A few years ago I was talking with a friend about a theater review he’d written for a local paper.  We both had hated the performance, but his printed comments were, ah…, “nuanced”. It took some reading between to discover that the production had problems.

Breakfast guest Falstaff (G. Valmont Thomas) in his Captain Morgan Pose

Full of righteous black-and-white perspective, I aggressively asked my friend why he didn’t more clearly warn people off that dog. He told me that people who knew his writing would understand the meaning of the lukewarm comments. He said that he didn’t need to offend the actors involved in the play who were friends and potential sources of future information. Harrumph! Not having my friend’s social encumbrances I have enjoyed self-righteously savaging plays and actors when they “deserved” it. (See past Ozdachs reviews.) Unfortunately, this summer’s trip to Ashland this year started me down the slippery slope to obliqueness and accommodation.  Our first night in town, friends Hollis and Mary Pat invited us to dinner at their house with four Oregon Shakespeare actors.  Each was a bright, interesting, and talented young person. Then friend Patty invited her college friend — and OSF star — to breakfast at the B&B.  That same  evening I spent a half hour talking with him at a party.  Turns out he is another very bright person with great social awareness who is fun to be around. Damn! Now how can I go the keyboard and freely write comments on the productions I see? Of course, all the five actors I mentioned gave first-rate performances in the shows I saw them in.  When I start posting my comments on those productions, my unrestrained praise and muted complains stem from the true quality of the acting.

Honest.

Berkeley, CA
at Berkeley Repertory Theater

The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams

What a disappointment! 

If Berkeley Rep had been the first producer of the young struggling playwright’s work,  we would never know the name Tennessee Williams. As it is, people who attended Berkeley Rep’s travesty have not made the acquaintance of this powerful play.

Figuring out where to start ranting is difficult, but the largest dose of vitriol is due director Les Waters. The acting cast shared many faults so misdirection is the most likely villain.

The family dynamics acted on stage — the key to the play — are not those written. Instead of pathological interpersonal behavior, at times Tom (the son, played by Erik Lochtefeld) and the mother, Amanda (Rita Moreno) smile at each other as they bicker.  It’s as if they had been told that they were in a family comedy where the witty repartee was meant to amuse the audience.  (more…)

San Francisco, CA
American Conservatory Theater

a number by Caryl Churchill

It’s not about cloning!

It’s about a father and 20 sons, 19 of whom who were cloned in a desperate do-over attempt at parenting by a drunken, failing father whose wife had committed suicide and left her husband and their two-year-old son.

It’s about intense dialog tensing between the father and sons 30-some years later. 

It’s about nature vs. nurture (or lack thereof).

It’s about men — the only two actors are male, and the story unfolds in the very male den of the father (Bill Smitrovich as Salter). All of the three sons we see on stage (only one of whom is on stage at any given time) are played by  the same actor, Josh Charles.

It’s a tense, fascinating tragedy that raises questions quickly, without mercy, and without answer. The running time of 55 minutes obscures the potential for emotional exhaustion. It’s quick, but brutal. I left the theater with my mind swirling with the needs and possibilities of the characters I’d seen.

ACT’s West Coast premier of British playwrite Caryl Churchill’s one-act shot was excellent when I saw it, increased in quality as I thought about it during the audience exchange after the performance, and became down-right wonderful as reviewed it on the ride home.

The two actors deliver the not-quite-real conversation clearly, straight-forwardly, and without chewing scenery or telegraphing the Meaning behind any subtlety.  They are a gift that lets the author’s words do their work. 

The set is a bit obvious, but reinforcing the of the characters. The other technical areas are happily unobtrusive, just as they should be in a thought piece like this.

A Number closes May 28,… but there is still time and choices of seats left.

Ozdachs rating: