Some reviews can be a struggle. What new can be written about Nobel Prize winning playwright Samuel Beckett (1906-1989) and his masterworks about the human condition? As for Beckett’s allusive, yet curiously poetic, Happy Days what might it say for contemporary audiences in these current times. Does the “old style” of existentialism still set the mind aflutter?

Let’s be clear, the 1961 Happy Days is theater with deeply drawn substance to chew on especially for those with an affinity for post-WW II “Theatre of the Absurd” chops. As Scena Literary Manager Anne Nottage wrote in program notes, the “Theater of the Absurd” was hell-bent “to shake audience from their conventional viewing habits.”

As Nottage wrote, playwrights like Beckett wanted to force audiences “to think about the absurdity and unresolved issues in their own lives.” For Beckett’s Happy Days Scena Theatre Artistic Director Robert McNamara wrote in his program notes that the play “presents us as audience with an astonishing central image…a veritable earth goddess.” She is living in “a kind of post-nuclear” world, hungering for with “mutual need and dependency.”

For your reviewer, recent new events brought images to mind of a genderless central protagonist as a POW or a prisoner of the state locked away in some hole of a maximum security prison, with sleep deprivation the main tool of control by an unseen force. The prisoner must find a way to survive until, well just until. So the ritual of talking, with words pouring forth gives a semblance of living.

Legendary DC actor and multi-Helen Hayes recipient, Nancy Robinette is a confident actor to behold in her role Winnie in Happy Days. She takes on her character who is entombed in the earth up to her chest in Act I and in Act II finds herself swallowed by sand up to her neck. Robinette spends her time before us as a sad eyed prophet with long bursts of optimism and a bright smile to carry her through her sun-lit, yet dreary day. No matter the nature of her miserable day, it is a happy day that she conjures in her mind even as tears are so close.

We are drawn to Robinette’s simple humanity as Winnie; the naturalness of her presentation. It is as if being stuck in a mound of sand is to be expected. Vocally her tone is a paint brush of words, with diction tight. Some words are drawn out in a hissing long breath as she often pronounces the phrase “the old style.” And yes there are little jokes, some about sexuality, that bring her and the laughter.

Visually the lines on Robinette’s face are the lines of a life lived. Her eyes, oh her eyes! They are matched and move to the words she speaks so smoothly. Her eyes are heavily covered with a thick cobalt blue eye shadow which can make her eyes small and sorrowful and then burst into being large moons of happiness. And she is just stuck in place at the center of the audience’s attention.

Between a piercing bell for waking and a bell to announce time for rest, the character Winnie struggles to pace her day. She tries to stay alert and even has a routine to brush her teeth and put on make-up. Well, at least while she can move her arms to reach her close-by leather hand bag.

Winnie’s only human contact is Willie (a loud, annoyed, very precise Stephen Lorne Williams), her husband or partner. He is largely unseen to the audience and not seen at all by Winnie until a few short critical moments as the play reaches its end. He lives in a small cave out of Winnie’s view from her high mound of earth. One trait that Winnie admires about her Willie is his ability to sleep which she cannot. She calls it a “marvelous gift.”

In Act I, actor Williams is seen a few times, but only from the rear. From what the audience sees, he is dressed in quite informal attire, with a straw hat covering his bald pate. In the final moments of the play the audience finally sees Williams as he crawls up the mound toward Robinette in full formal attire including spats. As he reaches up toward Robinette, he becomes frozen almost touching her hand. Or is he reaching for the gun that is also near-by? With his last word; “win” he brings a final outburst of words and humming of a waltz from Robinette. And darkness falls.

Scenic designer Michael C. Stepowany has given the audience a desolate, dun-colored waste land; a dry desert of a landscape barren of life. There is a mound in the center for Robinette and a backdrop of a blue sky with one fair weather puffy cloud, which a photographers would relish. Multiple Helen Hayes nominated lighting designer Marianne Meadows provides halogen white-hot lighting worthy of a New Mexico desert, with a hint of amber to highlight the set’s sand and pebbles surrounding Robinette.

The costume design by Alisa Mandel gives Robinette a matronly look. She is in a dark blue dress along with a strand of large pearls around her neck. Robinette is topped-off with a little pill of a hat with some eye-blinking ostrich feathers shooting up from the front. Filled to the brim is a black leather hand bag, just in Robinette’s reach during Act I. Inside is a bevy of items by way of props designer Joyce Milford.

Denise R. Rose’s sound design has a most piercing buzzer bell to wake character Winnie as well as to inform her when it is time for a moment of rest. It certainly startled the audience at the performance.

“So little to say, so little to do, and the fear so great,” says the character Winnie. Yet she finds a way to go on looking ever forward to other Happy Days. That is, should tomorrow come for her.

Your reviewer is brought back to Bob Dylan’s “Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands” with its final refrain, “who do they think could bury you?” For Robinette’s Winnie as created by Beckett, sorrow is always breaking in, just as she finds a reason to be optimistic even as she is buried ever so slowly.

Photo Gallery

Nancy Robinette in the lead role of Winnie	Stephen Lorne Williams as Willie and Nancy Robinette as Winnie

Photos by Don Summers, Jr.

Cast

• Winnie: Nancy Robinette
• Willie: Stephen Lorne Williams

Artistic and Design

• Director: Robert McNamara
• Scenic Designer: Michael C. Stepowany
• Costume Designer: Alisa Mandel
• Lighting Designer: Marianne Meadows
• Dramturg: Gabriele Jakobi
• Sound Designer: Denise R. Rose
• Stage Manager: Lena Salinas
• Production Manager: Michael Sperber
• Properties: Joyce Milford

Disclaimer: Scena Theatre provided two complimentary media tickets to ShowBizRadio for this review.

In the “chair force” world depicted in George Brandt’s Grounded we witness the slow grinding boredom of the new way to wage war, punctuated by moments when a pilot feels a God-like rush to take action against the bad guys. The warrior is, at first, a strutting “gung-ho lifer” who initially has no compunctions about wasting a bad guy’s life until more personal issues find their way into the warrior’s mind.

But then the warrior is no longer piloting a high-flying, fancy, F-16, doing unseen damage from high in the blue sky. This warrior is piloting a high technology drone which endlessly surveils and then can destroy someone in the time it takes a signal to transmit half way around the world into the air above Afghanistan…in this case, a bit over one second. Then a silent poof as a missile is launched, destruction happens seen from grey images on a screen.

To some this particular warrior may be an unlikely one. She is an unnamed, grounded pilot. She was grounded after she unexpectedly became pregnant and then became a mother and wife. No longer flying high into the wild blue yonder, she is a drone pilot in a barcolounger an hour’s drive from Las Vegas in the Nevada desert. A desert not unlike what is in Afghanistan.

Grounded is a fairly taut portrayal of this unnamed Air Force Major’s life as she unravels into a break-down into a lock-up awaiting a court-martial. Grounded is not so much a drama about the morality of new warfare methods, nor is it a flashy production full of visual pyrotechnics. In its own way, it is very old-fashioned; a one actor monologue with the pilot (Lucy Ellinson) trying to get inside the audience’s head and stir things up.

Grounded is to be appreciated for Ellinson’s acting prowess over its 60 intermission-free, claustrophobic minutes. The audience comes to know Ellinson’s character as her mind opens up even as she is “locked” away in the transparent box that is her mind. It is her mind-box we peer into as her crack-up slowly begins, taking away her pride, her sense of self and much more.

Now before I go too much further into this review, let me say this, I was once in the Air Force, as an intelligence officer in a war long ago. I was stationed in the Far East and worked in a large windowless box, with some of my unit in a trailer not unlike what is depicted in Grounded miles farther from my own main windowless box. It was a different war, Vietnam, and I was not a “gung-ho lifer.” I recall utter monotony, until events happened which set all into a highly stressed mode. I was often enough the only officer on duty in the world of around the clock shift work. Decisions had to be made. Actions had to be taken. So, Grounded is a show that brought my own memories flooding back.

Under Christopher Haydon’s straight forward direction of Grounded, we first come in contact with the Pilot as she is in a transparent box, by way of set designer Oliver Townsend. She is actively surveilling the audience. AC-DC like rock music (sound designer Tom Gibbons) is blaring. The Pilot is not passive as she stands in her at-ease position even moving into a more swagger laden pose with hands in front, always watching. And the words begin to flow. The grinding down of her pride, her personhood, and the unnerving juxtaposition of killing from a distance only to drive home and be with her husband and daughter.

We see her descent into her own private Hell as her words tumble out, her fists harden, her pilot’s cock-sure strut is no more. Lights flash in the mind box as things happen. In the last gripping five minutes or so of the production, the audience witnesses intimately the Pilot’s actions and inactions. Frozen. Traumatic. Then a black-out leaving the audience to contemplate the issues raised.

As directed by Haydon, who is the artistic director of Britain’s Gate Theatre and directed the show there, Grounded is a well-accomplished production with a rhythm of life working in the stressful conditions that war brings. Some of the technical and acting elements hit quite well. The blaring music to drown out boredom and help to alleviate stress. The pilot’s need for a blatant kind of lusty life to prove herself alive.

This is playwright Brandt’s introductory course into modern, distant warfare. It will not be the last such teaching production from a playwright or screen writer, I am certain. Grounded is not a drama about the larger morality issues of new warfare including the use of drones. It is more an intimate portrait of one particular woman warrior. A warrior who believes totally in “protect and destroy” as an adage. Who thinks being a pilot is being a “rock star.” Who at first wears a flight suit (Oliver Townsend again) as a powerful sexy attire that draws men to her.

In an interview, Grounded playwright Brant is noted to say: “I approached this play with a lot of questions and wasn’t sure where I stood with this new technology and the moral implications of it; I’m happy anytime American soldiers lives are not at risk, but am troubled by some of the moral implications of [drone warfare] and what it’s doing to our standing in the world.”

Grounded is an issue-raising script and performance that doesn’t shrivel away from tough matters. It has its share of tragedies depicting a world rarely shown on stage. It is another import from the Edinburgh Fringe Festival but will strike a different nerve than the vastly different Black Watch that Shakespeare Theatre brought to town a few years ago. Of possible interest for those who see Grounded is a new movie that will be opening soon in DC, that started as a play written by Matt Witten. It had a one performance screening last week at the E Street Cinema. It is called “Drones.”

Studio Theatre’s artistic director David Muse has brought to DC, what is surely to be a growing list of theater productions not unlike what some of us vividly recall from the Vietnam War era. Different wars with new artistic visions and distinct voices.

Note: I recall this from 1970 as my unit (called Able Flight back then) would sometimes sing from Elton Johns’ “Burn Down the Mission” with lyrics by Bernie Taupin:

If we’re gonna stay alive
Watch the black smoke fly to heaven
See the red flame light the sky.
Burn down the mission
Burn it down to stay alive
It’s our only chance of living
Take all you need to live inside.

Photo Gallery

Photos provided by Studio Theatre

Cast

• The Pilot: Lucy Ellinson

• Playwright: George Brant
• Director: Christopher Haydon
• Set and Costume Designer: Oliver Townsend
• Lighting Designer: Mark Howland
• Sound Designer: Tom Gibbons
• Technical Tour Manager: Katy Munroe Farlie
• Studio Technical Director: Robert Shearin

Disclaimer: Studio Theatre provided a complimentary media ticket to ShowBizRadio for this review.

If one needed an “excuse” not to be home watching the Tony Awards, nothing could serve better than a near-perfect production of Noel Coward’s comedy of unmannerly manners, Private Lives, at Shakespeare Theatre Company.

There isn’t a false note in the direction of Maria Aitkin, an acclaimed Coward actor and teacher, or in the performances of James Waterston and Bianca Amato as Elyot and Amanda. The couple had divorced five years previously and re-meet while on their honeymoons with new spouses, only to find their passions quickly rekindled. Autumn Hurlbert and Jeremy Webb, playing those spouses, the hysterical Sybil and the well-meaning but rigid Victor, ably match the leads. Even in her small role, Jane Ridley grabs and holds the stage for as long as the playwright allows her to.

It doesn’t hurt that this may be Coward’s funniest play — certainly the wit never takes a break and the barbs fly fast and furious, especially between Elyot and Amanda. They’re hopelessly in love and equally hopelessly unable to live together for very long without objects and insults being thrown. Later Sybil and Victor get drawn into the fray, but they are mere amateurs learning from the masters…

From the minute Waterston steps out on the balcony of his and Sybil’s hotel suite, you know he’s in command. Of a perfect English accent, the wit, the right look, and the bits of physical comedy later on.

Plus the actor’s chemistry with Amato’s alternatively sexy, playful, forbidding, and defiant (almost feminist) — not to mention mercurial–Amanda sizzles. From Act II, although not much of a plot is advanced, we seem to learn every nuance of romantic attraction, happy, passionate, frustrated, and miserable.

You might say Private Lives is a master class in love, so much so that we forgive Elyot and Amanda for outrageous and insensitive behavior and overlook the fact that we know nothing about them other than what we see — violations both of morality and theatrical conventions up to that point.

The play is light-hearted; you’ll likely find yourself laughing at almost every line, especially in a production as on target as this one. But you’ll also feel the reality of two people who may be more elegant and devil-may-care than we are but are still looking, underneath their acerbic, callous statements, for a true connection.

In short, Elyot and Amanda are too lovable to judge. And the more-upright Sybil and Victor come across as tedious, even as a part of us feels sorry for the awful way they’re being treated.

Beyond the underlying serious side, Private Lives is hilarious, and this production gives you plenty of cause to laugh. I’m certain many audience members would have sat through a repeat performance right away.

It is fitting that Allen Moyer’s sets — elegant in Act I, and bohemian tossed into disarray in the next two — move forward slightly as each Act begins. Like the text itself, they beckon us to enter the chaotic but endearing world of Elyot and Amanda.

This production is debuting at STC, but cut its teeth in the spring of 2012 at the Huntington Theatre Company in Boston, with the same cast and director.

Cast

• Amanda: Bianca Amato
• Sibyl: Autumn Hurlbert
• Louise: Jane Ridley
• Elyot: James Waterston
• Victor: Jeremy Webb

Direction and Design

• Director: Maria Aitken
• Set Designer: Allen Moyer
• Costume Designer: Candice Donnelly
• Lighting Designer: Philip S. Rosenberg
• Sound Design & Music Arrangements: Rob Milburn and Michael Bodeen
• Music Director: Barbara Irvine
• Choreographer: Daniel Pelzig
• Fight Choreographer: Ted Hewlett
• Head of Voice and Text (for STC): Ellen O’Brien
• Original Casting Director: Alaine Alldaffer
• Additional Casting, of Binder Casting: Jack Bowdan
• Literary Associate: Drew Lichtenberg
• Assistant Director: Gus Heagerty
• Production Stage Manager: Leslie Sears
• Assistant Stage Manager: Elizabeth Clewley

Disclaimer: Shakespeare Theatre Company provided two complimentary media tickets to ShowBizRadio for this review.

How do you avoid cheesy lines in praise of Faction of Fools’ current production of Titus Andronicus? Things like “Bloody good time!” or “Give those actors a hand.” Oh, why try? In this intentionally, violently silly production of what could justly be regarded as Shakespeare’s worst play, the mayhem and over-the-top shtick make far more sense than an attempt at a straightforward production. And, by the way, the play may not even be Shakespeare’s at all. There is a centuries-old, probably unresolvable, controversy about whether Shakespeare actually wrote the thing, or at least whether he may have had a forgettable collaborator. It’s an interesting question whether, absent its debatable connection to Shakespeare, anyone would bother looking at this early 1590s mess of a revenge tragedy outside the depths of university literature departments.

Well, Faction of Fools (FoF) might, because the script, full as it is of scheming, beheading, behanding, stabbing, strangling, spearing, and meat pie-baking, and rape, is perfect fodder for the troupe’s comedia-influenced, high-speed, slapstick, ironically knowing, approach to its material. The play uses an ensemble cast, with no preeminent lead, but the FoF production does have a star: stage blood. It’s everywhere. Sometimes it’s a fountain. Sometimes it shoots forth in rhythm, to musical accompaniment. Sometimes it lies on stage for a while, waiting for use by a character. Sometimes you just turn a faucet and there it is. The sanguinary permutations seem endless, and much credit goes to fight choreographer Casey Kaleba for the design and execution of the effects. If there were a Helen Hayes Award for blood, he’d be the front-runner.

Whether non-Shakespeare or semi-Shakespeare or simply bad Shakespeare, the play does not teem with fully realized characters an audience comes to care about, which makes it easier to accept their usually bloody demise. There is one major exception, Lavinia, the daughter of Titus, who is raped, then has her tongue pulled out and her hands cut off to keep her silent. The role is played by Miranda Medugno, a Galludet theater graduate who signs the lines she has before she is mutilated. (The perpetrators have a chilling moment where their realization that she communicates by signing motivates them to remove her hands.) After the graphic horror of the attack on her, she becomes a rather still, almost stoic figure, most notably in a scene where three other characters loudly wail and wallow in bathos on seeing her condition, while she remains seemingly unmoved.

In this style, and given the absence of memorable language in the script, verbal nuance is not a priority. For the most part, actors declaim their lines loudly and rather melodramatically. Titus (Nello DeBlasio) is a prime example of this tendency, which could be fatal to a portrayal in a “straight” production of this or any play but which does not make much difference here. There’s one nice exception to this trend, when Marcus (Toby Mulford) quietly and tenderly helps Lavinia offstage after she is attacked.

Nor is the play itself, or the FoF style in performing it, a place to look for subtle shadings of character. Take the two villains, Tamora (Christina Marie Frank) and Aaron (Manu Kumasi). Tamora is the deadliest of femme fatales, waving her arms about, blatantly exercising her feminine wiles to the hilt, and scheming to hurt her enemy Titus by any means available, the crueler the better. Aaron, Tamora’s servant and lover, simply enjoys his villainy — seldom has evil been so cheerful, as when he notes that he has made his mistress his mistress. Kumasi moves extremely well, making his evil graceful as well as cheerful. Megduno’s Lavinia aside, this pair of malefactors make the most pronounced individual impressions of any of the cast’s members.

There is also an interesting racial angle to the villains’ relationship. While the moral makeup of the characters could not be more different, Aaron, like Othello, is a “Moor” (i.e., is black), while Tamora, like Desdemona, is white. Together, they produce a mixed-race baby (the doll representing the baby is outfitted with its own miniature mask), which quite scandalizes the ancient Rome seen through 16th-century British eyes. Unlike many a production of Othello, the FoF production does not seek interesting ways of exploring the contemporary resonance of this portion of the script, seemingly being content to take this aspect of the play at face value.

The production’s hallmark is choreographed comic movement. Director Matthew R. Wilson and Kaleba keep the cast in nearly constant, sometimes frenetic, motion, with one sight gag after another, even when the blood is not flowing. The cast is strongly committed to the style, and they carry it out with verve and precision.

There is a serious point behind all the lunacy, and that point is also made visually. Ethan Sinnott’s set and Denise Umland’s costumes are white, as are the actors’ comedia makeup and Aaron Cromie’s well-executed masks. As the production proceeds, everything white becomes covered — saturated is not too strong a term — with the free-flowing gore, as the production displays the craziness of unrestrained violence to the audience in vivid red-on-white. Director Wilson’s program note underlines the point, when he says “There is nothing funny about murder or rape but there is something absurd about the culture of violence and patriarchy that produces these atrocities.”

FoF turns a problematic script into a stylistic and darkly funny triumph. Far be it from a critic to skewer the company’s efforts.

(Editor’s Note: Due to a scheduling mixup, ShowBizRadio sent two reviewers to cover this production. See David Siegel’s review for another view of the show.)

Director’s Notes

I have always been fascinated by the aesthetic of violence. Conflict, collision, and combat — although sources of pain — can also bring moments of beauty. Consider the virtuosity of the martial artist, the elegant sheen of a blood spatter, or even the breathtaking splendor of an exploding supernova.
 
For this bloody play, all the world’s a canvas, and we witness, not only acts of violence, but their aftermath as well. Our Rome is a pristine, gleaming empire that inflicts brutality on other cultures while maintaining a capital city that is sanitary, safe, and spotless. All that changes when Titus returns triumphant and the bloodstains start to accumulate.
 
The bloodshed in Titus is senseless; it is spectacular; and, yes, sometimes it is downright silly. But Shakespeare and his contemporaries already knew that.
 
During the Renaissance, Seneca’s grisly Roman tragedies came back into vogue, and Commedia dell’Arte players presented their own violent delights as part of their repertoire of traveling plays. These “tragic” Commedia pieces were known under the genre of opera reggia, the “royal works” featuring nobles behaving badly — very badly indeed…

Shakespeare knew of this genre both from Seneca’s classical writings and from the contemporary performances of itinerant Italian players. He clearly had these in mind when penning Titus Andronicus, his own contribution to the genre of Renaissance horror story. The play is not meant to be a joke, but it is too absurd to stomach as a straight drama. It is the sixteenth-century’s version of Saw or Hostel.
 
In our darkly comic adaptation, something wicked becomes something wickedly delightful. We see the senselessness of violence — whether in warfare, sibling rivalries, or revenge — and we see the egocentric callousness with which people ignore survivors because they are too consumed with their own grief. There is nothing funny about murder or rape, but there is something absurd about the culture of violence and patriarchy that produces these atrocities. If we laugh at perpetuators of violence, it is only because we know that they don’t deserve to be taken seriously. Or maybe it is because, as Titus says, we “have no tears left to shed.”

Photo Gallery

Nello DeBlasio (Titus), Matthew Pauli (Lucius), Miranda Medugno (Lavinia), Toby Mulford (Marcus)	Matthew Pauli (Lucius), Miranda Medugno (Lavinia), Toby Mulford (Marcus)
Nello DeBlasio (Titus), Miranda Medugno (Lavinia)	Toby Mulford (Marcus), Miranda Medugno (Lavinia), Nello DeBlasio (Titus)

Photos by Teresa Wood

Cast

• Titus Andronicus: Nello DeBlasio
• Demetrius: Charlie Ainsworth
• Bassianus/Publius/Goth Soldier/Quintus: Chema Pineda-Fernandez
• Young Lucius/Mutius/Nurse/Aemilius: Cori Dioquino
• Saturninus: Daniel Flint
• Tamora: Christina Marie Frank
• Chiron/Martius: Tyler Herman
• Aaron: Manu Kumasi
• Lavinia: Miranda Medugno
• Marcus Andronicus/Alarbus: Toby Mulford
• Lucius: Matthew Pauli

Artistic and Design Team

• Written by William Shakespeare
• Adapted and Directed and Co-Choreographer: Matthew R. Wilson
• Production Manager/Stage Manager: Sarah Conte
• Scenic Design: Ethan Sinnott
• Costume Design: Denise Umland
• Lighting Design: Michael Barnett
• Sound Design & Music Composition: Thomas Sowers
• Fight Direction: Casey Kaleba & Matthew R. Wilson
• Co-Choreographer and Blood Effects: Casey Kaleba
• Properties Design & Assistant Blood Effects: Kristen Pilgrim
• Mask Designer and Fabricator: Aaron Cromie
• Assistant Stage Manager: Kathryn Dooley
• Assistant Director: Rachel Spicknall Mulford
• Dramaturg: Natalie Tenner
• ASL Consultant/Interpreter: Dr. Lindsey D. Snyder

Disclaimer: Faction of Fools provided a complimentary media ticket to ShowBizRadio for this review.

Shakespeare certainly knew how to make an audience squirm. “Vengeance is in my heart, death in my hand, Blood and revenge are hammering in my head” says Aaron, a key figure in Shakespeare’s rarely produced Titus Andronicus that just opened in DC.

But, this production is by the scrappy Faction of Fools theater company with a go-for-broke, unmuted “commedia dell’ arte” vision. For those not familiar with the Faction of Fools, it is the 2012 Helen Hayes Recipient of the John Aniello Award for Outstanding Emerging Theatre Company in the DC area.

Titus Andronicus is one of Shakespeare’s most chilling, violent, quite unsubtle bloody tales full of honor killings, revenge killings, infanticide, and any number of chopped-off limbs and dismemberments. Nothing much comic in that.

What is the storyline? Titus Andronicus is a fictional Roman general who returns from a decade of war with most of his sons dead on the battlefield. In his victories for the Roman Empire, he has captured Tamora, Queen of the Goths, her three sons as well as Tamora’s lover, Aaron the Moor.

From this start, the blood-fest moves forward with the characters seeking vengeance, advantage and survival to the point of self-mutilation. “If there were reason for these miseries, then into limits could I bind my woes” says Titus after much carnage.

Titus is an operatic play that spins and twists into a bloody cyclone of madness not unlike epic movies with a Vietnam War era mentality such as the “Godfather I & II” or “Apocalypse Now.” Few are left standing as the tragic goings-on finally end. Ah, but his is a Faction of Fools production.

Adapted and staged by Matthew R. Wilson, the Faction of Fools has respected the play’s grisly bones but added a veneer of comic touches to coat the bones and make them a bit more palatable. Wilson and his troupe have not made Titus into a Mel Brooks farce, or a late night comedy act but used their special brand of masked antics, tongue-in-cheek mannerisms and speech along with plenty of double-entendre laden physical movements touches, sitting right along-side the eviscerations. It is as if there is the written text with theatrical components filtering and shifting the words into new meanings.

The Titus set design by Ethan Sinnott is a constructed imperial city that fills the stage at the Elstad Annex at Gallaudet University. There are multi-level play areas, doorways for entrances and exits along with several trap doors and well-positioned windows. It is painted a luminous pure white made even brighter by the white-hot lights from Michael Barnett. Over the course of the performance the pure white becomes a crimson red abstract expressionist canvas of blood splotches, splatters and swirls courtesy of designer Casey Kaleba.

Costume designer Denise Umland has the cast outfitted in white as well, which also takes on a crimson hue. Apropos of “commedia dell’arte,” the actors wear hand-crafted, half masks also in white fabricated by Aaron Cromie. Props are a perverse amusement done up to gratify the most fervent Grand Guignol fane. There is such creativity in the exaggerated manner of showing amputated limbs and other body parts and flowing blood that is sophisticated and cartoonish, and perhaps not for everyone. I will not look at a spigot or a dark quiet pool quite the same again.

Actors who make strong impressions include Miranda Medugno as Lavina, the ultimate victim, who loses hands and tongue after she is raped. Medugno, who is pursuing a Master’s degree in Sign Language Education, brings her “silenced” character into dramatic light and intensity. She draws us to her with her entire being. She is the moral, non-comic center of Titus.

As Tamara, Queen of the Goths, Christina Pineda-Fernandez vamps her way through the proceedings. She is physically impish and cunning. Her words, both straight and humorous, are darts that sting all in good fun, well as best fun as can be given her nasty character.

Aaron The Moor is played by Manu Kumasi with a vigorous strut and fire in his eyes. He even gives off a subtext as to why he is so villainous. Nello DeBlasio’s Titus is a madman who loudly whines for attention. DeBlasio plays his Titus as someone on speed with Munchausen by proxy syndrome. Other male characters also have a too-rushed approach to their deliveries. Demetrius (Charlie Ainsworth) and Chiron (Tyler Herman) deserve note for their manner of accomplishing dastardly deeds using both spoken words and ASL in a helter-skelter duet.

Faction of Fools marketing material notes, “Faction’s fifth season ends with a shriek, as we bring you the funniest version yet of Shakespeare’s bloodiest play. In the Fools’ darkly comic take, something wicked becomes something wickedly delightful.” Well, I would not go that far.

Your reviewer marvels at what Wilson and the Fools have accomplished with their audacious take of rushing rivers of blood and carnage. It is up to you and your own gimlet eye whether to buckle up and take this Titus in. It will challenge you to find your pathway past lines such as: “Art thou not sorry for these heinous deeds?… Ay, that I had not done a thousand more” to find and appreciate the comic touches. It is all a matter of one’s tastes.

I guess humor can be found even in Marlon Brando’s last line in “Apocalypse Now,” “The horror, the horror.”

NOTE: No late seating. Appropriate for ages 13 and up. Select performances ASL Interpreted. Open Captioning available upon request.

(Editor’s Note: Due to a scheduling mixup, ShowBizRadio sent two reviewers to cover this production. See Bob Ashby’s review for another view of the show.)

Director’s Notes

I have always been fascinated by the aesthetic of violence. Conflict, collision, and combat — although sources of pain — can also bring moments of beauty. Consider the virtuosity of the martial artist, the elegant sheen of a blood spatter, or even the breathtaking splendor of an exploding supernova.
 
For this bloody play, all the world’s a canvas, and we witness, not only acts of violence, but their aftermath as well. Our Rome is a pristine, gleaming empire that inflicts brutality on other cultures while maintaining a capital city that is sanitary, safe, and spotless. All that changes when Titus returns triumphant and the bloodstains start to accumulate.
 
The bloodshed in Titus is senseless; it is spectacular; and, yes, sometimes it is downright silly. But Shakespeare and his contemporaries already knew that.
 
During the Renaissance, Seneca’s grisly Roman tragedies came back into vogue, and Commedia dell’Arte players presented their own violent delights as part of their repertoire of traveling plays. These “tragic” Commedia pieces were known under the genre of opera reggia, the “royal works” featuring nobles behaving badly — very badly indeed…

Shakespeare knew of this genre both from Seneca’s classical writings and from the contemporary performances of itinerant Italian players. He clearly had these in mind when penning Titus Andronicus, his own contribution to the genre of Renaissance horror story. The play is not meant to be a joke, but it is too absurd to stomach as a straight drama. It is the sixteenth-century’s version of Saw or Hostel.
 
In our darkly comic adaptation, something wicked becomes something wickedly delightful. We see the senselessness of violence — whether in warfare, sibling rivalries, or revenge — and we see the egocentric callousness with which people ignore survivors because they are too consumed with their own grief. There is nothing funny about murder or rape, but there is something absurd about the culture of violence and patriarchy that produces these atrocities. If we laugh at perpetuators of violence, it is only because we know that they don’t deserve to be taken seriously. Or maybe it is because, as Titus says, we “have no tears left to shed.”

Photo Gallery

Nello DeBlasio (Titus), Matthew Pauli (Lucius), Miranda Medugno (Lavinia), Toby Mulford (Marcus)	Matthew Pauli (Lucius), Miranda Medugno (Lavinia), Toby Mulford (Marcus)
Nello DeBlasio (Titus), Miranda Medugno (Lavinia)	Toby Mulford (Marcus), Miranda Medugno (Lavinia), Nello DeBlasio (Titus)

Photos by Teresa Wood

Cast

• Titus Andronicus: Nello DeBlasio
• Demetrius: Charlie Ainsworth
• Bassianus/Publius/Goth Soldier/Quintus: Chema Pineda-Fernandez
• Young Lucius/Mutius/Nurse/Aemilius: Cori Dioquino
• Saturninus: Daniel Flint
• Tamora: Christina Marie Frank
• Chiron/Martius: Tyler Herman
• Aaron: Manu Kumasi
• Lavinia: Miranda Medugno
• Marcus Andronicus/Alarbus: Toby Mulford
• Lucius: Matthew Pauli

Artistic and Design Team

• Written by William Shakespeare
• Adapted and Directed and Co-Choreographer: Matthew R. Wilson
• Production Manager/Stage Manager: Sarah Conte
• Scenic Design: Ethan Sinnott
• Costume Design: Denise Umland
• Lighting Design: Michael Barnett
• Sound Design & Music Composition: Thomas Sowers
• Fight Direction: Casey Kaleba & Matthew R. Wilson
• Co-Choreographer and Blood Effects: Casey Kaleba
• Properties Design & Assistant Blood Effects: Kristen Pilgrim
• Mask Designer and Fabricator: Aaron Cromie
• Assistant Stage Manager: Kathryn Dooley
• Assistant Director: Rachel Spicknall Mulford
• Dramaturg: Natalie Tenner
• ASL Consultant/Interpreter: Dr. Lindsey D. Snyder

Disclaimer: Faction of Fools provided a complimentary media ticket to ShowBizRadio for this review.

With all of London anguished by fear that Hitler’s war will soon reach their city, atheist physician Sigmund Freud invites Oxford professor C.S. Lewis into his study for a lively debate, addressing questions like: Does God exist? Do humans possess an innate moral conscience? How can a believer adequately explain the quandaries of war, pain, sickness, and death?

Such is the opening scene of Mark St. Germain’s production, Freud’s Last Session; with performances scheduled at Washington DC’s Jewish Community Center Theater J through July 6. The 80-minute play features just two actors and one set; the parquet wood-floored study of Freud, adorned with a carefully arranged bookshelf, floor to ceiling drapes, and an examination couch — which becomes an object of jest throughout.

While an entertaining interplay of opposing worldviews, the lack of an organic exchange of ideas can make the sequences seem too contrived at times — particularly for those familiar with C.S. Lewis’ and Freud’s canon of work, from which their debate heavily draws.

Rick Foucheux’s admirable portrayal of Freud stands out, with the psychoanalyst’s constant questioning halted only by the painful, oral cancer-induced coughing fits that leave him with a bloody rag in his hands; yet nonetheless determined to proceed in defense of all things proven by facts, logic, and empirical observations. He calls Darwin a personal “saint” and derides C.S. Lewis — a hailed scholar and one-time atheist — for being swept up in the “fairytale” of religion.

For his part, Todd Scofield, playing the part of Lewis, deftly calls out the seeming contradictions in Foucheux’s rigid opposition to religious belief; among them the assemblage of religious artifacts carefully arranged on Freud’s desk, as well as the physician’s own admission that he drew comfort from reading the Christian-themed epic, Paradise Lost.

Still, it’s hard not to notice Lewis’ character as the less dynamic of the pair; stiffer both in movement and in speech. As an admirer of the famed literary scholar and member of the Oxford writing group the Inklings, of which J.R.R. Tolkien was also a part, I felt Lewis’ role seemed too defensive and less reliant on the wit and confidence that compelled the 20th century writer to produce a swath of heavily praised Christian writings and apologia.

There were other details from Lewis’ own life that seemed appropriate to introduce, yet were not discussed in the play; among them the fact that his mother — Flora Hamilton Lewis — suffered her own fatal bout of cancer, an experience believed to influence C.S. Lewis’ later conversion. While Lewis does surmise that Freud’s declining health could be leading him to reconsider a belief in God, perhaps in light of his mortality, the close-to-heart experience from Lewis’ childhood was never mentioned.

It’s the painful cancer that seems to drive a wedge deeper in Freud’s resistance to Lewis’ claims that moral consciousness and religious belief are inclinations inscribed on the human heart from birth.

“Is killing me God’s revenge?” asks an exasperated Freud, to which C.S. Lewis confesses, “I do not know.”

For Freud, all circumstance, all decision-making, all belief, can be explained through a logical interpretation of one’s own life experiences. In the case of Lewis, Freud explains away the Oxford writer’s flight to Christianity as a desperate attempt to resolve adolescent “daddy issues,” since Lewis was never close to his biological father from birth.

Another of Freud’s notable lines in the play illustrates this point: “Religion has made the world his nursery.” The pronoun his emphasizes another contention of Freud’s; that religion is an oppressive tool of patriarchal institutions determined to wield power.

Despite the spirited opposition, Lewis does continue to nudge Freud nearer to agnosticism. After sharing a story about a time he spent sick in the hospital, aided by a diminutive man, Freud suggests that there has never been a better joke than that — “an eminent intellectual, saved by a dwarf,” to which Lewis replies, “If it was a joke, who made it?”

But in a play focused on speech and debate, it was an unspoken act that seemed to speak the loudest, and in effect, draw the two men closer than any words they shared. Throughout the play, as Freud was repeatedly interrupted by writhing pain, he tells Lewis that his daughter Anna is the only person he entrusts to remove his mouthpiece and clean it to help assuage the pain.

But as the cancer becomes too much to bear, Lewis steps in, helps the suffering man to his desk chair and proceeds to remove the prostheses. While the play ends relatively unceremoniously — with a simple shake of the hands — it’s hard not to think that exchange trumped the rest.

Cast

• Freud: Rick Foucheux
• C.S. Lewis: Todd Scofield

Disclaimer: Theater J provided two complimentary media tickets to ShowBizRadio for this review.

Moving beyond its flame-thrower of a title, Mike Bartlett’s Cock is a striking, verbally pungent jolt of theater about a love-triangle for contemporary times and audiences. The production is part of Studio’s New British Invasion Festival.

In Cock we witness two men and a woman circling each other; trying to get the right angle and upper hand for a take-down of sorts. To the victor, goes the prize of a lovely young man, who keeps everyone hanging on, but one who has his share of commitment-phobias, to use a dated term of reference. The characters smash at one another with the spewed-forth, hurtful words of people who know well each other’s vulnerable places.

The play is a competitive schoolyard wrestling match, with verbal taunts, and accompanying thrusts and parries as the audience views the goings-on almost as school chums of one or another of the active participants. Will someone get hurt or just give-up and leave the circle forfeiting the match and the prize?

In the case of Cock it is a very angst-filled bout of constant movement with words spit out in an overlapping manner. Then a beat or two of silence to assess the damage. Under David Muse’s direction the production takes on an athletic air with attacks and counter-attacks, rather than cock-fighting event with blood, physical dismemberment and death the expectation. Muse gives the show a plenitude of game-playing offensive and defensive movements and maneuvers; grapples, holds and attempts at take-downs. Whatever sex and sexuality that might be expected with the play’s title is accomplished with words, rather than a shedding of clothes or hot public shows of affection.

Written by the Brit Mike Bartlett, who is in his early 30′s and has made a mark in only about seven years of playwriting. When first produced in Great Britain, Cock won an Olivier Award in 2010 for Outstanding Achievement in an Affiliate Theatre. In the Studio program, Bartlett is quoted; “theatre has to appeal to people who do jobs and have lives…the only choice is where your focus is. Do you write your play thinking about other plays? Or do you look out the window and say, my play is about that –whatever the world is. That’s what I’m after.”

Permit your reviewer a digression, but when I read those words from Bartlett, I was drawn back to Al Kooper’s bluesy version of Donovan’s “Season of the Witch” with its lyrics of “When I look out my window, Many sights to see, And when I look in my window, So many different people to be, That it’s strange, So strange…must be the season of the witch.”

Cock forcefully tells the story of two men in a long-time relationship just as the younger one, named John (convincingly played in a passive-aggressive manner by Ben Cole in his Studio début), artfully pushes for a break. He is either bored or unhappy with the way his older, stock-broker partner, named M (Scott Parkinson ably showing both a powerful “bitchy” bitterness and a nuanced vulnerability based upon real hurt) treats him. And off John goes.

Soon enough John finds himself involved with not another man; but a divorced, childless woman in her late 20′s named W (a lovely sometimes gentle, sometimes forceful Liesel Allen Yeager in her Studio début as a risk-taking woman going after what she wants). W is a school teacher of sorts. But, for confused and convoluted reasons, John returns to M seeking a reconciliation. M at first seems willing to forgive John, but then is not so certain. He needs some proof of John’s permanence in the partnership. So a dinner is planned to settle the matter. And we learn that W does not want to give up on John who has become the man of her dreams with the possibility of a future to include marriage and children.

There is also a late-comer to the proceedings, M’s father who is called F. As played by Bruce Dow, he is a middle-aged widower with life experiences of his own. He is a wild card at the dinner giving weight to his son’s love for John. He wants the woman W to just go.

This is the set-up for Cock, a tale of sexual attractions and a plenitude of simultaneous conflicting feelings along with an abundance of heated exchanges that pose complex questions about identity, sexuality, and a need for certainty and loyalty in a relationship. As the perplexed John asks himself, “what do I wish to be” his response to himself and others often enough is, “you can’t force me.” He is just in a dumb-struck muddle. He is at a loss of what comes after physical desire and sexual attraction with another human being of any gender.

The technical design for the intimacy of the Milton Theatre is what director Muse described in his program notes as “unencumbered by furniture or scene shifts.” There are short pauses accompanied by a tone-perfect sports buzzer to begin each new interval of action, courtesy of James Bigbee Garver. With Debra Booth’s spare set; a circle of hard-packed (but so clean-looking!) grayish sand-dirt mixture in which the combatants do their work is lit by 10 long fluorescent tubes from lighting designer Colin K. Bills. The only other hard set design element is a circular, blondish plywood back drop It is sometimes used as sitting place for the characters to take a momentary break and a public sip of water, as an athlete might do during a period, quarter or half-time interlude from action.

Alex Jaeger’s tasteful costumes give off the aura of each character. Parkinson wears nicely fitted clothes including a vest and fine laced brown shoes, Yeager is attired in a stylish, well-fitted figure-hugging black dress over her small frame that gives off a chic femininity along with square 3+ inch heels. Cole is in more casual attire with Tiger-like athletic shoes and an open neck shirt.

In program notes, Studio Theatre Dramaturg Adrien-Alice Hansel called the show “an unflinching examination of the vertiginous and seemingly provisional nature of identity itself” with the “main character paralyzed by ambivalence, in love with two people, his long-term boyfriend and a woman he’s just met.” Phew, now that is an excited mouthful of a description, but not off the mark.

So we have character John, who is questioning his sexuality and frames of reference. Who does he love, what does he want? How will he decide between the two people who want him? Would John’s charm and prowess be sufficient for a long-run partnership with anyone? Bartlett’s Cock asks many questions, but leaves answers up to audience members to contemplate and perhaps decide.

Cock is an accomplished trek into a well-groomed performance and culturally loaded play that is worth an audience’s attention. As the play unfolds, it digs deeper and deeper, leaving no character unscathed. Your reviewer leaned ever forward throughout so as not to miss the striking, vivid dialogue and nuanced movements.

And now I am going downstairs to play my very worn vinyl copy of Al Kooper’s “Season of the Witch” and then to YouTube for Donovan’s original version.

(Note: This production contains strong language and sexual content.)

Photo Gallery

Liesel Allen Yeager (W) and Ben Cole (John)	Ben Cole (John), Scott Parkinson (M), and Liesel Allen Yeager (W)
Ben Cole (John) and Scott Parkinson (M)	Liesel Allen Yeager (W), Ben Cole (John), and Scott Parkinson (M)

Photos by Teddy Wolff

Cast

• John: Ben Cole
• M: Scott Parkinson
• W: Liesel Allen Yeager
• F: Bruce Dow

Artistic and Design Team

• Playwright: Mike Bartlett
• Director: David Muse
• Set Design: Debra Booth
• Lighting Design: Colin K. Bills
• Costume Design: Alex Jaeger
• Sound Design: James Bigbee Garver
• Dramaturg: Adrien-Alice Hansel
• Dialect Coach: Ashley Smith
• Casting Director: Jack Doulin
• Production Stage Manager: John Keith Hall
• Technical Director: Robert Shearin

Disclaimer: Studio Theatre provided a complimentary media ticket to ShowBizRadio for this review.

Some advertisements and reviews of past productions of Peter Ackerman’s 1999 comedy of post-coital misunderstanding, Things You Shouldn’t Say Past Midnight, currently playing at the Keegan Theatre, have described it as a “bedroom farce,” bringing to mind one of those contraptions with seven doors, disguises, mistaken identities, multiple quick entrances and exits, and cardboard characters, in which, despite scripts stuffed with coy sexual innuendo, no one actually winds up in bed with anyone. Michael Frayn sent up the genre brilliantly in Noises Off.

Fortunately, that description does not actually apply to Things You Shouldn’t Say Past Midnight. True, it does take place mostly in bedrooms — three of them, in fact — in which Ackerman’s quirky sextet of characters does get to enjoy a good deal of horizontal recreation. The ensemble cast delivers not only one well-conceived laugh line after another but also highly satisfying character development along the way. Each of the actors creates a vivid, individual portrait.

The play begins with Nancy (Caroline Wolfson), in the throes of passion, uttering an intentionally indistinct bit of ethnic inappropriateness (the sort of thing, notwithstanding the play’s title, that might well be problematic at any time of day). Her boyfriend of six months, Ben (Michael Innocenti, who also designed the set), an earnest Jewish grad student, can’t resist teasing out her exact words and cross-examining her as to what she intended or implied by them. This results in a spat that spins out of control when Ben notes that since one can never be fully sure of the truth of someone’s self-representation, it is possible — just hypothetically — that a seemingly straight man might actually be gay. Ultimately, this sends Nancy, an immigrant from relatively sheltered world of small town Oregon, fleeing into the wilds of the Big City at 3 a.m., where she seeks refuge at the apartment of her best friend, Grace (Allison Corke).

Grace, a free-spirited, and unsurprisingly unemployed, art history major, has just one thing in mind: sex with her latest hook-up (though they have hooked up for five nights in a row, a seemingly long winning streak for such an arrangement). She is turned on by the fact that Gene (Peter Finnegan) is an older, working-class guy who has never been to college and is yet well-established in his career, that of a hit man for some minor league mobsters. Ackerman has fun with the role reversal here, as Grace’s laser focus on simply getting it on in the sack contrasts with the fastidious, rather kindly, professional killer’s desire for a bit of conversation, perhaps augmented with a snuggle, along the way. Gene even wants to hear something about art history, which Grace testily obliges with a riff about how bad shoes can become art objects.

Grace rings up her friend Mark (Kevin Hasser), a gay psychotherapist who is also Gene’s younger brother, to advise Nancy on her worries about Ben’s sexual orientation, only to reach Mark as he is enjoying the bedtime company of his much older companion, Mr. Abramson (Timothy J. Lynch), a carpet merchant. This leads to the show’s primary set-piece, a verbal circus of a three-way call involving Grace, Gene, and Nancy in one bedroom, Mark and Mr. Abramson in another, and Ben in the third.

Each of the three pairs of actors creates a believable couple dynamic and all succeed in the key task of being funny by ensuring that their characters take themselves perfectly seriously. The actors and director Colin Smith keep the rapid-fire lines fluid and perfectly timed, never letting the comic momentum flag. The only point at which matters slow a bit is toward the end of the show, as Ackerman’s script has the characters perhaps too readily learning their lessons of acceptance and compromise, which Ackerman follows up with a brief coda as the three couples — after the lights have gone down — once more make good use of their beds.

Innocenti’s set is simplicity itself, as befits a show that began life off-Broadway: three bedrooms, spaced across the stage at slightly different height levels. Allen Sean Weeks’ lighting design provides the area lighting necessary for the transitions from one bedroom to another. Kelly Peacock’s costumes fit the time of night and the varying moods resident in three bedrooms, with the contrast between Gene’s conservative pajamas and Grace’s racier nightwear being especially fun.

A number of reviews of previous productions of Things You Shouldn’t Say Past Midnight in other cities criticized the play for being too facile, going for easy laughs in sitcom-like fashion. (Indeed, DirecTV has announced that, beginning this month, it is producing a 10-episode show based on the play.) It may possibly be that some other productions of the play simply were not as skillfully executed as Keegan’s. The present production is an overwhelmingly funny rendering of Ackerman’s script: I cannot remember such a constantly uproarious audience reaction since the last good production of Noises Off I saw. But there is something more not far under the surface of the laughs, as the comedy springs from the emotional distress produced when people exalt categories (e.g., Jewish/non-Jewish, gay/straight) above the individuality of others in their lives. Both in terms of its humor and the underlying emotions, the Keegan production far exceeds the impact one would expect from a sitcom.

The Cast

• Nancy: Caroline Wolfson
• Grace: Allison Corke
• Ben: Michael Innocenti
• Gene: Peter Finnegan
• Mark: Kevin Hasser
• Mr. Abramson: Timothy Hayes Lynch

The Production Team

• Director: Colin Smith
• Assistant Director: Brianna Letourneau
• Scenic Design: Michael Innocenti/Colin Smith
• Lighting Design: Allan Weeks
• Costume Design: Kelly Peacock
• Sound Design: Dan Deiter
• Properties Designer and Set Dressing: Carol Hood Baker
• Hair and Makeup Design: Craig Miller
• Stage Manager: Megan Thrift

Disclaimer: Keegan Theatre provided two complimentary media tickets to ShowBizRadio for this review.

Silence = Death. The famous slogan of the AIDS activist group ACT UP could serve as an epigraph for Timberlake Wertenbaker’s The Love of the Nightingale, given a terrifyingly beautiful performance by the Constellation Theatre Company. Based on a tragedy by Sophocles, of which only fragments have survived, and a treatment by Ovid in his Metamorphoses, Wertenbaker’s 1988 play considers the role of voluntary and coerced silence in enabling cruelty and oppression and, ultimately, in leading to further atrocity.

The play begins and ends in violence. Soldiers fight to the death in the opening scene, the fight choreography by Matthew Wilson bringing to mind the combat scenes of “The Illiad.” Tereus (Matthew Schleigh), King of Thrace, receives as the reward of his victory the hand of Procne (Dorea Schmidt), daughter of the King of Athens. Schmidt’s deer-in-the-headlights shock as she dutifully submits to a political marriage is the first of many silences that mark the play.

After five years and a baby in what seem to her the lonely cultural wasteland of Thrace, Procne longs for the company of her younger sister Philomele (Meagan Dominy), and Tereus goes to Athens to fetch her. They view a performance of the Phaedra story, with the actors skillfully wearing beautiful and intricate theatrical masks. They touch, Philomele innocently and Tereus with what he recognizes as desire. On the voyage back to Thrace, Tereus delays the ship’s arrival; when Philomele rejects his advances, he kills the captain (Ashley Ivey), who Philomele has begun to love, and carries off the girl and rapes her. He is the King and has the power do all he wants.

The ship’s crewmembers are aware of all this: Tereus’s lust for Philomele, the murder of their captain, the abduction and rape. But they say nothing and pretend to see nothing. Their job is to follow orders, nothing more. When Tereus stonewalls their tentative questions, they meekly comply. Meanwhile, Philomele’s servant, Niobe (Rena Cherry Brown), an older woman who laments her loss of allure, speaks with cynical despair of the powerlessness of women. Philomele must accept the rape and, perhaps, try to gain what advantage she can from the situation. She must keep silent in the face of Tereus’ power; certainly she must not protest.

But Philomele will not remain silent. She ridicules the King to his face about his weakness and promises to proclaim to the world what a fool he is. At first, Tereus repeats what must be a familiar refrain to victims of sexual violence everywhere: why speak up, when no one will believe you against my words? When she continues to speak, he takes action to silence her voice once and for all, cutting out her tongue in one of the most horrifying scenes one is likely to see on stage. It is commonplace to talk of actors being committed to a role or a scene: the commitment of Schleigh and Dominy to the brutality of this scene is well beyond what most actors are ever asked to do.

What is to become of the speechless girl? She languishes in Thrace (Tereus has told Procne that her sister died on the voyage) for years. Wishing to contact Procne and convince her of her husband’s crimes, she seizes on the mechanism of a puppet play (the puppets, designed and choreographed by Don Becker and Eric Brooks, respectively, are a marvel), reenacting her rape and mutilation. In the midst of a drunken festival, Procne sees and, after some initial reluctance, believes. The two women take a Medea-like revenge on Tereus. Again, members of the ensemble observe a killing but resolve to say nothing and deny seeing anything.

The quality of the acting is extraordinary throughout. Schleigh’s King is a shallow, unthinking creature who typifies the arrogance of power, unable to face those he has wronged. Schmidt’s Procne tries, but never quite succeeds, to assimilate to the foreign world of Thrace, and when her illusions about her husband and her life with him are shattered, responds with an extreme of violence. Brown’s Niobe proclaims her hard-earned wisdom as a woman who knows what the world is like, but becomes instead a collaborator in the silence that imprisons Philomele and herself, almost satisfied to see Philomele punished the transgression Niobe had warned her against. Dominy’s Philomele has the longest and hardest journey, from innocent girl to adventurer to lover to rape victim (seldom has the nature of rape as a crime of power been portrayed more clearly) to dissident to sufferer of a horror to cruel avenger. Every step on her path is utterly convincing. In smaller roles, Ivey as the warm captain and Henry Niepoetter as Tereus’ unpleasant apprentice warrior of a son make their mark as well.

The ensemble, whether as soldiers, sailors, women of the court, or revelers at a festival, play their parts with flair, moving smartly to Kelly King’s choreography, above all in the bacchanal scene, as merriment mixes with the dread created by Philomele’s puppet show. To an extent, they play the traditional role of the Greek chorus, but they more importantly portray members of a society who, by choosing not to notice and speak, become accomplices in the crimes of the powerful.

The gold-colored foil-covered walls of scenic designer A.J. Guban’s set, which largely surrounds the oblong playing area, create a glittery world of splendor, the world that those in power wish society to see and be dazzled by. Augmented by Joseph Wall’s lighting design, which features many reds, the floor — shiny black planks with red spaces in between — evokes the dark and bloody underpinnings of a society based on the arbitrary exercise of power.

Kendra Rai’s costumes for the ensemble convey the multiple roles that its members play: those for the revelers in the festival scene, white costumes seemingly doused in wine, were especially colorful. Without attempting to be fixed in a given historical period, the costumes for the principals as well as those for the ensemble create the impression of characters living in the distant past of classical myth while confronting very contemporary issues.

Constellation, which makes something of a specialty of plays based on classical and world myths (their Metamorphoses a few years ago was noticeably superior to Arena Stage’s larger subsequent production, for example), has developed a fruitful relationship with musician Tom Teasley. Teasley provides the soundscape for Nightingale, with percussion and wind instrumentation helping to create the impression of the mythical world while responding to the emotions of each scene.

Without losing its roots in classical myth, the play has even greater resonance today than when it opened in 1988. What, after all, do the powerful seek? To do their will, with the role of the rest of society being quiet compliance. When torture, assassination, and sweeping collection of private information become state policy, treat those who publicize official conduct as criminals. When there is widespread criticism of a government on the internet and social media, censor or shut down electronic communications (the Turkish government’s recent attempt to pull to plug on Twitter comes to mind). In a more private sphere, silence is golden to those in positions of family or institutional power who sexually abuse children. Speaking up is dangerous, but what other choice is there but complicity? Not easy choices, but issues made vivid in this stunning production.

Director’s Note

I welcome you on this voyage to a foreign land in an unspecified time that feels at once ancient and modern. I have loved this play from the first time I read it over a decade ago. With opportunities for singing and dancing, romance and violence, sacrifice and transcendence, there are moments all over the emotional spectrum. A classical story created first by Sophocles, and then transformed by Ovid in Metamorphoses, is re-imagined by the brilliant Olivier Award-winning playwright Timberlake Wertenbaker.
 
This myth is a vehicle for us to express and process the darkest desires of the human heart. It is a complex world in which both love and violence are beautiful and terrifying. Tereus, the King of Thrace, is a war hero who has liberated Athens by conquering the invading army. His physical prowess and steely courage are celebrated, but when violent tendencies emerge later we find ourselves condemning the warrior we once adored. Wertenbaker gives us glimmering moments of love, both familial and romantic. The strength of the sisters’ bond drives the play. The romance between Philomele and the Captain allows them to feel “the gods within us.” Yet, the god of love can also be cruel, even merciless, fueling a fiery passion that can be all-consuming.
 
The women in this play are vivid and varied; they are all survivors finding their way in a world dominated by men. Philomele’s quest to know the world, to gain experiences, to embrace her inner longings, and to bravely ask questions is both inspirational and dangerous. We watch Procne evolve from a frightened young woman to a brave and decisive queen. Niobe, a lowly servant, offers years of wisdom and advice that is both shrewd and disturbing. Classical tales so often revolve around men; it is riveting to gain the perspective of a female playwright and all the women she has brought to life.
 
The Love of the Nightingale celebrates the power of the performing arts to transform lives and to communicate through image, movement and music as well as words. The King of Athens tells us, “I find plays help me think. You catch a phrase, recognize a character.” Wertenbaker gives us a ceremonial court drama as well as a freewheeling puppet show. The collective energy of a large ensemble is harnessed with the chorus. Magical transformations allow for redemption and forgiveness in a way that is uniquely theatrical. This play allows us to tap into the imagination of the ancients, yet it also calls on us to see the reflection of the action in our own world today.
 
I hope you will enjoy the story before you and that you will return to Constellation next year as a subscriber. Our 2014-2015 Season offers an exciting selection of plays from Italy, Ireland, and India. Come with us as we embark on our vibrant exhilarating journey!

Photo Gallery

Photos by Stan Barouh

Cast

• People of Athens
  • Philomele: Megan Dominy
  • Procne: Dorea Schmidt
  • King Pandion: Edward Christian
  • Queen: Vanessa Brandchulis
  • Niobe: Rena Cherry Brown
  • Athenian Soldier: Bru Ajueyitsi
• The Enemy
  • Barbarian Soldier: Daniel Corey
• People of Thrace
  • King Tereus: Matthew Schleigh
  • Itys: Henry Niepoetter
  • Captain: Ashley Ivey
  • Sailors/Soldiers: Bru Ajueyitsi, Edward Christian, Daniel Corey
  • Hero: Jennifer J. Hopkins
  • Iris: Emma Jackson
  • June: Vanessa Bradchulis
  • Helen: Neelam Patel
  • Servant: Edward Christian
• Actors in the Hippolytus Play
  • Aphrodite: Jennifer J. Hopkins
  • King Theseus: Daniel Corey
  • Phaedra: Neelam Patel
  • Hippolytus: Bru Ajueyitsi
  • Nurse: Emma Jackson
  • Chorus: Daniel Corey, Jennifer J. Hopkins, Ashley Ivey, Emma Jackson

Production Staff

• Director: Allison Arkell Stockman
• Scenic Designer: A.J. Guban
• Musician and Composer: Tom Teasley
• Costume Designer: Kendra Rai
• Assistant Costume Designer: Courtney Wood
• Lighting Designer: Joseph R. Walls
• Fight Director: Matthew R. Wilson
• Dance & Movement Choreographer: Kelly King
• Associate Sound Designer: Adam W. Johnson
• Props Designer: Angela Plante
• Puppet Designer: Don Becker
• Puppet Choreographer: Eric Brooks
• Stage Manager: Cheryl Ann Gnerlich
• Assistant Stage Managers: Brett Steven Abelman, Daniel Mori
• Production Assistant: James Brown
• Assistant Director: Gwen Grastorf
• Second Costume Assistant: Sara Jane Palmer
• Stitcher: Sandy Smoker
• Mask Builder and Intern: Sara Tomaszewski
• Costume Crafts: Chris Hall
• Dramaturg: Maddie Gaw
• Technical Director: Jason Krznarich
• Assistant Technical Director: William Klemt
• Charge Artist: Pallas Bane
• Carpenters: Walter Berry, Leanne Bock
• Master Electrician: Alex Keen
• Electricians: Paul Callaghan, Jeny Hall, Molly Scrivens, Gordon Nimno Smith, J. Cody Whitfield
• Sound Engineer: Jim Robeson
• Sound Board Operator: Alec Henneberger
• Associate Lighting Designer: Lesley Boeckman
• Audience Services Manager: Lindsey Ruehl
• House Managers: Erin Gifford, Ginny Page

Disclaimer: Constellation Theatre Company provided two complimentary media tickets to ShowBizRadio for this review.

With Living Out playwright Lisa Loomer found a way to use sharp-edged comedy to give cover to a politically tinged, ultimately tragic tale about child-rearing. As produced by GALA Hispanic Theater, Living Out is chock-full of Sophie’s choices for families deeply affected by their unequal economic and legal relationships.

In the play, written in 2003, Loomer directly asks these types of questions: what is the cost of sacrificing your own child’s well-being to take care of another family’s child? When a mother is overwhelmed who will pay the price? She presents her perspective in the collision of very asymmetrical power relationships between an undocumented Salvadoran mother hired to be the nanny by an up-and-coming Anglo entertainment lawyer and new mother. The two working mothers, both married with working husbands, make any number of uneasy choices to provide better lives for their children.

Playwright Loomer (b. 1956) has received awards for her many works, including the Kennedy Center Fund for New American Plays, and the American Critics Association Award. She has been nominated twice for a Pulitzer Prize and has also received the Imagen Award for positive portrayals of Latinos in media. She was the screen writer for the 1999 movie “Girl, Interrupted.”

Living Out is directed by Abel López, GALA’s Associate Producing Director. “I was drawn to Living Out,” stated López, “because it addresses an issue that affects working women of all races, class, and economic status in our community – entrusting the primary care of their children to someone else.” As a note, the show is in English with Spanish surtitles projected.

For your reviewer, what is striking about Living Out is that it is not full of Washington-based talking points and clichés. It is a street-level view. There are few saints as the characters try to make life the best they can under the circumstances they are in. Loomer does not bludgeon with sharply defined Fox vs. MSNBC points of view, but gives the audience plenty of room to take in the presentation and think for themselves.

The play explores a myriad of issues about the differences of race, class and undocumented status in America. Through the play we witness struggles of mothers and families trying to make it in a pressurized world. With a great big delightful heart, the play also explores the misconceptions between Anglos and Latinos from each of their perspectives. This includes some outrageously diabolical, funny dialogue that leaves no group untouched. Everyone is properly roasted.

Megan Behm plays the Anglo, Nancy. Ana is played by Belen Oyola-Rebaza. The difference in power is made quite visual in the casting of these two actors. Behen towers over Oyola-Rehbaza. As the play progresses, there comes a time when Nancy must deal with an unexpected work situation. She pressures Ana into a decision that she will come to regret.

In her character, Behm projects a progressive sensibility and generosity in her interactions with Ana. Yet, when Ana lets her employer know that she had trained to be a dentist in her native El Salvador, there is a moment of silence as Nancy tries to process the information.

Oyola-Rebaza projects living under constant siege by outside forces; a life beholden to others. When Nancy seems to try to befriend and not just employ Ana, Oyola-Rebaza gives off a nuanced, leery reaction to the offer of friendship.

The two husbands in Living Out while not central, do matter. Each is given a back-story to flesh out the characters. Nancy’s husband is Kyle McGruther, a man who hates a Volvo and unsure of what is wife is going through but supports her. Ana’s husband is Peter Pereyra, a man who wants better for his family, but life has dealt him a bad hand as he struggles to find steady employment at a decent wage.

There is a top-flight ensemble of Anglo mothers and Latina child-care givers. They give effervescent life. They are like back-up singers who provide the rhythm and visual interest standing a few feet behind the lead. Each has a clearly drawn personality. There is Lisa Hodsoll as Wallace, the selfish woman of means who treats non-Anglo’s with disdain. There is Amal Sasde as Linda, the unsure of herself Anglo Mom with a hint of decency. Stefanie Garcia is Sandra, the Latina with a plan to become a citizen and kiss-off her past. Then there is Lorena Sabogal as Zoila. She brought the house down with her delivery and spot-on comic, cynical outlook. Louis CK should pay a visit to see her. She is one tough cookie. She is like a Shakespeare-drawn comic clown.

The set give off detailed visual clues to the various power relationships. There are two small open “houses” in plain sight. They look similar until one peers closer. One has a modern, dropped multi-bulb lighting fixture and a contemporary painting of an almost un-seen Star of David. The other house has a single, un-shaded incandescent bulb on the ceiling with a large cross on the wall. Between the two houses is a sitting area which becomes everything from a living room to benches at a park.

Living Out has plenty of laughter to cover the deep issues it explores with compassion. In this production, even with the best of hearts, the woman and family with the most economic and other power “wins;” leaving the other Salvadoran family left to deal with and mourn their losses.

And, the title? Living Out comes a question asked of Ana and the other nannies. Do you want to live-in and be in the home 24/7 or live at your home and travel each day to care for another’s child.

Living Out is what the GALA marketing material called it. “A comedy with serious relevance to our contemporary society.” It is well worth a visit.

Note: Off-street parking is available at the nearby Giant parking garage on Park Road, NW.

Photo Gallery

Kyle McGruther and Belen Oyola-Rebaza	Belen Oyola-Rebaza and Lorena Sabogal
Belen Oyola-Rebaza and Peter Pereyra	Belen Oyola-Rebaza, Stefanie Garcia, and Lorena Sabogal

Photos by Lonnie Tague

Cast

• Ana: Belén Oyola-Rebaza
• Nancy: Megan Behm
• Bobby: Peter Pereyra
• Sandra: Stefanie García
• Wallace: Lisa Hodsoll
• Richard: Kyle McGruther
• Linda: Amal Saad
• Zoila: Lorena Sabogal

Artistic and Design Team

• Director: Abel Lopez
• Set design : Girogos Tsappas
• Lighting design : Cory Frank Ryan
• Sound Design : Brendon Vierra
• Properties: Pam Weiner.
• Stage Manager: Lena Salins
• Production Manager : Anna Bate
• Producer: Hugo Medrano
• Spanish Translation : Gustavo Ott
• Assistant Technical Director: Linda Di Bernardo
• Master Electrician: Jenny Hall
• Light Board Operator: Lena Salins
• Sound Board Operator: Artemis Lopez
• Surtitles Programmer and Surtitles Operator: Laura Ettabbakh
• Surtitles Operator: Esther Gentile

Disclaimer: GALA Hispanic Theatre provided a complimentary media ticket to ShowBizRadio for this review.