When your phone rings and you answer, sixteen year old Danny is on the other line.  He is absolutely terrified.  “Can you hear me?” is the first line of an immensely unusual and incredibly captivating piece of social distancing theater.  Claws is a forty minute one-on-one telephone encounter.  The experience is creepy, mysterious, unnerving, unsettling, utterly captivating and a little sad.  All of that makes this journey a fascinating one.

When you book your ticket, a time slot is purchased.  A phone call will come and the tale will commence.  No spoiler alerts here.  I would hate to destroy the surprises that unravel as this little horror story unfolds.

Abject terror is what you hear in Danny’s voice.  There is loud banging in the background.  He is reaching out like he’s calling 9-1-1.  There’s a monster in the closet.  And he “LOOKS LIKE ME.”  My mind raced as I both tried to communicate with Danny and also predict how the story would develop.  As I threw out questions or answered his, details effortlessly emerged.  My role seemed to be very, very serious which is how my personal discomfort settled in.  “You believe me, don’t you?” was a tough one to answer.  I decided to go down the path of “yes.”

Created by Evan Neiden and Directed by John Ertman, Claws is for fans who miss experiential theater.  These two have managed to bring that to this social distancing world in a enormously creative package.  As the story evolves, the tension is ratcheted upward.  New information enriches the scenario.  “Where is this going?”  My mind was caught in a complex blend of participation and analysis.  The intimacy of the one-on-one set up was definitely intense.

Vincent D’Avanzo portrays Danny.  The performance is a spectacularly realized amalgam of terrifying, heartbreaking, sad and worrying.  The youthful naivete of a sixteen year old was spot on.  Not yet a man and still somewhat a boy.  That monster was indeed frightening.  Mr. D’Avanzo never missed a moment in presenting this tale no matter what my input added to the mix of ingredients.  In a very weird way, this little play was disturbingly fun.

I had taken a little break from streaming theater during the last month.  Candle House Collective is new to me.  When talented creative people problem solve to maximum effect, Claws is a shining example of success.  When they take the world around us in 2020 and incorporate all of our fears into that storytelling, the result is astonishingly impactful.  Wherever this company goes next, I’ll be there to answer the call.

www.candlehousecollective.com

Three very different works in this entry to my Seclusion Smörgåsbord series viewing of streaming theater.  A solo memoir about a disastrous musical flop.  A disturbingly effective solo piece about the monstrous depiction of black men in American film and culture.  And a short dystopian play featuring the last two surviving humans.

Desperately Seeking the Exit

In 2007, a $6 million musical based on the Madonna film Desperately Seeking Susan featuring the hit songs of Blondie flopped in London’s West End.  Peter Michael Marino shares his story of creation and demise in Desperately Seeking the Exit.  This monologue was performed live on Zoom with the audience able to be seen and heard.  For a comedy, the laughter was additive to this amusing tell-all.

Mr. Marino and a friend were smoking pot and came up with what they believed was a fantastic idea.  Broadway needed a cool show.  A Mamma Mia! but edgier.  This musical could open with the song “Dreaming” to introduce the bored suburban housewife.  “Call Me” would introduce the rocker girl character of Susan.  Despite no previous writing experience, the Old Vic in London signed on.  Joe Mantello agreed to direct.  (He left later when he needed more money.)  The Sardi’s luncheon meeting with Debbie Harry went well.

No one ever asked the creator if he ever wrote anything before.  A new director and the choreographer (Andy Blankenbuehler who would later win three Tonys) stopped communicating during rehearsals.  The director Angus Jackson kept “making huge moments tiny” while Andy made “tiny moments huge.”  The mess culminated in the review headline, “Desperately Seeking the Exit.”

Mr. Marino is a funny, self-deprecating host.  Theater folk are likely to relate to a dysfunctional creative process.  Investors should probably be irate at the unprofessional shenanigans.  The silver lining?  A Japanese production four years later somehow got it right.  The opening night performance received five curtain calls.  A little clip of each production followed this light and enjoyable monologue.

Despreately Seeking the Exit was presented as part of the two week Cincinnati Fringe Festival which ended on June 13th.

www.cincyfringe.com

Disposable Men (HERE Arts Center)

James Scruggs created and starred in this multimedia piece aimed at confronting the historical depiction of black men in American culture and media.  HERE Arts Center streamed this performance from February 2005.  The show is a mixture of monologue stories and projected imagery.  While many of the moments were familiar, the ones that opened my eyes were devastating.

I have seen the movie King Kong many times in my youth.  Film clips were interspersed with period pieces which clearly demonstrated the storytelling was about powerfully built black men from Africa as a menace to society and a danger to white women.  The slave auction imagery versus King Kong in chains.  A white woman screaming at the sight of this very black “monster.”  The minstrel-like monkey face in closeups, notably the eyes and lips, compared to other visual images of the day.  Seeing this classic film in this way was revelatory and shocking.

The balance of the show was broad and diverse.  An imagined job in a New York City restaurant called Supremacy 1860 Mississippi.  One of the best jobs is “lynch nigger” who helps reenact those abominations to “make it as realistic as possible to get big tips.”  Another segment considered the American government’s Tuskegee Experiment when the government deceived poor African American sharecroppers to analyze the effects of untreated syphilis for thirty years.

“How to transition to manhood?”  That question was asked and not easily answered.  If you are not college, military or religious material, what is your route into adulthood?  A $5 bottle of crack cocaine was cheap, affordable and addictive.  “One by one, all of us got recruited by big brother.”  And then “one $5 vial got me fifteen years.”

People who cannot understand the Black Lives Matter movement just don’t want to face this starkly grim reality.  James Scrugg’s absorbing and ultimately sobering work is a fine place to journey into those perspectives in a richly complex and dramatic form.

Disposable Men was presented as part of HERE Arts Center’s Wednesday live streaming series.  The video remains accessible on their Facebook page.

facebook.com/hereartscenter

Godforsaken (The Tank)

Two men are having a conversation at the start of Godforsaken, a short play rewritten for streaming.  Are they alone?  In limbo?  One says, “I keep hallucinating you.”  Was the end of the human race caused by nuclear holocaust, ozone depletion or cybergenocide?  Even if the two men were able to find women, “would it be wise to bring children to this godforsaken place?”

An encounter with a mutant being begins to clear up the mystery.  Or at least explain their intention for these two men.  Frank J. Avella’s writing is playful, enigmatic and darkly humorous.  This play nicely contrasts real versus imaginary as well as optimism against nihilism.  All three performers (Carlotta Brentan, Rob Brinkmann and Marc Lombardo) were very good in presenting this quirky and interesting tale.

The Tank, an Off-Off Broadway arts incubator streams many experimental and varied works each week.

www.thetanknyc.org

Trips back in time are featured in this entry to my Seclusion Smörgåsbord series.  A historically important play from 1912, a one act comedy from 1921 and the first in a four part adaptation of Wagner’s Ring Cycle from the 1870’s.

Professor Bernhardi (Schaubüehne, Berlin, Germany)

Viennese dramatist Arthur Schnitzler’s play Professor Bernhardi was first performed in Berlin in 1912.  It was banned in his home country until after the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire as a result of World War I.  Billed as a “comedy in five acts,” the play addresses antisemitism and Austrian-Jewish identity.

Thomas Ostermeier directed this adaptation with a clinical setting of all white walls and a couple of doors.  Doctor Bernhardi gets into an argument with a priest who arrives to administer last rites to a dying girl.  She has had a botched abortion and is nearing death.  Bernhardi argues that the young woman is feeling optimistic about her chances and does not want to upset her.  As the two argue, the girl dies.

From this beginning, the play revolves around office politics and polarizing rhetoric.  A new position at the medical center becomes a battleground between a highly qualified Jewish candidate and a less competent Christian one.  Bernhardi takes a stand which becomes a feast for public opinion and governmental investigation.

The messages in this play reflect many ideologies we hear today.  “Christian beliefs should be aligned with science” is one of them.  Regarding a fierce determination to cling to the truth, one character muses “I bet you wouldn’t be so stubborn about your convictions if we still sent people to the pyre for their convictions.”

This play and this production is a riveting three hour meditation on the outwardly spoken anti-Semitic environment which would shape European politics of the twentieth century and culminate in the Holocaust.  Jörg Hartmann’s performance in the title role grounds the play in naturalistic realism.  As a result, the progression of events swirling around him seem even more frightening and claustrophobic.  Offensive personalities are exquisitely drawn to showcase the hypocrisy of mankind.

I watched this depiction of vacuous self-righteous moralists with an eye on America (and the world) today.  A century later we are overflowing with similarly crafted politically corrupt opportunists that live in support of themselves above all else.

Schaubüehne is regularly streaming past productions, some of which contain English subtitles.  The next two are The Raft (Flotten) on June 17th and Angélica (una tragedia) on June 18th.

www.schaubuehne.de

Ever Young (Metropolitan Playhouse)

On Saturday evenings, Metropolitan Playhouse live streams readings of short one act plays from the theatrical past.  Playwright Alice Gerstenberg has been featured a few times already.  Ever Young is a 1921 comedy about four women who meet at the Royal Poinciana Hotel in Palm Beach.  Has it really been fifty years since these women were debutantes?

Widows and divorcees meet to share stories and criticize as only the self-satisfied elite class can do.  The play is both sharp-tongued and rueful.  They sneer at the debutantes today who have a “supercilious air” with their “smoking in public.”  Later in life, some are reflective about choices they might have made differently.  Others stand by their rigid adherence to the roles as they were supposed to be performed.  This play was a nice time capsule about women and their reflections on evolving (and stagnant) attitudes towards life.

The Metropolitan Playhouse weekly readings and other events can be found on their homepage.

www.metropolitanplayhouse.org

Der Ring Gott Farblonjet: Act I (Theatre at St. John’s)

Camp master Everett Quinton, the widower of queer-theater icon Charles Ludlam and the custodian of his Ridiculous Theater Company directs and stars in a live-streamed reading of Der Ring Gott Farblonjet.  This epic 1977 send-up of Wagner’s Ring Cycle is divided into four acts.  Act I is the first part called Das Rheingold.

Woglinde, Welgunde and Flosshilde are the fish creatures/sisters who guard the gold so that no one will steal the river.  A golden light spreads through the water.  That’s the “rheingold” of the title.  The sisters “svim in its glow.” The send up is firmly tongue in cheek.  Of course the gold is stolen.  If the precious metal could be fashioned into a ring, one could rule the world.  A woman notes that if she were in possession of such a ring, she “might be able to keep her husband home at night.”

While this company is well-known for campy fun, this reading was not excessively so.  The semi-serious presentation which clearly has a wink-wink sensibility was a fun diversion.  There are three more parts which will be presented on successive Sunday evenings in June in celebration of Pride month.  Since I am not an opera buff, this is my chance to enjoy Wagner’s opus in perhaps its most ridiculous incarnation.

Act II of Der Ring Gott Farblonjet will be streamed on Sunday, June 14th on the Facebook page of St. John’s Lutheran Church in New York City.

Facebook/stjohnslutheranchurchnyc

I have reached the fifteenth entry in my Seclusion Smörgåsbord series just as New York City is reopening from the coronavirus lockdown.  Phase 1 begins today.  Live theater is much further away.  My last behind the scenes intel is that Broadway is targeting early December.  In the meantime, fans will have to make due with virtual offerings.

This entry includes two filmed performances of well-reviewed Off and Off-Off Broadway plays.  The third is a live Zoom meeting in which the actors interact with an audience who can see each other through the show.

Biter (Every Time I Turn Around)  [Title:Point]

Filmed in 2016 at the Brick Theater, Title:Point’s production of the engrossing and unique Biter (Every Time I Turn Around) is filled to the brim with “wow” moments.  This is experimental theater for sure.  The writing, the clever lunacy and the remarkable visuals elevate this work to form-busting fabulousness.  As one character observes, “My wish was to start out as an adult and then become a baby like Jon Voight.”

Framed in a Rauschenberg dream set of crowded dots and cartoonish panels, Harold and Ann Marie begin their take on the Bickerson’s.  Co-writer Ryan William Downer and Catrin Lloyd-Bollard are fantastic in their bizarre caricatures and deadpan line readings.  A postman with one eye unexpectedly arrives with a package.  Eventually Joey Lepage will deliver a sinister and riveting monologue about his pharmacist father and the apothecary.  This paranoid hallucination turns violent before moving onto the next segment, a deranged birthday party.

Harold and Ann Marie continue their well-polished Abbott and Costello routine with updated charmers like “Your upbringing was a form of long-term abortion” and “Your birth certificate must be written in limerick.”  The birthday boy (Justin Anselmi) is in a bear suit and one of the guests is a fish (co-writer Spencer Thomas Campbell).  The goofiness is all there but it’s the word play and artfully framed staging that makes this one so good.  “She is a metaphor” is followed by “A meta for what?”  If you like delectably edgy and smart experimental theater, this one is an absolute gem and the filming is excellent.

Biter (Every Time I Turn Around) is available to stream on the You Tube channel of the Brick Theater.

www.titlepoint.org

The Romance of Magno Rubio (Ma-Yi Theater Company)

Based on a short story by Carlos Bulosan, Lonnie Carter’s play The Romance of Magno Rubio contrasts the harsh life of immigrant migrant workers against the hopefulness of eternal love.  Fresh off the boat, a group of Filipino men have been tricked into low paying farm work.  Magno has fallen in love with a girl he found in a lonely hearts magazine.  He is illiterate but others help him pen letters to his love Clarabell from Arkansas.

Magno is mercilessly teased by his co-workers who feel this Amazonian white women will eat the diminutive (4’6″) Magno alive.  Nick, an educated man who suffers doing menial work far below his capabilities, befriends Magno.  He will help him write a marriage proposal.

This play won eight Obie Awards in 2003.  This particular performance was taped in Manila that same year.  Jojo Gonzales and Arthur Acuña, the Off-Broadway originators of Magno and Nick, were very convincing in their portrayals, balancing hope and despair.  The direction by Loy Arcenas made this Depression era tale explode with vivid life in a naturalistic, easygoing style with memorable theatrical flourishes.  The use of sticks choreographed to mimic work on the farm ingeniously demonstrated the backbreaking physical and emotional turmoil experienced in the lives of these men.

Ma-Yi Theater Company’s next live stream is Livin’ La Vida Imelda from June 17 – 30, 2020 which will be available on its homepage.  The week before this pandemic happened in New York City, I saw a revival Off-Broadway of Suicide Forest.  This production was another excellent example of how this troupe fulfills its mission of presenting innovative plays by Asian American writers.

www.ma-yitheatre.org

theaterreviewsfrommyseat/suicideforest

The Time Machine (Creation Theatre, Oxford, England)

“Strap yourselves in.  Leave your notions of sanity and predictability at the door.”  Those are advertising taglines to entice science fiction fans to The Time Machine.  Inspired by H.G. Wells’ classic novel, writer Jonathan Holloway has reinvented the basic premise for the digital stage.  It’s the year 2300 and so many humans have died.  The time machine will provide the gateway back to unravel the now forgotten historical mystery of what exactly happened.

The most inventive element of this Zoom play is that the audience is part of the experience.  We all watch each other in addition to the actors.  Some are addressed directly.  The size of the group is limited which makes this work very well.  The plot is uber nerdy and concentrates on the evils of science and commerce running hand in hand.  Interesting asides pop in now and then.  The human race’s destruction of the planet “for the sake of fashion and gastronomical delights” was a personal favorite.

The location backgrounds and technical execution of the wormhole travel were nicely done.  Plot was not as focused as the atmosphere.  Travels back in time were diversions rather than interesting trips.  The performers were uniformly excellent and fully committed to their characters.  Unfortunately, there was no way to cover up the voluminous gobbledygook and overwrought mumbo jumbo.  The concept was great, the execution was very good but ultimately the experience was not the parallel reality needed to create science fiction bliss.

Seats for each performance are limited and can be booked in advance through Creation Theatre’s homepage.  The show is running through June 21, 2020.

www.creationtheatre.co.uk

Facebook content moderators, Serena Williams and circus performers in this chapter of my Seclusion Smörgåsbord series.

Socially Unacceptable

There have been many streams of plays through Zoom during this pandemic.  Socially Unacceptable is one that takes this environment as the basis for its plot.  In Matt Steinberg’s tightly constructed and well-conceived piece, four Facebook content moderators are hired to work remotely during the COVID-19 crisis.  The ZOOM meeting is their training pod when they begin their employment.

Every day these young people work together to individually watch potentially objectionable posts and determine if they should be removed.  They are scored for accuracy and the pressure to keep precious employment is omnipresent.  Darriah is their pod manager who is looking out for herself while maintaining a manufactured air of concern.  As the days and months progress, these individuals become close friends.  Significant psychological issues emerge from this type of work and viewing disturbing images.  Elle, the coder, reminds them that “it’s just pixels” as if that cures anything.

Nicely directed by Ran Xia, this production pays attention to the details.  The character’s eye movements clearly show them doing their jobs while chatting with each other.  All of the performances are solid and realistic.  Mr. Steinberg has some funny lines and pointed criticisms of social media and big company dynamics.  As Darriah remarks, Facebook is just a platform.  “It’s neutral.  If you got food poisoning you wouldn’t blame the plate.”  A perfect way to comment on social media’s frequent abdication of moral responsibility.

Socially Unacceptable was performed as a fundraising benefit for Harlem Grown.

www.harlemgrown.org

G.O.A.T.  (Playing on Air)

For their last episode of the spring 2020 season, Playing on Air presented G.O.A.T. by Ngozi Anyanwu (The Homecoming Queen).  The author was joined by Denise Manning Jay and April Matthis to portray three black women on a rooftop.  They are obviously close friends, if not more than that.  The purpose of the gathering is to use “black girl magic” in support of another Grand Slam tennis championship for their hero, Serena Williams.

Directed by Whitney White (who had an off-Broadway success this year with Our Dear Drug Lord at WP Theater), this ten minute play has funny banter between these superstitious ladies.  The major accomplishments of Ms. Williams and the high levels of inspiration she provides are the thematic backbone of this play.  But you can never be too careful.  That is why “we pray to you, the ghost of Arthur Ashe” so that he will “look over your thick boned progeny.”

Playing on Air showcases short plays with many familiar actors and playwrights.  They are a recommended diversion and usually can be enjoyed in less than twenty minutes.

www.playingonair.org

theaterreviewsfromyseat/thehomecomingqueen

Bindlestiff Open Stage Variety Show: Quarantine Edition #9

The first quarantainment presented by Bindlestiff Family Cirkus was discussed in Seclusion Smörgåsbord II.  I decided to check back in on this weekly series.  The ninth episode promised to be “a respite for those in need.”  The technical capabilities are greatly enhanced since the first outing including multi-camera angles and upgraded backdrops.  The homemade video feel, however, imparts the true charm for this downtown amalgamation of circus talents.

Keith Nelson is the host and kicks things off with his diablo routine while commenting that “twenty years of no social life is finally paying off.”  Steve Langley followed with bubble tricks.  One involved fire.  “That’s something you don’t see everyday… a flaming heterosexual.”  The bubble volcano at the end of his segment was extraordinary.  Pinkie Special, a hula hoop artist and showgirl, was next.  She delightfully came across as the Christina Applegate character from Married With Children a decade or so later.

Professor DR Schreiber appeared as an 18th century entertainment with card tricks.  In Larry Vee’s disheveled living room, there was much juggling and a unicycle.  His cat peering down from the top of the stairs did not seem too impressed.  A great segment was “Ask Hovey” Burgess.  Viewers send in a question about the circus and he describes the history.  The topic was the human cannibal, complete with photographs.

Marcus Monroe juggled up to five bowling pins in his backyard at night.  In between he tells the driest of jokes.  The pièce de résistance was saved for last.  A video of Peru’s The Coronel Sisters and their rolling globe act was an incredible display of balance atop large exercise balls.  As Mr. Nelson noted during the show, these performers are Phase 4 in terms of getting back to work, anywhere from two to eighteen months from now.  These shows allow them to perform and also try to raise money to support themselves in the meantime.

The weekly variety show airs on Monday evenings at 7:30 pm on the Facebook and You Tube pages for Bindlestiff Family Cirkus.  They also offer hands-on learning programs and new videos through its BindlestiffFamilyCirkusKids page.

theaterreviewsfrommyseat/seclusionsmorgasbordII

At this point it is fair to say that Seclusion Smörgåsbord has become a semi-permanent series on Theater Reviews From My Seat.  I’ve begun receiving more requests to watch certain live streams especially from smaller theater companies.  This post includes one from Thornhill Theatre Space.

Our Lady of 121st Street (LAByrinth Theater)

In 2002, the LAByrinth Theater Company produced Our Lady of 121st Street by Stephen Adly Guirgis.  He went on to win a Pulitzer Prize in 2015 for his excellent play Between Riverside and Crazy.  Director Elizabeth Rodriguez mounted a virtual production with eight members of the original company.  Heavyweight actors Bobby Cannavale and Laurence Fishburne were also on hand to shine a bright light on this hilariously dark comedy.

Vic (Bobby Cannavale) is upset.  Someone stole the body of Sister Rose from the Ortiz Funeral Home.  They also stole his pants.  He is grieving this revered nun who taught and advised many children in their neighborhood.  A bunch of locals and out-of-towners will be attending this funeral.  The assortment of characters is large but the smallish scenes made the video viewing exciting.  When a favorite character came back in another scene, it was cause for celebration.

Balthazar (Felix Solis) is the detective who boozes it up.  Inez (Portia) is the ex-wife of the now famous disc jockey Walter “Rooftop” Desmond (Laurence Fishburne).  His scene in a confessional with Father Lux (John Doman) is more conversation than confession.  Why is he there?  Feeling guilty about his many affairs while married.

One of these trysts was with Norca, a friend of Inez, his wife.  Norca is tough and aggressive.  Detective Balthazar interviews her about her whereabouts when the crime was committed.  She tells him “I was at home fucking your mother up the ass with a strap on.”  Cursing is used in abundance and the jokes are very funny.  When Inez and Norca are sitting in bar near the funeral home, they get to the point.  Inez says to her, “You fucked my husband.”  Norca retorts, “How many times I got to apologize for that?”  Inez zings, “How about once?”

Flip (Russell G. Jones), a closeted lawyer, and his lover Gail (Scott Hudson), a community theater actor, travel from Wisconsin to pay their respects.  Not wanting to appear gay with the uber effeminate Gail, Flip lands the gut punch.  You are no Al Pacino, he says.  “Everything you’re in you’re the worst fucking one.”

The play is not really one with forward propulsion but is rather an observational study on the importance of lives, relationships and belief systems.  There are even more memorable characters in this hugely entertaining play filled with outrageous scenes of people behaving badly.  Or trying to be good.  Imperfections and the comedy of life are celebrated.  The pain underneath is what makes it all so real.

The LAByrinth Theater Company announced that over 17,000 people watched this performance.  They accepted donations on their website.

www.labtheater.org

Of Darkness (and Light) (Thornhill Theatre Space)

Thornhill Theatre Space is a digital social media theater space. With the pandemic hitting they created a live stream series titled “Couch Readings” of new plays.  I was invited to take a look at their offerings and selected Of Darkness (and Light) by Tyler Mathews.  The subject matter caught my attention as the United States was gripped in violent nationwide protests amidst a global pandemic.

Lina (Secorra Carillo) and her daughter Sebold (Raelynn Willbanks) are on the move.  They are scavengers in the midst of an apocalypse.  They find an empty warehouse to shelter in from a storm for the night.  A hooded stranger appears coated in white powder.  Regis (Ben Savory) simply says, “Help me.”

Lina is coughing and promises that she is not sick.  A disease is spreading which is killing people.  This short play is not all darkness.  The characters are young, confused and scared.  There are a few cutesy moments which at first seemed forced against the deep anguish of the situation.  Those sections, however, provide a view into their remaining, if fleeting, hopefulness.  Without that lightness, there would just be despair.

Of Darkness (and Light) was recently selected by the Pittsburgh Virtual Fringe Festival.  This production and others in its series of Couch Readings can be viewed on Thornhill Theatre Space’s Facebook page.  A link to the fringe festival:

pittsburghfringe.org/ofdarknessandlight

the [title of show] show (Vineyard Theatre)

The Vineyard Theatre set a fundraising goal.  If they raised $100,000, the original cast and creative team of [title of show] would reunite for a special virtual benefit performance.  I never saw this well-loved musical which rose from the now defunct New York Musical Festival to a short run on Broadway.  Apparently my focus was blurry due to pandemic brainwave shortfalls.  The reunion was a created variety show not having anything to do with the original.

The team wrote skits, sang songs, featured invited guests and performed a heartfelt tribute to Grandma.  “A Virtual Date with Brooke Shields” was accurately titled.  She mixed drinks and talked through a mask as if on a date with you.  Billy Crudup did another, more cranky but equally entertaining date later in the show.  Heidi Blickenstaff repurposed a famous Bee Gee’s tune to “How Deep Are Your Roots?”

The Orange County School of the Arts was going to present Now. Here. This. before the coronavirus struck.  Most of the creative team of [title of show] wrote this musical.  The school production was going to be the first adaptation of a more inclusive version.  The kids and their parents in isolation got together and made it happen.  This variety show streamed the song “More Life” which provided a joyous example of how to go through a roadblock.

Silliness such as “Show Us Your Pets” and the fabulous “Diva Interrupted!” segment kept the laughs – and stars – coming.  The singular highlight of the show happened late.  Micaela Diamond (The Cher Show) and Nathan Salstone (Harry Potter and the Cursed Child) sang a gorgeous rendition of John Denver’s “Sunshine On My Shoulders.”  In the middle of a seemingly never ending stay-at-home (especially for us city dwellers), it was cathartic to hear:  “sunshine, almost always, makes me high.”

The Vineyard Theater will host a live discussion with the creators of this event on Tuesday, June 2nd on its weekly series The VT Show at 5:00 pm est.

www.vineyardtheatre.org

Live theater is nowhere in sight but the opportunity to stream continues to grow exponentially.  Importantly, actors and playwrights are pooling their talents to raise money not only to save their non-profit companies but also for the many charities which provide needed resources to those in need.  The three events in this Seclusion Smörgåsbord feature some big name actors as well as an inventive shadow puppetry performance.

Love Letters (Spotlight on Plays)

Sally Field and Bryan Cranston got together to perform A.R. Gurney’s Love Letters which ran on Broadway in 1988.  Back then I saw Stockard Channing and John Rubenstein portray Melissa Gardner and Andrew Makepeace Ladd III, two people born into wealth and position.  The play is staged as a reading of the letters, notes and cards shared between them over a fifty year relationship.

Beginning in childhood, the two exchange Valentines.  They are clearly soul mates from an early age, drawn to each other and their differences.  Despite similar privilege, he totes the line and she pushes against rules and convention.  As they age and mature, the two delve deeply into their feelings and sense of happiness.  At one point Melissa says, “You may not have as much money as we have but you have a better family.”  Everything which came before that line nicely supported her statement.

The writing also cleverly reflects lingo of the various periods represented in the timeline.  As teenagers, they become more aware of the opposite sex and jealousy emerges.  Andrew hears a rumor about Melissa.  “You let Bucky Zeller put a tennis ball in your cleavage,” he accuses.  The follow up question is hilariously on point:  “Are you a nympho or what?”  Both performers inhabited their characters well.  Ms. Field, in the juicier role, was equally funny, defiant and heartbreaking.

As these two age, life gets more complicated and much more serious.  They travel different paths but the letter writing, while sometimes interrupted, continues on.  They question this paper relationship.  “All this letter writing.  It’s a bad habit.  It makes us seem like people we’re not.”  Parallels to today’s texting, tweeting and social media excesses keep this play’s focus relevant.

Love Letters was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize.  I’m not sure the play is of that caliber but for sheer entertainment and many rewarding lines, it remains a good one.  For me, this observation stood out.  “I don’t think you can be smart and be Catholic at the same time.”  I was raised to be both and had to shed one of those labels to thrive.

Love Letters was the third play presented as a benefit for the Actor’s Fund by Spotlight on Plays.

www.actorsfund.org

Feathers of Fire (Fictionville Studio/Kingorama)

At the end of the first millennium C.E., Persian poet Ferdowsi wrote the epic poem Shahnameh.  This “Book of Kings” tells mainly the mythical but also some historical history of the Persian Empire from the creation of the world until the Arab conquest of Iran in the 7th century.  A selection from this revered cultural literature is told through the use of shadow puppetry in Feathers of Fire.

A knight’s wife dies in childbirth.  The son was born with white hair.  The father abandons the baby outside the palace.  A bird swoops it up and raises the boy with her other hatchlings.  The father’s guilt brings the boy and his nakedness back to palace life and societal responsibility.  This is a taped version of a children’s show.  The story is simple but the artistic achievement to create the visual effects are intricate and often beautifully and colorfully rendered.

This one hour show required 8 actors, 160 puppets, 137 animated backgrounds and 1,163 audio/visual cues.  Before the video begins, they provide a behind the scenes glimpse which puts the workload and creativity in perspective.  A unique view into the splendor of the royal courts of Iran and a major piece of literature for its people.

Feathers of Fire is available to rent on Vimeo for $4.95 which provides 48 hour access.

www.vimeo.com/ondemand/feathersoffire

The Homebound Project

The second of three new online theater streams in The Homebound Project featured the theme of “sustenance.”  Eleven playwrights paired up with actors (and sometimes directors) to record these monologues.  The range of material in tone, scope and quality was almost uniformly high.  Ngozi Anyanwu begins in Anne Washburn’s “Comfort Food.”  She gets our attention fast by lighting a candle and blurting out:  “what sustains me now is rage… not the petty rage directed at unmasked joggers…”

“Worms” by Lily Houghton shows a one sided cellphone conversation with a college friend.  When things get too deep or serious, the unseen and unheard friend abruptly changes the subject.  In Will Arbery’s “notes towards godliness” a young man presents the “apotheosis of my philosophy” which entails completely ignoring his parents for six years.  With an intense performance by Nicholas Braun, things get very deep in this one as well.

Bryna Turner’s “the prophet Cassandra sees a different future” has Mary-Louise Parker in thought.  She muses to Helen of Troy, “I just had another prophecy.”  Babak Tafti’s performance in David Zheng’s “You Best Believe” begins with a facial contusion care of his best friend.  This monologue considers the love and competition within a testosterone fueled bromance in the hood.  There was also a virtual wedding moment via “Zoom on Toast.”

The final piece was “I Promise” which was performed by Zachary Quinto which began semi-serious.  In various picturesque outside location shots, he talks about what his friends are missing most during this pandemic and isolation.  Like all of us, however, focus gets murky.  Eventually he is dressed in camouflage and mouths lines from the movie Private Benjamin using Goldie Hawn’s voice.

My favorite short play was “These Hands” by Loy A. Webb.  Kimberley Hébert Gregory manages to snag an invitation to the once in a generation Humanitarian Gala.  She gets in line and has to deal with the question, “What is your gift to humanity.”  After listening to others in front of her, she knocks her response out of the park.

My second runner up was “Is This a Play Yet” by Marco Ramirez.  Utkarsh Ambudkar is holding his tiny sleeping infant like a corsage on his shoulder.  He wants theater.  Any theater no matter how bad.  He says dryly, “I’d like to be watching a bad play now… the kind my friend is in.”  A play where “someone in a leotard represents death” and “where the pop cultural references feel dated.”  At this point in the pandemic, I’m all in too.

The Homebound Project’s mission is to raise funds for No Kid Hungry.  Tickets for the third show in this series go on sale May 26, 2020.  The stream will run from June 3rd until the 7th.  Tickets are $10 but higher donations gladly accepted.

www.homeboundtheater.org

Three more entries into my Seclusion Smörgåsbord series.  A Berlin theater company’s production of a Tony winning playwright.  A children’s show in the style of microscopic live cinema-theatre.  And the first ever online presentation of a series at the Tank called “Puppet Spread.”

Bella Figura (Schaubühne, Berlin)

This theater company from Berlin presented History of Violence last fall at St. Ann’s Warehouse in Brooklyn.  At the end of my review I noted that I would not miss an opportunity to see their work again given the high quality and originality on stage.  How lucky then to find they are streaming their repertoire with occasional productions featuring English subtitles.

Bella Figura is a play by French playwright Yazmina Reza.  She is the only woman to have won two Best Play Tony Awards for Art and God of Carnage.  The director was Thomas Ostermeier who helmed History of Violence.  My expectations were high and they were surpassed.  Andrea (Nina Hoss) and Boris (Mark Waschke) are driving in a car to dinner.  He’s married and this affair has been going on for four years.  They flirt, bicker and pull up to a restaurant for dinner.

An accident occurs in the parking lot.  A friend of Boris’ wife is involved.  She sizes up the situation quickly.  Eric (Renato Schuch) and Françoise (Stephanie Eidt) are taking his mother (Lore Stefanek) out for a birthday dinner.  A series of scenes follow where tensions mount, booze flows, pills are popped, financial distress is shared and character assassinations gush profusely.  These people may be trying to display a bella figura, or fine appearance, but the entertaining cracks are too big to hide.

Mr. Ostermeier’s direction is once again terrific.  The actors are uniformly excellent as relationships attract, repel and swirl around in a fog of delicious angst.  (Mr. Schuch was especially memorable in a very different role in History of Violence.)  The two leads, Ms. Hoss and Mr. Waschke, inhabit these characterizations so thoroughly that every hairpin turn is ridiculous and surprising while maintaining just enough balance with realism and believability.

Schaubühne is streaming many plays each week (refer to the online replacement schedule).  The next one which includes English subtitles is Returning to Reims by this same director.  This production can be accessed through their website on May 27, 2020 between 12:30 pm est through 6:00 for one day only.

www.schaubuhne.de

theaterreviewsfrommyseat/historyofviolence

Not Outside (La Mama Kids)

La Mama Kids online is presenting a weekly children’s program through the end of the summer.  This week’s entry was Not Outside, a twenty minute show in the style of microscopic live cinema-theatre by Nekaa Lab.  A sheep is staring at a television and says, “I’m not going outside today.”  This sheep loves adventure but is very bored.  The connection to our stay at home coronavirus situation is obvious and timely.

This sheep decides to enter the television and go on an adventure of their own imagination.  Household objects become a boat.  Clever images suggest penguins on an iceberg.  The message for children is to try to make live cinema theater yourselves.  “Trippy” is the word I wrote down to describe the mood of this piece.  Not Outside was an interesting combination of psychedelic, creepy, creative and cute.

La Mama Kids shows stream every Thursday afternoon at 4:00 pm est.  Not Outside is still available for viewing.  

lamama/notoutside

Puppet Spread (The Tank)

For their first ever online show “in a box,” three hosts presented an assortment of puppet works.  Their theme for this group was to answer the question, “What is essential to you?”  These “Ladies of Mischief” use a variety show format with banter.  A puppet “singer” performs musical interludes and takes requests from the viewing audience.

The finest piece was “Supernatural” from Atlanta’s Sociedad Especial.  Manipulated toilet paper rolls and use of blacklights created fantastic and colorful puppets.  The tale was loosely based on the Bible story of 2 Kings 4-17.  A mother reached out to God to help her save her children.  This selection was first and set the bar high.  What followed was a very mixed bag.

My second favorite puppetry performance was called “Companion.”  This one had a nice blend of melancholy and hopefulness.  A person in mourning has his life changed when a new puppy arrives in a box to be loved.  Jenny Hann developed a nice mood to showcase her emotional storyline.

I have to point out that this stream lasted a long ninety minutes.  More than half of the time seemed to be variety show banter and musical sidetracks of significantly decreasing effectiveness.  A much tighter format is advised.  Perhaps I am the wrong age group for this material.  As I review theater for young audiences regularly, I don’t think so.

The Tank is streaming many events each week to give developing artists opportunities to create and present their works during this period of shuttered theaters.

www.thetanknyc.org

This entry into my Seclusion Smörgåsbord series features streaming artists considering the themes of home and isolation.  Some employ comedy.  Others are dramatic.  The best pieces brilliantly illuminate the present or slyly get under your skin.  There is a commissioned collection from 22 southern U.S. playwrights.  Another features an international take on our times.  And the third is a homemade sketch show.  All in all, these 29 works grapple with the world in which we now live.  These artists share their thoughts in very different ways with very different perspectives.  A true smörgåsbord of ideas.

Help!  I’m Stuck!  With Cole Escola

Mr. Escola has been touring a show with this title since 2017.  This quarantine edition finds him at home alone with an assortment of characters, wigs and costumes.  This is a self-created special “as no one asked me to do it.”  The most humiliating part is the reason he wanted to do it.  “I really, really, really want to.”  This hour long video contains mini-films, character studies, blue humor, laugh and tears.  Certain sections of Help!  I’m Stuck!  With Cole Escola are great.

After some potty mouth talk (literally) and personal revelations, the fun begins.  He opens with a film noir from 1943 about Jennifer Convertibles.  Naturally he plays all of the characters.  Shade is thrown everywhere and the payoff is big.  My other favorite skit was the porch scene between Sam and Laura Jean.  He is bringing her home after a date.  Her father is not a big fan of Sam.  The storytelling and the two performances are so good in setting mood and heartache.

There are other fine parts in this mixed bag of oddities, including a mom commercial like no other.  Be warned.  There is a character called Poopy Sue and moments which might offend delicate sensibilities.  For everyone else, this collection is outrageous, often idiotic and memorably offbeat.

Cole Escola has recently been a recurring character on At Home With Amy Sedaris.  This video remains available on You Tube.

YouTube/Help!I’mStuck!

22 Homes (Alabama Shakespeare Festival)

ASF commissioned southern playwrights to create original pieces on the theme of home.  22 Homes is a collaboration between those playwrights and the actors which bring the works to life.  The artists had about a week to work and film their segments.  The pieces are roughly between three and ten minutes long.  The variety is remarkable and worth a visit.

I decided to sample all of them in two sittings.  Gloria Bond Clunie’s The Porch is performed by Jen Harper.  This is both a memory play and a word of warning to her daughter.  Would you rather sit inside with a big screen and watch people live or go outside on the front porch and interact with the world?  In Pearl Cleage’s Coming Home, Darlene Hope is preparing to welcome her sister back home.  This thoughtful piece nicely framed the role of mom, memories of family and what a home actually means.

Martin K. Lewis is a young man newly in love in Donnetta Lavinia Grays Sweet.  His father owes him something.  The dialogue here entrances: “I look into her eyes and see memories we ain’t even made yet.”  Alan Knoll is sitting in a monastery kitchen in Will Arbery’s Frances and Anthony.  A memory is shared which provides insight into how this man came to be in this particular home.  Both of these playwrights had works performed in New York this season.

The Way He Should Go (by Quinton Cockrell) imagines life long after a funeral has passed.  Christopher Gerson, a religious man, is having a conversation with his priest.  “If you have a problem you wrap it up in prayer and send it to God.”  This emotional play was the longest at 10:40 and is filled with sadness and regret.  Shannon Eubanks was memorable in Topher Payne’s surprising and touching eulogy to the AIDS epidemic in What You Can Fix.

Joy Vandervort-Cobb burned the biscuits for the funeral party of her 103 year old mother in Rum and Biscuits written by David Lee Nelson.  She’s enjoying a Piña Colada.  She doesn’t drink scotch because it “tastes like white people.”  She’s day drinking when her daughter arrives.  “Nobody happy drinks during the day.”  Ms. Vandervort-Cobb’s character is complexly drawn and filled with the fortifications of self-protection, for better or worse.

If you view the entire collection of 22 Homes, you’ll also see life today from a cat’s point of view, a surgeon learning to shoot a gun to find a connection with her husband and a panicking wife whose spouse has a fever which is being ignored.  And finally, there is a richly seasoned cast iron skillet containing the histories, secrets and memories of multiple generations of families.

Each short play is viewable individually on the Alabama Shakespeare Festival website.

www.asf.net/22Homes

theaterreviewsfrommyseat/WhereWeStand/DonnettaLaviniaGrays

theaterreviewsfrommyseat/HeroesOfTheFourthTurning/WillArbery

Felt Sad, posted a frog (and other streams of global quarantine)

The Cherry Artspace is a non-profit arts facilitator and presenting organization from Ithaca, New York.  In these times of non-theater, they brought together an international array of six authors to write specific material for live streaming.  All of the characters and situations created reflect the boredom of being trapped at home.

The title piece, Felt Sad, posted a frog was from Berlin and written by Rebekka Kricheldorf.  Snippets of thoughts performed by Godfrey L. Simmons, Jr.  are scattered seemingly randomly.  He is funny, annoyed, obsessed with the return of dolphins to Venice and listening to the advice of Mom, aka Angela Merkel. His Facebook friends are berating him for excessively sharing pictures of frogs.

My favorite segment was from Belgrade and was written by Iva Brdar.  Erica Steinhagen portrays a woman looking to the internet for connection and self-improvement.  Dean Robinson plays Wikihow in brightness of the screen warming our skin.  The silliness and broad comedy is captioned in parts including “How to prevent loneliness?” and “How to answer the question – what do you like about me?”  Before this pandemic, we never thought we needed to ask “How to take a walk?”  Just go “past the gas station with bad coffee and inedible sandwiches.”  Then the kicker which hits hard.  “What are we going to do now?  I don’t know how to walk on water.”

A couple has recently broken up and they are quarantined separately in Buenos Aires by Argentina’s Santiago Loza.  A lesbian couple from Brooklyn and their son are isolating and home schooling in Upstate New York.  From San Salvador, Jorgelina Cerritos considers life and emotions before, during and After these days of isolation, but not in chronogical order.  She worries about being hired when this is all done.  “That’s how capitalism works now.”

The final work is New York/ Oesti / Milan.  Saviana Stanescu imagines a Zoom birthday party between three family members scattered around the world during this crisis.  Some of these works are spliced and spread throughout the presentation which I found enjoyable, especially when a favorite story line reappeared.  Iconic trending videos such as the penguins in the aquarium and the Venetian dolphins show up in multiple pieces.  This coincidental global imprint lends an online sense of worldwide community and a welcome absurdist flair to our situation.

The Cherry Artspace presentation of Felt Sad, posted a frog (and other streams of global quarantine) completed its five show run this weekend.  For information about future events, you can visit their website.

www.thecherry.org

 

Dance, a monstrous creature and a play written specifically for Zoom in this entry into my Seclusion Smörgåsbord series.

Ode (Alvin Ailey American Dance)

Company member and resident choreographer Jamar Roberts offers a meditation on the beauty and fragility of life in a time of growing gun violence.  Ode is set to a piano jazz piece by Don Pullen, “Suite (Sweet) Malcolm (Part 1:  Memories and Gunshots).”  The music ranges from melodic to intense, mimicking life.

The six male dancers perform in front of a screen which, to me, seemed to represent the Tree of Life.  The choreography highlights their individualism and also their collectivism.  The piece is not a literal representation of gun violence but more a celebration of life and the heartbreaking events which can shatter joy.  When a victim is laid to rest, the tinkling of the piano keys and the dancer’s melancholic movement beautifully articulates the moment.

Ode is available on the Alvin Ailey American Dance website until Thursday, May 7, 2020 at 6:30 pm est.

www.alvinailey.org/ode

I Don’t See Mom (Looking Glass Theatre)

Many of us have become Zoom meeting participants through this coronavirus crisis.  Kenneth Nowell has written I Don’t See Mom specifically as a play for this medium.  Two adult children decide to introduce their mom to the miracle of video conferencing.  Naturally mom is late to the scheduled meeting.  A stranger, in mom’s living room, joins the call instead.  The play is an eavesdropping on this family’s state of affairs.

Directed by Justine Lambert, we watch three characters as they interact sharing details and conflicts.  The actors (Erica Becker, Molly Parker Myers and Jay William Thomas) nicely convey this story as it deepens.  The ending is unresolved and well done.  I especially enjoyed Mr. Thomas’ naturalistic presentation.  The themes which emerge from the words expressed by the stranger were thought provoking.

Like Zoom meetings you may have attended, this one requires the performers and the audience to join together.  As you might expect, all participants were not of the same technical prowess.  The muting and hiding video images took a few minutes.  The format is promising, however, and it was interesting to see a family obviously out of touch trying to reconnect.

Looking Glass Theatre is performing this event again on Saturday, May 9, 2020 at 6:00 pm est.  Go to their Facebook page for the Eventbrite link.

www.facebook.com/LookingGlassNYC

Frankenstein (National Theatre of London)

A 2011 production of Frankenstein won Jonny Lee Miller an Olivier Award for Best Actor.  Mr. Miller was exceptional in Ink on Broadway last year.  He and Benedict Cumberbatch alternated the lead roles of Victor Frankenstein and the Creature.  Nick Dear’s stage adaptation of Mary Shelley’s 1818 novel differs in one substantial way with many smaller plot adjustments.  The tale is told from the Creature’s point of view rather than the creator.  Like the novel, the moral dilemmas are seriously handled.  “Did I ask to be created?”  This production often veers into melodramatic histrionics.  As a result, the pedantic babbling and far-fetched highbrow language noticeably comes across as ridiculous and utterly unbelievable.

The scope of the set design and the creatures’ make up are awesome.  Mr. Miller is absolutely riveting in the long opening sequence when he is born.  There is a steampunk vibe to the streets of Ingolstadt which was visually arresting.  Karl Johnson was wonderfully effective as the blind man who befriends the monster.  The show feels too stagy and uncomfortably seesaws in tone and acting styles.  The second act dream scene between the doctor and his dead younger brother was the hardest for me to endure.  This play can be recommended for the central performance but be warned.  There are more than a few moments of boredom to be had.

Frankenstein is streaming for free on the National Theater’s website until Friday, May 8, 2020.

www.nationaltheatre.org.uk/nt-at-home