Review of: Birth and After Birth

Tina Howe has obviously been influenced by her previous efforts in translating Eugene Ionesco's The Bald Soprano and The Lesson. Her Birth and After Birth, which was originally written in the 70's with a few recent changes, owes a lot to the older playwright's absurdist genre but where his plays were of a time and place indicative of the genre's evolution, this play seems like a throwback and frankly, Mr. Ionesco did it better. Much better.

It is Nicky's fourth birthday and his overly indulgent parents, Bill and Sandy, want to give this monster child everything his heart desires. Spoiled rotten, unappreciative, and tantrum throwing, this amazingly precocious and talented child understands everything and nothing at once. Though attempts are made to discipline, boundaries and limits are never recognized or enforced. The toll on the parents is costly to say the least, especially Sandy who is losing her hair, teeth and skin in the process. Bill, obsessed with video-recording everything, has a short fuse but blames it on the pressures at his cut-throat job instead of fathering a grotesque. With the arrival of Sandy's cousin, Mia and her husband, Jeffrey, the birthday party goes into full swing. This childless couple makes up an anthropological team of two who study the children and their families of remote and perhaps ancient civilizations, some of which are hilariously bizarre.

Miss Howe tries to make several points, some of which aren't clear, but to anyone witnessing current child-rearing processes, the antics on stage can certainly be appreciated. With the ever-increasing stakes to achieve (even before they are conceived), children not only come first in every and all things, they are put on a pedestal and allowed to run riot. I always think of Whitney Houston's song with the moronic lyric "I believe the children are our future" which lately scares the bejesus out of me. Yes, we want our children to have every opportunity and have the tools to succeed in an extremely competitive world but at what expense? When the children run the show, I run in the opposite direction. As many women discovered recently, you can't have it all nor should children. When Mia and Jeffrey arrive, Ms. Howe finds her absurdist voice and the play takes off. Though impressed with Nicky's ability to pick up languages and play the cello, they barely pay attention to him because compared with the unbelievable struggles of the children in other cultures, this kid hasn't earned anything.

The first act jumps around all over the place and Director Christian Parker has a difficult time trying to make it work. It's all ideas without linkage to unify it into something manageable. Therefore, Jeff Binder and Maggie Kiley as the monster creating parents have a rough time of making their roles cohere. Ms. Kiley tends to whine in one key while Mr. Binder simply injects everything with energy. With something more concrete to play in the second act, Peter Benson's matter of fact deadpan is perfect while Kate Blumberg's bohemian scientist has the right amount of other-worldliness. As Nicky, the very large adult Jordan Gelber manages to convey the innocence and wonder of a child as well as the gluttony, depravity and ugliness when innocence and wonder are sublimated. It's a horrifyingly funny performance. When Ms. Howe finds her footing in the second act, so does Mr. Parker. The image of a family around a campfire, in this case the cathode ray of a video screen, says it all.

Using Ionesco's trick of exploiting age-old expressions and adages to carry dialogue, Ms. Howe left out the obvious - "children should be seen and not heard". And in my book, they shouldn't even be seen.

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