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Posted by Alexis Soloski at 9:54 PM, March 29, 2007
Sweater Girl: Lucy Thurber
Welcome to another week of Play in the Drawer, where we feature unproduced plays by our favorite playwrights. This week we offer a selection from Monstrosity by Lucy Thurber. She describes Monstrosity as "a play about fascism and commerce. It is a re-telling of the Hero Story with several girls functioning in the role of the hero.”
Lucy Thurber is the author of seven plays, Where We’re Born, Ashville, Scarcity, Killers and Other Family, Stay, Bottom of The World and Monstrosity. She has had readings and workshops at Manhattan Theatre Club, The New Group, Primary Stages, MCC, Encore Theatre in San Francisco, PlayPenn, Williamstown and SOHO Rep. She is a member of MCC Playwrights’ Coalition, Primary Stages writing group, 13P and New Dramatists.
After the jump, a selection from Monstrosity, if you dare!
Act One
Scene One
The sound of marching feet. The beginning of an assembly. Thomas enters marching followed by a group of teenage boys and girls in uniform. As they enter they are singing and marching in time.
Group
Warm rooms and cigarettes, jewels and powder puffs, perfumed soaps and sweet privileged faces, we don’t want them! We are Three, with wild manes and stomping fists, with hobnailed boots and laughing teeth; we accomplish things and do not rest. We are Three and we are best.
(Thomas steps forward, he raises his hand, the young men and women fan out and stand behind him in formation. He lowers his hand. There is silence. Light change, a spot light on Thomas)
Thomas
He has come to speak to us, to lead us and to help us lead ourselves.
(Thomas turns and marches back to his place in line. Michael enters, he crosses center stage and stands facing the audience.)
Michael
Choose your way oh youth. Go where your talent tells you to go. This country needs you to be clever, it needs your hands and your words. Your words are banners for us to follow. Your thoughts are bridges to cross. So why won’t you speak? Why won’t you stand? Do you lack the courage? Do you lack the strength? Or is it that you stand alone and see no others beside you? Do you feel that your thoughts and hearts are falling into a void till your words don’t work, your feet frozen, your hand raised? Are you tired? Are you small? Too small to speak, too small to be heard? Do you think it is possible that I could hear you? That we (He motions to the teenagers standing behind him.) could hear you? Is it possible that you may not be alone? I know that you wake up every day without a sense of purpose. Is it just another day? Endless in its sameness. Endless in its pettiness. Endless in the shallow glances and remarks of your peers. I’ll tell what I know. The truth will set you free, but first it will make you very, very, miserable. But aren’t you miserable now? Don’t you feel it? I know you can feel it. Way down in that place you hide from everyone. Down in that place no one can touch, the place you guard with your very life. The thing you protect with space. The space from which you watch. You know what you have. You are gifted with a unique potential. You can build it, meld it, bend it strengthen it until it shines and cuts through reality like a sword. Yes a sword, you possess a weapon. Put your hands on it and dare to wield it. Learn The Code of Three.
(We hear the sound of canned applause. Michael turns and strides off stage followed closely by Thomas. The teenagers turn and march as a group off stage singing as they go.)
Group
The Code of Three guides our nights. We eats its words to help us fight. We fight for good. We channel power. Beautiful Code of Three you are our mother. We are four to a unit. We are stronger than steel. We march as four heel to heel. We make a square and cannot be divided. Watch us march and know what pride is.
(A moment of silence. The feel of an empty street after a parade. The Twins ride in on their double bicycle.)
Twins
We are the children of no time. We take what we want and we leave nothing behind. We know everything and nothing at all.
Twin 1
Tell me a story the little boy said.
Twin 2
A brother, a sister better off dead.
Twin 1
Horror of horrors a world full of sorrows.
Twin 2
Nothing but straight lines and boxed in shadows.
Twin 1
Tell me a story the little girl said.
Twin 2
A story of magic, a story that’s true.
Twins
We’re the children of no time. Take everything and leave everything behind. We’re here to tell you a story, to bewitch you one and all. We’re here to tell you a story of heroes who want to live for a cause.
Twin 2
A boy running to hide and a girl trying to rise.
Twin 1
A sister and brother with identical eyes.
Twins
Fighting for freedom can be such a bore. Atrocity is timeless, humanity’s greatest chore.
Twin 1
It’s coming dear audience and you know it’s true-
Twin 2
You know it’s true and that they will be blue-
Twin 1
Bluer than the bluest night, filled with terrible frights-
Twins
And where will they stand when they don’t know how to fall? And how will they know if we forget to tell them at all?
Twin 1
Are they strong enough to make the stand? And what about the little girl when she’s frozen with fright and there’s nothing left but you, but dear audience, as her sight?
Twin 2
And what about the brother? Is he strong enough to grow into a man? How many times can he take her bite, before he falls back into the darkness and refuses to fight?
Twins
It’s coming dear audience and you know it’s true. It’s coming dear audience and we’ve chosen you
(The Twins ride off stage.)
(Light switch. Michael sitting at a big wooden desk. He is sorting through papers and making notes. Thomas enters and stands at attention waiting to be noticed. Michael makes one final note and then looks up.)
Michael
You spoke well today Thomas.
Thomas
Thank you Sir.
Michael
And what did you think of my speech?
Thomas
Moving as always, Sir.
Michael
Thank you, thank you.
Thomas
You’re welcome Sir.
Michael
And you look well.
Thomas
Thank you Sir.
Michael
So you’re back.
Thomas
Yes Sir.
Michael
And how do you feel?
Thomas
I don’t know what you mean Sir.
Michael
I see. Would you like to sit down Thomas?
Thomas
I would rather stand if that’s O.K. Sir?
Michael
Yes, that’s O.K. Thomas. How was your father’s funeral?
Thomas
Elegant.
Michael
Your mother was pleased?
Thomas
Who can tell, Sir?
Michael
I see. I know the two of you were never that close.
Thomas
No, Sir. I look too much like my Father for her taste.
Michael
Right. For God’s Sake Tom, sit down. We know each other too well for this, don’t you think.
Thomas
I can’t sit down Sir, if I sit down I may never get up again.
Michael
It’s that bad?
Thomas
Yes Sir.
Michael
I see. Well you better tell me about it, don’t you think?
Thomas
I didn’t have a chance to tell him I hated him.
Michael
I see.
Thomas
Though I think he hated me more. He felt I’d robbed him of his youth. He never wanted an heir. It only reminded him he would die one day, and now he has.
Michael
Yes. But you’ve worked very hard these past few years. I know you pleased him.
Thomas
It hasn’t been him I was trying to please Sir…
Michael
I see. You know it’s against my principles to play favorites-
Thomas
Of course Sir-
Michael
But I am only human after all.
Thomas
Yes Sir?
Michael
I’ve become quite fond of you over the years. I know I’m not your father-
Thomas
But you are Sir. You are more a father to me than my own-
Michael
Yes, yes. I know. I do know. Well, enough of that don’t you think?
Thomas
Yes Sir.
Michael
I’m glad you’re back. I’ve found I’m quite lost without you. There’s so much to do.
Thomas
Yes Sir.
Michael
Work always takes my mind off things. It’s helpful in times of stress. (He pulls out a sheet of paper and hands it to Thomas.) We have some new arrivals.
Thomas
Yes Sir.
Michael
The Morgans and a few of their friends have had an unfortunate accident.
Thomas
That’s really for the best Sir.
Michael
Yes of course. We have possession of their two children.
Thomas
Sir…?
Michael
A boy and a girl.
Thomas
I see Sir…
Michael
Who knew they had children, kept them hidden away.
Thomas
Yes Sir.
Michael
Exceptional test scores, some of the best I’ve ever seen. Train your enemy’s children to love you. That’s what we’re all about Thomas. Their children must be given the gift of Three.
Thomas
Yes Sir.
Michael
I’m terribly excited.
Thomas
Of course Sir.
Michael
Your father and I…I have always depended on your father Thomas, over the years he and I…but I’ve always felt closest to you…I’ve always felt as if, in a way you were my son…
Thomas
Sir I...
Michael
Well we’ve said enough, Thomas you and I understand each other. You may go.
(Thomas salutes and turns to go. He reaches the door.)
Thomas
Sir?
Michael
Yes?
Thomas
It’s good to be home again.
(Thomas exits and Michael goes back to work.)
End of Scene
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 9:49 PM, March 29, 2007
Read the blog--or else!: Oliver Twist
On Friday I’ll visit a work-in-progress showing of Young Jean Lee’s Church and then, if time allows, dash over to 3LD for a later performance of The Curse of the Mystic Reynaldo The. On Saturday it’s another double bill, Oliver Twist in the morning and Essential Self-Defense (by OBIE Committee member Adam Rapp) at night. Sunday and Monday I’ll spend the day with my sweetheart. Tuesday it’s off to Losing Something, again at 3LD.
Anything else I should catch?
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 9:37 PM, March 29, 2007
It’s a Man’s Man’s Man’s Man’s World: Propeller Company
This week in the Village Voice’s theater section, Michael Feingold went behind the scenes, spying on the backstage worlds of Curtains and Our Leading Lady. He remarks, “Just as the stage is a standard metaphor for the world, the disorienting realm we call backstage is the mirror of our hidden world, a place where everything stage illusion disguises can get spilled out, and spelled out explicitly, under harsh, unflattering work lights.” Feingold objects to elements of Charles Busch’s writing and Lynne Meadow’s direction, but happily falls under the spell of Leading Lady’s leading lady, Kate Mulgrew. While complimenting its cast, he calls Curtains, “a lot of sound and fury signifying mild diversion.”
Feingold also set sail on a performance of Jack Goes Boating. He finds it somewhat shallow going: “Its sweetness and surface truth, though pleasurably genuine, don't offer the characters either much depth or much convincing context.”
I rather selfishly swallowed up the Sightlines section so as to sample the glut of Shakespeare shows running at present. I was entirely tamed by Propeller Theater Company’s Taming of the Shrew, “the homosocial universe of the Propeller production offers commentary on and criticism of the text itself, laying bare its assumptions regarding sex and gender, the cruelty toward women it seems to unthinkingly endorse.” Their Twelfth Night also made for a pleasant evening. I had a colder reaction to poortom productions a new all-male company devoted to Shakespeare, finding that “Neither actors nor director seem to delight much in the verse. The best bits are extratextual moments. Poor Tom has assembled an able company—and some very lively designers—but they may wish to rethink their Shakespeare focus.” The verse wasn’t worth delighting in in Sweet Love, Adieu, Ryan J-W Smith’s sophomoric Shakespearean pastiche.
I also swore some degree of fealty to Signature’s revival of King Hedley II, finding it a very worthy resurrection.
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 1:33 PM, March 28, 2007
Floor Model: Aoi
Saw Takeshi Kawamura's Aoi/Komachi at the Japan Society over the weekend. This year, its 100th anniversary, the japan Society has made a great effort to offer more performance events. Pretty great ones, too: Basil Twist, Big Dance Theater, Koosil-Ja Hwang. The Kawamura pieces are part of Noh Now!, contemporary adaptations of classic noh plays.
Kawamura seems a very cinematic director. The first piece Aoi, could have been a theatricalized and ghosty version of Shampoo, while Komachi transmuted Sunset Boulevard to postwar Japan.
The first piece delights more than the second, if only because one acclimates to Kawamura's distinctive aesthetic very quickly. At first, it's surprising. By the second act, it's familiar. He does beautifully marry contemporary technology (screens, projections, etc.) to classical Japanese theatrical techniques (such as black-hooded stagehands). He's also very sensitive to light, shadow, and color on the stage. he restricts most of his props and outfits to a black-and-white palette, splashes of red, even flesh tones are striking.
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 1:26 PM, March 28, 2007
The Man Who Laughs
Welcome to another edition of Dream Play, wherein we ask directors and producers to reveal the plays buried deep within their breasts, what they might work on if cost, space, and rights weren't an option. This week, we feature the cheerfully handsome Davis McCallum (he plans he looks better in miniature, but we distrust this). Davis McCallum directed Quiara Hudes’s Elliot: A Soldier’s Fugue at the Culture Project last season. He has two shows opening in NY in April: Jane Eyre for The Acting Company at Baruch, and West Moon Street for Prospect Theater Company at the Hudson Guild.
If eft to his own devices, Davis would direct...
Chuck Mee's Perfect Wedding. I directed the third-year class at NYU Grad Acting in it last spring, and it was the most fun I've ever had doing a play. I am dying to get that same production a further life. I think it would be great in the Classic Stage Company space on 13th street, but it's proven prohibitively expensive because it requires a cast of 21. The play is kind of loosely based on Robert Altman's film, A Wedding, with a little bit of Midsummer Night's Dream thrown in. We staged it in the round, under a big white wedding tent, designed by Tom Gleason. The play has a big mudfight at the end of the first act, and culminates in a huge Bollywood dance. I think it's a mind-blowing masterpiece, and it's regrettable that no one in NY but Lincoln Center can seriously consider a play with more than 20 actors.
I'd also like to do a site-specific adaptation of James Merrill's Changing Light at Sandover, in a big dilapidated warehouse in Long Island City. I'd also like to a do a one-person show with my friend Qing-Yi, which would be in a funeral home parlour in Chinatown, and only performed for a dozen or so people a night. She'd serve tea.
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 11:56 AM, March 26, 2007
Oh, my orchard! Sweetie! Darling!
The Articles What I Read and Enjoyed:
In the incomparable Guardian, Michael Billington translates the work and words of playwright/adaptor Christopher Hampton, who currently has three plays running in London. Lynn Gardner reports that Joanna Lumley (my idol!) does an absolutely fabulous job in a current production of the Cherry Orchard. Cheers, darling! Gardner also has good news that the Battersea Arts Center, one of the premiere crucibles for collaborative performance, seems to be surviving a funding crisis. Jay Rayner offers a noble profile of Ian McKellen, who will soon take on King Lear, likely with more success than Kevin Kline. The play will arrive at BAM in September. McKellen’s method: 'Acting is no longer about lying. It's now about revealing the truth. Honesty is the best policy.'
In the New York Times, Joy Goodwin plays around with the puppets of Avenue Q, writing an amusing piece casting Avenue Q's touring company (although as the show has spawned London and Las Vegas companies the piece is perhaps less than timely). The Times also reports on a Connecticut high school that canceled a student written play based on first person accounts of the war in Iraq.
In New York magazine, Boris Kachka annotates OBIE judge Adam Rapp’s resume. Military School? Graphic novels? Bouncer?
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 11:44 AM, March 26, 2007
Founding father, budgetary enforcer
Since the close of the that peculiar Cambodian restaurant, I've been at a loss for cheap eats in and around the Brooklyn Academy of Music. Sure, Thomas Biesl's fabulous, and while their schnitzel is not prohibitive, neither is it a steal. But last weekend, while enjoying Propeller Shakespeare, my sweetheart and I had our first, but very likely not our last meal at Pequena. My share may have cost just a bit more than a Hamilton, particularly as a glass of sangria was deemed medicinal and necessary, but it was awfully, awfully good. Who knew fish tacos and Shakespeare went so well together. Next time, I may try the wings at The Smoke, once I can forgive it for replacing the Cambodian place.
Also, I'll be revisiting BAM Wednesday to see the Matthew Bourne. Will entertain reasonable suggestions for where to enjoy an post-play drink.
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 11:39 AM, March 26, 2007
An Undisclosed (okay, fairly disclosed) Location
The super secret members of the OBIE committee (who certainly haven't been named on this very blog), gave up a portion of our valuable weekends to eat thin-crust pizza and discuss the current crop of shows. Conversation ranged from new plays to revivals, young companies to established ones, and we enjoyed a brief and amusing digression into the vagaries of attractive playwrights. Adam Bock and Sheila Callaghan, I trust your eyes are burning. I can't in good faith reveal any more, alas. You'll just ahve to attend our ceremony on the 21st.
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 2:51 PM, March 22, 2007
Just Say Noh: Aoi/Komachi at Japan Society
As I have some personal commitments to honor, this week will not be quite as jam-packed as the last several--welcome, as I could use a bit of rest for the wicked.
Tonight I see Stay at the Rattlestick. Tomorrow I see long neglected friends. Saturday it's Aoi/Komachi at the Japan Society. Sunday if I'm not too tired I'll see Volume of Smoke. Monday I'm at home. Tuesday it's off to Fugue and Wednesday to Edward Scissorhands.
After the jump, see how I plan to spend my nights off (this is just for you, Jason Zinoman):
That's right, dallying with my gentlemen friends--and maybe a bit of spring cleaning, too.
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 2:44 PM, March 22, 2007
Stall Together Now (courtesy theatermania)
This week, with my discussion of assless chaps and fisting, I seem to be horrifying even myself. Especially myself. Since I may never offer such an uncouth week of posts again, I may as well make the most of this one. On that note, I was at Classic Stage Company last night and will hazard that the bathroom stalls there could not possibly be any smaller without leading to unfortunate and unhygienic accidents. They don't win my vote for grottiest bathroom (probably the Kraine or Soho Rep) or even worst lighting (Second Stage), but the proportions there are not classical in the least.
Other worst washroom nominations?
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 2:32 PM, March 22, 2007
A Blog you say? I need a drink.
This week, in the Village Voice theater section, Michael Feingold climbs into 1001 Beds and takes Tea and Sympathy, tracing half a century of American social history [and] the 50-year evolution of gay-themed theater as well. He also tunes into the revival of Eric Bogosian’s Talk Radio. Feingold finds that the revival “never quite coalesces into a dramatic statement. What does coalesce, pretty unforgettably, is Schreiber's performance as a hard, compulsive, lizard-eyed cynic who keeps revealing, in flashes, the helpless, betrayed, idealist self he spends his nights trying to bury.”
I listened in (legally) on Lawrence Wright’s My Trip to Al-Qaeda, which details his efforts to research and write The Looming Tower. If I didn’t exactly find him credible as an actor, I very much enjoyed his narrative and sweater vest. I informed on the Irish Rep’s Defender of the Faith, determining that the plot of this so-called thriller emerges as “more workmanlike than revelatory.”
In the Sightlines column, Andy Propst raises half a glass to Bill W. and Dr. Bob, a drama about the founders of Lindsay Lohan hangout AA. In a welcome visit to the theater section, film critic J. Hoberman sets sail with Moby Dick—Rehearsed, writing, “The emphasis is on the power of Melville's language, and the sturdy ensemble.” Meanwhile, Joseph McCombs ventures into Tall Grass, Brian Harris’s dramedy about three couples, remarking “Harris overindulges his need for novelty, twisting his characters' motives just as you think you understand them.”
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 9:53 PM, March 20, 2007
My Super-Dainty Kate
We continue our weekly series featuring unproduced plays by the playwrights at 13P. This week’s entry, the one-act Sprinkler, by Kate Ryan.
Kate’s plays include Dot, Mark Smith, The Pool Skimmer, Design Your Kitchen, and most recently a wonderful adaptation of Sophocles's Women of Trachis. Her plays have been produced by the New York theater companies 13P, Clubbed Thumb, The Flea Theater, the Ontological-Hysteric Theatre, and Target Margin, and regionally at Annex Theatre in Seattle and the Williamstown Theatre Festival workshop.
CHARACTERS
Helene: a woman in her 60s
Jack: a man in his 60s
Barb: Jack’s wife, a woman in her 60s
Livia: Helene’s daughter, a woman in her 30s
Charles: a man in his 30s
SETTING
Two small plots of lawn, small house behind each. One plot belongs to HELENE. The other belongs to JACK and BARB.
SCENE ONE. JACK AND HELENE WATERING THEIR LAWNS
(JACK is watering his front lawn with a hose that has a new-fangled sprinkler head attachment.)
(HELENE exits her house. She is holding a hose and attaching the same kind of sprinkler head to it.)
JACK
You got one too.
HELENE
Yeah.
JACK
You like it?
HELENE
I haven't used it yet.
JACK
Oh.
(A little bit of time while HELENE adjusts the attachment and turns on the sprinkler.)
JACK
It's much better than the old way. The old way in the ground was killing off my grass. Killing off Barb's flowers, too.
HELENE
She's got some nice flowers there.
JACK
Yeah, she does.
HELENE
What are they?
JACK
Perennials.
HELENE
Perennials? But what kind?
JACK
She doesn't tell me.
HELENE
Why doesn’t she tell you?
JACK
She does tell me.
(Short pause.)
HELENE
Looks like daisies.
JACK
Could be daisies, yeah. Daisies, I know. Yeah. Those are daisies. What you got over there?
HELENE
No flowers.
JACK
No flowers, eh?
HELENE
No. I don't... I want to. I mean, I'd like to plant flowers but. No time.
JACK
No time.
HELENE
I have no time to do that.
JACK
What do you do?
HELENE
I'm retired.
JACK
You told me that.
HELENE
I don't think so.
(Pause. They water their lawns.)
HELENE
What do you do?
JACK
Garbage collector. Ah, Sanitation Worker.
HELENE
Oh.
(Short pause.)
Maybe I could just hand over my trash to you.
When my husband was alive we'd have a normal trash, a bin. But I don't need that. I have a little plastic bag I attach to the kitchen cabinet.
I collect, what. One banana peel, an empty box of rice, soup lids. Soup cans. The insides of green peppers. Coffee filters. Used coffee grounds. Pens that don't work. Receipts I don't need to save. Old cheese. Empty pickle jars with a bit of pickle juice in them. Foil. Tin foil. Old, stained rags. I used to collect--I mean, throw away--tampons. Pads. But no more. Sometimes cotton balls. I take off my nail polish with cotton balls.
JACK
My wife does that. I think.
HELENE
So think I could just hand that over? Instead of putting it down on the street? Letting it collect with my bathroom trash--the box the soap comes in, used tissues, bits of dental floss--when I decide to floss--you know it hurts!--used cotton balls, I mentioned that.
(Pause.)
JACK
I'm gonna go inside now, Helene. I got things to do.
(JACK turns off his sprinkler.)
HELENE
Enjoy your weekend.
(JACK goes inside.)
HELENE
Crumbled concrete, bent street signs, ruined furniture. Punched-in lampshades, empty pop bottles, rusted Swiss Army knives. Hair that's been cut off.
(Pause.)
I don't know.
(She turns off her sprinkler, goes back inside.)
SCENE TWO. JACK TALKS TO BARB
(JACK is sitting at the kitchen table talking to BARB.)
JACK
What flowers you got out there.
BARB
What?
JACK
Helene asked what flowers you got out there.
BARB
Helene who.
JACK
Our neighbor.
BARB
(Pointing) Our neighbor over there?
JACK
Yeah Helene Rostocco.
BARB
Oh, Helene Rostocco. Right.
JACK
Yeah. Geez. What are the flowers.
BARB
Let’s see. There are irises, marigolds, some peonies.
JACK
Ah.
(JACK picks up the paper and reads it.)
SCENE THREE. HELENE EATS TOAST
(HELENE is sitting alone at her kitchen table. She is eating toast with jam very slowly. She is watching a tiny TV that we don’t see. We faintly hear the sound of the TV.)
SCENE FOUR. JACK AND HELENE WATERING THEIR LAWNS
(HELENE is watering her lawn with her hose and the sprinkler attachment. She hums quietly to herself. After a little while, JACK enters.)
JACK
Hey.
HELENE
Oh hi Jack.
(They water their lawns.)
JACK
Watering again?
HELENE
Watering again. Hey, how was your week?
JACK
Oh, uh, it was fine.
HELENE
Good.
(They water. JACK stops watering.)
JACK
Weird thing happened this week though. A guy I know, guy I work with, he, ah, he found—you might have heard this on the news--he found an infant. Among the--in his bed. Of his truck.
HELENE
She was alive?
JACK
No, he--it, it was dead.
HELENE
Is it a boy or a girl?
JACK
Uh, a boy.
(Short pause.)
HELENE
That is terrible.
JACK
Isn't that awful?
HELENE
That is so awful. That is disgusting.
JACK
Well, we got a problem in our country. People are having babies young, they don't have anyplace to go.
(Short pause.)
How are you enjoying your attachment?
HELENE
Oh, it seems to be working. It seems to be doing something.
(She looks at her grass.)
JACK
Your lawn needs some work there. I don't mean to insult your--you inherited it that way. When you bought it.
HELENE
We'll see. We'll see if I can change it.
Look at Barb's flowers.
JACK
They look nice don't they?
HELENE
She's great at that.
JACK
She is good at it. She's got books of them at home. How to do this kind of gardening, that kind of gardening
HELENE
We don't have any books. I don't have any books. Anymore.
JACK
No?
HELENE
Old dusty jackets, spines coming out, threads undone--books break. Books break apart. My father was a big reader.
JACK
I'm gonna head inside now, Helene.
HELENE
All done watering?
JACK
This thing works darn fast. Darn fast.
(JACK goes inside. HELENE waters for a little while.)
HELENE
Rows and rows of gleaming; hmm.
(She thinks. She thinks of the baby.)
Hmm.
SCENE FIVE. LIVIA COMES TO STAY WITH HELENE
(HELENE is in her kitchen, doing something standing up. LIVIA enters with her bags.)
LIVIA
Hey Mom.
HELENE
Hey! Livia!
LIVIA
Hey.
(A few beats.)
HELENE
What's up honey?
LIVIA
Mark did something disgusting with the cat.
HELENE
Oh geez
LIVIA
So I left.
Is it all right if I stay here for a little while?
HELENE
Of course honey you can stay here.
LIVIA
It will just be for a little while.
HELENE
You can stay here as long as you like.
LIVIA
Just until Mark gets better.
HELENE
Honey I think it's best that you stay here.
(LIVIA sits. HELENE stands. HELENE pats LIVIA's head.)
SCENE SIX. CHARLES' MESSAGE
(Lights up on HELENE's kitchen. No one is there. We hear the click of the answering machine turning on: CHARLES is leaving a message.)
CHARLES' VOICE
Hi, ah, I'm sorry I missed you Helene. My name is, ah, Charlie Gorman and, um, if you could call me back that would be great. I, um, I'll tell you what I'm calling about: my father, Frank Rostocco, he's your brother-in-law. You might not have heard of me but he's, my father, we never really knew each other but he's my father. But so I know your husband recently passed, I'm sorry to hear about that by the way, my condolences, and I'm wondering if, see, I'm dying. I'm dying of leukemia. And my mother, she went missing years ago and I'm looking for as I make my plans for my own funeral I'd like to see if perhaps I could be buried in your family's plot, the Rostocco plot.
I'd tried contacting Frank's wife, of course she doesn't want to talk to me. I'm wondering if you could help me. If you could I would greatly appreciate it. My number, it's 808 563 0504. I'm located here in Farnsboro. Just over the bridge. Thank you Helene. Thank you very much.
(HELENE has walked in, in her nightgown, towards the end of the message. She hears the last few lines.)
SCENE SEVEN. HELENE CALLS CHARLES BACK
(HELENE's kitchen. HELENE is now dressed in her regular clothes. She is on the phone. CHARLES appears in another area of the stage.)
HELENE
Mr. Gorman?
CHARLES
Yes.
HELENE
This is Helene Rostocco.
CHARLES
Helene! It's so good to hear from you.
HELENE
I wanted to call you back. I'm sorry I couldn't call you back yesterday.
CHARLES
That's all right. That's fine. Well how are you?
HELENE
I'm all right. It was quite a surprise to get your phone call.
CHARLES
Well I can imagine. Did you--did you know about me?
HELENE
No, I didn't.
CHARLES
Right. I didn't think Frank told many people.
HELENE
He didn't. I mean, I don't know if he did. I didn't know.
(Pause.)
CHARLES
I'm sorry to hear about your husband passing, by the way. My uncle.
HELENE
Well thank you. And I am very sorry to hear that you're sick.
CHARLES
I am. I'm very sick.
(Short pause.)
HELENE
I hope you can beat this thing.
CHARLES
That doesn't seem very likely.
But, so, as you know, I am preparing for my own passing. My own death. It's-a-coming, Helene.
HELENE
Oh.
CHARLES
And I know that, I thought that you would have some sympathy for me. Seeing that, as I said, Frank's wife, she won't answer my attempts to contact her.
HELENE
I do feel for you. I do feel for you Charles.
CHARLES
The thought of being cremated, my ashes spread, alone, that frightens me. And I'm already frightened enough.
HELENE
You're alone?
CHARLES
I'm alone.
HELENE
No wife? No kids?
CHARLES
No wife, no kids.
HELENE
Were you ever married?
CHARLES
I’ve had some girlfriends here and there.
(Short pause.)
HELENE
I wish I could help you Charles. But I don't have much pull in that family.
I'm sorry.
CHARLES
You're saying that this is a wasted phone call? That my efforts are wasted?
HELENE
I'm--no.
CHARLES
You're saying that after growing up the way I did, with cancer now, cancer that I had nothing to do with, that you're not even going to help me plan my own funeral.
HELENE
I'd love to help you. I'd love to help you, Charles.
CHARLES
You're a bitch. You know that? You're a fucking bitch.
(CHARLES hangs up the phone. HELENE stands there holding the phone. Then she hangs up. She pauses and tries to collect herself. She walks to another part of the room to go begin to do something.)
(LIVIA comes downstairs. She is carrying her bags.)
LIVIA
I talked to Mark last night.
HELENE
Oh really?
LIVIA
We were on the phone for a couple of hours. I'm going to go over there today and we're going to see if we can work things out.
HELENE
Oh.
(Short pause.)
LIVIA
He said he's sorry about the cat. He said he doesn't know what got into him.
HELENE
How is the cat?
LIVIA
She's okay.
HELENE
Are you guys going to get the cat back, or leave it with the neighbors.
LIVIA
Probably leave it with the neighbors. For now.
HELENE
I hope the cat is okay.
LIVIA
She's fine. She's fine, Mom. Her ear is a little scratched but she's fine.
(A few beats.)
Well, I'm off.
HELENE
Okay.
LIVIA
I'm going to call you soon.
HELENE
We should have dinner together. We should have dinner together soon, Livia.
LIVIA
Sure! Let me get things worked out with Mark and then we'll have dinner together.
HELENE
Okay.
(HELENE embraces LIVIA and gives her a kiss on the cheek.)
HELENE
You know I love you.
LIVIA
I know you do. I love you too, Mom.
HELENE
Oh that's nice.
LIVIA
I do! Bye.
HELENE
Bye.
(LIVIA exits.)
(After a few moments, HELENE picks up the sprinkler head attachment, which has been lying somewhere in her kitchen. She looks at it.)
SCENE EIGHT. BARB AT HER KITCHEN TABLE
(BARB, JACK’s wife, is sitting alone at her kitchen table. It is sunny. She holds a mug of coffee in her hands. She sings, softly.)
BARB
Sunshine on the mornings makes me happy
Sunshine almost always makes me high
Sunlight on my shoulder makes me happy
Sunlight almost always gets me high
SCENE NINE. HELENE AND JACK WATERING
(JACK is watering his front lawn with the hose and attachment. HELENE enters with her hose. She turns it on and begins to water her grass.)
JACK
Where’s your attachment?
HELENE
I got rid of it.
JACK
You got rid of it? Why?
HELENE
I don’t need it. It was frivolous.
JACK
What do you mean frivolous? Special fertilizers in there.
HELENE
My grass looks fine.
(Pause. They water their lawns.)
JACK
The funeral's Thursday.
HELENE
For what.
JACK
The infant.
HELENE
Oh.
JACK
The guys put it together. I get off work at 5 and it's at 4:30 so I’m just gonna show up a little bit late.
HELENE
I bet it will still be going on by then.
JACK
That’s what I’m hoping.
(Pause.)
(HELENE turns off her hose and starts to go inside.)
JACK
Why you going inside?
HELENE
That’s all I need to do.
JACK
You barely did anything.
HELENE
My grass is all right.
JACK
It’s dying.
(HELENE inspects her grass.)
HELENE
I guess it is.
JACK
That new sprinkler is gonna make all the difference I tell you. My grass is stronger, brighter, also, we haven’t been walking on it. I asked Barb to make a point to walk around it so we’ve been doing that and it’s really improved.
HELENE
Are you having a party or something?
JACK
No.
HELENE
I can understand wanting your grass to look nice if you’re having a party or something but for everyday, I just, I’m kind of an old woman and the hose suits me just fine.
JACK
What’d you do with the sprinkler head?
HELENE
I threw it out.
JACK
Threw it out?
HELENE
It hurt my hand.
JACK
Hurt your hand?
HELENE
Where you hold it.
(Pause.)
HELENE
I’m gonna go inside now Jack.
JACK
All done watering?
HELENE
Yup.
(HELENE goes in her house.)
SCENE TEN. LIVIA CALLS HELENE FROM THE HOSPITAL
(HELENE is sitting alone at her kitchen table. She is eating toast with jam very slowly. She is watching a tiny TV that we don’t see. We faintly hear the sound of the TV. The phone rings. HELENE gets up and answers it. LIVIA appears in another area of the stage.)
HELENE
Hello.
LIVIA
Hey Mom? This is Livia.
HELENE
Livia. Honey. How are you?
LIVIA
Not good. Not good. I need you to come to the hospital.
HELENE
Come to the hospital. Why.
LIVIA
Mark's hurt himself.
(Short pause.)
HELENE
You’re there with him?
LIVIA
Yes. Mom, I really need you. I know this is fucked up but
(A few beats.)
HELENE
Of course I’ll be there honey.
LIVIA
Okay he’s at Port Green Heights in the emergency wing.
HELENE
(HELENE writes this down) Port Green Heights. Now that’s a big hospital is the emergency easy to find?
LIVIA
It’s easy to find. It’s the big main entrance with the circular driveway.
HELENE
(As she writes this down) Big main entrance with the circular driveway.
LIVIA
I’ll see you soon Mom.
HELENE
See you soon.
(HELENE hangs up the phone.)
SCENE ELEVEN. BARB OUTSIDE TENDING TO HER FLOWERS
(BARB is tending to her flowers. HELENE exits her house. HELENE takes her time. She is wearing her jacket and holding a purse.)
HELENE
Oh hi Barb.
BARB
Hi. Helene.
HELENE
Working on your flowers?
BARB
Yup.
HELENE
They’re very nice flowers.
BARB
Thank you.
HELENE
If I could plant flowers and grow them I would but I can’t.
BARB
Why can’t you?
HELENE
I have no green thumb. But it doesn’t matter.
BARB
It doesn’t matter.
(BARB goes back to tending her flowers. She works for a while. HELENE watches her.)
HELENE
It’s all right. People are good at all kinds of different things. Some people are good at some things, some people are good at other things.
BARB
That’s true.
HELENE
You’re good at that.
BARB
I’m okay at this.
HELENE
You can do it. You can find the time to do it.
(Short pause.)
I gotta go to the hospital. My daughter's husband's tried to hurt himself.
BARB
Oh no.
HELENE
I don't know what he did but I'm sure it's crazy.
(She laughs.)
BARB
Well I hope he’s all right.
HELENE
I hope he’s all right too. He's a loser.
BARB
My ex-husband was a loser.
HELENE
They're all around.
BARB
All around.
(Short pause.)
HELENE
Well, I'll be seeing you Barb.
BARB
I'll be seeing you too.
HELENE
Buh-bye Barb.
BARB
Bye Helene.
(HELENE walks to her car. BARB goes back to her flowers. We watch her work for a while. Lights fade.)
END OF PLAY
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 9:43 PM, March 20, 2007
Buck Angel: Back in Black
After spending some years with the Wooster Group and a few more directing such lovely oddities as multimedia extravagances and Ludwig von Tieck adaptations, Richard Kimmel has spent the last little while writing and directing for some very theatrical parties and also readying the L.E.S. nightspot the Box, due to soon offer purportedly cool dinner theater. Monday night, Kimmel was able to combine these two occupations, screening at the Box a new film he’s made, Schwarzwald, much of it recorded live at the famed Black Party.
The film was a whirl of pagan, fairytale pornography, though more watchable than that descriptive likely suggests. It also answers questions we had never thought to ask: Can a grown man fist himself? Might he want to? The Box—and here we’re referring to the space and not star Buck Angel’s privates—looks to be a charming space, and we’re eager to see what stage delights they’ll offer once they raise their red plush curtains.
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 12:57 PM, March 19, 2007
Emma Griffin: A Pearl
Welcome to our weekly feature in which we ask directors what play they would stage were time, cost, rights, etc. not a consideration.
This week we feature the savory Emma Griffin, artistic director of Salt Theater, (currently working on Our Town and an adaptation of Riders of the Purple Sage) and a freelance director of theater and opera.
In an ideal world Emma would direct...
Jesus Christ Superstar
"Totally re-orchestrated, with a kick ass band and a fantastic string section. Sometimes I think I want to do it with a full cast of pop-stars (Christina Aguilera as Mary Magdalene), but then I come to my senses and I want to do with with a bunch of crazy actors. It should be in the summer, in that old factory in DUMBO on the east river, the one that is between the two bridges. With a rock-star lighting rig. And it needs to be very loud."
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 12:49 PM, March 19, 2007
This kills me.
My comments on Propeller Shakespeare's Twelfth Night and Taming of the Shrew at BAM won't appear into the Voice until next week, but I would like to offer some thoughts, and encourage ticket buyers not to hesitate, especially where Shrew is concerned.
As is well-known, while Aristotle's essay on tragedy survives, his one on comedy is lost. So in Western literary criticism, it's a great mystery what precisely comedy entails. But England's Propeller Shakespeare seems to have distilled a few rules.
1. Men in dresses are funny.
2. Men in assless chaps are much, much funnier.
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 5:31 PM, March 16, 2007
Sibyl? Is that you?
As a performer and playwright Sibyl Kempson is frequently a Downtowner's delight. She makes me want to use whole rafts of outdated descriptives: hoyden, rapscallion, spitfire. Just caught a workshop at Crime or Emergency at Dixon Place, which closes tonight. The play's still very much in process. Some scenes are indelible, some passable, some obscure, the focus is diffuse. But Kempson does a remarkable turn as a cabaret singer whose numbers bear more than a passing resemblance to Darkness on the Edge of Town. She performs them with stiff-limbed, lockjawed abandoned, accompanied by Mike Iveson and Rich Maxwell, who occasionally lend sprightly harmonies and leaden patter. I'd happily sit through an evening length performance of just these numbers. That would be "Something in the Night," indeed.
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 5:24 PM, March 16, 2007
If you could compose like this man, you too might look smug.
A weekly compendium of the articles what I read, and enjoyed:
The gray lady earned herself some indie cred with a profile of charming tunesmith Michael Friedman. Although we might take some issue to the “Composing for Shakespeare while Listening to Timberlake” headline. Both immensely popular entertainers, both occasionally sporting earrings, both bringing the sexy back—are they really so far apart?
In an article on understudies, the Guardian discovers what it’s like to step into the sizable shoes of Richard Griffiths—with very little notice.
How do you do it? "Self-deception, mainly," says Haigh wryly. "It's a sort of confidence trick against yourself. You force yourself into a pretend calmness - and, at first, I came on with the script."
On the Guardian’s blog, Lyn Gardner takes the measure of women writers’ liking for experimental forms and male critics’ ensuing displeasure. And Brian Logan and Michael Billington very nearly have an articulate and exquisitely mannered fight. In somewhat related articles, Logan praises collaborative theater while Billington longs for productions that focus less on “collective endeavor” and more on writing star-making roles.
In the New York Sun, Kate Taylor offered some excellent advice for freelance directors looking to make a living at it, recommending labs at Lincoln Center and Soho Rep and fellowships offered by NEA/TCG and the Drama League. But she does offer the somewhat puzzling comment that “Several now prominent people got their start at Theatre for a New Audience.” Last time we checked, TFANA wasn’t offering gigs to kids fresh out of drama school.
And in the “My eyes! My eyes!” category, I did happen to glance at an announcement of a Little House on the Prairie musical starring Patrick Swayze. End times, clearly.
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 11:19 PM, March 15, 2007
Aquila offers one way to keep the audience in their seats.
Only just back from my mini-break in the swamps of Florida and already cheerfully swamped with theater. Tomorrow I'll begin my Shakespeare marathon, starting with the Shakespeare inspired comedy Sweet Love Adieu, followed by a double-bill of actual Shakespeare comedies by Propeller Company (The Taming of the Shrew and Twelfth Night) and then finishing with another all-male production, new company poortom production's As You Like It at Here.
But wait! There's more...
Monday has me checking out director Rich Kimmels' film debut, Schwarzwald: The Movie You Can Dance To, which may offend my sensibilities (am a closet prude). Or forever alter them. Tuesday is a day of rest. Wednesday I'm shackled to Prometheus Bound and Thursday' I'll stay for Stay at Rattlestick.
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 11:03 PM, March 15, 2007
One day, little Cave Dweller, this blog could all be yours.
In the Village Voice's theater coverage this week:
I took up residence in Christopher Shinn’s rather uncomfortable Dying City. While the play offers affecting portraits of its citizenry, it doesn’t rate as a work of social or political import.
Though Michael Feingold does not suggest we should never never never never see Kevin Kline’s King Lear, he does maintain that the title role demands a fury that simply isn't a part of Kline's emotional makeup. Feingold also appreciates the retelling of Terence McNally’s “fairy tale” Prelude to a Kiss, directed by Daniel Sullivan.
In Sightlines, Andy Propst listens in on Spalding Gray: Stories Left to Tell. And he likes what he hears. David Ng doesn’t have a ball at Looking Glass Theatre’s production of Baal, though he somewhat blames the script. I like just about any play with bears in it, and Gwen Orel somewhat agrees, offering warm and fuzzy words for the ursine-inclusive The Cave Dwellers.
Elsewhere in the paper, Angela Ashman takes a rather naughty view of the onstage seats (apparently known as the “ass” and “boob” seats) available at Spring Awakening and in an article neatly times with the imminent St. Patrick’s Day festivities, Mark Blankenship says slainte the importance of being Irish, especially when you’re the Irish Repertory Theatre and you’ve just bought your space.
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 3:04 PM, March 14, 2007
Very much alive: Dead City’s Sheila Callaghan
Welcome to yet another edition featuring unproduced works by favorite playwrights, currently featuring 13P. (By the way13P, we're still waiting to hear from 6 of you). This week's excerpt is provided by the lovely Sheila Callaghan. Her plays have been produced and developed with Soho Rep, Playwrights Horizons, South Coast Repertory, Clubbed Thumb, The Lark, Actor’s Theatre of Louisville, New Georges, Moving Arts, and Crowded Fire, among others. Her full-length plays include Scab, The Hunger Waltz, Crawl Fade to White, Crumble (Lay Me Down, Justin Timberlake), We Are Not These Hands, Dead City (which won the Susan Smith Blackburn!), Lascivious Something and Kate Crackernuts. She is also the lead vocalist of the electro-pop ensemble If I Told Napoleon.
Of this excerpt, she writes, "My play doesn't have a title yet... this scene takes place at a strange dinner party, where the women keep dropping to the floor and rolling into the walls in their gowns for no reason."
Long silence. People eating and drinking.
WENDY reaches for the bread. RODNEY slaps her hand away.
Long silence. People eating and drinking.
Suddenly, RODNEY pushes back in his chair and begins to shout the
following.
RODNEY
Say. I have a funny story!
The others exclaim "Really?" "Bravo!" "Fantastic, go on!"
RODNEY (cont.)
It's rather comical. I think you'll enjoy it. It's about the time I
nearly lost all my money!
More exclamations.
RODNEY (cont.)
It's a completely true story. I really think you'll enjoy it. I was
in the war!
More exclamations.
OWEN
Which war?
RODNEY
THE war. The one I was in! I was in the war. And we were in this
country. And there were several of us. Old Eddie and old Ronnie and
old Johnnie and old Billy and old Charlie and old Artie and old Howie
and old Rudy and old Jimmy and old Gary. And there was a cave. And
the cave had two entrances. And we were chasing two guys. Two
poop-flingers. We called them poop-flingers.
OWEN
Ha!
RODNEY
We called them poop-flingers because after they shat they wiped their
asses with their hands and then flung their shit at the walls.
Exclamations: "No!" "They didn't!" "Disgusting!"
RODNEY (cont.)
And THEN they shook your hand.
More exclamations of disgust.
RODNEY (cont.)
So we chasing these two poop-flingers across this prairie, well it
wasn't a prairie but it was a stretch of land not unlike a prairie
except there were no prairie dogs, and then the land became rocks and
the rocks turned into caves, and we were still chasing, and we weren't
shooting because we knew about these caves and we knew the
poop-flingers were running straight into the caves, and so we just
chased them for a bunch of miles, and we lost sight of them because
they were pretty fast, but then old Jimmy said he saw one of them
disappear into the cave with two entrances, and so old Eddie and old
Ronnie and old Johnnie and old Billy climbed over the rocks to the
other side of the cave, and we waited for their signal, and when they
were in position old Eddie screamed POOP TUBE!!! And they ran into
the cave screaming, and the poop-flinger inside freaked and started
running out the other side, and me and Charlie and Artie and Howie and
Rudy and Jimmy and Gary were standing there with flame throwers, and
so when the poop-flinger came at us we torched him. But he was still
running. And so we torched him again, and he kept running. He ran
around in a little circle. And he was on fire. And his skin was
melting off him. And there were screams, but they weren't his. There
were other poop-flingers inside the poop-tube. They also came running
out. They were on fire too. They were much smaller than the first
poop-flinger. Half his size. And one really small one.
Long beat.
OWEN
What happened to the prairie dogs?
RODNEY
There were none. I said that already.
OWEN
Right right, you did. My bad, sorry.
Long beat.
OWEN (cont.)
And so how did you lose your money?
RODNEY
When?
OWEN
You said, before your story. You said it was about nearly losing all
your money.
RODNEY
Huh. I did, didn't I.
Another long beat.
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 2:39 PM, March 13, 2007
Look into my eyes: Hal Brooks
Welcome to a new weekly feature (well, it will be weekly if a few more directors get back to me), in which we ask directors what they would stage if time, money, availability, and rights were not considerations.
Our first respondent is the mesmerizing (see pic) Hal Brooks who most recently directed directed No Child...by Nilaja Sun, now playing at the Barrow Street Theatre, which just won Best One-Person Show at HBO's Comedy Fest. He also directed Pulitzer Finalist Thom Pain (based on nothing) by Will Eno. Other credits: Rinne Groff's What Then (Clubbed Thumb); Don DeLillo's Valparaiso; Will Eno's The Flu Season (Oppy winner), Sharr White's Six Years (Humana Festival).
If left to his own devices, Brooks would choose...
"I'd love to stage the American (World?) premiere of Beckett's other first play, Eleutheria. I think there was once a reading of it at NYTW - and Paul Giamatti was in that. The play has been tied up in litigation for years. The story goes that Beckett's wife Suzanne shopped both Godot and Eleutheria around equally, but that the guy who eventually produced Godot - and didn't really get it - preferred the tree-as-set and five actors of Godot to Eleutheria's 18 characters and massive set.
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 2:37 PM, March 13, 2007
It's been brought to my attention that both Loretta Greco and Julie Crosby boasted the title of Producing Artistic Director. I had suggested Greco had been designated simply Artistic Director. Apologies!
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 2:22 PM, March 13, 2007
Costume Budget? Low.
On April 30th, judges and audience members who have purchased $100-$500 tickets can vote for Mr. Broadway. Actors from Broadway shows will compete in talent, interview, and yes (yes!), swimsuit competitions. Original songs will also feature. The evening will benefit the Ali Forney Center, which provides shelter for LGBT youth.
Is Simon Russell Beale (now in the London Spamalot cast) still eligible? He's my pick.
Yours?
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 2:13 PM, March 13, 2007
Greetings from Florida
Just back from quickie getaway, in what I understand is called the sunshine state. Sunshine was plentiful as was wildlife. Tried to make friends with peacocks, egrets, lizards, geese, grackles, and a couple of alligators. The animals were not amenable, though I feel my boyfriend's interventions meant the alligators and I really didn't have enough of a chance.
I love animals (my pet rabbit most of all) and would like to echo a call Juliana Francis made in an article on New Year's Resolutions for theater, in which she requested more plays with animals featuring actual animals (as opposed to Sarah Jessica Parker playing one). Here, here!
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 3:34 PM, March 8, 2007
Taking it on the chin: Martin Crimp
A weekly compendium of the articles what I read and enjoyed:
Edward Albee may be afraid of Virginia Woolf, but, on the occasion of the play's revival, he isn't afraid to speak candidly to the L.A. Weekly about playwrights, critics, and the theatrical milieu.
The Guardian's theater coverage continues to thrill. This week features an interview with the misanthropic Mr. Crimp, who will soon enjoy a revival of his play Attempts on Her Life (New York audiences saw this play some years ago at Soho Rep). Playwright Mark Ravenhill offers an essay on whether or not artists are apt judges of their own work.
The New York Times strips off for the Harry-Potter-naked fray. The article restates earlier British material, but does feature the quotation, from an adolescent filly, "We’re all kind of freaked out about seeing his — well, him naked.” Hear, hear
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 2:55 PM, March 8, 2007
The Cat Came Back, and so Will I
Well, I didn't make it to 8 plays last week. My Four Hour Tax Appointment (don't ask) meant that I missed Tom Bradshaw's twinned one acts at the Brick. And when I fell asleep on the subway (twice) on Tuesday, I realized I was in no fit shape to attend the TEAM's Particularly in the Heartland. Apologies all around.
I was pushing myself as I'm taking a long weekend in Florida (alligators, here I come) and was trying to put in some anticipatory overtime. I'll be back late Monday night, ready to blog again. And as soon as I'm back, I'll be seeing King Hedley II at the Signature and Sibyl Kempson's Crime or Emergency at Dixon Place.
See you soon!
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 5:37 PM, March 7, 2007
Miracle Sister: Kirsten Childs
Ladies and gentlemen, please meet the remarkable Ms. Kirsten Childs. In addition to penning the musicals, The Bubbly Black Girl Sheds Her Chameleon Skin and Miracle Brothers, she’s also an accomplished actress, having worked on film and Broadway. She was kind enough to answer a few questions.
Name:
Kirsten Childs
Title:
Musical Theater Writer
How you became involved in the theater:
I was a modern dancer hired by a choreographer who for months wouldn't let me dance in his dance concerts because he said I wasn't ready and yes, it begs the question so why the hell did he hire me, but moving on, I learned about an open call audition for a touring Broadway show and bogarded my way into a chorus part. And proceeded to learn about the history of theater from some of the most knowledgeable and fun and out of their minds theater history professors in the world - chorines and chorus boys.
What makes a piece of theater extraordinary:
the ability to elicit:
a collective audience gasp
recognition
a moment of blinding clarity
unashamed and uncontrollable weeping, especially from folks not prone to sentiment
uncontrollable laughter
What shows from the past several years have stayed with you:
Take Me Out, I Am My Own Wife, The Long Christmas Ride Home, Eli's Comin', Intimate Apparel, Where Do We Live?, 9 Parts Of Desire, Syringa Tree, Dessa Rose, Breath, Boom, Doubt
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 5:27 PM, March 7, 2007
Am I Blue? The Attic
This week Michael Feingold goes our of the past, revisiting three plays form the World War One era. Feingold sees echoes of our current conflicts in the art of earlier generations. He surrenders to R.C. Sheffield’s Journey’s End, its revival directed by David Grindley. He has wispier praise for the J.M. Barrie ghost story Mary Rose and a revival of Harley Granville Barker’s The Madras House at the Mint.
In the Sightlines section, John Beer squeezes into Yoji Sakate’s The Attic, pronouncing it “witty, bizarre, and intensely moving.” Katie Baker investigates The Girl Detective, a stage adaptation of Kelly link’s short story, with excellent results. Arrivals, a play discussing government encroachment on civil liberties, encroaches on Andy Propst’s time.
I took in two plays featuring girls gone not exactly wild, but certainly somewhat astray. Julian Sheppard’s Los Angeles is a star map to ingénue Audrey’s psyche. In Anna Ziegler’s BFF, a young woman finds herself borne back ceaselessly, and somewhat shallowly, into the past.
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 8:21 PM, March 6, 2007
Sash and burn
Following the exit of artistic director Loretta Greco, the Women's Project has announced a new artistic director. Sort of. Producer Julie Crosby has been named the "Producing Artistic Director." Crosby has an impressive pedigree. She's produced everything from the Fringe to Broadway and earned her Ph.D. in medieval drama, where she occasionally teaches. Obviously we're champions of Columbia academics who work in the theater (Yo, represent!), but the naming of Crosby does somewhat give us pause. Even if we didn't love all of Greco's productions, we admired the thrilling and demanding female playwrights she chose to produce: Neena Beber, RInne Groff, Lisa D'Amour. Nice! Crosby's resume is a little blander: On Golden Pond, Eve Ensler's A Good Body, Skitch Henderson's New Faces of ’04. (She's produced Laurie Anderson, too.)
The Women's Project seems to be making a statement in hiring a producer rather than a director, dramaturg, or playwright. Crosby's initial choices are interesting, but they do indicate a move away form script-based drama. Upcoming works include Lear Debessonet's transFigures, about people acting peculiar in the holy land, and the site-specific Girls Just Want to Have Funds. They sound fun, but the talented Debessonet's more impressive as a director than a playwright and the site-specific projects tend to de-emphasize the literary.
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 8:11 PM, March 6, 2007
The Importance of Being Urn-est
There's an article in today's New York Times about using Sophocles's Philoctetes as a teaching tool for medical students. Apparently they've found that the play's depictions of illness and the reactions of friends and family to the sick person are psychologically accurate today. Marvelous, no?
I've long loved this play both as an academic and as a critic (sort of like those Frosted Mini-Wheats commercials, the grown-up loves the ethical and social implications while the kid in me loves the emotional content!). More recently we've been treated to Seamus Heaney's The Cure at Troy, a most eloquent update, but I think it's time for a restaging of the Sophocles original. Takers?
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 7:36 PM, March 6, 2007
Erin Courtney: Demon Babe (courtesy Peter Bellamy)
Our series highlighting unproduced plays by favorite playwrights, currently featuring the fly scribes of 13Pmarches resolutely onward. This week we feature the lovely Erin Courtney, whom we occasionally run into at the dry cleaners. Erin teaches playwriting at Brooklyn College and has graced New York with many plays, often produced by Clubbed Thumb, including Demon Baby, Pricked, Summer Play, and Downwinders.
Erin offers us an untitled play, from a series she did in 1993 where she challenged herself to write a play every day during the month of August, essentially 1/12th of Suzan-Lori Parks's current project. Erin explains, "The first day I wrote a play called "The Death of Smiley Face". In the middle there are plays about Mickey Mouse with bloody stumps for hands and Minnie Mouse as some kind of Ophelia, Elmer Fudd and Lana Turner in a foxhole together waiting for the war to end and reminiscing about their favorite luxuries like "Cleaning up", "Killing for sport", and "Hot Soup on cold days". The
last day's play is untitled but here it is:"
August 29. 1993
The woman gets up from the wood floor. She is suffering from writer's block or from lack of concentration. On the day of August 29th 1993 she is unable to think of one thing. A man made out of cardboard boxes enters. He chases the woman around the stage.
Boxman: Wanna play trivial pursuit?
Woman: NO!
Boxman takes out a small shaving razor. He starts making small cuts on the woman's forehead. She pushes boxman away and he mutates into a bizarre virus that is shaped like a snowflake.
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 1:55 PM, March 5, 2007
Because she's worth it.
Well at any rate call me frivolous. Watching Courtney Baron's A Very Common Procedure. I found myself most intrigued not by the nuances of the script or the skill of the performances (and they were skilled), but by Lynn Collins's hair. It's stunning. layered, lustrous, this shade of red I'd kill for. If anyone has information on her colorist, do share it!
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 1:47 PM, March 5, 2007
It's all about the Hamiltons.
I have a map in my head of all the theaters I frequently attend and the cafes nearby that will sell me a pre-theater meal, preferably a passably healthy one, foe less than $10. No one wants a "hangry" theater critic (thanks to [title of show] for the neologism). If I'm at Theater Row there's Better Burger; if at the Lucille Lortel, there's Mama Buddha; if I'm at P.S.122 there's Veselka or Momofoku Ssam; at the Flea is Nha Trang. I think I'm stuck in a rut, albeit a nutritious one. Am very willing to entertain suggestions. Your favorites? Also, anyone have a good pick near 59E59?
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 6:11 PM, March 2, 2007
Admittedly, he is a bit funny-looking here.
The Articles What I Read, a weekly compendium of reviews, features, and interviews that I've enjoyed:
In the Sun, Kate Ryan shines light on the problem of theaters who offering readings and workshops of new plays, rather than choosing to produce them. Several members of 13P, the generous contributors to our “Play in the Drawer” series, are quoted. In the article Anne Washburn comments, "Even if the play is imperfect, you need to see it up," a playwright and member of 13P, Anne Washburn, said. "You need to see it in front of an audience, and then you need to write the next one."
I love pieces that explore the materiality of theater buildings, so I delighted in Michael Billington’s appraisal of the Stratford’s Royal Shakespeare Theater, which is due to close for a three-year renovation process. Billington covers the theaters 75-year history, from its architectural detailings to the production it housed.
Also in the Guardian, director Nicholas Hytner frets that rising Olympic costs could mean and end to arts subsidies And Billington also offers (where does he find the time?) an analysis of revived interest in Harold Pinter.
In New York Magazine, lucky, lucky Boris Kachka sits down with Liev Schreiber as the latter rehearses Talk Radio. As I did not write the article, moony-eyed descriptions of Schreiber’s handsomeness are alas few. Indeed, he’s described as “funny-looking.” We should all be so funny looking.
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 5:17 PM, March 1, 2007
The Team: Making a splash
I rested a bit last weekend, a movie, dinner, with friends, an Oscar party (well, two) and that's left me scrambling to see theater this week. Tonight I see to A Very Common Procedure, tomorrow it's The Attic. Saturday, if my tax appointment hasn't left me catatonic, it's Thomas Bradshaw's double-feature at the Brick and Dying City. Sunday I take a trip to My Trip to Al Qaeda. Monday I'm off (hurray), Tuesday I'm off to Particularly in the Heartland, and Wednesday to Defender of the Faith.
Then it's a long weekend in Florida for some much needed rest and playtime with the alligators. Although I've been warned I may not like their games.
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 4:53 PM, March 1, 2007
Death to critics!
This week, in the Village Voice theater section:
Michael Feingold responds to Charles Isherwood's boredom with The Coast of Utopia and offers some concluding remarks on the whole of the Stoppard trilogy. Feingold charges, "[Stoppard's] passion for ideas itself starts to seem an evasion."
I conflated Sam Marks's Nelson, an ambitious drama about a talent agency employee, to Marc Spitz's Your Face Is a Mess, an unambitious but sunny entertainment in which a drug dealer attempts to reform.
In the Sightlines section, David Ng did battle with The Jaded Assassin, John Beer observed A Very Common Procedure, and Andy Propst commits himself warily to Marat/Sade.
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 4:33 PM, March 1, 2007
Are you sitting down for this?
Welcome, once again to our online meet-and-greet with the guest judges for the 2007 OBIE committee. I'm delighted to introduce Ain Gordon, the distractingly handsome writer, director, and actor who recently received an OBIE award for Wally's Ghost. Other works as a writer director include Punch and Judy Get Divorced and The Family Business. He's currently featured in Spalding Gray: Stories Left to Tell.
Name: Ain Gordon
Title/Position: Writer/Director
How did You become involved with the theater: I was born into the downtown dance world but I didn't want to dance. My father also loved words (inveterate scrabble and crossword player) as did his father (champion jumble player of the world and composer of humorous holiday poems). When my father began to incorporate his writing into his dancing, I ran off with the words.
What do you think makes a piece of theater extraordinary: I hope I can never answer this question. "Extraordinary" must be constantly redefined or it becomes ordinary. As an audience member, I am thrilled to be in sure and rigorous artistic hands - regardless of my personal taste.
What are some plays or performance pieces from the past several years that have remained with you, that are favorites: I am always stumped by this question. I can remember what art changed my life 20 years ago better than I can remember last year. Ask me in 2027 about this past few years.
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 12:36 AM, March 1, 2007
The Elephant in the Room: Ms. Miller requested we use this as an author photo. We oblige.
Our series, in which we ask favorite playwrights to offer us scenes form unproduced plays, proudly continues. This week's scribe is the lovely Winter Miller, a 13P member, Miller's plays include THE PENETRATION PLAY (produced by 13P, 2004); CAKE AND ICE CREAM; GREETINGS FROM VIETNAM, WISH YOU WERE HERE; and a series of short plays, including DARFUR, SUDAN and PARTYLINES (Ignite Festival, Synapse 2006). Miller was awarded The Guthrie Theater and Playwrights' Center's Two-Headed Challenge 2006. She was a 2003 O'Neill Finalist.
What follows is an excerpt from her musical in progress SOMETHING’S WRONG WITH AMANDINE. Set in 1830’s France, the story, told in three acts. Miller adds, "For those who read Foucault (it’s okay, no one’s watching you read this), Amandine’s roots are found in the based-on-a-true-story of Herculine Barbin." In this scene, Amandine, a young teacher, has a stomach pain so terrible she is compelled to see the doctor.
DOCTOR
Breathe.
AMANDINE
I am.
DOCTOR
In, and out. In and out.
AMANDINE inhales and exhales.
DOCTOR (cont’d)
Raise your arms. Lower them. Raise. Lower. Whistle.
AMANDINE
I can’t.
DOCTOR
Stand on one leg.
AMANDINE does a lovely arabesque. The DOCTOR makes notes.
DoCTOR (cont’d)
How old are you?
AMANDINE
Twenty one.
DOCTOR
When did you begin menstruation?
AMANDINE
I don’t know.
DOCTOR
How often do you?
AMANDINE
Do I what?
DOCTOR
Menstruate!
AMANDINE
I don’t know.
DOCTOR
Your stomach is concave, like a young man’s. Does this hurt?
The DOCTOR pokes AMANDINE in the stomach several times.
AMANDINE
No.
DOCTOR
Remove your robe.
AMANDINE
I musn’t! I’ve changed my mind. I feel fine!
DOCTOR
You must. I can’t guess what’s under there.
AMANDINE removes her robe and stands in her underclothes. The DOCTOR circles her, humming and clucking to himself.
AMANDINE
Is it my arms?
DOCTOR
Let me see. Peculiarly hairy.
The DOCTOR makes a note.
DOCTOR (cont’d)
Have you engaged in carnal relations with a man?
AMANDINE
Gasp!
DOCTOR
Did he do this to you?
The DOCTOR reaches for her breast.
DOCTOR (cont’d)
What lovely, tiny, pink nipples you have.
The DOCTOR makes a note. He reaches for AMANDINE’s drawers.
AMANDINE
No!
DOCTOR
That’s what you should have said to him.
AMANDINE
There was no him!
The DOCTOR thrusts his hand down AMANDINE’S drawers.
AmANDINE (cont’d)
Gasp!
DOCTOR
What have we here?
AMANDINE
Am I ill?
THE DOCTOR clucks. And inspects.
DOCTOR
Hmmmmm. Something must be done.
Removing his hand from her groin, he slaps AMANDINE across the face.
DOCTOR (cont’d)
Monstrous! What chicanery.
AmANDINE
But I--
DOCTOR
Thought you could fool the Doctor, eh?
AMANDINE
No!
The DOCTOR puts his face up close to AMANDINE’S.
DOCTOR
You can’t fool a man with this sort of deviant behavior. Madame et mademoiselles, entrez-vous. I regret to inform you, you have been taken in, duped.
2ND TEACHER
Heavens!
1ST TEACHER
What do you mean?
AmANDINE
I didn’t mean to!
2ND TEACHER
God help us!
AMANDINE
I’m going to be ill!
DOCTOR
Hoodwinked. Pulled the wool over. Betrayed. Bamboozled. A most disgusting, and might I add, pitiful--display of femininity.
2ND TEACHER
She was our prized teacher. I don’t understand--
AMANDINE faints, landing in 1ST TEACHER’S arms.
2nd TEACHER (cont’d)
Oh!
She drops AMANDINE to the floor where she remains.
2nd TEACHER (cont’d)
Oh!
DOCTOR
That is not a she.
2ND TEACHER
Pardon?
DOCTOR
That. Is. A. He.
1ST TEACHER
Scandalous!
2ND TEACHER
She looks the same as yesterday!
DOCTOR
Silence! I’m thinking. It’s obvious he needs a name and a vocation. Hmmmm.
A placard with the name Gaston drops from above.
DoCTOR (cont’d)
Gaston. He looks like a Gaston. But what can he do?
A placard with the word ditchdigger drops from above.
DOCTOR (cont’d)
He will be a ditchdigger. But where will he go?
A placard with Paris! drops from above.
DOCTOR (cont’d)
Off to Paris he’ll go!
2ND TEACHER
Will there be a scandal?
1ST TEACHER
What do we do with... it?
DOCTOR
Leave it to me, I’m the doctor.
2ND TEACHER
Bless you. Lord bless us all.
1ST TEACHER
Forgive us Father, for the sinner among us.
1st and 2nd teacher
Keep us safe from harm, protected from evil, and safe from deception.
Teachers and DOCTOR
Amen.
MOTHER SUPERIOR draws the curtain to the examination room.
MoTHER SUPERIOR
(sings)
HOODWINKED!
BETRAYED!
BAMBOOZLED!
PULLED THE WOOL OVER!
THERE IS NO SCANDAL
NOT EVER,
AT L’ACADEMIE DU
SAINT THOMAS AQUINAS!
MOTHER SUPERIOR steps out from behind the curtain, composed.
MoTHER SUPERIOR (cont’d)
Bless Amandine, bless us all.
Teachers 1, 2
Bless Amandine, bless us all.
1ST TEACHER
I was near vomiting.
2ND TEACHER
I feel
1ST TEACHER
Ill.
2ND TEACHER
No. Shame. Take this bowl, wash from me my sin, cleanse me.
MoTHER SUPERIOR
I once loved Amandine as one loves a child.
1ST TEACHER
I suppose it explains her curiosity.
MoTHER SUPERIOR
Intellectual curiosity.
1ST TEACHER
Yes of course! Such an intellectual nature, so aggressive in its pursuit of... facts.
MOTHER SUPERIOR
I will retire. I’ll send for tea.
MOTHER SUPERIOR retires.
1ST TEACHER
Intellectual curiosity my foot.
2ND TEACHER
I feel small and irrelevant.
1ST TEACHER
Did you love the boy yourself?
2ND TEACHER
No but--
1ST TEACHER
Grant your pity to the weak and poor, not the liars and perverts.
2ND TEACHER
Is she a liar if she never knew the truth?
1ST TEACHER
He knew. He kept it hidden. He never swam.
2ND TEACHER
She only undressed in the toilet.
1ST TEACHER
I shudder to think...
2ND TEACHER
What exactly is it that we saw?
1ST TEACHER
How do you mean?
2ND TEACHER
His... appearance?
1ST TEACHER
The genitalia?
2ND TEACHER
Was it misshapen?
1ST TEACHER
I suspect.
2ND TEACHER
I wouldn’t know, is all--
1ST TEACHER
Are you suggesting I would?
2ND TEACHER
No! I meant that, well IT seemed small.
1ST TEACHER
There are different sizes.
2ND TEACHER
I think I mean harmless? Perhaps?
1ST TEACHER
Genitals, in and of themselves, are harmful. It’s a fact that men, outside of the clergy have uncontrollable--
2ND TEACHER
What? Uncontrollable what?
1ST TEACHER
Urges.
2ND TEACHER
I am at a loss. I would like an egg. Maybe with toast. This is all very unsettling to the digestive system.
1ST TEACHER
The lies... Perhaps Amandine is not the only one in need of an examination. If a carnal sin were--
2ND TEACHER
I’m feverish!
1ST TEACHER
Time will tell. It would be scandalous for l’Academie.
2ND TEACHER
My forehead is warm. I will lie down until dinner. I may send for an egg to be poached.
Posted by Alexis Soloski at 12:26 AM, March 1, 2007
Greco-Roman gods are lovely, but we meant the other Apollo
On Monday the 12th, the Village Voice is hosting an Offstage Voice party at the Apollo Theater, a tippling and networking event where theater types can hobnob with Voice types including Editor-in-Chief David Blum and my own wonderful editor, Joy Press. You would be hobnobbing with me, too, but alas before the date was announced I had long since bought a ticket to Florida where I will be hobnobbing with my eventual in-laws, lots of alligators, and a mojito--a large one. But even without me, it should be a fun event. I've attended several and have enjoyed the drink tickets and conversation equally well. And often there are snacks!
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