Brand Upon The Brain! (Live)

Brand Upon The Brain! for those of you keeping score at home, isn't just a show -- it's a spectacle. I'm too young to remember the golden days of film, but Guy Maddin's photo-play brings new levels to black-and-white expressionism, and revives the exhibitionism of silent films with live scores. For this limited run, various "interlocutors" provide the sparse text of the movie (John Ashbury when I saw it, Isabelli Rosellini for the recorded one), while Ensemble Sospeso provides an excellent rendition of Jason Staczek's classical score. Plus: Foley artists, in all their white-coated glory. Oh, and the film is pretty good, too: a comically bleak semi-biography that uses exaggerated characters (like the tyrannical mom and professorial father) to explore childhood and adolescence between Guy and his Sis. There are so many lively shots and such charm that it's easy to forget the dark Grand Guignol of the story or the stark mise-en-scene, but it all ties together rather neatly. Not to be missed!

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The Jocker

photo: Carol Rosegg

There's a moment in The Jocker when an abusive tough-guy wakes up a runaway by roughly snatching his blanket and leaving him bareassed naked. The runaway (Nick Matthews) stays exposed far longer than the mere purposes of drama would reasonably allow; we're being given time to linger on the actor's dimpled butt. There's no doubt we're at the Wings Theatre seeing something in their annual Gay Plays series, where the stories are usually like pulp novels and there's almost always gratuitous male nudity. This one, a drama about men who ride the rails during the Depression, has more skin than most, so much that after a while it starts to feel like we're watching a gay porno film minus the sex scenes. The performances are, of course, better than that: the play's nicely-rendered B-plot, about a warm-hearted married hobo and the African-American male whore he falls for, is especially well-acted by David Tacheny and Stephen Tyrone Williams. The play is tidy and one of the better examples of what the Wings does, but I never know quite how to take what it is that they do.

Blackbird

David Harrower has found a way to add color to the formerly black-and-white subject of pedophilia. Whether that's a good thing or not, his gripping play Blackbird is an effective and balanced study of a twisted relationship back to bite our "hero" in the butt. Jeff Daniels is a likeable man, trying to hold on to his job and his life, and Alison Pill is an outstanding performer who channels the traumatized girl at the same time as the seductive adult, all while taking her pound of flesh from her one-time abuser. I only wish director Joe Mantello hadn't taken away from the powerful office setting and the naturally staccato script by fiddling with the light switch. Thought: maybe love--which affects the mind, body, and heart--is a trauma, too.

[Read on] [Also blogged by: Patrick ]

Coram Boy

****

Imperial

So no Tony nomination for best play, eh? I spoze its foaming-at-the-mouth bid to create gargantuan, emotionally wrenching melodrama is a bit transparent but I am willing to forgive that. Coram Boy is all about its wildly theatrical thrill-a-minute theme ride of a production. With its gorgeous scenic design, 40 person/million character cast, ever present score by Handel and some other guy there was always something to throw your popcorn at. Quite frankly I had a blast at this and I wouldn't mind going back again.

An Octopus Love Story

Photo/Mike Klar

There's something fishy about the set-up and resolution of An Octopus Love Story, but the questions it raises about gender identity are a real winner. For me, the show works best when active: the interrogative scene between a smarmy reporter and the public activists (Danny and Jane, who are both gay, but marrying each other to protest marriage restrictions) is very revealing, and the playful "first date" between Danny and Jane, which climaxes with a lip-sync re-enactment of a classic film, gives us a lot between the lines. But the monologues -- or more accurately, one-sided conversations -- are a lot harder to excuse, especially coupled with Mike Klar's passive direction. Ironically, the choice to make the set look somewhat like a glass-walled fish tank actually makes a lot of the action on stage less transparent: the strain to make the set match the watery anecdotes of the play displaces the action. I'd still recommend it, but watch out for the soggy subplots of Danny and Jane's thinly cut friends.

[Read on] [Also blogged by: Patrick]

Cary From The Cock

**
Gene Frankel

There is a lot of courage here in Cary Curran who is baring her soul and pretty much everything else in this autobiographical one woman play generally about her transition from Catholic square to Downtown fag hag. Being close to the same age as her and also having my own transition from a suburban Christian square to Downtown trash fag, I got every reference from The Waltons and Amy Grant (I sang "Thy Word" in church too) to Girlina (oops! I mean `Lina) and that infamous jizzy Jaccuzi (sorry about that). Though there was plenty for me to relate to, unfortunately with notalotta experience carrying a show on her own there was a lack of timing and delivery that really could have sold her sassy material (however it must be noted that I saw only her second performance). Also this seemed to be less of a focused narrative about a single theme and more of a hodgepodge of stories strung together by the simple fact that they're all about herself. My favorite part was her dance tribute to Mother Theresa to Air Supply's "Making Love Out Of Nothing At All". It was hysterical and the audience loved it. She's a kick-ass dancer- that's what she does best.