Bruised, Bothered and Bewildered

The modest-sized hotel room cum theater features a wild-eyed tiger portrait hung over the bed, a 1960’s radio, and fourteen folding chairs. If it weren’t for the slick production design (by Chris Keegan and director Travis Chamberlain, who runs lights and sound while perched atop a hotel room dresser), the setting might suggest the sort of skits vacationing children put on for their relatives. But Tennessee Williams’ Green Eyes is not child’s play: it’s a whip smart romp through the boundaries of sex and violence, betrayal and fidelity. Written in 1970 but not published until 2008, Green Eyes played to sold out houses at The Bushwick Starr, as part of Target Margin’s Unknown Williams festival earlier this year. Now, under the auspices of P.S. 122’s Coil Festival, Chamberlain has remounted the production inside midtown’s Hudson Hotel. Aside from the obvious stunt of performing a play in a hotel room (light designer Derek Wright deserves a gold star for his work in this tight setting), the atypical performance space adds a disarming layer of playfulness not necessarily expected of a 30-minute psychological thriller that opens to a naked woman with bruises all over her body and a sullen husband demanding to know how they got there.

Williams never explicitly solves the mystery. Did the newlywed couple engage in rough honeymoon sex that the bridegroom has blocked out? Or did his wife sneak home a stranger while he drank himself into a stupor on Bourbon Street? Chamberlain takes pains not to paint either spouse as a victim, though they are damaged (and damaging) in their respective ways. As the tormented young soldier Claude Dunphy, Adam Couperthwaite brings a raw earnestness that creates sharp tension with Erin Markey’s more calculated take on Mrs. Dunphy, whose terrors are, perhaps, more deliciously mystifying. He is haunted by the horrors of Vietnam, which his new wife will not (cannot?) understand. Yet she is the one with the physical bruises at the outset of the play, and her demons are just as perplexing.

A three-part lecture series, The Kindness of Strangeness, presented in conjunction with Green Eyes at The Museum of Art and Design this month, contextualizes Williams as a member of the last century’s queer avant-garde. It’s helpful to note, for instance, that shortly after penning Green Eyes Williams publicly came out as a gay man. What is strangeness? Queerness?

Green Eyes is not a gay love story disguised in heteronormativity; this couple’s behavior is far from the norm. Remarkably, with Green Eyes, Williams anticipates by decades the inclusion of BDSM under the rubric of queer sexuality. That deviant desires exist across gender and sexual spectra is, by now, well-worn territory. Chamberlain skillfully takes Green Eyes one step further by locating the playfulness – the pleasure – in deviance. This is transgressive theater at its very best.

River of No Return

Harry Appleman, the dying poet of Jovanka Bach’s play Nightsong for the Boatman, is seldom at a loss for words. He rails against his unfair predicament, and seeks to hide from his imminent fate. The untidy drama that unfolds, like Harry’s life, resembles a sloppy rough draft, offering allegory in place of real character development, and lacking any variation on the “washed up” writer archetype that is all too familiar. Directed by John Stark, the play opens with Harry (John DiFusco) playing dice with an unnamed bloke on the outer docks of an undefined city. It soon becomes clear that the bloke is actually the boatman of the River Styx, the mythical river of the dead, and that Harry is playing the game for his life. He loses, in short order, and is instructed by the boatman to report back to the docks in one week’s time for his farewell voyage to the undiscovered country.

Rather than keeping his appointment, Harry hides out. The problem is he has told his daughter Jessie (Amanda Landis) to come to the docks to see him off (a complication that, not unlike other plot points, is never justified or explained). Once Harry realizes the mix up, he sets out to undo his misdeed and save his little girl.

The play’s premise, though plenty hokey, is not helped by its staid structure and stock characters. Through a series of cluttered flashbacks, and copious blackouts, we revisit Harry’s debauched life. We meet his considerably younger girlfriend Sheila (Nicole Gabriella Scipione), his jealous colleague Larry (J. Lawrence Landis), his fed up ex-wife Emily (Donna Luisa Guinan), and a sniveling doctoral student named Gordon (Geoffrey Hillback). Though these characters serve as bystanders to Harry’s spiraling off the tracks, it is never apparent what we, or they, are supposed to like about Harry in the first place. His character is the textbook cliché of the flawed, hack writer: womanizer (check!), smug academic (check!), creatively blocked (check!), disdainful of family life (check!), heavy drinker (you know it!). After all this, his crossing the Styx doesn’t seem like such a bad idea. About the only redeeming aspect of Harry is that he was once a brilliant poet, but Bach mars this pretense when she has the character recite his breakthrough poetry aloud. Harry’s poetry is not the stuff of the National Book Award, as the character mentions having won. Sometimes, it is best to leave “brilliance” to the audience’s imagination.

Joe Morrissey’s lights and John DeYoung’s music do a fine job of underscoring the mythical undertone of the piece. Considering the multiple locales of the play, and the limited stage space, Jaret Sacrey’s painted backdrop of a set is unobtrusive, if not particularly inventive.

At its heart, Nightsong for the Boatman is a Faustian tale of a writer forced to confront death so that he may see the wrongs of his ways, and how, contemplating these wrongs, he could become a better man and artist. There’s clearly a lot of soul to squeeze out of this conceit (forgive the quip), but Bach’s script provides little variation or nuance on the theme.

Stark and his cast pull together and move things along at a steady clip. Bach’s dialogue is compressed and never stagnant, but the thread of the piece is too thin to deliver a meaningful end.

Seeing the Reality of War

How can you tell that what you see is real? So ponders Frank Hasek, a twenty-first century rendering of the character Woyzeck, created by Georg Buchner. Private Hasek, the protagonist of Reservoir, by Eric Henry Sanders, is a not a relic of a bygone era. Rather, he is a very real and a very realistic product of contemporary combat. The play's greatest strength is its text. Sanders has done a truly commendable job of retelling this tale for a modern-day audience. We meet Frank after he has returned from his tour of duty. He attempts to readjust to his life at home in light of his horrific wartime experiences: his relationship with his girlfriend, his place in the Army, and even his sense of control over himself hang in the balance. As he succumbs to PTSD, his ability to cope with the world around him slowly but surely deteriorates. Due to his loss of mental clarity, he finds it difficult to convince himself of what he should believe and what are merely figments of his addled mind.

The story is told in an episodic manner, as was its source material. The director, Hamilton Clancy, has found subtle but useful ways of keeping this structure from being either overly distancing or too confusing. Through simple devices such as turning on a household light fixture when in a domestic space or displaying cheap flowers when in a doctor's office, it is always clear where the characters are in any given scene.

In addition to telling a meaningful and affecting story about the horrors of war and the effects that participating in combat have on the average soldier, the play also presents powerful and evocative poetic language. Single lines stand out as clear explanations of concepts and emotions that would otherwise need pages of dialogue to convey. The weight of what is being discussed is never lost, not even in the few terse moments of comedic release. It is always clear that what is being discussed is important and worth hearing, no matter how painful it might be to listen to.

The design aesthetic maintains the dark mood of the text while highlighting the plot points in interesting ways. The set is simple, made up of only a few chairs and stools and some chicken wire, and yet it is capable of evoking myriad locations. The chicken wire, in particular, gives the sense of entrapment that the characters are experiencing. Frank may no longer be "in country" but he is never far from being surrounded by its effects. The lighting completes the ambiance, using dim lighting to solidify the tone of the piece and then contrasting it with the unnatural brightness of some interior locales.

The performances are, in general, good. Alessandro Colla gives a compelling and empathetic representation of Frank Hasek. In addition, Karla Hendrick is worth mentioning for her turn as the therapist. She does an impressive job of conveying the internal turmoil of being someone who wants to help and who understands her patients' struggles and someone who is under the thumb of the U.S. Military hierarchy. Her struggle throws into relief the idea that Hasek may only be the product of a system; perhaps he never was in control of his own fate or identity at all.

Overall, Reservoir has the potential to be a really significant work of theater. There are moments of great poignancy in the piece. The play presents a disturbing reality in a way that forces its audiences to pay attention. This is assuredly a play to see and believe.

Oh Dear, Abbie

ABBIE, now playing at the West End Theater at The Church of St. Paul & St. Andrew on the Upper West Side, is a one-man show about radical 60s and 70s activist Abbie Hoffman. Adapted from Hoffman’s own speeches and writings and starring actor, educator, and native New Yorker Bern Cohen, ABBIE is an interesting tale, not so interestingly told. Subtitled The Personal Story of the Clown Prince of the Sixties Revolution, this 75-minute solo performance describes itself as an intimate portrait of the leader of the Youth International Party (“Yippies”) and author of the counterculture manifesto Steal This Book. Unfortunately, ABBIE drains all the life out of the controversial “Chicago Seven” member. Instead of being energizing, the show is oddly enervating.

Retired school principal and professional film actor Bern Cohen (27 Dresses, Holy Rollers, Brooklyn Rules), whose recent stage credits include The Assistant at the Turtle Shell Theater, boasts an actual connection to Hoffman. In addition to crossing paths with him at a 1971 Columbia University protest, Cohen was mistakenly arrested in 1976 in Ohio because of his physical resemblance to the infamous anarchist when Hoffman was a wanted man on cocaine charges. This incident spurred a lifelong interest in Cohen of all things Hoffman.

ABBIE is presented as a 1987 “sociology lecture” by Hoffman, complete with slides and video from Morgan Paul Freeman, a former Black Eyed Peas and Erykah Badu video projectionist. However, these images are too few and too far between to really add anything to the “lecture.” Mostly they are used as addenda to Hoffman’s talking points (“Here is a picture of my father… my house… my high school…” etc.). Showing the images on a larger screen, or, even better, projecting them on the unused wall space of the theater, might have given them more of an impact, as would smoother transitions.

The main problem with ABBIE, though, lies in the performance. Although Mr. Cohen wrote the script for this, his pet project, he struggled to remember his lines at the show I attended. Whether he was unprepared, under-rehearsed, or both, his Hoffman was unfocused and seemingly uncomfortable on stage. Director Thomas Caruso (Around the World in 80 Days at Penguin Rep, Associate Director of Bombay Dreams and Follies on Broadway) did not help matters by having Cohen in constant motion, repeatedly rearranging the set’s furniture and moving from chair to stool over and over again. As an acting teacher once told me, “There is power in stillness.”

Besides being 15 years too old to play Hoffman (who committed suicide at age 52 in 1989), the 67-year-old Cohen lacks nuance as the social and anti-war activist, never delving the depths of Hoffman’s revolutionary character. This is, after all, a man who suffered beatings by the police and was forced underground into hiding because of his actions. In addition, Hoffman was a slick salesman of guerilla theater tactics and outrageous media stunts, such as dropping cash onto the New York Stock Exchange trading floor. Whatever is being sold in ABBIE by Cohen is simply not being sold hard enough.

This first-person narrative of the life of Abbot Howard Hoffman is too pat and too dull for such an irascible and irrepressibly comic figure. Even an A&E Biography has more edge than ABBIE. Where is the humor? The passion? The outrageousness? The pain? The relatively short show drags on and on without a spark of life, ending unceremoniously with a clip of Hoffman himself talking about death.

Instead of spending their money on $38 tickets to ABBIE, fans of “the clown prince of the 60s revolution” are advised to check out his brilliant autobiography for real insight into the man. Or perhaps wait for the much-anticipated portrayal of Hoffman by Sasha Baron Cohen (Borat, Brüno) in the Aaron Sorkin-scripted film, The Trial of The Chicago Seven, currently in development?

War and Play

"I am speaking to you now of how bodies are transformed into different bodies" says a Churchill-like voice, crackled and fuzzy as if coming through an old wireless radio as his words are projected on a screen center stage, over an image of Earth. So begins Pants on Fire's adaptation of Metamorphoses , currently running at The Flea Theater. Though the proclamation sounds sweeping and serious, this production is anything but. Rather, Pants on Fire's Metamorphoses interprets the theme of transformation as might a vaudevillian or a circus performer: the ensemble transforms itself into slap-happy caricatures of musicians, puppeteers, and entertainers of all kinds, transforming the tales in Metamorphoses into fodder for their fun-making. Director Peter Bramley and his company have produced some highly theatrical, well-made, entertaining work. The company sets Metamorphoses in 1940's Britain, during WWII. Narcissus is a Bogart-esque film star, Cupid's a knicker-wearing schoolboy, and Echo bears a striking resemblance to Rosie the Riveter. These references aid in making the stories more accessible, something Pants on Fire strives to do in all its work and certainly achieves here. They are also adept at creating a specific, non-realistic and wonderfully whimsical world to play and perform in. Nearly everything the versatile cast of seven does is humorously stylized and exaggerated. Set and sound is low tech but inventive: music is either performed live by the actors or pumped in through an old-fashioned phonograph. The actors vocalize all other sound effects, at one point creating the sound of a passing plane they’re ‘watching’ fly by, effectively adjusting their volume as it approaches and quickly recedes.

The set is a thing of theatrical genius. Designed by Samuel Wyer (who also designed puppets and illustrations in the piece), it primarily consists of a series of five or six panels that the actors move around the stage at regular intervals. These panels transform the tiny Flea theater into multiple spaces, suggesting everything from a lake to the Minotaur’s labyrinth. Most fun is when actors shuffle the panels around the space, revealing someone where no one had been a moment before, as if by magic.

Pants on Fire is all about using the theatrical tools at their disposal, and they work them to their fullest here, incorporating song, dance, puppetry, body doubles, and inventive costume pieces, among other things. At one point, a woman lifts her skirt, revealing green tulle ruffles underneath which, thrown over her head and combined with her brown tights, transforms her into a pretty convincing tree.

While the entire ensemble is formidable, I find Eloise Secker, (who plays the aforementioned tree among other roles) particularly exceptional. With chameleon-like ease, she morphs from one role to the next, unrecognizable at times. She can mould her face like putty, putting it to use as anything from a young spurned lover to a severe political villain. I particularly enjoy her portrayal of Medusa as a dowdy housewife in a flowered nightdress.

Despite the fact that many of Ovid’s stories end tragically, Pants on Fire's telling of the tales keeps them light. The troupe's Metamorphoses takes the concept of transformation and enacts it, actively transforming set, sound, and story from one thing to the next, joyfully celebrating the possibility inherent in the idea that things are always changing.

That is, until the play’s final moments, when the piece takes a sharp left turn. Tiresius, the blind oracle, is asked what the future holds. He responds, “War...between nature and man!” He continues to describe the world’s return to chaos, due to man’s inharmonious dealings with nature, as images of natural destruction appear on the CS screen. All of a sudden, we are meant to understand Ovid’s stories as warning tales of our future doom. It is so idiosyncratic with the rest of the play that it feels tacked on, almost as an afterthought.

But, thankfully, the moment is brief, and the play ends not with it but with the crackly Churchill voice, reciting Ovid: "The world is changing. Heaven and everything under it will take on new forms, as will the earth too, and everything here upon it, as even we will, for we are a part of it also, not merely bodies, but winged spirits." To my ears, it strikes a more hopeful tune, as does the rest of the play. Its actions speak louder than its tales.

So, despite the random global warming tie-in, I say go see Pants on Fire’s Metamorphoses before this jolly band of Brits fly their way back to England like the winged spirits they are.

Mid-Life Crisis

A Small Fire, by Adam Bock, is an excellent play that is less than excellently produced. The play is a study of a marriage thrown into crisis mode. On the brink of her daughter's wedding, Emily Bridges (Michelle Pawk) loses her sense of smell. What begins as something minor and manageable quickly turns devastating as Bridges' sight and hearing fail her as well and she becomes completely reliant on her husband, John (Reed Birney). Pain and frustration build as the couple begins to cope with their impossible situation, struggling to keep from losing one another entirely. The play takes place over a short period of time, perhaps a few weeks, and much is unknown: we know little of the characters' past, and their future, the major ways in which Emily's illness will change the Bridges' lives, is left uncertain. This short time span allows us to share in the Bridges' dawning realization of what is happening to Emily, to imagine the horror of suddenly finding oneself cut off from one's world, living in darkness and silence.

Bock's script doesn't situate the Bridges in a particular class or location, but the colloquialism of the characters' speech, when read, seems to connect the characters, to bind them as a family. He uses (or doesn’t use) punctuation to score the rhythms of his characters’ speech. For example, talking to his daughter one night, John says:

“She is I know she is. But. I don't know how it happens but somehow you can get tied to each other. You're gonna see with Henry. Your Mom and I we're different about some things but I'm lucky she didn't like being alone because I can't. I can't be.”

While Pawk leans into these rhythms, sometimes overplaying them, Birney muffles them, adapting the text to his own way of speaking. This distances the characters from one another, as if they are living in different worlds, different plays even, which cheapens their otherwise stellar performances.

This lack of unity and specificity is a fault of the production as a whole. The set design is vague and tells us little about who or where the Bridges are. Several sound bytes sound like (possibly are) instrumental covers of indie rock songs, jarringly out of place. Even the costume design is odd: Pawk speaks roughly but dresses exquisitely, and the juxtaposition is confusing. This all makes it more difficult to enter into the Bridges’ world and really care about their struggle.

The production does manage to execute the play’s few lyrical moments beautifully. The lighting design (by David Weiner) enhanced the tone of several scenes, heightening the mood and increasing the drama in subtle ways, never overbearing but quite affective. At the end of one scene, all lights go down save one just behind and above Emily, just for a moment, before all goes dark. The moment is a visual illustration of her extreme isolation, and the clarity of it is striking.

An equally striking moment occurs when Emily is having a dream. While her recorded voice describes the dream, where she can see and hear and smell again, she stands downstage, looking out into the audience. Upstage, panels move aside to reveal a beautiful, billowing, blue-green curtain, which, with the help of lighting, completely transforms the space, taking us from the Bridges' home to an ethereal otherwhere. The moment is an accomplishment in scenic prowess, and an example of how much can be done with relatively little.

Just after this dream comes the play's resolution, one that wouldn't be possible if it weren't for the brief time span of the play. Emily awakes from her dream, out of bed, disoriented and upset, and John attempts to comfort her. Slowly, sweetly, they begin to kiss, and this moves into passionate love-making. The scene is expertly staged: it is intense, beautiful and honest. As they reach orgasm, the audience also experiences a release, a release of the tension and frustration that their situation creates. It is a relief in the realization that despite everything that separates them, the Bridges are still able to connect, however momentary that connection may be.

Still, these highly dramatic or theatrical moments are the exception: the bulk of the play is conversation, and it would have been much better served if the director, Trip Cullman, had focused more on text and less on billowing curtains and steamy love scenes. A Small Fire is a strong play, but this production does not quite do it justice.