IMFourPlay

Healing the Family Pain: Performance Number Eighteen

What a fun evening!! It can be difficult getting the proverbial curtain up at 10:00pm with the quick change over from Duel of Fools and an often steady stream of latecomers, but tonight the show got underway at 10:02 (and we actually finished up notes around 12:15 which must be some kind of a record too!) Kudos to the booth (Dana and Charley) and house manager Patrick's efforts for getting us underway in such style.

Act one was a hoot with a capital "H" and it feels like the show is back into high gear after a few slower performances. Chase, Ron and Kate were in rare form, and we had an act of really playful characters and promising storylines. (And perhaps, even more importantly, some great listening and team work.) Chase started strongly as George, a security guard in an emergency room peopled by Dr. Anderson, an almost saint-like physician, and the drug-addled and disease-ridden Margaret. George's young son, Brody, with his uncontrollable violent tendencies and fascination with weapons and poisons, provided ample conflict for the desperate father, and Chase used this conflict to great effect in his opening number. Ron played Tristan, a young home-bound construction worker with a psychotic and argumentative mother, Judith, a young female friend and supplier of smuggled Skittles, Trisha, and a mysterious best-friend, Bill, who inexplicably lived in the young man's closet. All but a prisoner to his mother's controlling ways and complex alarm system, Tristan craved to escape his home. Kate took on the role of Stacy, an "exchange" student who found herself assigned to an Alabama house with an oddball couple, Gertrude and Billy Bob. (Chase gave a particularly strong choice when he punched Stacy upon arrival noting that Alabama had two rules: you gotta learn to take a punch; and you can't have all your teeth!) Spicing things up further, Stacy was followed to her Alabama home by Heinrich, an impassioned young German boy that she had housed with years earlier. Last but not least, I was Rich, a young man for whom fly fishing was his "second favorite thing to do." His co-workers, helpful Bobby, lisping Sarah and born-lucky Trevor, joined Rich for a fishing expedition where it quickly became apparent that he wasn't going to catch anything of value (although we later learnt that he was really fishing for a different kind of life altogether!)

I would have been happy to follow any of these stories into the second act (which is not something we can say every night.) Chase's George took the vote, and his son's self-destructive ways continued to weaken family stability as Dr. Anderson's threats to take the boy away if he was admitted to the E.R. again loomed ominously as a real potential. The more George attempted to make his house safe for his son, the more devious acts Brody found to put himself in mortal danger. Just when Dr. Anderson feared Brody's actions had gone too far, father and son were reunited as Brody's safety helmet was revealed to have evil intents of its own. Kate provided some great physical moments as her Stacy slowly suffered in the background from an unattended wound, and Ron gave a brilliant final twist as the final song of the act culminated.

Listening was right on track tonight, and there were lots of great little details that were reincorporated playfully throughout the evening. (I particularly liked Kate's "Warning shot" reference as Stacy, and Chase bringing back a slapping game between us and the "odd and really specific" sign postings at the end of the show.) We had some great environment and physical work (Kate was particularly on fire in this regard), and there were lots of neat discovered games (such as Ron's escalating Tom Cruise references as he tried to escape his house--his repelling pose in an act one duet was a really great physical choice!) I was nervous that we weren't going to be able to find a satisfying ending, and although the "helmet of evil" was a bit of a stretch, as my right hand Gina noted, the whole company so over-accepted the choice that it almost seemed logical by the show's end!

In short, we had some good storytelling tonight. It's easy to forget in a show that has so many musical numbers (over 20) that the story really is the most important component. Chase did a nice job finding the human core and desire of our hero, and even though things became absurd at times (my rather dark solo as the son singing about how pain made me feel alive comes to mind), the company worked together smoothly to weave the various stories together.

When it's this much fun, it seems as if seven shows isn't enough to put the show to bed...

Your now-finally-writing-on-DSL-not-dial-up-and-loving-it Director, David C.