Time Stands Still @ Steppenwolf

Time Stands Still @ Steppenwolf Theatre Co.

The most difficult reviews to write are those regarding pretty perfect productions.

Steppenwolf productions tend to fall into this category; Time Stands Still was no exception.

The script’s thematic elements faced themes head-on. Sarah had to deal with outsiders’ expectation for a photographer to step in & fix the frame of upsetting subject matter. This allowed the understanding to erupt that altering art entirely discredits it & there is a stark difference between photography & photojournalism. The value of this specific art lies largely at presenting authenticity, despite the upsetting nature of what the camera captures. Sarah also poses the question of If It wasn’t for the ones with cameras, who would know? Who would care?

There is a sense of invasion of intimacy of the capturing of these complicated images on permanent & detached film. Sarah’s photos allowed a snap-shot into the private, tragic, distant world of war. This script was similarly structured as a invasive snap-shot into the realistic contemporary detachment in dealing with one’s PTSD & its’ abounding ripple effects. One arising result of Sarah’s homecoming was the experience of feeling like a stranger on your own sofa. Upon coming home, Sarah’s long-time partner James saw their future with 20/20 certainty, which his eyes saw hopefully & excitedly, while Sarah felt a sense of oppression. Re-seeing one’s old world with new eyes that have seen too much is a theme that can be applied to a wider scale of individuals than just those returning from war. There is a sense of empowerment that comes with overcoming the death & adrenaline of real-life tragedy, but it is equally crippling & confusing. The script did a beautiful job of addressing that grayscale kaleidoscope of emotion, action, & reaction.

I love a modern, QUADRANGULAR script:

2 couples [or 4 individuals] + 1 night/central event + the unraveling of characters =

recipe that consistently creates a quality script.

It is a formula that has been successfully applied in plays such as

Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Doubt, Proof, God of Carnage, & The Goat, Or Who is Sylvia.

I don’t know if this trend is on its way up, on its’ way out, or a somewhat eternal playwrighting tool, but I am a fan.

 

The Players

As Sarah’s boyfriend Richard Ehrlich, Francis Guinan created a very human character. He was, at times, somewhat vacant & seemed too empty to fill his character’s anger & angst. If this was intentional, it was an interesting approach to apply…being unquestionably devoted to a weathered woman but, at times, having to detach out of self-preservation. His performance was layered, sympathetic, & well-conceived. Randall Newsome played James Dodd & provided a calming anchor of sorts. His role was not the most colorful, but he I have no complaints. Kristina Valada-Viars played Mandy Bloom, Newsome’s young love. She reminded me of Maya Rudolph & I liked that she was costumed in shorts with tights. She offered a cute, chipper charm but was too quick to erupt into emotion. Overall, she was good but not great.

As Sarah Goodwin, Sally Murphy carried the show in a role that is nothing less than a star-carriage. Murphy is an amazingly talented actress who has been an ensemble member at Steppenwolf since 1993. I enjoyed her performance in Sex With Strangers & appreciate her commitment & versatility. I’ve loved Ms. Murphy since her performance as the perfect Julie Jordan in the 1995 Broadway Revival of Carousel. Julie Jordan is a part that is usually played as a wilting daisy…a bright, bubbly blonde who falls in love with a guy from the wrong side of the tracks but makes the best of it. To swing the pendulum, this role could also be textually defined as the disintegration of a young woman’s life & hope from an abusive relationship. She incorporated both elements to her portrayal & played the Julie Jordan we have all been waiting for. She applied to same insightful skill to the portrayal of this heavy character.

A Behanding at Spokane @ Profiles Theatre



I love Martin McDonagh. I saw The Lieutenant of Inishmore on Broadway & The Pillowman at Philadelphia’s Wilma Theatre. I have never seen a play from The Leenane Trilogy, but they have received enough acclaim to get props without my first-hand endorsement. The McDonagh I know creates an authentically heightened alternative world, presents a sincere farce that is genuinely funny, and uses heightened metaphors to create an authentically parallel world. This McDonagh tried to write from an American perspective and lost a lot of the qualities I had grown to love about his writing: this humor lacked a smart subtlety & was quipper than his previous writings. From the audience, there was genuine laughter as well as nervous laughter, but neither of these indicated a presence of genuinely humorous writing. McDonagh’s signature is his use of satirical but severely upfront violence with the purpose of transferring the play’s underlying moral. Somehow, he always makes the insane approachable, but that tendency was lost on this script & it just seemed bizarre without a direct intent. The play’s conflict centered around Carmichael, a degenerate trying to track down his hand that was stolen & semi-torturing a young, weed-dealing couple who claimed to have his hand for the dealing. The repeated sentiment that tortured Carmichael was the image of his attackers waving goodbye to him with his own hand. I had to assume this metaphor’s purpose was to communicate a commentary on the great loss of wanting something back that rightfully belongs to you. I do like that theme, but I remain unsure if that was McDonagh’s intended thought-provocation; that uncertainty does not speak well towards the quality of the script.

The Players

The quality of the cast made up for the flaws of the script. As Carmichael, Darrell W. Cox created & committed to a well-rounded but still intriguing central character. I saw him at Profiles in last season’s reasons to be pretty, and was very pleased with the complete & necessary physical transformation he made from that role. The ability to physically transform is a necessity for a member of an acting troupe, and I appreciate that Profiles is aware incorporating that reimagining into each production. As Marilyn & Toby, the weed-dealing couple held prisoner by Carmichael, Sara Greenfield & Levenix Riddle exhibited perfectly nuanced energy, excellent interaction with the text, and cleverly communicated comedic ability. As the front desk clerk Mervyn, Eric Burgher provided clean moments of punctuation during the overall production. His character unfolded throughout the script more than the others, and he was smart & subtle about delivering plot-punctuating moments of realization. This was a strongly cast ensemble piece with no weak link who acted with unadulterated commitment to their roles, and their performance quality alone makes this a show worth seeing.





DreamCast: After The Fair

After the Fair, set in late 1890s England, is the story of the tangled web that is woven when Edith, a bored married woman, begins to write love letters on behalf of her maid, Anna, to a young man with whom Anna has had a brief romance. The letters, Edith insists, are her words, but Anna's feelings. One of the interesting questions this musical raises is whether feelings can be separated from words. Can you feel something if you can't express it? Anna, charming as she is, is uneducated and limited in her ability to convey her feelings. Her brief (and physical) encounter with Charles is very different from the deeper, cerebral relationship Edith develops with him via letters. Which is more real? Which would he choose, if he had to? 

After The Fair: TalkinBroadway

Why I Love This Tiny Musical

• It reaffirms the power of letter-writing. At the end of the day, there really is nothing better than receiving a great, well-written letter. And if it's a love letter, all the better.
• With the love letters holding so much power over the plotline, there is a substantial amount of pressure for these love-letters to be exceptional. The beautiful text fulfills the expectations, but the fact that these love letters are placed to music of equal quality makes this the most authentically romantic musical I have ever encountered.
• In an opposing (but equally appreciated thought), this musical also brings to light the dangers that come with writing something meaningful rather than speaking it. It's ironic that this is such a solidly-set period piece because this message is so applicable to the contemporary, text-friendly audience.
• I love theatre being structured in a quadrangle [4-character] structure. This structure is becoming more common in plays, but I would love to see it applied to the musical theatre scene as well.

The Players

Bonnie Wright as Anna
I'm not a Harry Potter fan, so her face seemed familiar
but it was hard to pinpoint from where.
I like that vibe for Anna.
She has a manner & face that is
vaguely familiar & vaguely worldly, while still seeming
earnest, endearing, entrancing, & adorable.

James Franco as Charles Bradford
He immediately comes across as charming but with some depth.
If he could channel that sense of intensity with
a lazy rich-boy tone,
he would be a perfect casting as the
charismatic but ultimately disappointing beau.

Edward Herrmann as Arthur Harnham
Arthur's role is that of the unwaveringly strong, eternally oblivious,
but ultimately loving male provider.
He operates from the mentality that care-taking equals love,
but a love that is not always sufficient
to the complicated females in his life.
The distant, white-collar husband/father is a role that can easily fall flat,
but on he played & conquered a similar role on Gilmore Girls.

Sela Ward as Edith Harnham

I initially thought of her because of her physical resemblance to Michele Pawk.

And being a regular on CSI means that she knows how to play a thinker,

and Edith is nothing if not a

plotter, planner, & executor.

God of Carnage @ The Goodman

I realized after I saw God of Carnage that Yasmina Reza also wrote Art. It put my experience in perspective because I had the exact same reaction to this production that I did to Art. Before I saw both of these plays, I thought they looked right up my alley...they have small casts, contemporary settings, and plotlines that are so simple & intriguing that the play's commentary has to be weighty & important. But at the end of the play, the simple plotline remained very simple. The script just lacked the essential element of enrichment & thought-provocation. Not to say it was pointless. There is something important about actually acknowledging the serious frustrations that erupt from the mundane problems of real life. There can be poetry & purpose found in cleaning up the messes of every day life. I just wish that poetry & purpose had been infused more heavily in the script.

In a quadrangle of a play, it is difficult to truly critique the actors unless they have strikingly varying skill sets. All four actors were sharply-tuned, charasmatic, & fully invested in their roles. To create a strong, 4-person ensemble (absent of a weak link) is a feat to be applauded.

The theatre was beautiful.
The actors were impeccable.
The point of the production....I'm not so clear on.

The Goat, or Who is Sylvia? @ Remy Bumppo

Hands down, the best Chicago play I have seen thus far.
It was a perfect production of a script that is a thick mountain heavy wording & a heavy-headed trip of a story. I went with a friend who had never seen a play before, so it was a relief that his first taste of the stage was a great one. Their front-of-house staff also stood out as being especially friendly, accomodating, & approachable.

It was clear that this production had hours of energy from a variety of sources to finely-articulate the end-product. It was staged well, which allowed for poignant, snap-shots of moments. The set was great, which is not something on which I usually have a huge opinion, but it did stand out. It is easy to get lazy when a play has one set, especially when that one set is in a living room. I think the standard should be higher when there is only one set because it is the sole result of the set decorating efforts. This set was a realistic interpretation of a beautiful living room for a beautiful family. It was also the perfect stage to set the scene for the imploding/exploding of the family unit. The fact that the set was great, and the fact that it was destroyed so well, just served as a visual/thematic hammering in of the reality of what was happening to this family. The set actively contributed when it could have been slighted, which is an example of what made me think so highly of this production: they majored in minors. Details did not go unnoticed on the production end, and were highly noticable & effective on the audience's end.  

thinkTalk: the official Remy Bumppo Theatre Company blog

 The Players
In a quadrangle of a play, the effect of one weak link can be an irrevocable poison to the production. Luckily, Remy Bumppo's cast was individually & wholly thoughtful, effective, & engaging.

Will Allan as Billy
His character served as a punctuating point to mark how far the chaos has fallen, as well as the face of the future this diaster has broken. He had limited time to present the entire color wheel of emotion from the perpective of a man young in years & life. He was cast very well in terms of age-appropriateness & chemistry with both parents, which is important because this play means nothing if we don't care about this family. As the only child of a married couple, this character served as the heart of this play's heartbreak. And this actor hit the nail on the head, heartbreak & all.

Annabel Armour as Stevie
She changed with the character. Her acting was like a surfer who adjusts their balance based on the curl of the wave. With the shocking curl of information that Stevie has to survive, there are a thousand tiny moments where an actress could drop the ball, lose character, make the absolute wrong choice, or just lose momentum. Luckily, she avoided all of those potential pitfalls and gave a seething, crystal-clear performance. She created a character whose life i could picture off the stage. She created a character whose past & future I could clearly envision.

Michael Joseph Mitchell as Ross

His role serves as the involved but removed, third-party informant/victim. It's a part without tons of stage time, but the most relatable the the audience. In watching this family fall apart, we become involved & invested in their trauma even though we are audience members. Ross is an audience member of this conflict, so his reaction should provide an arena for the audience to emotionally resonate with actualizing the unimaginable. He achieved this, while bringing a fresh energy, comedic know-how, & an authentically personal performance.

Nick Sandys as Martin

He is clearly a very seasoned actor. The challenge of this part is, not only to make the audience somehow able to believe this man made this terrible choice, but to also stir up empathy of the resulting disintegration of his life. As the backbone of the cast, I couldn't imagine a stronger spine.

I forgot about my 3 favorite quotes from The Goat & was very happy to hear them spoken.