Jamie Smithson, Zuzanna Szadkowski and Tony Torn (left to right) in Act II of Bedlam Company’s production of Fall River Fishing, a new play whose first act is based on the 1892 Fall River, Mass., murders of Lizzie Borden’s family.
Lizzie Borden, a favorite true-crime subject since long before the genre had that name, is the inspiration behind Fall River Fishing, a new play directed by Eric Tucker and written by two of its cast members, Deb Knox and Zuzanna Szadkowski. Their double duty as playwrights and performers doesn’t fully convey just how much Knox and Szadkowski, along with their three castmates (Susannah Millonzi, Jamie Smithson and Tony Torn), put into the show. It succeeds because of these five deeply invested performances, each actor playing two roles that require them to deliver absurdist, anachronistic dialogue and engage in physical gags like eating—and feeding each other—spaghetti with their hands, sitting on the toilet for an extended period of time and getting splattered with blood.
Lizzie Borden (Szadkowski, left) probably didn’t actually have a mimosa the morning her father and stepmother (Susannah Millonzi, center) were murdered. Smithson (right) plays Uncle Nathan.
All five actors are excellent, though Torn—in his oily arrogance as both Mr. Borden and his Act II character, Krogstad—and Millonzi, slithering on the furniture as a vain and tactless woman in both halves, earn the biggest laughs. The entire cast take the ridiculous script completely seriously yet go all-out with the comedic bits. As a result, even if you’re not sure what’s going on in Fall River Fishing, you can enjoy watching it happen.
This is not, as one may have guessed, a straight-up dramatization of the Borden murders. It does include stuff from the facts of the case: a visiting uncle, some possibly rancid mutton, Mr. Borden’s killing of pigeons, tension between Lizzie and her stepmother, an Irish maid who may have had a romantic relationship with Lizzie, going to the barn as an alibi. But in Fall River Fishing, Lizzie is a bitter, narcissistic actress. Her stepmom does yoga, has gotten face fillers and wears Givenchy perfume. The uncle talks about Greek yogurt, Tinder and the Condé Nast Building.
And after intermission, the story morphs into a modern-day A Doll’s House, with Nora and Torvald Helmer joined by another true-crime figure whose saga has been rehashed in pop culture, Sharon Tate. This Nora, unlike Ibsen’s original, is very vocal about her marital frustrations. Also in this version, her old friend Christine is a neighbor of the Bordens.
There’s a meta layer to the show, too. “This is absurd. You’re American. You’re from Greensboro,” Lizzie says to Bridget, the Irish maid played by Knox, who is from Greensboro, N.C. Then Bridget and Lizzie—played by Szadkowski, who portrays Nora in the second act (when Knox plays Tate)—discuss Lizzie’s acting.
Bridget: “The best one you’ve ever done is Nora from Doll’s House. It’s, like, otherworldly.”
Lizzie: “I’ve always felt that way—that I become myself inside of Nora.”
Bridget: “And I love the part when murdered Sharon Tate comes in!”
Lizzie: “We can try it. You can do Sharon. There’s a wig...”
So what is the thematic through-line amid this plot mash-up? Maybe something about dissatisfied women. Or murder as part of celebrity culture. How women associated with violent crimes, whether as victims or alleged perpetrators, are regarded. How people can’t escape certain interpersonal dynamics, even in different relationships.
Sharon and Nora, portrayed by co-playwrights Deb Knox (left) and Szadkowski, in the bizarro second half. Photographs by Ashley Garrett.
The play may not be making any of these points, however, and some audience members might think it doesn’t make any point and is just a jumble of non sequiturs, parody, cultural references and off-kilter dialogue. But it’s all embraced so robustly by the ensemble that that becomes the point. Nowhere is this as evident as in the climactic spaghetti scene—an episode that has no clear point but is a well-executed bit of physical humor and blatant lunacy.
Elaborate production design also gives the show a veneer of gravitas. The set, designed by Cate McCrea, consists of interiors of two homes, Victorian-era and contemporary. A bed and sofa in the Borden home are soaked in blood from the start of the play, when everybody is still alive. Props abound, some as décor (including a Borden’s milk crate in Nora’s home in the second act) and some as part of the action, like the aforementioned spaghetti, a pitcher of yogurt that gets hurled against the wall and, of course, a hatchet. Props designer Buffy Cardoza is also responsible, presumably, for the gory head on Mr. Borden that shows the damage from the whacks that killed him.
Costume designer Charlotte Palmer-Lane has attired the Borden household in period finery as if this were a faithful historical drama. In the second act, the costumes have the vibe of 1970s swingers—particularly for Christine, wearing shades and a plaid jumpsuit, and Krogstad, in his denim jacket and paisley ascot. Sharon Tate, pregnant, is dressed in a bloodstained baby doll nightie.
Bedlam’s Fall River Fishing runs through March 9 at the Connelly Theatre (220 E. 4th St.). Evening performances are at 7 p.m. Tuesday through Friday and at 8 p.m. Saturday; matinees are at 2 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. For tickets and more information, visit bedlam.org.
