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Brick Theater
June 6, 2009
Reviewed by VanLoan
vanloan@nyconstage.org
The full title of Theatre Askew's latest production is The Tale of the Good Whistleblower of Chaillot's Caucasian Mother and her Other Children of a Lesser Marriage Chalk Circle.
Written by Stan Richardson (and one suspects the unaccredited input of the company) with incidental music by Rachel Peters, this witty, tongue-twisting label tells us everything we need to know about the work. Of the three authors that are subversively alluded to in the title (Mark Medoff, Jean Giraudoux and Bertolt Brecht), it's Brecht who gets the most mileage preparing us for the dialectical message to follow. It's a little too clever, a little too self-referential and a little too long for its own good. This is not to say the show is preachy or uninteresting; quite the contrary. So much of the show is smart, persuasive and politically correct that it's a shame that Richardson cannot meet a metaphor or allegory he doesn't bring into play.
In the prologue that opens the show, a group of twenty somethings are smoking from a bong mourning the suicide attempt of John, one of their friends. There is some concern that the cause was overmedication. Reverend Cindy (a droll Joanna Parson) the local Christian minister stops by to offer some consolation via a story/parable. With her folk guitar (which speaks to her in only a voice she can hear), she relates a tale set in Belle Époque Paris about a capitalistic pharmaceutical engineer who has a reversal of conscience and decides to devote his work to the benefit of mankind not profits. Various complications ensue; insuring that no good deed goes unpunished.
Brecht's masterpiece on war profiteering, Mother Courage and her Children serves as the template here. As related via three Greek gods (Matt Steiner, Sara Alvarez and Brandon Uranowitz who will serve as a first-rate comedic chorus throughout) from the "House of Courage", Dr. Courage (pronounced with a distinct French accent) decides that the rich aristocracy should pay for their own medication while the poor should be subsidized. When his suggestions are presented before his board of directors (the chorus), Courage (an excellent Tim Cusack) is soon assassinated for his efforts ("the Gods will answer for not answering"). His mother, Madame Courage (an often strident Debbie Troche) is left to fend for herself and her three deaf mute children (you know who).
 The production aspects are minimal (the lack of any set hurts the production) and director Jason Jacobs does what he can to keep the action from becoming too static in the Brick's black box playing space. The energetic ensemble of actors carries the piece although they are often at the mercy of the material. The slickness of the writing is both its strength and its undoing. The big musical send-up of Les Miserables is a hoot while references to a goat named Sylvia (Edward Albee) are a groaner. Yet any show that can comically morph Mother Courage and her son Swiss Cheese into Auntie Mame and her ward Dennis must be doing something right. The show ends on a nihilistic, Brechtian note chastising the adolescents of 9/11 who have become the do-nothings of the "Great Recession". With some judicious editing, this Caucasian Mother could pack quite a punch of black comedy.
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Brick Theater
June 21, 2009
VanLoan
vanloan@nyconstage.org
The most famous stage direction in William Shakespeare's canon, "Exit, pursued by a bear." is found in his play The Winter's Tale. Antigonus has just abandoned the newborn baby girl, Perdita on the coast of Bohemia. The cryptic direction follows although we later find out that he inevitably meets his doom. Author Casey Wimpee uses the direction as the title of his equally cryptic, equally wintry one act play currently at the Brick's Anti-Depression Festival.
 Chicago is the setting; the windy city, the city of broken backs, the city that's a shredder of men according to our anti-hero Leon Schmeer (great evocative name; he's played with suitable schlubby charm by Jared Culverhouse). Leon is the Vice-President of the Chicago's Department of Sanitation (or vice-president of shit as he puts it) and has quite a few problems. The DOS is going on strike for higher wages ("we deserve it, working in this hidden Venice of shit"), his wife Ursula (a quirky performance in drag by Michael Mason) has herpes and is thinking of leaving Leon to become an opera singer, his brother Corbin (Cole Wimpee) is in New Orleans dying of AIDS and most indignantly his beloved Chicago Cubs are out of World Series contention.
It's all enough to make one crawl into a cave and die - or at least hibernate for an indefinite period of time. Before Leon does this however he asks the universe for a sign. It comes in the form of the form of the Kernode Bear. A rare subspecies of the black bear family in that it's coloring was Albino; it confused Darwinian scholars yet was revered by ancient tribes as a spiritual totem. Leon is indeed symbolically pursued.
Author Wimpee is less interested in creating a linear narrative than creating a dreamscape of emotion. This one hour fever dream seems to be about Leon's handling Corbin's death watch. The whole 'bear' motif conjures the homosexual subculture while the numerous scatological references ("does a bear shit in the woods") infer the futility of existence. We are never quite sure whether is action is in real time or flashback; actually it seems to be a little of both. Director Julie Rossman gets some good comic mileage out of the costumed bears and Benjamin Manglos provides a neat musical backdrop but we are still left a little out in the cold.
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Brick Theater
VanLoan
July 1, 2009 07/01/09
I suppose it was inevitable that someone would think to use the AIDS virus as a marketable commodity. As an amoral, queasy-inducing topic, I suppose we should be grateful that James Comtois' new play Infectious Opportunity is as well crafted and fascinating as it is.
Closing out the Brick's Anti-Depressive Festival, Infectious Opportunity's protagonist, Wes (played initially with self-righteous humility by David Ian Lee) is a HIV+ film maker who is about to make the big break into mainstream consciousness with his film, "Shoulder for the World to Cry On". It's the story of a doomed love affair between two heterosexual members of a HIV+ support group. Wes has dutifully researched his story by attending many sessions of one such group to the point of basing his leading female character on someone he grew close to (Josie has subsequently died). In addition to his directorial duties, Wes also teaches screenplay writing at the very college where he was an undergraduate. He is revered as though he were a young Orson Welles. The devious deus ex machina that Comtois introduces is that Wes (Attention: spoiler alert!) is not nor has ever been in a compromised health status. He has used the AIDS crisis and its inherent notoriety as a means to further his career (on his way to receiving an Academy Award no less).
Back in his undergraduate days, Wes was not always so unprincipled. In fact, his sympathy for good friend Rob (DR Mann Hanson) who actually is HIV+ causes rumors to start that is also "simpatico". Wes soon receives the compassionate attention that usually comes with such a diagnosis and willfully neglects to correct the response. Suddenly, opportunities open up and there is no turning back harking back to that proverbial 'tangled web'. The 'game' becomes Wes' destiny coloring every decision he makes despite the loathsome cost on his spirit (i.e. he takes his "meds" in front of his students to illicit sympathy).
Author Comtois has written a tight 90 minute, well for lack of a better word, thriller. Once we are "on to" Wes' con game, we eagerly await how he will inevitably trip himself up. We almost forget the repugnant mature of the con. Told in a present tense/past tense format, the play is a bit of a puzzle that we must put together. Structurally, the character of Josie presents something of a problem. While alive, Josie falls for Wes who is unresponsive to her advances. After she has died, she becomes a moral muse for Wes constantly commenting on and denouncing him for his duplicity. It is a rather confusing construct to use especially with the non-chronological design. Actress Andrea Marie Smith is first-rate in her characterization however, nailing the resignation, then anger, then outrage with Wes. The supporting cast is equally good with Ronica Reddick standing out in three cameo roles. Director Pete Boisvert navigates with a steady hand over the narrative bumps and appropriately heightens the tension as Wes' scam become more and more excruciating. David Ian Lee gives a fearless performance pulling no punches as Wes; totally unafraid of the character's questionable moral code and at times delight in the chicanery of the situation.
There is an elephant in this living room, though. The question hovering from the start of this ruse is "Is Wes gay?" His homo-erotic advances towards Rob and his standoffishness towards Josie seem to suggest so. Yet, Wes never comes out of the closet as a gay man even at the height of his fame (or does his fame keep him in his closet?). While the choice of masquerading as a positive person in the quest for celebrity is repugnant enough regardless of sexual preference, the fact that Wes might be gay would make the choice more repulsive. It's an opportunity that author Comtois seems to have missed.
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