Ocean bottom for fish eggs? When did we decide that staying awake in the daytime was what we were supposed to do? A lot of it has to do with tradition and the fact that we had to make due with what we had. It’s true that today there are 24 hour cities all over the world, there are all manner of food we can eat, but the truth is that year and years ago there was decidedly less option, less ability to maneuver around, and we had to get all our work done before the sun sets or vampires would come out of the hills!

While many myths have been debunked (ever seen Myth Busters?) there are some things which have always worked and that’s the reason we keep doing them. Take for example, jogging. It raises the heart rate, gets the blood flowing, makes you sweat, and when done in handy enough fashion keeps you in shape.

But there are always alternatives! There has to be! Yoga has been around in the east for thousands of years; in some marketing department in the 80’s some marketing department came up with the idea that people in America would love Yoga! Women loved Jane Fonda videos but while the men were playing racquetball and talking about their Triple Crown picks at the club, the women didn’t need to leave their 13 channel VHS equipped LCD TV (ah, memories)

Fast foreword to today; men are trying to get back ahead as it’s increasingly becoming a woman’s world (listen to Jane Fonda tell it like it is) and thus came about “Naked Yoga.” This is a world premiere of a new play about sexual politics turned on it’s head, playing at The Unknown Theatre (1110 Seward St; Los Angeles) from writer/director Alex Carter.
Mr. Carter explores the world of Yoga politics in his debut turn as writer/director. Based on a true story, Naked Yoga takes comedy up a notch as there is a whole new rulebook for sexual politics in the modern world.

With a teaser like “She came! She saw! She kicked his butt! And he never knew what hit him.” You can’t help but be intrigued. Weak men are everywhere but the old dynamic of man in a constant position of power just doesn’t apply anymore. Naked Yoga hopes to explore, expose, and exploit this fact with humor and humanity.

“…and to all a good night!” Why A Tuna Christmas May Be Just the Thing for Your Holiday Blues

2007-12-10T18:29:00.000-08:00

I recently was able to catch the limited run of “A Tuna Christmas” (now through January 6, 2008) presented by Combined Art Form Entertainment (C.A.F.E.) at Theatre Asylum (6320 Santa Monica Blvd) in Hollywood. This was THE A Tuna Christmas; the woman who’d set me up with the tickets didn’t want me to confuse it with the other production of the same name going on elsewhere in the Los Angeles area. Not that there was anything wrong with the other production; she just wasn’t repping the other production (and she hadn’t gotten me tickets to the other production!)

This was “A Tuna Christmas,” with Mindy Sterling and Patrick Bristow both alumni of the famous Groundlings Comedy Troupe. The Groundlings of Will Ferrell, Cheri Oteri, Jon Lovitz, Chris Kattan, Ana Gasteyer, Maya Rudolph, Chris Parnell, Julia Sweeney, Phil Hartman!! Saturday Night Legends (not to dip too deep into the pool of SNL formers; Kathy Griffin, Topher Grace, Lisa Kudrow, and Pee Wee Herman all went to Groundlings as well, hah-ha!) …So these two had to be good!

Not that I should use the success of others from the same institution to judge how good someone or other would be. You need look no further than their own individual resumes to see that Ms. Sterling and Mr. Bristow are able to hold their own.

Mind Sterling may be best known and most easily recognized in a pop culture sense as “Frau Farbissina” the love interest and henchwoman of Mike Meyer’s Dr. Evil in the Austin Powers Trilogy. She has also done a number of other films including The Grinch, Drop Dead Gorgeous, and Reno 911 Miami.

Patrick Bristow has done a whole host of television appearances including Curb Your Enthusiasm, Seinfeld, Friends, Mad About You, Whose Line Is It Anyway, and he created the character “Peter” on the TV Sitcom Ellen.

So these two are not humble pie; they are surely able to hold their own in the comedy arena. And what a legend they are stepping into; this is A Tuna Christmas by Jaston Williams, Joe Sears, and Ed Howard! The first president Bush and Barbara had this show performed for them by the original company when he was in office! This show has been around for going on 20 years and has been performed time and time again to rave reviews. Enter two experienced comedy hands like Sterling and Bristow, insert some timely pop culture references, and you’ve got yourself a hit!

…sort of.

I had real issues with this production, at first, despite all the hooting and hollering around me. I couldn’t explain it; what did everyone think was so darn funny? I thought most of the humor was crude, explicit, and dated; I thought that the pacing was all off; in the 21st century when you make a joke about an all white cast of Raisin in the Sun…I didn’t even know what to say.

The story in this play centers around a variety of characters and situations; there is a competition going on for the best yard decorations; and a wily phantom is ripping out everyone’s displays; an earnest guy who just wants to get on with his life and get out of Tuna might be denied his ability to finish parole because the theatre where he’s got to go do his last bit of community service hasn’t paid their light bill and they can’t put on the show.

It wasn’t until these stories began to resolve themselves did I begin to chuckle, then chortle, then giggle, then laugh out loud. The thing about A Tuna Christmas that I started in on right away were the finer details, not waiting and allowing their delivery and their tempo to reveal itself to me in due course. What I’d failed to see and what everyone else was able to appreciate more than I was that this town is found in all of our squabbles and all of our fights. It’s one of those places that everyone knows yet no one will admit to. It's the place we grew up, grew out of, and left behind.

So if you are looking for a laugh and you want to revisit some of the repressed memories of your Holidays past, check out A Tuna Christmas at the Theatre Asylum.

Ripped From the Headlines: Mustang Sally Gives its All

2007-12-03T11:30:00.000-08:00

While I’m always hesitant to be overly critical of any show just for the mere fact that I’ve been there myself and gotten a good slamming; it should be noted that the show that’s running at the Whitefire Theatre in Sherman Oaks, “Mustang Sally,” has a number of non-homogeneous factors, flying in from the cosmos which could have been slightly tweaked to make a more cohesive production.

Being a playwright, I always first blame the writer. The actors, directors, and everyone else live and die by the playwright’s pen and a playwright, no matter the deadline, production schedule, or timeliness of things should never rush something to production. This is what Mustang Sally seems to be suffering from; “propelled by insomnia, I stumble to my computer in the middle of the night to probe these events in depth. Then, with facts, imagination, and some passion, I build a play to share what I’ve discovered,” says Linda Felton Steinbaum in the Playwrights Notes section of the program. Ms. Felton-Steinbaum seems to have gotten the essence of this topical matter, but the devil is in the details and she has grossly misfired on a number of the details.

There were even moments where this whole piece may have redeemed itself; just before the curtain drops, one of the characters comes on and gives a startling, albeit predictable revelation which shifts the whole tenor of the piece. If this character had just left the stage and left us all with the horrific thought about people’s subtext or motives or underlying primary objective, I might have thought differently of it, in hindsight. However, much to my chagrin, this character then goes into excessive detail; we didn’t need to hear all of that

But let’s take this play from the start. To begin with, the audience is served a fair bit of staging from the second you take your seat in The Whitefire Theatre’s Ventura Blvd Stage. Made up of pastels; blues, pinks, yellows; the set looks like a child’s playpen. There is a prominent Justin Timberlake poster in the kitchen and there is a tiny patio table for a main kitchen centerpiece. The refrigerator (from which a steady stream of beer is produced for the adult, male characters in the show) is adorned with playful looking magnets and everywhere there are stuffed animals lying about. This is the protagonist’s world and when we first meet Kathy; the main character around which all the action in this show moves; we immediately understand why.

Kathy is a young teacher in her 20’s who is having a major crisis. While the urgency is apparent; she relents, talking about blasé non-events rather than digging in to the meat of the issue. While this is done, no doubt, to Raise The Stakes, the character Kathy seems disinterested. In everything! While some may blame the director or the actors choices, the words she says say it all.

There is an entire side story with the mother and sister; they don’t get along. While their catty bickering is entertaining, the subtext seems to be that this young woman’s broken home justifies her juvenile actions…Which they are just about to reveal. In a minute.

Apparently Kathy has dabbled in her young student’s lunch box and was caught out in it. Kathy has fallen in love and “you can’t control who you fall in love with.” Which is a very sweet sentiment but this is the whole problem with this fanatical character and her appeals.

Mary Kay Letourneau is one of the more infamous of the teacher/student relation episodes from 1996. Her sneaking around and sleeping with her student wasn’t at all a believable situation; just because what happened with her happened in real life doesn’t make this play any more viable. And she got pregnant; twice. And she went to jail and is still in jail. But this plays ending just makes the whole point moot; they seem to be leading to a dramatic arc for the teacher at the end; but it turns into a slap on the wrist much more reminiscent of the more recent Debra Lafave episode.

This Kathy seems a little too self aware and everyone around her does as well. You’d figure that with some of the warning signs fired off by this person, any real adults with any interest in their friend or family members well being would have intervened. Live and let live and all that but when it comes to entanglements with a teenager? You really need to step into the mix. For example, there is this art teacher friend of hers who plays the only sympathetic line in the whole show. When he comes on and talks with her sister about the situation he says, “She relates to kids even more than parents.” …!!!! While he gave a bravo performance, is that really the position that someone who cared about someone else would take? I’d think that no matter what kind of a pushover he was, he would be driven to action before this point.

Even sis says to her man, “Kathy always has had a vivid imagination.” The implication being that ‘maybe this whole thing didn’t even happen.’ Really? Is that the answer? Don blinders? Especially interesting is the older sisters assumption of the mother role; limiting contact that the real mother has with the daughter, plotting a course of action, sending the younger sister to her room; while some of these are interesting choices, her division seems to fall split down the middle. For example sis shares all sorts of complex details about the trial with her accused and yet she can’t even chose what to wear when she wants to leave the house!

Kathy seems to be played as a girl split in two; on the one hand she needs the bail process explained to her by sisters lawyer boyfriend but then in the same breath she is able to parse from their conversation, seemingly from nowhere, “Do they think I’m a FLIGHT RISK?”

Kathy’s behavior is also conspicuous towards her purple tights/leopard print wrap/bible thumping mother. The argument, towards the end of this play, has been going round and round when suddenly, from nowhere, Kathy gets up on her pulpit and quoth scripture (lines which have not been present elsewhere) shocking everyone in the room.

The real proof happens in the end. “Is everyone gossiping about me,” she asks her art teacher friend, to which he replies that they’ve been instructed not to talk about it. Kathy seems very let down about it. When news jumps across the wire that: 1) everything is going to be okay 2) there will be no trial and 3) Kathy won’t be listed as a sex predator, this is where the show turns hyper-real.

It would seem that if you were trying to write a real play “ripped from the headlines,” that you may want to lead your end to real consequences; not a fluff puff ending which ties together disparate ends yet leaves the only one who deserves it, not holding the bag of responsibility.

Cornucopia at the Actors Workshop Studio in NoHo

2007-10-31T10:13:00.000-07:00

It Began With a Bang & Ended With a Yell:
The Shared Experience from the Cornucopia

One weekend each month at the Actors Workshop Studio a rotating group of performance artists, actors, musicians, storytellers, poets, and those interested in the art form all converge on the Actors Workshop Studio to share their stories, their frustrations, their sadness, their fears, their rage, their voice and their song in a grand convergence of the time honored art form of storytelling; an art-form that seems to have been silenced by the ceaseless noise in a world that is too busy, too loud, too reckless, and too narrow.

Don’t tell that to the performers at the Actors Workshop Studio though; these artists are so vibrant and full of life that their tale just comes bursting out at you; like a peaceful cable car ride brought to a screeching halt by a screaming child or an awkward teen shown the door by a resistant father who isn’t hearing the right message. The performers I saw this past Sunday all had such an endearing heart; lasting longer than the non-biodegradable tuna fish cans that were drawn into likeness with eating a thermometer; an endurance that is just as visceral as the embarrassment brought on by a proud father at a graduation.

This was just a small sampling of the stories that were on display this most recent go around in North Hollywood; the performers each had their individual strengths, their own warmth, their own passions, and their own comical insights into the idiosyncrasies of our whirring modern age.

As we all filtered into this tiny, tiny room with a smattering of fold out chairs, benches, stools, and what appeared to be former assembly hall seats that had been smashed together to form this story space. The room immediately brought forward the idea that this might be some kind of a silent auction or show of hands vote of some kind, but no performance of any kind! Don’t be dismayed by the ramshackle room as the performance buzzing around the fringe of this venue was set to pop. I looked around and was reassured by all the happily smiling people who had all made their reservations well ahead of schedule; of course they must have as the sign on the door as we entered said “Cornucopia is SOLD OUT.”

Situated around us were a whole host of hand drums, shakers, wood blocks, and tambourines which were a welcome sight to me; I’d once been an experienced percussionist all throughout my former years and dreamed of going on to a career before fate intervened and cut that idea from the limb. What I’d learned from that episode more than 10 years ago, I’d lost somewhere along the way; but this knowledge and these facts were reintroduced through the stories of these five people who helped to show me the true spirit of the afternoon.

The event began with Mike DeMenno who was the owner of all these random drum pieces. He had a story for us about how he went on a camping adventure, all alone. Not fifty miles from his own front door he’d traveled with some camping equipment and his own drums and as dusk fell over his campsite he pulled out his drums and began playing. All alone in the wilderness the beat, beat, beat of his own drum music attracted curious children one night and ended up bringing together the whole campground as so many others surrounded his tent and the driving force of the music and danced and laughed and played. We all were instructed to play the instruments which were before us and the uplifting spirit of Mr. DeMenno’s story coupled with the driving beat of the drum really set the day off with a bang!

Padraic Keohane was next up. His story was one which had obviously haunted him for some time; the story of his first date in high school. His was the tale of a confused younger version of himself who hadn’t known he was confused when he’d arrived to pick the girl up, but was very sure he understood abundantly less and more a few hours later. While his story, which might have been better suited for another audience, veered off into the fantastical at points it was still entertaining.

Mr. Keohane was followed by the svelte and beautiful Tanya Alexander. Her story was more of a sprawling, visceral, rhyming, epic, long form poem than straight up story. Careful ears were rewarded though as this was the tale of a girl who was brought up being taught to use her brain to succeed but had been shown that her body gets her much further, indeed! Told as a bridge from the past to the future between the poetic styling of a Ginsberg or Kerouac to the modern day rhymes of Q-Tip, Ms. Alexander is towards the front down a path and a new way of communication and understanding. Down deep though, her poem and her story revisits universal themes which are at once timeless and powerful. One is reminded of the challenging work of Ralph Ellison more than seventy years past and his character without a name.

When an actor is able to be so entrenched in the psyche of their character, it is an awe inspiring experience. Honesty in performance is rare but the teetering edge that Vicki Juditz walked was absolutely brilliant. Ms. Juditz’s story was our own story; that of the consumption of man and how horrifying it really one day will be. Much of her story was ‘light;’ that is, one could see, as most of the audience did, how what she was saying was funny. However, her absolute commitment to what she was saying; her pathos, made this reviewer a little uneasy at times; I’d wanted to lose myself in the absolute grandiosity of her words, but in a way I also knew better.

Finally was the jovial Michael D. McCarty. He shared the story of his daughter which is a story many of us have lived through, participated in, overcome, and been able to reflect back on or share ourselves. His daughter was a rebellious teen and her cathartic tale of going through the ringer, taking life’s challenges, and overcoming them on her own (no doubt, with a whole lot of love from her dear old dad) brought forth the Michael D. McCarty hyena yell; at her graduation and to close the show.

I walked away from the Actors Workshop Studio a little jarred at the random presentation of these equally, divergently powerful pieces; it was then that I realized the point of this art form; the fact that Padrick’s date went so horribly and Mike had that lonesome camping trip; the fact that Tanya came to her own epiphany; the fact that Vicki’s still dealing with her own demons; the fact that Michael is able to wake up every morning and sing out loud; the point wasn’t a single idea but the combined installation of these stories into the basket that is our modern day impression of a Cornucopia.

These are a bunch of strangers, thrust into a room with a bunch of other strangers, all trying to navigate the course that life has plotted out for them with one simple message; everyone gets redirected, misdirected, makes mistakes, trips and fall, gets embarrassed, gets infuriated, loses something they thought they could never be without but gains the knowledge, the wisdom, the courage, the experience, and the fortitude to pick themselves up, pick another road, and continue forward. So if you’ve ever been confused, heartbroken, wanted to laugh so hard that you cried or cried until you just laughed; if you’re confused at the way that people behave, if you’ve ever lost your own self in your own way on your own path then you will, no doubt, find some solace in the stories of these random few who came to tell you they too know the feeling that only you’ve known. And they’ve survived.

Cornucopia plays one weekend per month at the Actors Workout Studio; 4735 Lankershim Blvd. North Hollywood, 91602; (818) 506-3903. All inquiries about Cornucopia can be directed to host Ellen Switkes at theellenloop@hotmail.com. Become friends at www.myspace.com/cornucopiastorytelling

Displays of Affection in North Hollywood

2007-10-30T08:27:00.000-07:00

Two One Act Plays Walk the Line

"Displays of Affection" is a twin bill of one act plays; Carnality by Mark Lowenstern and Riches by Lee Blessing; that is currently running at the Avery Schreiber Theater (11050 Magnolia Blvd) in North Hollywood. While affection is said to be on display at this theatre, you wouldn't know it with all the sarcasm, yelling, and broken glass in the room. Affection it is though and affection is, despite all the events within the works themselves, what is come to be seen. The displays are on view in two marriages in two very different, distinct, and difficult passages in their flow.

Carnality was the first show which leads off the festivities and it features Irene White as Michelle and Zach Dulli as Ben; Michelle and Ben are parents of a near kindergarten child who have recently had an "amicable divorce:" per Michelle's wishes. Poor Ben can't let go and this becomes the whole problem in this short play. Michelle is visiting to discuss where to send their child to school and as the lights come up Ben is seen gripping onto his former wife. Immediately their relationship becomes clear as Ben begins leaning in on Michelle; "I hear that you've been dating" "Who said that?" "I don't remember!"

The humor and pathos which colors the past of their relationship is endearing through the astute character choices of the players; Dulli plays Ben like a puppy dog who is shedding all over you but looks so cute from afar; White plays Michelle with a cautious reserve which is quickly exploited but to whom she does not buckle. We quickly learn that Michelle has got problems of her own with their divorce. "We should spend more time arguing; I just need to hate you more!" and it is apparent that there is more to these two than meets the eye.

We're left in a comfortable place of hopeful reconciliation with Carnality but the second piece Riches shows a much more damaged couple and much more damage to the meticulously crafted set. In the first piece we were in a half moved in apartment with no stove for the male protagonist. However the set quickly becomes in the second piece a hotel bedroom on the 21st wedding anniversary of Carolyn and David played with an amazing amount of convincing energy by Marypat Farrell and Michael Dempsey. This play depicts a very involved and complicated argument that anyone who has been in a meaningful relationship of any standing will have a keen eye into.

On this picture perfect anniversary that Carolyn and David are sharing with similarly aged business partner of David and his twenty three year old wife, Carolyn has one mantra, "Let's go down to the bar." David is a lot more sympathetic and would rather remember the good times from their original honeymoon in the same hotel; one floor below; and everything else that goes along with that.

Carolyn ultimately reveals her unhappiness; David can't believe it and demands an explanation. Carolyn has some interesting observations which is what makes this play so relevant, powerful, and familiar for many. "I can't stay in a relationship because there is nothing wrong with it!" "People begin to be un-attracted to the things that they used to be attracted to - this just can't change."

While in the end you believe that these two crazy cats have another 21 years of good times on tap, there is an interesting bit of straight ahead commentary that should be heeded; always give your partner an adequate amount of space, always leave yourself the amount of room to reinvent yourself. The underlying messages are even more interesting such as How far does any person need to be pushed before they snap? What is going on inside the head of your partner, should you have one? And how boring might this play have been if poor David had just relented with his wife downstairs to the bar? How boring might all our lives be?

Displays of Affection runs though November 11th at 11050 Magnolia Blvd North Hollywood CA

www.plays411.com/affection

ACTober Fest from Fire Rose Productions

2007-10-29T19:27:00.000-07:00

Beautiful, cathartic, amazing, and joyful are not terms typically associated with 10 minute plays, however this was the scene at the Secret Rose Theatre (11246 Magnolia Blvd, North Hollywood, CA 91601) this past weekend, Produced by Fire Rose Productions and local luminary Kaz Matamura, the plays selected for this production seem to be artfully chosen. All of varying levels of skill and intensity, the 5th Annual ACTober Fest of Ten Minute Plays is around for one more week; I encourage anyone in the area during these days to make haste and see these groundbreaking new plays from this smart company.

The revolutionary short play in question was "The Hole," written by Art Schulman and directed by Elizabeth Brasler. The Hole is beautiful, cathartic, amazing, and joyful in addition to being an indictment of our times and a vindication of the individual spirit. Essentially a solo show, powerfully erected by Lynne Conner as her character enters into an outdoor park area, sets up an easel, and warns the soundtrack for this show; a solitary guitar player, artfully strummed by Joey Brasler, that "we don't need to talk; I do plenty of talking when I draw." What seems like a rather simple conceit ends up being anything but. While the ending may seem a little bit obvious, in hindsight, it is the powerful musical score of Mr. Brasler, the nimble words of Mr. Schulman, the artful direction of Ms. Brasler, and moreover the convincing and desperate invocations of Ms. Conner that steal the show and put this simple ten minute play down in the history books as one to remember.

Also notable from this series as "Harry Wilson's 15 Minutes" which is of similar, though slightly more light commentary on our news and fame obsessed culture. Christian Gossett directs the seven players in Dennis Jones play as the chatty characters fumble and bumble through this hilariously broadcast slice of life.

"11th Minute" by Marika Barnett and directed by Ms. Matamura was hosted as a staged reading on the night that I attended; however, even though the fresh actors had scripts in their hands, you could see the underlying tension and farcical humor in the deftly written play.

"Tipping Point," by Mark Andrew and directed by Jennie Roberson shows the struggle between letting go and hanging on and is an eye opening account of the life altering choices many of us need to make too, too early in our lives and the consequences of holding on.

Capping off the night was "Bad Dad," by Jan Michael Alejandro and directed by Alan Palmer is an antithetical "Full Monty" style musical of grandly proportioned fathers and "Leap Year," by Roy Bottochio and directed by Stu Berg was a yuk-yucky suicide attempt which took its own life that led off the evenings affair.

The ACTober Festival of ten minute play actually runs through the 10th of November at the Secret Rose Theatre in the NoHo Arts District.

www.ACToberfest.com
www.FireRoseProductions.com

The Love Talker in NoHo at the Hub

2007-10-29T19:16:00.000-07:00

When you walk into the eerily lit, long, narrow theatre space and you hear the crickets chirping, you can bet that there is going to be no good going on. When you take in your surroundings in the high backed, old time, carnival style chairs and you see the ivy crawling up the walls, the veils hanging down from the ceiling, the bunk bed area high above the stage, and the hollowed out tree stump on the floor, your mind goes on overdrive and you can bet that there is trouble in the wings.

This is the scene at the play written by Deborah Pryor and directed by Ben Kusler, "The Love Talker," which is running now through November 17, 2007 at The Hub Theatre (5425 Lankershim Blvd. N. Hollywood, CA 91601) This play is not new; in fact it was first produced in The Actors Theatre of Louisville Humana Play Festival in 1987 and had a brief run at The Hudson Guild Theatre, Off Broadway in Manhattan in 1988.

Much of the language in this play seems a little dated at best; this is a Huck Finn yarn told in a 21st Century world. It seems, in this modern world that not many of us are that accustomed to entering an unfamiliar, anonymous theatre and be expected to suspend our disbelief long enough to enjoy the show. This is the sad truth to this particular staging.

Unfortunately for this play we are all too well aware of everything that we see and with actors entering from behind the audience and players coming and going from all points on the stage, it was tough to get my bearings enough to appreciate the play before me. At just over an hour this play zips by; with two of the four players setting themselves up on either side of the battle over the presence of the other two, you can see right away the ball of yarn begin to unravel.
Becca White and Olevia White are Gowdie and Bun; sisters, in the play only, and the older Bun has a dark recollection of the past when their mother engaged with a man known only as "The Love Talker." Younger Gowdie was only a babe at this time and can't even recall their mother at all, really; so she is ripe for the pickings of this dubious monster when he makes his unwelcome return.

Alexi Sean Anthony is The Love Talker and he smoothly glides all around the stage in a come hither manner that is both alluring and repulsive; Amanda D'Angelo plays The Red Head; a character, much like the Furies of the Ancient Greeks or the Witches from Shakespeare; she foresees the drama before its unfolding and recklessly yaps about it.

With able setting from the design team, steady direction of an unwieldy text by Mr. Kusler, and all around solid performances; particularly so from the sisters, whose roles were a little more developed and their struggle more clearly defined, this is a play that is definitely worth further scrutiny. Some who see this may not think that it is much more than a ghost story. However "The Love Talker" reminds us that the most basic human elements; lust, revenge, jealousy, freedom; are no where more compelling to watch than when blood ties become strained.

The Love Talker plays Fridays and Saturdays at 8PM and Sundays at 3PM through November 17.
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