Restraint and Refrains

The grim masochism squeezing at the heart of brothers Allen and Wallace Shawn's delicate new musical, The Music Teacher, first appears to be nothing more insidious than a bit of urbane self-deprecation. After a brief, filmed montage of snow-covered groves and teenagers lounging in idyllic fields—all blurred just enough to indicate that we will be watching a memory play—the fifty-something Mr. Smith (the wonderful Mark Blum) casually settles into his spot before the audience. "There are a lot of people in this world about whom you can honestly say that it just doesn't matter if they're alive or dead," he tells us. The otherwise caustic comment is endearing for what comes next: Smith, the titular music teacher, admits without rancor that he considers himself one of them.

Wallace, playing writer to Allen's composer, frames the piece as a wistful reminiscence. Yet, even before we're properly situated in the memories Smith will be exploring—his stint, 20 years past, as a music instructor at a small, rural liberal arts boarding school—we are aware that there was a schism in his life and that we are looking with him backward across the fissure. And as with any such retrospection, hindsight reveals that the tendrils of misfortune reach further back than expected, into moments that seemed entirely innocuous at the time.

For Smith, it's the occasions he spent teasing, and being teased by, his teenage students. "So are you girls planning on going swimming today?" he asks in the first scene. To which one female pupil gently mocks, "Oh—why do you ask that? Do you want to come too, Mr. Smith?" "Yes, well—what I might like to do and what I'm going to do are two entirely different things," he responds. Self-restraint, we find, is no different than any other indulgence: it is best taken in moderation. Smith suffers from an excess. And this conflict—what is desired versus what is attempted—quickly becomes a refrain, both spoken and unspoken. Later, as part of the miniature, wonderfully scored opera occupying the middle of the piece, it will be sung.

This mini-opera, in fact, is both the story's fulcrum and its masterstroke. Pushed into composing it by his two favorite students, Jane and Jim (Kathryn Skemp and Ross Benoliel at the performance I attended), Smith finds that he focused like a laser on its completion. After its performance, in which Smith, Jim, and Jane—who is also the librettist—play the leads, every ounce of energy the teacher has worked to suppress is released into his life like an atom bomb. Jane, whose older self (Kellie Overbey) describes her role in the aftermath with beautiful simplicity, is especially devastated by what follows.

The power of The Music Teacher isn't immediately obvious. The piece gives us a before-and-after view of a man's life by walking us over the bridge between the two. But Teacher never goes so far as to give that bridge a name. An audience member is left, instead, to compare one end of the journey to the other and draw his or her own conclusions.

I, for one, appreciate the courtesy. Wallace, no stranger to the war zone of sexual torment (his Marie and Bruce and A Thought in Three Parts spring to mind), is lyrical without being florid. Allen, himself a music professor at a rural, liberal arts institution, is gifted both technically and as a stylist—note the difference between the rhythmic, almost Stravinskian melodies of the "musical theater" songs and the markedly (sometimes satirically) Verdian sweep of the operatic score. Neither brother says more than is needed. Their restraint, unlike their poor protagonist's, is healthy.

The only times Teacher falls flat are the few instances when the two authors fail to support a given moment with an appropriate theatrical convention. A modern overcoat and an English breakfast setting are brought into the Grecian courtyard of Smith and Jane's magnum opus. (I must note here that the set, which transforms smoothly from numerous school settings into an ancient garden and back again, is a great credit to designer Tom Cairns.) While such anachronisms are admittedly amusing—an older couple behind me seemed near diaphragmatic distress—one needn't be an opera scholar to realize that they would quickly earn a teacherly veto.

Musically, the only nonstarter is an ostensibly seductive nightclub number—an oddity for a composer so comfortable with style. Allen is unwilling or, I suggest less confidently, unable to move away from the rhythmic and harmonic complexity that is his home ground. Crooning requires a certain structural and melodic simplicity. Without this, the warm bedroom eyes of the seducer turn into the cool appraisal of the collector.

This, not coincidentally, is what Smith lists as his secondary profession. He doesn't collect anything that can be put under lock and key, though. Rather, he is a collector "of experiences…of beauty." While running his riches through his fingers one lonely night, he adds, "I had kept my life a secret because I wanted no one to be hurt by me, and I had harmed no one." But, in fact, it is Smith who has been hurt. And, when we stop to reflect on it, we have been too.

One Hot Night

The trio of characters who make up Adam Rapp's scabrous new drama, Red Light Winter, are a cruel, cunning bunch, and while they are all guilty of using sex as weapon, the only people these masochists end up hurting are themselves. In fact, misery riddles the Barrow Street Theater, where Winter is playing. Matt (Christopher Denham), a depressed playwright, is vacationing with his former college roommate and apparent best friend, Davis (Gary Wilmes), in Amsterdam's red light district. After Matt survives at the play's beginning an abortive suicide attempt by hanging, the cockier Davis arrives. But he is not alone. He has brought a French prostitute, Christina (Lisa Joyce), from a local club—not for his own purposes, we eventually learn, but as a gift for Matt.

It turns out that Matt has been in a funk for three years, ever since his girlfriend Sarah broke up with him, leaving him for Davis. The Davis-Matt relationship is the central one in writer/director Rapp's play, but also the one least explored. Why are these two 30-year-olds, with different upbringings and temperaments, still good friends? If Davis has betrayed Matt, why is he Matt's lone confidant?

Christina, it turns out, has her own mysteries, many of which also remain unanswered. She and Matt do tryst while in Amsterdam, but when the action returns to Matt's home in the East Village (kudos to Todd Rosenthal's convincingly claustrophobic set design) and the characters reunite, it turns out she is a very different woman from what the audience originally thought her to be. She emerges as somewhat more of a victim, yet she continues to be an enigma.

Rapp's disappointing plot is less important than his characters, particularly his male ones. Davis calls to mind fellow playwright Neil LaBute's work. Wilmes understands Davis—a misogynist, a man to whom everything has been handed and for whom everything has worked out, and someone who knows no boundaries but looks for new ones to push—and never seeks sympathy in his portrayal. As a result, we never grasp Davis's motivations—for instance, does proffering sex to Matt really assuage his guilt?—but we believe him.

Christina is a bigger muddle, and it is not clear that Rapp knows exactly what he wants to make of her. At times, she appears manipulative, while at others, she's merely wounded. Joyce does the best she can to navigate this self-destructive character.

As Matt, however, Denham gives one of the more astounding performances of the season. Matt is a complicated man, both wise and socially naïve, a linguist (Rapp's attention to the details of language through Matt, a stickler for correct word usage, is one of the play's highlights) and a playwright who carries an enormous amount of weight and worry with him onstage. (Given Denham's intensity during the curtain call, perhaps that weight lingers with the actor.) Many people, exemplified by Christina and Davis, have lives that intersect with others but never pay any attention to the people they encounter in passing; Matt, on the other hand, remembers everything, which is both a blessing and a curse.

But one wishes that all these lessons amounted to something more than the basic notion that young people use sexual encounters to fill emotional voids. That's a little elementary for a show that portrays attempted suicide, simulated sex, and drug use. Why, for instance, does Christina, who has had many Johns, fixate on Davis? We never really learn, and as a result, Winter loses whatever gravitas was built up during the first act. What it all comes down to is that if this one night in Amsterdam was so pivotal for these characters, they must all lead pretty boring lives.

She-Hamlet

Amid the decaying opulence of the Brooklyn Academy of Music's Harvey Theater, there's trouble afoot, and her name is Hedda. In her much-anticipated American stage debut, Cate Blanchett gives a taut, intelligent, and revelatory performance as Ibsen's infamous anti-heroine. A renowned film actress (she won an Academy Award just last year for her portrayal of Katharine Hepburn in The Aviator), Blanchett originally got her start on the stage, and to watch her in this medium is to watch a performer who seems to have truly come home. In presenting the U.S. premiere of the Sydney Theater Company's award-winning Hedda Gabler, BAM has scored a coup de théâtre, wisely retaining all of the production's prime elements, from Andrew Upton's lively, smart adaptation to Kristian Fredrikson's sleek, sumptuous costumes. Under Robyn Nevin's evocative direction, this Hedda Gabler crackles with intensity and suspense. From the first dramatic moment when the lights go down (just quickly and unexpectedly enough to make you catch your breath), this highly visceral production will make you feel relieved to be watching from the relative safety of your seat.

The daughter of a respected general, Hedda has just returned to her new home from a six-month honeymoon with her husband, Jorgen Tesman (Anthony Weigh). The couple is clearly mismatched (shirking romantic whimsy, Hedda describes their union as "a match made on earth"), and she is openly bored by Tesman's uninspired academic ambitions. When her old acquaintance Thea Elvsted (Justine Clarke) bursts in with a frantic plea, Hedda begins to manipulate the lives of those around her—including a former love interest and a family friend—to tragic ends.

Hedda is often described as the female Hamlet—a role so filled with ambiguities and questionable motives that it requires an accomplished performer adept enough to negotiate its flimsy boundaries. Ibsen's writing is clear but spare, leaving much open to the interpretation of actor and director. In other words, it begs for the signature of a consummate actress.

Blanchett rises to the task and fully surpasses it with a superbly defined performance. Her Hedda is intelligent, cunning, and athletic—as she prowls the set, her fluid movements can never be counted on to follow a predictable pattern. Through the overt use of bars and a wall of jail-like windowpanes, set designer Fiona Crombie suggests Hedda's entrapment. But even as she lashes out with jealousy against her perceived captors, Blanchett disarmingly conveys the extent to which Hedda holds herself captive.

Discovering "what it's like to have control over someone's life," Blanchett uses her deep, husky voice to full advantage, infusing Ibsen's text with a multitude of colors and textures. "I get this urge," she moans, looking as if she'd rather be anywhere than laced into her high-necked gown. Urges and all, though, Hedda lives more through the lives of others rather than for herself. When Thea confides that she has run away from an unhappy domestic life, Hedda incredulously—and somewhat greedily—confirms, "You'd risk everything." Here, Hedda seems to speak to herself, faulting her own cowardice and a terror of scandal that paralyzes her. Like the colorful new furniture that Tesman requires Hedda to protect with muted covers, Blanchett's Hedda is stifled beneath a protective veneer of her own making.

Composer Alan John's music offers a powerful, supplemental rendering of Hedda's imprisonment. Reminiscent of a frenetic funeral dirge, the music employs pounding timpani and maddeningly plucked strings to reflect a state of inner chaos.

As Hedda's confidant, the gallant-turned-ghastly Judge Brack, Hugo Weaving gives a marvelously controlled performance as he admirably convinces the audience of his (questionably) good intentions. Clarke delicately brings forth the shrewdness of the ostensibly flighty and impressionable Thea, while admirably holding her own opposite Blanchett.

Weigh comes on a bit strong as Tesman (perhaps overselling his eccentric posturing), but his boyish energy successfully foils Hedda's sarcasm, often rendering him a spoiled and rather simple child. Aden Young makes a strong impression as the brooding author Ejlert Lovborg.

The answers to many of the play's questions are not self-evident (for example, why does Hedda marry Tesman in the first place?), and in the steady hands of the Sydney Theater Company—grounded by the even steadier presence of Blanchett—this Hedda Gabler makes a powerful statement about the importance of making choices for oneself, as well as the perils of inaction. And whether she makes you laugh, flinch, or shudder, Blanchett won't allow you to look away.

Theater as Language: The Foreman-Artaud Connection

What do an oversized mallet, a rat in a spacesuit, and a 1930's French madman have to do with one another? Read on for the answer. Or rather, don't read the words, read the signs.

It is rather easy to make the connection between contemporary avant-garde American writer and director Richard Foreman and 1930's French drama theorist/actor/occasional lunatic Antonin Artaud. Foreman is one of the most Artaudian playwrights working on Off-Off-Broadway today.

Both are well known for zany productions that are heavy on theatrics and light on characterization, with more emphasis on mise-en-scène than on text and dialogue. They are both concerned with contemporary issues, and both are associated with work that is difficult to approach: there is little "plot" that is determined by recognizable characters. They are both generally popular with an elite theater crowd and are largely unknown to the general public. What is not often explores is Artuad and Foreman's connection through the labyrinthine social science of semiotics.

Semiotics, the study of signs, was first popularized by Ferdinand de Saussure. At the turn of the century, while teaching a course in linguistics in Geneva, he proposed a radical new way to study language. Instead of studying where words come from or a history of language (diachronic study), Saussure suggested a study of the relationships of words in language at the moment (synchronic study).

In doing so, he developed a new way of looking at the sign. Roughly speaking, it's about phenomena and their meaning. As any introductory linguistics course will teach you, Saussure talked about the difference between the signifier (or the sound-word) and the signified (the mental "concept"). For example, I say "playwright" (signifier) and you think "Shakespeare" (signified).

This field of study had a profound effect on the way 20th-century thinkers in various fields began looking at things, including those working in theater. Artaud, in his seminal work The Theater and Its Double, called for a "theater of cruelty" that, among other things, favors a play's theatrical elements (sight, sound, space, costuming-all referred to as mise-en-scène) over the text and dialogue. In addition, these theatrical elements, Artaud wrote, create a language of theater that is entirely its own.

This theatrical language stemmed from Artaud's reading of Saussure. Artaud proposed a semiotics of theater that deals largely with non-textual theatrical elements: lights, staging, costuming, effects, pantomime, and motion. This new language would avoid the confusion between theater and text. In The Theater and Its Double, Artaud wrote, "If confusion is the sign of the times, I see at the root of this confusion a rupt

In a 2002 interview in The Drama Review, Foreman acknowledged the influence semiotics had on him. Speaking of a quintessential semiotician, he said, "When I started writing theater, I was under the influence of people like [Roland] Barthes."

At the Brick Theater's recent production of Foreman's Symphony of Rats, that semiotic influence was palpable. Foreman's work is a theater of lights, action, and movement.Don't look for character development.Look for ominous puppets/actors, like the ghastly 

"crippled rat" that rises out of a wheelchair and extends grotesquely long arms that seem to reach across the entire stage. Look also for props that serve to drive the plot and take on the substance and weight that most theater gives to the characters.

One of those props, a spaceman/rat, becomes an intrinsic force throughout the play. In the beginning, it represents a thing of desire and envy to the main character, the president of the United States. The spaceman/rat has been to the nether regions of space and is now a national hero with whom the president wants to be affiliated. By the end of the play, the spaceman/rat has become a thing of terror, a hideous rat whose hollow promise is revealed. The rat, which was once what the president most wanted, turns into what he most fears.

This use of terror, invoked in both the characters and the audience, is an underlying element of Artaud's theater of cruelty. It is one of the forces that drive his proposed new language of theater, which is based not on conventional characterization but on an older form of ritual theater that originated in Greek tragedy. 

This terror is appropriately evoked through the theatrical elements of sight, sound, and staging. The dialogue is almost insignificant, which can be a problem. A friend who went with me to Symphony of Rats (and has written extensively on Foreman himself) noted that it would "be fun" to "turn the volume down" on the dialogue and "write your own," since what is important is not the lines but the spectacle. At one point, one of the characters sprayed the audience with copious amounts of perfume. Here, as in Artaud, the language of theater is specifically theatric and not in the words.

Take it as a sign of the times.

Richard Foreman's ZOMBOID! Film/Performance Project #1 is playing at the Ontological-Hysteric Theater (founded by Foreman) through April 9.

Born Again

What would you do if you woke up naked and alone inside the belly of a cow? Jason Pizzarello's InsideOut—a 45-minute multimedia performance that dramatizes the answer to that question—is a whimsical take on the agony of the human condition. Artists from Beckett to the Beatles have long attempted to depict the frustrating absurdity of not knowing why we are here or where we're going, but as far as I know, none have done so like this. While InsideOut doesn't break new ground on the topics of loneliness and insecurity, it does manage to represent the same old struggles in a fairly novel way.

A young man wakes up gasping for air. We see portions of his naked, blood-doused body projected in extreme close-up on a translucent screen. The eye of the camera blinks at random, and for a few moments the man is only an eye and then a gaping mouth and then an entire face. The camera pans out finally and continues to train its eye on him from different angles; as we watch him, we too are disoriented, trying to make a coherent picture of this man and his surroundings. He is scared and seemingly alone.

And then, from nowhere, a voice answers his, and he is no longer alone. A woman, it seems, shares his predicament and calls out to him from another space. Her picture, as tightly focused as his, appears on the screen. We can see them both, huddled meekly in their spaces, though they cannot see each other. Their conversation flitters from the logical and speculative to the hysterical and hopeless. They are in no way connected to themselves or to each other except that they search for answers to questions they don't fully know.

The woman is variously crafty, playful, and vindictive; she seems at times to be unwilling to help the frightened man. She is more accustomed to her surroundings, but cannot (or will not) answer all the questions he has for her. As we follow their conversation, we learn bits and pieces of their history, their relationship to each other. He is Harold, and she is Dana. They are siblings. They are dead. Or at least they think they are. Their hosts, the cows, have agreed to take them in.

Dana seems resigned to their odd fate because at least it is something she knows. What if the space outside the cow's belly is worse? But Harold is not so sure. In the performance piece's climactic moment, he decides to punch his way out. By now the pair of video images is being projected on the white plaster sides of two life-sized cows. The screen that has shielded them from us is pulled away at the moment that Dana reveals their whereabouts to her brother. As Harold breaks through the cow's side, we see his naked body being "born" as though from a womb.

The visual effect is dazzling for a show as seemingly low budget as this one is. Kudos to video designer Lindsey Bostwick and director Aaron Rhyne for faithfully recreating the images that must have seemed so otherworldly in Pizzarello's mind.

Instinctively, Dana follows her brother, and they are both free from the cows that bore them. Free, that is, until the gasping for breath and the screaming begin again. This time it is Dana who has just woken up disoriented and alone. Several seconds after their escape, Dana and Harold are seemingly confined again, doomed to die and be born forever. Perhaps the idea of "death" here is simply this cycle's state of non-being...within a cow.

West Meets East

There have been many misconceptions about geisha, the most common being that they are a fancy Japanese version of prostitutes. Fortunately, more is now known about these impeccably groomed women, who are, in fact, "professional party guests." In Randall David Cook's compelling and jolting drama, Sake With the Haiku Geisha, playing at the Perry Street Theater, we meet a geisha (Angela Lin) who only speaks in haiku, thus earning the name Haiku Geisha. She spends most of the play nearly hidden by the set's shimmering cloth walls, silently listening to the comedic, touching, and tragic stories of three tourists.

Midway through the play, the set self-destructs, noisily dropping its metal bars to the floor, where they land in a heap of fallen curtains. On an eerily bare stage lit only by an orange light, the Haiku Geisha springs to life. She moves with power and conviction, performing a graceful dance that ends as suddenly as it begins. Facing the audience, she hunches her shoulders, sheds her robe, and stands before us in a starched white shirt and stiff black business skirt. It is here that her heartrending story begins.

However, before we reach this climactic moment where the mysterious geisha boldly bares her soul, we watch her persuade three seemingly perky tourists to slowly reveal theirs. They are members of a "worldwide gathering of teachers" who have traveled to Japan to share their culture with the students, though their host suspects the teachers' praise of his country is insincere. He solicits the aid of the Haiku Geisha to uncover the truth.

An Englishwoman named Charlotte (Emma Bowers) complains that she constantly felt illiterate, everyone criticized her noisy shoes, and all the tea was "green like sewage." A homosexual man from America named Parker (Jeremy Hollingworth) feels alienated by the lack of gay men and the ridicule he endured for being one. The third tourist, a Canadian woman named Brianna (Fiona Gallagher), is appalled at the sight of students saluting a Hitler float. She hits a sensitive nerve, taunting, "How would you like it if I made a float of an atomic bomb?"

With the mention of "atomic bomb," the play's tone instantly changes, marked by the set's collapse, which ends the tourists' stories and launches into a Japanese perspective.

There is a chilling scene between a father (Ikuma Isaac) and a son, Ichihiro Hashimoto (David Shih), where Hashimoto refuses to speak English. Furious at his disobedience, Father describes to him the losses their family suffered when the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. He orders the family to speak English because it is vital that they understand the language of the country that did this. He stresses the need to not only "connect" with potential enemies but to "communicate" with them, in the hopes of preventing such a horrific event from ever occurring again.

When Brianna learns that the students who built the Hitler float did not know about the Holocaust and only admire Hitler as a good speaker, she screams that it is wrong to honor someone without acknowledging the destruction his leadership has caused. The Japanese men remain stony-faced through her scolding, perhaps because they are thinking the same about America's attitude toward Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Everyone in this play is searching for understanding, whether it is tourists struggling to make sense of new words, students in Japan trying to comprehend ours, or broken families unable to grasp the concept of peace with a country responsible for the death of their loved ones. The Haiku Geisha is the only character to lay her past on the table and then embrace it as part of herself, for better or worse. Her story overcomes the language barrier others have succumbed to, enabling this play to succeed on a level where its characters could not. Sake With the Haiku Geisha not only connects with its audience; it communicates.

Devil's Work

In his first epistle—fifth chapter, eighth verse—the apostle Peter warns Christians to "be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walks about seeking whom he may devour." A funny little man with a pitchfork and bright red tights this is definitely not.

Adapted from C.S. Lewis's epistolary novel of the same name, The Screwtape Letters is a fictionalized, but biblically motivated, firsthand look at the inner workings of hell. As a spiritual and philosophical warning about the devil's trickery, Lewis's work is fascinating and instructive, giving causality and consequence to our daily travails. But as a piece of theater, the production unfortunately does not pass muster.

Screwtape (Max McLean) is the undersecretary of the Department of Temptation, an underworld bureaucratic office assigned to keep nonbelievers from knowing God at all, and believers from turning their decision of faith into any kind of lasting devotion, charity, or repentance. With the constant stenographical assistance of a buxom young demoness, Toadpipe (Jenny Savage), Screwtape fires missives to a flailing young apprentice, Wormwood, who must thwart the maturation of faith in an unnamed young Christian man.

Lewis—whose religious insights are far more cryptic in his famous, mythological Narnia series than they are here—was writing during the Second World War. But references to contemporary history do not keep his biblically sound insights about the devil's workings from being as cogent today as when they were written. As a Christian, I was struck by the time and care that Screwtape, this master tempter and a cog in the bureaucracy of hell, invests in the life of one man.

Screwtape encourages Wormwood to wreak havoc in various areas in the young Christian's life, including the continual and recurring arguments he has with his mother, in which both of them assume innocence and superiority; society's distorted female ideal, which can only lead to marital disappointment; anxieties about the future that keep him from enjoying the present; and, most insidiously, the claustrophobic pride that accompanies his identification as a believer in the first place. It seems that every good thing—filial affection, romantic love, the passage of time, and even the presence of faith itself—is in danger of being distorted and damaged, thereby clouding God's loving attempts to make us better people.

McLean's Screwtape is charismatic enough, which is a good thing, because the entire production consists of his talking directly to the audience. We simply watch his impassioned dictation for the better part of two hours. With only a handful of lines, Savage must resort to nonsensical and thematically disjointed dance numbers in between writing letters. The decision to keep her moving comes, no doubt, from the director's anxiety about how little there is to actually watch.

Better to have spent less money on the elaborately furnished set and put it toward hiring more actors, who could have pantomimed the spiritual warfare Screwtape so explicitly describes. We suspend our disbelief in order to see hell unfold before us, but we are not granted a view of ourselves, weakly cursing our circumstances, wondering at the meaning of it all—or of the angels whose intersession counteracts the likes of Wormwood, Screwtape, and the whole bunch.

Because the production is little more than a dramatized reading of Lewis's book, it can only succeed in preaching to the converted—audiences who will forgive its lack of theatricality because of its spiritual richness.

Revenge on a Silver Platter

Subtitling films works because the performances are prerecorded and therefore predictable; it's easy enough to graft the words onto the picture and get them to sync up to the dialogue. Subtitling (or supertitling) opera works because the words are sung to a melody, and its meter can provide cues as to the proper placement of timely translations. But how does one add titles to a play? How can an actor's delivery be calculated so that the written word matches up with the spoken word?

La MaMa E.T.C., in continuing its tradition of bringing theater from around the world to the New York stage, is presenting an ambitious Italian transplant, The Last Night of Salomé. Performed in Italian with English supertitles (projected onto a discreet black screen above the set), this period piece starring two middle-aged women and one passed-out man has all the theatrics to keep the audience interested, but those not conversant in Italian may have trouble with the plot specifics.

The show opens one hour before dawn in a delightfully divey bar, the prewar, below-ground, brick-walled type. Lighted only by neon signs and weak yellow bulbs, it never gets a single ray of sunshine (and people like it that way). The bar is located in Rome in the 1950s, and its owner, Desi, is busy clearing bottles and verbally abusing her husband, the drunk and dead-to-the-world Buffalo Bill. Then a woman, formally dressed in rumpled clothing, breezes in and demands a drink.

Once the mystery woman removes her large hat, Desi recognizes her as Veronica Lopez, the famous actress currently appearing in Oscar Wilde's Salomé, which Desi has recently seen. Starstruck, Desi forgets that the bar is closed and studies Veronica like a scientist eyeballing a sample on a glass slide. Veronica, glad for the adoration and the alcohol, answers questions, performs, and generally abuses Desi's adulation. They discuss their careers, their husbands, and their desires in real time as it grows closer to dawn.

Perhaps out of the director's fear that only one set and few performers could grow wearisome (or that the language barrier could cause audiences to get bored), the show is highly stylized, peppered with dramatic sound and lighting cues and bold movement. Yet those moments, often played for laughs, don't take away from the authenticity of the experience. Credit must be given to Lydia Biondi and Carla Cassola for their committed, lived-in performances.

Biondi's Desi, a worldly woman trapped in a small-town life, becomes more fascinating as the contradictions in her character pile up. Cassola's Veronica (who, it could be said, is a small-town girl trapped in a worldly life) is selfish but also terribly needy, the kind of person who forms close attachments to people quickly but is quick to forget those attachments if they don't suit her. Veronica is one of those "actressy" characters that actresses love to play, yet Cassola wisely avoids romanticizing Veronica in any way but in Veronica's own mind.

On the night of this review, there were many Italians in the audience; they seemed to really enjoy the production, laughing at things when the English titles gave no indication of a joke and clapping enthusiastically at its end. For those who didn't parlano Italiano, there were still laughs and general understanding, though the laughs came at different times (upon reading the lines rather than hearing the joke told), and the words sometimes came a little too speedy to read when the fast-talking ladies got going.

Perhaps the only nonspeakers who should be discouraged from seeing The Last Night of Salome are those who obsessively need the words to figure out what's going on. The rest of us can rely on the strong performances and production values, which need no translation.

Put on a Show

About halfway through [title of show], Jeff Bowen and Hunter Bell's musical about making a musical, I began to wonder what all the fuss was about. Yes, self-referential humor can be funny, up to a point. And yes, dropping obscure musical-theater references can often be a witty choice. But for an entire show? Yet just when things begin to seem overly contrived, Heidi (Heidi Blickenstaff) performs the ballad "A Way Back to Then," a poignant tribute to the innocent child within every aspiring theater (or creative) professional. It's a deceptively simple story of sacrifice and aspiration that carries indelible truth, bringing clarity to everything that has already transpired. The show celebrates the noble dream of being "part of it all," but more than that, it exalts the importance of the individual in creating art.

In a spare, fluid production gleefully presented by the Vineyard Theater, [title of show] is a delightful look into the process of creating a musical. With a festival deadline rapidly approaching, Bowen and Bell decided to write a musical about the process of writing a musical, enlisting the help of two friends, Heidi and Susan (Susan Blackwell). They all play themselves (well, versions of themselves) as they collaborate to create an original musical.

As they begin to drum up ideas, casual conversation becomes dialogue, and jealousy becomes fodder for duets. Even the musical director/accompanist Larry (Larry Pressgrove, who plays the lone onstage keyboard) jumps into the action from time to time.

What sets [title of show] apart from other shows about making art is its refusal to push its tongue-in-cheek humor down our throats. Michael Berresse, a well-respected and successful New York actor making his directing debut, keeps the action restrained, preserving the honesty and integrity of the performers and their material. (He also contributes choreography with a light touch that charms without relying on in-your-face shtick.)

Several musical numbers, however, rely on jokes that eventually lose their luster, including "An Original Musical," which starts out strong but trails off haphazardly by the end. (Some one-liners just can't be suspended over an entire song.) For the most part, though, Bell's book is strong and witty, while Bowen, who writes very pleasant—if mostly unmemorable—music, displays an exciting gift for setting words to music. Both the lyrics and the script, in fact, feature writing that is often fresh and unexpected.

All four actors contribute outstanding performances, illustrating the different types of people and personalities that create art. For example, Heidi continues to audition and perform, while Susan has taken a day job (they sing about this discrepancy in their well-done duet, "What Kind of Girl Is She?"). And while Bowen is rather uptight and overly conscious of grammar, Bell is more laid-back, procrastinating with TV and autoeroticism.

All numbers are well executed, and each performer displays impeccable comic timing. Other highlights include "Die Vampire, Die!" (a warning against the "vampires" of self-doubt that paralyze creative people), "Part of It All" (a touching showcase for Bell and Bowen's desire to join the theater community), and "Nine People's Favorite Thing" (the inspirational closing anthem).

Frequent theatergoers (aficionados and die-hards) will find much to appreciate in [title of show], from the amusing voice-mail transitions (featuring many renowned theater performers) to the many references to musicals, both obscure and well known. Others, however, may find the material alienating, especially in "Monkeys and Playbills," a song that highlights Playbills from many now-defunct Broadway shows. While it is an inventive concept, the references are sometimes difficult to catch, even for those in the know.

Still, even audiences who are unfamiliar with the "in-language" of theater will be able to sympathize with the highs and lows of the creative process. As they wonder whether they should "sell out" (changing themselves and their show), Bell and Bowen raise important questions about the commercialization of theater—an industry that remains focused on product. Who can create art? Who are the important voices? And what compromises must one make to be heard?

By placing themselves (and their friends) front and center, Bell and Bowen remind us that real lives are what matters in theater. As referenced in "A Way Back to Then," there are still unaffected children with big dreams at the heart of musical theater, despite commercialism, financial greed, and artistic corruption. And in its own small, sweet, and endearing way, [title of show] encourages us to value the simplicity—and worth—of our own stories.

(Off-Off) Broadway Baby: Jersey Boys's John Lloyd Young

John Lloyd Young

Downtown theater can be grueling. Just ask John Lloyd Young, who, not so very long ago, found himself onstage with a gaping head wound from a self-inflicted gunshot in the unforgiving heat of summer.

"I had to lean my head against the exposed brick wall supposedly to hold my brain inside the hole in my head, and as I walked across the stage, I left a long smear of blood against it," he remembers. "When I stepped away from the wall, I had to hold my head up with my hand so my brain wouldn't fall out."

The production, Spring Awakening at Expanded Arts, a 30-seat storefront theater, encapsulates the ever-paradoxical nature of downtown theater, Young says. "It was disgusting, gruesome, hot, sticky, ghoulish: a barrel of laughs." Today, no longer battling onstage blood, Young is poised on the brink of stardom, at least by Broadway standards. His widely acclaimed performance as Frankie Valli in the hit

musical Jersey Boys has already generated early Tony Award buzz, as well as the accolades and respect of critics and fans alike, including Valli himself.

But while he currently plays to sold-out audiences at the August Wilson Theater, Young began his New York stage career-as so many performers do-in Off- and Off-Off-Broadway theaters. And while his move uptown places him in a more distinctly commercial theatrical environment, the actor-who admits to being in his late 20s-continues to cling to the artistic ideals that informed his work early on.

In fact, Young says his experiences downtown initially discouraged him from pursuing any Broadway roles at all. In Off- and Off-Off-Broadway shows, he relished "interesting" and "artistically challenging" material that was "sometimes so out there." Broadway shows, by comparison, were often "high on spectacle and low on bite."

Even after finding success on the Great White Way, Young still maintains that he never intended to work there. "To be perfectly honest," he says, "I began to get very resentful of Broadway. I was very angry. The musical shows seemed to be empty and artless, and those that were good had trouble attracting an audience."

The Broadway landscape has undoubtedly become increasingly commercial, and the appearance of the jukebox musical has been seen by many as perhaps its most emblematic, money-hungry product. Beloved by many tourists but maligned by most critics, the form splices together pre-existing songs from popular musical groups, with plots that, due to their slapdash genesis, can often seem overly simplistic and contrived. Recent jukebox ventures, both successful and less so, include Mamma Mia! (Abba), Movin' Out (Billy Joel), Good Vibrations (the Beach Boys), and this season's Ring of Fire (Johnny Cash).

Young himself acknowledges that the jukebox musical is at odds with the less conventional, progressive trends found in much Off- and Off-Off-Broadway theater. "I hate the jukebox musical, if 'jukebox musical' means an inane story line strung around recognizable songs making a fool of everyone onstage and in the audience," he says. "The shows that do that [present dumbed-down material] don't survive, probably because no one likes to be made a fool of."

But Jersey Boys, which tells the story of the Four Seasons, is, of course, a jukebox musical. So how does a veteran of downtown theater suddenly find himself in the middle of a jukebox? Although Young auditioned for "a lot of so-called jukebox shows," it wasn't until Jersey Boys

A scene from Jersey Boys

that he found a project he believed to be "at once commercially successful and still artistically challenging." And the critics agreed, praising the musical for embracing the actual history of the Four Seasons-depicting actual lives rather than trying to shoehorn music into a fictionalized structure.

Young credits "playable, actable scenes," a strong character arc, and highly demanding falsetto singing for creating a "steep enough challenge to create that fire inside my belly to want to surmount it." And it was Off- and Off-Off-Broadway theater that helped, in part, to fuel his desire to seek out huge challenges. "You do things like a storefront expressionist drama for no money while temping during the day," he remembers. "And [you] succeed at it—or fail—and emerge emboldened."

Citing one favorite Off-Broadway stage experience, at Target Margin Theater, he recalls, "Half the audience left at intermission; half stayed, mesmerized." The potency of Off-Broadway material can be divisive for an audience, but he relishes that knee-jerk response. Whether off Broadway or on, he values "an audacious and exciting theatrical environment where anything could happen."

The biggest benefits of working in a more commercial environment, Young says, are the "luxurious trappings" and the ability to enjoy "complete immersion in the work." Although playing a leading role in a powerhouse Broadway musical demands its share of one's free time (interviews, press events, benefits, etc.), there is plenty of luxury in "being paid enough to not have to split your attention with a survival job."

In fact, "luxury" is a word Young often uses to describe his new uptown performance venue. But for him the charm lies less in his solo dressing room and the wardrobe department and more in having enough time and energy to devote himself wholeheartedly to his craft. He admits to having been tremendously frustrated when he had to hold down "a survival job."

Jersey Boys

"I wanted nothing else than to dedicate all of my attention toward the project," he says. "There is nothing more frustrating than delving into something artistically irresistible to then have to go and type spreadsheets for some unimaginative dullard."

Even with additional time to focus, Young maintains that his approach to the craft has remained the same, whether the production is commercial or downtown. "I've always contended that working in front of an audience is the best training," he says. "And you're not going to be infected just because you're working commercially; you never forget the renegade guerilla experiences you've had. They become part of your artistic personality and sensibility."

So although he is now fronting a mainstream show, don't expect him to "suddenly be transformed into somebody who wants to do the next big revival of Oklahoma!," he says. "It's just not in my makeup. Jersey Boys is something I can do

and do well, because the person I was makes me right for it, not because I've suddenly melded into something new or more 'commercialized.' "

In addition to Jersey Boys, Young has found several other recent Broadway productions encouraging for both their artistic merit and wide audience following. He cites Doubt, The Light in the Piazza, The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, and Avenue Q as shows that have become popular without sacrificing artistic integrity. (All have also won Tony Awards in recent years.) And even with steep differences in funding, resources, and expectations, he believes the worlds of Off-Broadway and Broadway are not mutually exclusive.

At least not completely. "There is certainly a big gulf between the kind of work that happens in a storefront theater on Ludlow Street and on a cruise ship," he admits. "Broadway can sometimes tend more towards cruise ship, of course, and almost never resembles anything you'd see at a storefront theater downtown.

"[Broadway] is a commercial enterprise, and your run-of-the-mill tourist doesn't always want to be 'challenged.' I heard some guy in a restaurant in the Theater District last night say, 'I don't like the plays where I have to think.' It's our job as artists to think, though. Part of the fun of what we do is 'tricking' people like him into thinking, without his realizing we've done it.'"

According to Young, the interplay between Broadway and Off- and Off-Off-Broadway theater happens primarily through its artists. Julie Taymor, for example, honed her craft for years before her innovative puppetry found a wider audience in Disney's stage adaptation of The Lion King. While her talent was certainly no secret to much of the theater community, her presence on Broadway made her a household name.

"The Lion King was the right fit for her in the commercial arena," Young says. "And suddenly the mainstream sees something 'new' without realizing that Taymor had been doing that stuff her whole career."

And this widening of scope need not be detrimental for the artist, he says. "As long as what's authentic to the artist isn't irretrievably lost or bastardized, then I think it's nice for them to be able to peek through to a more mainstream audience sometimes."

Young himself had hoped for a healthy career in Off-Broadway plays, peppered with "interesting film or TV projects." Thanks to Jersey Boys, the door is opening wider, but he still refuses to compromise his ideals. "If the next compelling project is Off-Broadway, and the next and the next after that, I'd be elated with that, too. It's really the role and the material that gets me going. The venue is an afterthought."

One thing he definitely plans to do in 2006 is support small companies as they continue to make new theater. In addition to Target Margin, to which he donates every year, he says he tries to donate to "emerging companies who are doing exciting work or whose mission I can stand behind. It changes every year. What is great about being on Broadway is that I I can afford to donate to more companies than I have in the past, and I'm excited about doing that this year."

Again, it's a luxury afforded by Broadway, but it's one that will benefit such theaters as the La Jolla Playhouse (where Jersey Boys originated) and the 52nd Street Project.

A dedicated supporter of up-and-coming theater, Young ranks "sheer force of will" as one of Off- and Off-Off-Broadway theater's many strengths. One weakness he has noticed, however, lies in the "strong strain of dilettantism" when people are not equally and fully dedicated to a project.

"It is enervating to someone who takes their art seriously to have to act alongside someone who's just fooling around or not serious about what they're doing," he says. "When you want to make a career of it and you're acting with people who are doing it just for fun, it can be very discouraging."

Like Valli, whose rags-to-riches story took him from working-class New Jersey to the height of fame, you could say that Young has graduated from downtown theater and "made it" on Broadway. But he refuses to see it that way, reaffirming his loyalty to the ever-shifting, ever-challenging unconventional houses that nurtured his early career.

Off- and Off-Off-Broadway theater, he points out, is a "boot camp for artists" and "a laboratory" where "stakes are lower financially so the tolerance for risk can be higher." And risk, of course, begets growth. Daring innovation is born of limited resources, and in this way "you can create a whole theatrical universe around a few blocks and a piece of fabric."

So how would he advise the hard-working people who continue to make Off- and Off-Off-Broadway theater, often quite unluxuriously?

"To keep on," he says. "It's really a noble struggle, a great place to experiment and fail and a gold mine of interesting people, ideas, and talent.

"It can be a morass, too. I don't think anyone would deny that. But when there are flashes of brilliance, it's blinding. To find the means and tenacity to continue to be able to create and thrive in a sometimes hostile environment is probably one of the most exhausting, exciting, rewarding experiences one can have."

Musical Milton

When considering source material for a musical, the epic battle between heaven and hell seems an unlikely—if not fatal—choice. And yet, creators Benjamin Birney (music and lyrics), Rob Seitelman (lyrics), and Seth Magoon (additional lyrics) have taken the bait, adapting John Milton's much-canonized poem Paradise Lost into a sexy and evocative full-length musical. Their efforts, while not always successful, are unquestionably valiant. Skillfully directed by Seitelman and ferociously performed by an attractive, amped-up cast, this Paradise Lost provides passionate, muscular entertainment. And the stakes, of course, are nothing short of grandiose. Lucifer, God's most trusted angel, reacts with jealousy and rage when God creates Adam and Eve. After a divisive battle (staged with force and grace by choreographer Jason Summers), Lucifer and his followers find themselves banished to hell, where they begin to plot against humankind. As Lucifer's power increases, he takes the name Satan, solidifying the diametric opposition of good and evil.

The problem, however, is that most of us already know how the story turns out, eliminating much of the suspense and conflict. Eve, of course, inevitably takes a bite from the forbidden fruit. But Birney and Seitelman have wisely inserted a new character into the story—Sophia, Lucifer's lover. Representing various incarnations of the feminine divine, Sophia is "Wisdom" in the Bible and appears in both Eastern and Western religions. Here, she is also sent to hell with Lucifer, but her sympathy for Adam and Eve brings much-needed conflict and complexity to both her character and the entire show. We may know what happens to Adam and Eve, but what happens to Sophia is anyone's guess.

Birney has penned a lovely, difficult score for the sung-through show, full of sophisticated (often a cappella) choral writing, powerful anthems, and spunky vaudevillian numbers. Too often, however, the songs are too lengthy and begin to blend together. As it dutifully reflects incendiary themes of battle and revenge, the music is finally unable to successfully maintain the continuous fervor the material demands. The dynamics explode almost instantaneously as the action begins, leaving little room to build in intensity as the show progresses.

The action also becomes a bit blurry in spots; with so much plotting and bellowing going on, it is often difficult to track exactly which battle is being waged. And the emphasis on sexuality, while it creates intriguing conflict (a love triangle of sorts between Sophia, Lucifer, and Eve, for one), sometimes feels forced. The personifications of Sin and Death, for example, appear to be castaways from the latest revival of Cabaret, clad in sadomasochist splendor that is more embarrassing than effective. And in "The Temptation of Eve" (and a few other songs), the melody is obscured by the addition of percussive accompaniment that sounds suspiciously like tacky porn music.

The multitalented cast rises to the challenge of the material, offering well-sung, convincing performances. Paul A. Schaefer dominates the stage as Lucifer/Satan; he's a charming, seductive villain who sings and moves with finesse. Danielle Erin Rhodes is forceful and compassionate as Sophia, and although Adam and Eve function as little more than pawns for the angels, Darryl Calmese and Ashleigh Davidson (in particular) bring remarkable depth to their performances. Sarah Madej and Tynan Davis turn in beautifully sung, radiant performances as the angels Raphael and Terathel. (Music director Jeremy Randall also deserves accolades for his meticulous work on some difficult choral passages.)

The angels spar on a bare stage, and they are simply adorned (white tank tops for angels; black for fallen angels), with wings suggestively painted on the backs of their arms by the creative costume and makeup designer, Sarah Levine.

A dedicated (and sometimes thrilling) attempt to create a dramatic miracle from problematic material, this Paradise Lost doesn't quite work as a musical. But the talented cast and crew have created a production that is well worth watching, and Birney and Seitelman are a promising young team of musical theater writers. One hopes that, as they begin their next project, they will assume a task of less epic proportions.

Speaking Directly: Playwright and Director Mark Finley

 

Mark Finley

I first came in contact with Mark Finley in his role as a playwright, when he mounted his play The Mermaid with the theater company called the Other Side of Silence II (affectionately known as TOSOS), where he is artistic director. I wasn't unduly surprised to learn, during my time around that project, that Finley also directs-as in other fields with limited resources, no one can afford the blinders of a specialist. But the good noises his peers continually made about his talents piqued my curiosity.

I was finally afforded the opportunity to see his work when he took the reins of Ross MacLean's Follies of Grandeur, which recently played at Theater for the New City. With the show fresh in mind, I sat down with Finley to discuss his views on directing for Off-Off-Broadway, his take on the current state of the theater, and the pleasures of sitting outside a stage door in pink pajamas.

Offoffonline.com: How did you get into directing?

Finley: I went to North Carolina School of the Arts for acting, then got involved in a theater company called the Native Aliens Theater

Collective. One day, a friend of mine gave me a book called Young Stowaways in Space to look at. It was a young-adult science fiction book written-in 1962?-for boys between the ages of 12 and 15. It blew me away how homoerotic, how sexist this thing was. It had to be seen. I figured that, rather than hand it to a director and say, "This is what I want, blah, blah, blah," I would try to direct it myself. So I came up with a framing device for it and basically staged the book.

Was there something about the material that made you want to take that step?

MF: It was the way it was written. It wasn't just the dialogue. The dialogue was bad enough. It wasn't written to be spoken. If you tried to make it the way a human would talk, it would just be dumb, instead of amazingly, spectacularly, charmingly dumb. I hope this doesn't get back to the author.

So that was your first full-scale production as a director?

MF: Yeah. I mean, I probably should've started with a simple, little three-character Chekhov or something, where nobody really moves, instead of moving nine people-who are onstage most of the time together-through outer space.
So yeah, I kind of started as a late sophomore/early junior and not a freshman at directing. But I fell in love with it right away. As an actor, you can only control your performance, if that. As a writer, you control even less; you control the word on the page, then you just kind of throw it into the ocean and hope somebody gets it. As a director, you're absolutely responsible for what the audience sees. I love that.

Thinking about the arc of things you've chosen to direct, is there something in particular that you look for in a script?

MF: I always look for humor. Also, the thing I love about Follies is the total humanity of the characters. I certainly had never seen this story told in this way, in such a theatrical, forgiving, human way. Nonsexual, nonexploitive.
Even the topless moments are nonsexual.

A testament to your skill, I guess.

MF: [Laughs] I guess. So the quick answer would be: first, humor, then humanity. With this one, I'm also walking away going, "Wow, I really kind of realize why I like to work on comedy more," because it's just more fun.

Because comedy generally has a higher energy?
I think it's just less depressing. If you're working on a show, it's a world you have to live in 24/7, and my release is humor, not drama. So I would much rather live in a wacky, kooky, nutty place than a very important, serious place for eight hours a day. Personal preference.

How do you view the state of Off-Off-Broadway today?

MF: When I first came to New York in 1987, Off-Off was literally a showcase land for people to get seen, to maybe get cast in stuff. Now-and this was evidenced last year with the IT [Innovative Theater] Awards-Off-Off-Broadway is so much more diverse. It's so much more than little groups of people getting together and saying, "Let's do Sam Shepard's Red Cross for two weekends and try to get some agents in." It's people forming theater companies and putting seasons together, trying to make a go of it. There are institutions out there that have always been doing that: La MaMa, P.S. 122. But companies like Emerging Artists Theater and Women Seeking… have established a watermark of "this is what we do." And people seek that out, and I think that's great.

What are your ambitions for the future? Is there something you're pushing toward?

MF: I want to be able to direct full time, all the time. Everywhere, anywhere.

Would you say that you have a philosophy that you adhere to in your directing?

MF: The way I approach a project came from my friend John Reese, whom I worked with on a project in Virginia a few years back. He stepped up and said, "O.K., this is how this works: I do my work, you do your work, then we work together, then we go home." Sounds pretty basic, but you'd be amazed how many people don't or can't adhere to that.

So hands-on?

MF: Yeah. This is going to sound really arty-farty, but I like to feel like I'm building a machine with my actors that I can leave and they can drive. Often, I've had actors come up to me after a production and say, "You know, when those lights go up, I feel like I'm stepping on a roller coaster and we just come out at the other side." And I'm like, "Good, that's how it should be." I'm not a fan of lolling around on the floor. It's not my thing.

Do you have a story that epitomizes what Off-Off-Broadway is for you?

MF: I don't know if this is a funny story or anything. I'd stopped acting for a while, and a friend had gotten me into a production of Pillow Talk, with Native Aliens [Theater Collective]. It was a stage adaptation of the movie, and I played Doris Day. I didn't do it in drag; I dyed my hair and I ran around in pink pajamas through the whole thing.
We had one matinee performance. It was early in the run and it was raining, so it was very lightly attended, and I'm sitting on the fire escape just out of the rain-I had maybe three scenes where I'm not onstage-just sitting there in my little pink pajamas and I'm like, "What the hell am I doing here? I'm in an almost empty theater on a rainy day in the middle of the spring, but I'm just so happy to be here. I don't even know why. I'm just so damn happy to be here."

No Room at the Top

In front of the script for The Right Kind of People, playwright/actor Charles Grodin quotes Abraham Lincoln: "Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power." Said power may be relative in Charles Grodin's condescending new play, but it nonetheless corrupts his characters absolutely, and as a result, virtually everyone in People save for Tom Rashman (Robert Stanton), the protagonist, fails this character test. But it's not as though Grodin's play is a particularly winning success either.

In the program, Grodin tells the audience that he based People on his own bitter experience as a member of an elite Manhattan co-op board, and one can still taste the sour grapes. Tom, the morally upright milquetoast, is a theatrical producer invited to join the board based on the recommendation of his Uncle Frank (Edwin C. Owens), a highly influential member. Frank and his wife Edna (never seen, only referenced) raised Tom when both of his parents died during his childhood, though Grodin never specifies how. This is a problem, as the question is never answered but calls plenty of attention to itself. It would have been smarter for Grodin to have simply explained why and moved on.

Not only does Frank serve as Tom's father figure and fellow board member, but the two are also producing partners, currently working on bringing a Revolutionary War play to the Great White Way. Unfortunately, this makes for overkill. It is easy to show how their personal relationship could be affected by a professional one, but either the theatrical relationship or the real estate one would have sufficed; the two here are redundant. Nonetheless, Frank and his nephew become estranged due to Frank's growing problem with the bottle and his estrangement from Aunt Edna.

Frank proves to be one of the foolhardy members of the co-op board, but not the only one. Events escalate as the members make rather racist restrictions, and an ill-explained feud between Frank and bleeding-heart member Doug Bernstein (Mitchell Greenberg) boils over once Doug takes Tom under his wing. Grodin's message is obvious and thematically facile: the rich and privileged prefer to keep company only with their own kind and will take drastic measures to do so. After a coup disassembles the original board, a new one emerges, but it proves to be even more outrageous; its members are racist, anti-Semitic, even anti-children.

Stanton does what he can, but Tom is not a character; he is merely the playwright's alter ego. Grodin admits this in the playbill when quoting a particularly nasty co-op board member who treated him like a vulgarian for buying his wardrobe off the rack (he repeats the line early in the show). As a result, Tom is merely a reaction, not a human being. Grodin also makes an awkward misstep by having Tom close the show with an expository monologue, the only time he breaks the fourth wall. It is hard to say whether he made such a choice due to time restraints or a lack of self-censorship, but it was still a mistake. These are choices that director Chris Smith's fluid direction and Annie Smart's impressively realistic set design cannot rectify.

Both Greenberg and Owens are excellent, solid, and resolute presences in their respective roles. Film and theater veteran Doris Belack steals scenes in a dual role as a stuffy board member and an apartment applicant. But a solid cast cannot elevate the material. Grodin sounds too whiny in People, with its rehashing of uppity Upper East Side stereotypes.

Lincoln also once said, "Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt." Here's wishing Grodin had kept his thoughts to himself.

Separately Together

Sometimes it's hard to pinpoint exactly why a musical flops. Take, for instance, Side Show. Despite earning four Tony Award nominations (including Best Musical) as well as a cult following, the show played a scant 91 performances during the 1997-98 Broadway season. Thanks to the reliable Gallery Players, it is now enjoying a heartfelt revival in Brooklyn—its first major New York-area production since its Broadway debut. Based on the true story of conjoined twins Daisy and Violet Hilton, Side Show chronicles the twins' rise to fame on the 1930s vaudeville circuit. Bill Russell and Henry Krieger penned a gorgeous score for the nearly sung-through show, including several power ballads that have since become contemporary standards.

Central to the show, however, are the twins, and director Matt Schicker has helmed an earnest production that smartly puts Daisy and Violet's humanity at the forefront. The action unfurls at a brisk, heady speed, carrying the audience along with the twins on their turbulent whirlwind adventure toward realizing their dreams.

Enterprising producers Terry Connor and Buddy Foster discover Daisy and Violet at a seedy Texas sideshow and lure them away from their diabolical Boss. Daisy and Violet "want to be like everyone else," but that means something different for each of them. The more introverted Violet longs for a loving husband and a family life, while Daisy, the extrovert, wants to be rich and famous.

They rocket to stardom as Buddy coaches them in song and dance, and romance also blooms (a bit problematically) among the foursome. Daisy is instantly (and very obviously) drawn to Terry, while Violet privately nurtures her slowly developing love for Buddy. By the end, each twin has realized her dream, but not exactly as she had hoped.

As the twins, Kristen Sergeant and Tiffany Diane Smith give convincing portrayals of two very disparate personalities. Smith is a comic delight as Daisy, and she mixes a lovely old-movie-musical charm with sassy grit to create a very fresh interpretation of the more feisty twin. As good as Smith is, however, Sergeant steals the show as Violet. Her graceful, open performance exhibits all of Violet's conflict and sensitivity; you never doubt her.

Both have strong, captivating voices that combine to sound like one, and the production numbers are well paced to showcase their developing talents. "Rare Songbirds on Display" is a vocal highlight, as is the big Act I closer, "Who Will Love Me as I Am?" A successful wig job makes Sergeant and Smith look alike, but I couldn't help wishing that more effort had been put into making them appear to be the same height (adjusting shoe height and matching their hemlines) to further suspend disbelief.

Energetic Jimmy Hays Nelson makes a perfect Buddy, youthful and bright with a stunning tenor voice. Matt Witten brings a slick, smarmy charm to Terry, and his performance—along with his warm, easy voice—becomes more solid in Act II.

In the rather thankless role of Jake, the black "cannibal king" who leaves the sideshow to accompany the twins on their journey, Melvin Shambry shows a lot of vocal passion, but his acting doesn't quite bring that fire into his interactions with other characters. Greg Horton is deliciously disturbing as the tyrannical Boss.

The ensemble offers strong performances, both collectively and individually. Unfortunately, they are often encumbered by awkward choreography and staging. In "The Devil You Know," a bit of West Side Story-inspired choreography turns the stage into a morass of misguided bodies, muffling the vocals. And at the end of several scenes, cast members slink slowly away from the action, fading offstage without any clear motivation.

Joseph Trainor has devised a creative and functional set that employs moving wooden panels painted for each sideshow character, while Melanie Swersey has chosen a lovely palette of costumes for the large cast.

Side Show is such an abbreviated ride that you can't help wanting to know even more about Daisy and Violet. Out of their personal tragedy (wanting what one simply cannot have) springs a very universal need—the desire to be loved for who and what you are, without apology. And in this production, the Gallery Players poignantly explore this theme as they bring the twins' story to life.

So why did the show flop on Broadway? One theory: Side Show launched the careers of Alice Ripley and Emily Skinner, who shared a 1998 Tony nomination for their performances as the Hiltons. Perhaps the nominating committee's decision to lump two very distinctive performances into one reflected the attitude of an audience (and society) that wasn't quite ready for the Hilton twins, and was more comfortable with grouping them together and casting them—once again—as freaks.

Liberated

While it no longer packs the emotional punch of, say, Sophie's choice, Nora Helmer's decision to leave her marriage—and her children—to pursue her own happiness still resonates as one of the most thrilling denouements in theater. In A Doll's House, Henrik Ibsen daringly thwarted the social conventions of 1879 Copenhagen, challenging audiences to debate the character of a woman who, trapped in unhappy circumstances, finds her way out. In Nora, his 1981 adaptation of Ibsen's classic play, Ingmar Bergman pares down the cast and strips away scenes to better examine the cascade of forces that act on Ibsen's famous protagonist. In his streamlined revision, she emerges as a true prisoner of her household, but, more important, the extent to which she has been imprisoned within herself becomes frightfully apparent. While impeded by some problematic performances, Test Pilot Productions nonetheless offers an admirable New York premiere of Nora, thoughtfully directed by Pamela Moller Kareman.

Beneath the arches of the ArcLight Theater, set designer Joseph J. Egan places Nora within a half-circle of ominous birch trees, where she remains—minus one quick costume change—for the play's entire 90 minutes. The other four characters sit along the circle's perimeter, filtering through the trees to enter for their scenes, but otherwise simply watching the action as it unfolds. (Interestingly, Bergman used a similar device in his 1991 direction of A Doll's House at the Brooklyn Academy of Music.)

The omnipresence of these observers heightens the urgency of Nora's situation. Years earlier, she had borrowed money from Nils Krogstad to secure money for a trip abroad to benefit her husband Torvald's precarious health, forging her deceased father's signature on the promissory note. Now, Krogstad, whose bank job is in jeopardy, threatens to tell Torvald the truth—unless, of course, Nora can persuade her husband, newly promoted at the bank, to let Krogstad keep his job.

Backed into a corner, Nora unsuccessfully pleads with Krogstad, enlists the empathy of her long-lost friend Mrs. Linde, and considers how she might procure money from family friend Dr. Rank. Throughout, Torvald's cloying, patronizing treatment of his wife becomes more and more evident, building to their final—and powerfully realized—confrontation.

Ibsen's fully drawn characters resonate with both positive and negative traits, and Carey Macaleer finds the contrasts in Nora, deftly portraying her selfishness, vulnerability, and steeliness. Her high, chirpy voice belies her inner torment, and one can see how she is, as she describes herself, "not happy, only cheerful." It's a subtle difference, but one she plays well.

The other actors, unfortunately, are less successful in developing fully resonant characters. While perhaps limited by an abbreviated script, Troy Myers, as Torvald, is overly stiff, monotonous, and lethargic in his delivery. A more complex performance from this unsympathetic character would certainly give Nora's final decision more credence.

Sneering and gesticulating with abandon, John Tyrrell overplays the villainous Krogstad. And although Sarah Bennett and Tyne Firmin show welcome restraint as Mrs. Linde and Dr. Rank, respectively, neither has enough stage time to leave much of an impression.

But it is, after all, Nora's show, and this production is most notable for the attention paid to her journey. Matt Stine's original music underscores her thinly disguised manic state with taut intensity; in well-executed transitions, hauntingly and thoughtfully revealed by David Pentz's lighting, we watch Nora fall apart as she acts out her anger. These episodes reveal a woman whose real, serious emotions are perilously locked away.

To walk out on one's husband is far from scandalous by today's standards, but the struggle between Nora and Torvald—provoked by issues of money, integrity, and power—feels all too familiar. In a recent New York Times column, Judith Warner addressed the death of Betty Friedan (The Feminine Mystique) and the failure of our society to fully realize her ideals. "We women have, in many very real ways, at long last made good on Ms. Friedan's dream that we would reach 'our full human potential—by participating in the mainstream of society,' " she writes. "But, for mothers in particular, at what cost? With what degree of exhaustion? And with what soul-numbing sacrifices made along the way?"

Nora's life, as rendered by Ibsen and Bergman, certainly registers as "soul-numbing," and the play offers an important glimpse into the first murmurs of the feminist movement, which, it would seem, is still in need of further advancement. While Nora's words might often sound antiquated to our ears, much of it is all too familiar. "No one sacrifices his honor for love," Torvald tells his wife, who replies, "Thousands of women have." Watching Nora march out that door yet again, it's still difficult to imagine exactly where (or when) she might find true happiness and fulfillment.

Prey for Salvation

In many ways, it's easier than ever to be gay in America. Queer Eye for the Straight Guy has shown mainstream audiences that homosexuals can be cool, creative, and kind. Brokeback Mountain has shown that they can love and be loved, and that good wives and family ties don't "straighten out" the situation. Though there is, and probably always will be, opposition to the lifestyle, it is no longer a social (or literal) death sentence to admit your sexual orientation in most parts of the country. But what if we as a country started going backward instead of forward? What if the LGBT community were treated no better than child molesters, or worse? And what if this treatment was authorized, and, indeed, authored, by our own government? This scenario is played out in Temple, a chilling though oblique piece by Tim Aumiller.

The show opens with the appearance of Russ (think a blue-collar Sean Astin with a longshoreman's vocabulary) as he storms into an abandoned room with boxes and a covered couch and yells at nothing in particular. He's soon joined by Walt (a bespectacled meek type), who's brought his older sister Brenda (a mentally challenged religious type) to meet up with an old friend.

This friend, John, has masterminded a plot to take down the U.S. Supreme Court as well as a computerized database (housed within the court building) that tracks homosexuals in America in compliance with the newly passed "Samuel Laws." Walt, who provided schematics of the target, and Russ, who is also in on the attack, are there for a post-mission rendezvous with John to find out the next part of the plan.

John, their charismatic and handsome leader, eventually arrives with most of the rest of the gang: the twitchy, straight Kent; the unconscious Remy, wounded in the attack; and the tough-talking Suzanne. (The other two in their party have gone missing.) Everyone but Kent, a hired gun, is gay and committed, to varying degrees and for varying reasons, to the cause and to John. As they wait for a phone call that will provide a pickup location, personalities clash and much speechmaking ensues—speeches that clarify the stratagem that occurred as well as the reasons for its genesis.

Sadly, the more we learn about these revolutionaries, the less we care about them. Sure, their plight is terrible: when the authorities learn that someone "plays for the other team," he or she is forced to "register" and made to go through counseling and treatments. The person's parents are sterilized and tested as well.

But the play's characters categorize all heterosexuals and practitioners of organized religion as evil and believe that the loss of life, as long as it's not their own, is just part of their work. They spend most of the evening whining and fighting and being consoled by John, who talks about their cause with a persuasive fervor but ultimately comes off as a selfish manipulator.

The actors put forth believable characterizations, and David Rudd, as John, certainly has the magnetism to make it understandable why all of these men can't seem to quit him. Greg Foro's direction keeps the actors moving and the atmospheric tension alive. Yet the audience needs to have a likable protagonist in order to become emotionally invested in the events, however horrifying, and especially if they're fantastic.

There have been complaints over the last ten years that while gays and lesbians are finally starting to appear in films and TV series, they are often emotionally and sexually neutered. Yet their mere presence has opened the door for more complex portrayals in Queer as Folk and The L Word. Those shows offer characters who are defined not just by whom they sleep with but by who they are; the audience in turn identifies with them. The gang in Temple define themselves solely on the basis of their sexual identity, and while audiences may pity them for their situation, they'll be hard pressed to find any reason to like them.

Sketching It Out

You don't have to have much to put on a show. All you really need is a script plus people to read it, a director to give it a vision, and an audience to watch it all. It helps, of course, if you have talent. Maybe the most important thing to have is heart: if you love what you're doing, it will smooth out any rough edges. TimeSpace Theater Company's presentation of short plays by Christopher Durang, Dessert With Durang, has all of these things. It's performed on a tiny stage at the Payan Theater in the Times Square Arts Center, and there was little room for fancy scenery, extravagant props, or elaborate lights. The basic set pieces—some chairs, a table, a squashy armchair—were reused in various combinations for each sketch. Costume choices were effective yet basic; for example, silky fabric wrapped with a belt became a toga.

This was clearly not a production with a big budget, but the simple design elements never felt like limitations. It was apparent that the entire cast had worked hard. Also, it didn't hurt that the playwright behind the material was talented satirist Christopher Durang.

TimeSpace chose six of his one-act plays. The opening piece, "Medea," was co-written with the late Wendy Wasserstein and dedicated to her memory. This version of the Medea story is a tongue-in-cheek look at the paucity of dramatic roles for women in theater. Full of wacky anachronisms and witty references to other plays, it was a fun choice to start with because of the high-energy performances by Emily Sandack as Medea and Kim Douthit, Cecelia Martin, and Allison Niedermeier as the all-female Greek chorus.

The highlight of the evening was "For Whom the Southern Belle Tolls." Durang created a clever adaptation of The Glass Menagerie that is both hysterically funny and faithful to the tiniest details of the original. In this version, the collection of glass animals has been replaced by a collection of glass swizzle sticks, and the troubled daughter Laura is now the troubled son, Lawrence. As Lawrence, Justin Lamb was the perfect combination of sweet innocent and slack-jawed moron. His performance was essential to the piece, and he brought to it the right amount of earnestness and comedy.

Equally flawless was Maureen Van Trease as Amanda, the overbearing mother. She was able to embody Tennessee Williams's flawed Southern belle while also layering in the twisted personality Durang adds to the character. And both Lamb and Van Trease had dead-on Southern accents. Paul Casali (Tom) and Cecelia Martin (Ginny, the "feminine caller") solidly supported the other characters without being overshadowed.

Another sketch, "The Hardy Boys and the Mystery of Where Babies Come From," again featured Lamb, this time as Joe Hardy, with Richard Rella Jr. as his brother Frank. The two young men had great chemistry together, and each obviously relished his role as a dimwitted, sweater-loving Hardy Boy.

All of the actors gave strong performances, and there were no "weak links," as can sometimes be found in ensemble casts. Michael Raimondi's direction was consistent across all of the sketches, and his interpretation of Durang's occasionally bombastic satire (gun-toting religious enthusiasts, a teenage anti-abortion zealot) was handled with the appropriate amount of irony. The energy level of many of the sketches dwindled at their conclusions, as if the actors felt the playwright's particular gimmick had gone on too long. But I believe this reflects more on the material than on this production.

The only blemish on the evening was that a program of six short plays was maybe too ambitious to be presented without an intermission. While Raimondi cleverly added stage business to the scene changes, there was never a full blackout onstage, and the audience never had any time to rest. With the show running about 90 minutes, a brief intermission could have ensured that everyone was as enthusiastic about the last three sketches as they were with the first three.

TimeSpace is a small and relatively young organization, founded in 2004. It no doubt faces many of the same hurdles that all fledgling companies come up against. But it's clear that the members care about theater and are willing to work hard to put on a good show. Dessert With Durang is ample proof of that.

Rules of Engagement

"What I really resent," sneers Carl, the brutish, Arabic-spouting interrogator, "is what you force us to become." And therein lies the transference of guilt and responsibility that, for many in power today, seems to sanction some, if not all, of the unspeakable acts that are part of the American war on terror. Yussef El Guindi's Back of the Throat is a provocative and harrowing critique of that act of transference, centering on the confrontation between two presumed government agents and a young Middle-Eastern immigrant, Khaled (Adel Akhtar), whom they suspect had an integral part in the 9/11 attacks. In order for the production to expose the (il)logic of Abu Ghraib and wiretapping, it requires its antagonists—Carl (Jamie Effros) and his Southern sophisticate partner, Bartlett (Jason Guy)—to self-consciously convey the bureaucratic tedium of privacy invasion and torture.

Much of the dialogue between Carl and Bartlett deals with interrogation tactics and their justification. El Guindi mines corporate-speak, often to comic effect: If a subject screams for longer than ten consecutive seconds or if his vital organs are pummeled directly, the methods used against him are not warranted, but if those narrow guidelines are followed….

In Khaled, a bookish introvert, we hear the voice of the unjustly accused. The production succeeds at being simultaneously provocative and entertaining in large part because of Akhtar's strong, deeply resonant performance; his Khaled is immediately likable, eliciting our empathy and concern.

Downstairs at the Flea is a long, narrow theater space that frames the action like a diorama or a letterboxed film. Audiences sit snuggly in one of only two equally long rows, with the actors merely feet away from them. A short wall, against which Khaled is repeatedly thrown and pushed, separates the stage from the rows of chairs. This kind of intimate space also works to communicate the production's immediacy. We are voyeurs, passive and silent, watching as this man, as much a citizen as any of us, has his rights systematically stripped from him.

Although the Flea's artistic director, Jim Simpson, who directed this production, efficiently works flashbacks into the narrative, using every bit of the space to its fullest potential, I wish he could have coaxed as strong a performance from his other actors as he does with Akhtar. Jamie Effros is believable enough and does fine as the more physically intimidating agent. Jason Guy's Bartlett, however, is incongruously slapstick, at times almost a sadistic, Southern Inspector Clouseau.

Bandar Albuliwi dutifully plays Asfoor, a dead Arab man connected to 9/11, with whom Khaled may or may not have had a relationship. And Erin Roth plays three separate women who give accounts of their interactions with Khaled. While her librarian is adequate, she does best as the spurned girlfriend; her over-the-top stripper is funny, but the laughs are cheap and keep the character from fully being the voice of ordinary American fear and distrust. Perhaps the fault lies with El Guindi's script, which, for all its critical strengths, artistically relies too heavily on cartoonish caricatures.

In the play's final scene, Asfoor speaks of the dominance of the English language, which does not have the "back of the throat" sound that Arabic does. He describes his desire to learn English so he can participate in the most basic sense, and how his anger grew when that participation was denied him. Back of the Throat is an excellent addition to the dialogue we must have about the war on terror and the investigation of that war's effects on us.

Connect the Dots

We crave narrative so much we see it everywhere, from the stars to the dirt. We seek out the stories of things because stories assure us that those things really do matter. And when no story exists, no matter; our imaginations connect the dots into whatever picture or pattern we desire. And so when the affable bunch of theater misfits behind Too Much Light Makes the Baby Go Blind declare they're going to cram 30—30!—plays into 60 minutes of over-caffeinated, adrenaline-fueled downtown entertainment, the mind exclaims, "So many stories! So little time!" When they add that the audience plays an important part in picking the order in which those plays are performed—shout out a number when you hear the prompt "Curtain"—the mind simply reels.

But two minutes is hardly enough time to get the whole story, so we're invited to connect those dots and see patterns of ourselves in the dialogue, monologue, and dance. We see ourselves failing to connect, and then goofily managing to, in the wordless dance piece "Wind Up." We see our prejudices hammed up and spelled out in "Housekeeper," a biting deconstruction of liberal biases. We see and can laugh at our stubbornness and folly in the well-played "Smoldering in the Silence of an Apology."

We see our insecurities heightened into sharp, self-conscious relief during "Do-It-Yourself," a confessional between two minority actors (Yolanda Kae Wilkinson and Desiree Burch) who make a plaything of the divide between real and fake as they discuss the six new company members, almost all of whom are white. Yes, the mind says, I recognize that kind of non-PC, self-involved talk; despite the limitations of race and gender, I recognize the jealousy and the fear of encroachment, and the need to protect what's mine. I recognize it so much that I'd like the backstory, or at least the rest of the story.

But no. They've yelled "Curtain," and it's time to move on. And move on we do.

Too Much Light is the New York imprint of an improv-short play genre mash-up that began in Chicago in 1988. It requires patrons to determine their own ticket prices with the roll of a die and promises to get audience members involved in the process. Once the hour is done, someone from the audience is asked to role the die to determine how many new plays will be added to the menu the following week. Cast members collaborate, writing and fine-tuning as many as six new plays for the next show, a feat that explains the palpable energy level in the room.

On the night I saw the show, one of the most compelling plays, "East of Eden," consisted of two actors (Justin Tolley and Sarah Levy) who speak, respectively, as the narrator of a Genesis-inspired creation story and a modern-day woman. Their back-and-forth seems like the fractured dialogue between two people trapped at opposite ends of history; the male in an impersonal tone decreeing that this is how it is, while the female intimately meanders her way through a relationship.

All the while, the actors use Scotch tape to enclose an apple that has been cut in two in a square maze of lines and restrictions. Once they were done, they stopped and looked at what they had made and saw that it was pretty good. They sat in the middle of the box and taped together the apple. What exactly did it mean? Forgiveness? Resilience? The reimagination of generations-old wounds and the mending of that original rupture?

But I didn't have time to think it out. The actors yelled "Curtain" and thankfully managed to snatch me back out of myself. Back out into the space where narratives are being flirted with and discarded, like so much Scotch tape on the floor of a black stage.

Rock 'n' Roll Saviors

Chekhov once quipped that "if there is a gun hanging on the wall in the first act, it must fire in the last." This basic dramaturgical tenet wasn't heeded in the productions of Cowboy Mouth by Sam Shepard and Thick Like Piano Legs by Robert Attenweiler, now playing at the Red Room. Nonetheless, the two one-acts packed enough heat to make an entertaining evening dedicated to down-at-their-heels musicians trying to find salvation amid the squalor of sex, drink, and rock 'n' roll. Attenweiler's new one-act depicts the regulars at a dive bar on the Lower East Side. The bar's struggling piano player, Tom (Nathan Williams), has one last big night to perform before he's off to Georgia.

When he enters the bar, however, he discovers someone's stolen his instrument. No one has a clue what happened to it. Upset that a "baby grand can't just fly away easy like, say, a baby elephant," Tom lashes out at the burly manager, Jack. Jack suspects Tom swiped it himself before scooting out of town. Meanwhile, Joanie, Tom's girlfriend and a cocktail waitress at the bar, gets upset that he has decided to leave her behind like "a chewed-off hangnail."

The play begins, though, with a fourth character, Billie, flashing a large wad of bills and asking Jack, "You wanna know where I got all this?" Jack would rather remain ignorant of what he suspects are her illicit dealings. Billie (Mary Guiteras) is a ne'er-do-well who lives out of her car and dreams of being a lounge singer. Like Tom, she's also back at the bar for one big last night—of boozing.

What I found odd was that the play never suggests a connection between the big wad of bills that Billie suddenly and inexplicably possesses and the conspicuously missing piano. To me, this looked like the gun that never went off, and could have acted as a dramatic decoy in the "case of the missing piano." As it is, Billie, though an amusing drunk, becomes somewhat extraneous to the plot.

Despite its loose construction, the play has enough action to hold one's interest. Attenweiler's one-act evokes the ambience of Tom Waits's ballads through its drunk and dreamy characters' slangy, exuberant dialect that's prone to down-home idioms and exaggerated storytelling, though the language slips into mannerism on occasion.

Likewise, the actors display panache and swagger without overdoing it most of the time. Bret Haines as Jack evinced a quiet control that radiated the sly worldliness, if not weariness, of the longtime bartender. Vina Less, as Joanie, conveyed the love-struck hysterics of a bright-eyed youth without resorting to melodramatic screaming.

"Cowboy Mouth," an early Shepard rock opera he co-wrote with Patti Smith, is pure spontaneous combustion throughout. Two lovers alternately argue and entertain each other with silly games in a seedy apartment. Slim unleashes his frustrations on his guitar, but can't quite be the rock 'n' roll savior that his quirky girlfriend, Cavale, hopes for. She's torn between romanticizing Johnny Ace, the black rock 'n' roll star who blew his brains out, and her more domestic dreams of owning a dishwasher and fancy shoes.

Bored, poor, and strung-out, the two lovers play out a fantasy life where they frolic like animals, pretend to go shopping, and make up wild stories. Eventually, they call the Lobster Man to get them some food. This strange delivery person intrigues them, and they call him back as a kind of prank to see what will happen.

Shepard's stage directions end the play on an intentionally ambivalent note, with the Lobster Man, unveiled as the rock 'n' roll savior, spinning the gun Cavale uses in her Johnny Ace monologue in a game of Russian roulette. The hammer strikes an empty chamber, and the lights slowly fade to black.

But director John Patrick Hayden chose to ignore the detail about the gun from Shepard's staging, and ends with the rock 'n' roll savior exultantly sprouting wings while Hendrix blares like an angelic chorus in the background. Without the gun clicking on an empty chamber, Shepard's well-constructed and grim parable about becoming disillusioned with the false idols of rock 'n' roll seems to have turned into a feel-good spectacle.

Overlooking my minor quibble with the last image, though, this fast-paced and exciting production is like a reckless joy ride with a stolen car. Becky Benhayon brings spunk, humor, and her own eccentricities to her interpretation of the peculiarly morbid yet bouncy character of Cavale, while Adam Groves delights with his boyish charm as the jumpy, energetic Slim.

While there weren't any smoking guns, these two one-acts successfully capture the explosive energy of down-and-out drifters in sexy, smoke-filled dives. Like rock 'n' roll itself, with its all-or-nothing attitude in the face of youth's big hopes and slim chances, these plays help life's disappointments seem a little less lonesome.