Party People
by UNIVERSES (Mildred Ruiz-Sapp, Steven Sapp, and William Ruiz/Ninja)
developed and directed by Liesl Tommy

The authors of this world-premiere, commissioned American Revolutions production told us in the post-performance audience talk-back that the Young Lords and the Black Panthers had effected their lives even though they had no knowledge of the groups themselves.  One creator’s first job was in clinic started by the Young Lords, and another routinely benefited from social programs started by the Black Panthers.  These racially-identified local community organizations truly changed the neighborhoods and residents’ lives. The artistic challenge for UNIVERSES, the authors said, was to tell the current generation about this legacy in a way which the young will hear.

The captivating response to the challenge is Party People, a performance piece that intimately dances, raps, and acts out the politics, the energy, the families, the fear, the conspiracy, the failure, and the success of the party people in a unfamiliar, non-white-bread format.  The approach, the music, and execution stirred pasty-skinned, hip-hop hating, old fogy me.  The brilliant moments excellently done took me in, especially because the presentation is not  done in a comfortable routine style. (more…)

All the Way
by Robert Schenkkan

Robert Schenkkan has written a masterful script that projects a sharp look at the leaders of America during the year which was more or less between my 10th and 11th birthdays.  I had expected a pleasant play that would remind me of my precocious political awakening.  I wound up dazzled by how well Schenkkan presents the feel of that first post-Kennedy year and by the tragic-hero humanness of the real-life figures that fought for civil rights, the Great Society, and for the liberal values that made the United States an economic and moral force.

Unlike many of the world premieres and commissioned works produced recently at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, All the Way is a classically constructed evening of theater.  That traditional approach, flawlessly executed, lets older theater goers experience the production without stretching uncomfortably to understand the format.  ATW is a wonderful play;  it’s not a performance piece nor a dressed-up poetry rap.  It taps into the power of a linear story, rising action, imperfect giants, and changed characters.  Its straight-forward plot and wording are evidence that the truisms of play design you learned in high school English class remain valid.

ATW is gimmick-free art. It is a camera-ready canvass for the director, actors, set designer, costume designer, lighting designer, … everyone… to apply their talent. (more…)

The Very Merry Wives of Windsor, Iowa
Written by Alison Carey
Adapted from the play by William Shakespeare

I cannot recall walking out at intermission at Oregon Shakespeare Festival before, but unless I was going to start hissing from the front row, I had to leave last night.

This sledge-hammer piece of political correctness is so crass and blatant that I felt creepily unclean as a beneficiary of its message of equality. On a grand scale, VMWWI is a modern adaptation of the jealousy and intrigue depicted in Shakespeare’s The Merry Wives of Windsor.  In this play there is a married female couple and single lesbians added to the traditional mix of confusion.  I like the concept, and treated with any sort of artistry, the production would have been modern, insightful, and enjoyable.

But, what flat, anvil-heavy crap was put in front of us instead! The author has the talent of a self-righteous high school student intent on making sure that even the slowest member of the audience understood the important message being dumped on stage.  I pity the straight liberals in the house who were the obvious targets of the evening.  They had to come back to their seats or else they would have been thought intolerant of the topic. 

The mental masturbation script occasionally had some funny one liners and scenes.  The best was in the second act where, according to reports from friends who stayed, actor Cathrine Coulson was given a piece of cut wood to hold.  She clutched it in her arms, and another character asked her for it by saying, “My log, lady.”  Coulson played the Log Lady on the cult television show Twin Peaks.

That funny, in-crowd line fairly represents the adaption script.  That Log Lady reference was like most of the hip, in-crowd winking and nudging that constituted the play. Except that most of the rest of the gags were nasty, cheap jabs at Mitt Romney and other evil enemies of enlightenment instead of being gentle, benign references to rarefied culture.

I am a sucker for art broadening horizons and challenging cultural assumptions.  I am particularly susceptible to gay-themed acceptance stories.  Big Eden is one of my favorite small town acceptance stories of all time.  That movie was unmistakable, but sweet, engaging, and not completely predictable.

Damn it. You don’t get to pass off cringe-inducing stereotypes and one-dimensional characters just because you know you’re on the side of the angels. Sure, Shakespeare had broad characters and traded on the stereotypes of his time.  But, the artistry of the language makes all the difference.  With Shakespeare there are seemingly an infinite number of interpretations possible for every character and every line.  In one production the villain is self-aware and in the next, using the same text, he is oblivious to his faults.  In VMWWI it’s hard to image a saving directorial vision that would justify another production of the flatly-written piece. Ever.

The lesbian marriage concept would have been better served if OSF had skipped employing Carey to adapt Shakespeare.  Instead, using the same excellent costumes, sharp set, talented cast, and same-sex couple casting, the evening would have been much more satisfying and point-making with the original story.

I am getting weary of leaving OSF plays saying, “Yes, but the actors gave their all and I stood and applauded for them.”  Although there was no standing ovation last night, once again the actors deserve rave reviews at a bad evening of theater.

Compliments to David Kelly for a smooth, smarmy Mitt Romney/Falstaff character. He seemed to be having fun.

Coulson was a fine and colorful Miss Quickly.  I especially liked Judith-Marie Bergan as the innkeeper. I feel sorry for Robin Goodrin Nordli for her wasted talents as Francie Ford, and my sympathy also to Gina Daniels (Alice Ford), Terri McMahon (Margaret Page), Ted Deasy (George Page), and the pretty cheerleader boys.

Alex Jaeger’s costumes were more alive than the script deserved.  Chris Acebo’s simple, corn-strewn set had us smiling before the play opened and the words brought us down.

Yeah, VMWWI is an archetypal waste of artistic talent that should have been killed or corrected long before it was inflicted on OSF’s loyal audience.

Ozdachs Rating
… although there should be an icon for Dog Gone to indicate a walk-out mid production.

Seagull
Written by Anton Chekhov
Adapted and Directed by Libby Appel

A three-word summary review of Seagull:  unfortunate play selection.

Everything about this production was well done.  The actors hit the right note in everything they did.  Chris Acebo’s set took inventive advantage of the New Theater’s intimacy.  Deb Dryden’s clothes were rich and a nice counterpart to the early sparseness of the stage.  Libby Apple directed a consistent, restrained, and intelligent vision of this Chekhov classic.  Even with all the top-notch craft work, the scenes dragged and nothing interesting was revealed.

I liked the production of Chekhov’s Cherry Orchid a few years ago, so I didn’t walk into the building wondering why I was there.  But, this play was too predictable and unrelievedly negative.  The characters don’t develop in any significant way, bad things happen, and time moves slowly. 

The cast navigated the turgid script admirably.  I enjoyed seeing Tasso Feldman (Kostya) in a dramatic, not-just-a-cute-kid role.  Armando Duran (Dr. Dorn) still has the looks to come off as a handsome, world weary rake.  I was interested in seeing the skills of Ashland newcomer Kathryn Meisle (Irina). Michael Hume (Pyotr) did a fine job deteriorating into an old man of 60-something.  And so on and so on.

These thoughts tracking the actors’ careers were going through my head during the performance.  I was desperate to keep my mind going and to keep focus.  The narrative was not doing it.

There were minor parts of the production I would change:

• The shiny deep blue of the stage didn’t work for me;  if it was supposed to help us think we were outdoors, wouldn’t earth brown be better?
• This new adaptation could have helped itself by making Michael Hume older than 62.  When the doctor told Hume that his physical condition would just go downhill because he was past 60, the mostly white-haired audience snickered.  I don’t think it was supposed to be a laugh line.
• The blocking had the actors marching too close to my row A seat, and I thought I was going to be accidentally hit on the back swing of Hume’s cane at one point.
• The dead seagull prop looked positively fuzzy and cuddly.

But, let’s not spend any more time craping about details.  It was a fine production of a story that didn’t reach me.

Ozdachs Rating:   

The White Snake
Written and Directed by Mary Zimmerman

Playwright Mary Zimmerman has distilled an ancient, often modified, Chinese legend of The White Snake into a coherent, relevant, engrossing, artistic, and accessible 138-minute story. The text is stylized and full of Eastern cultural references, but Zimmerman’s lively, humorous, and rich approach somehow [“somehow” as in “the magic happens here”] honors the fable’s roots while letting it transcend its place and time of origin. 

The White Snake avoids being artsy fartsy as Zimmerman’s works have been in the past (I’m thinking specifically of Berkeley Rep’s Metamorphoses which I disliked, its later Broadway Tony notwithstanding), and instead rises to a mesmerizing blend of straight-forward narrative, stylized symbolism, humor, gorgeous visuals, and conflicting morality. The Oregon Shakespeare Festival’s own January-deadline publications warned that the script had not yet been written, yet at its opening the play was polished, professional, and ready for prime time. (more…)