Long Distance

Leprosy that glittered like scales, making a bed sandy enough for one to dream, tossing and turning of the beach... such is the disturbingly normal writing of Judy Budnitz, whose work is well-adapted in Long Distance by the Ateh Theater Group. The three nontraditional stories about the gulfing spaces between us come across extremely well on the chashama stage, and between directors Bridgette Dunlap and Alexis Grausz and actors Elizabeth Neptune and Sara Montgomery, there are enough variations in styles and characters to keep the evening running smoothly (yet unsettlingly).

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FRINGE: Double Vision

Photo/Jim Baldassare

Double Vision is an eerily gripping play about love's collapse in the closed-off, urban atmosphere of modern relationships. As the title implies, perception is a big part of the play, and the characters are all tormented by their unyielding imaginations. Barbara Blumenthal-Ehrlich manges to find clarity, but she leaves understanding the characters up to the audience, which doesn't quite work, especially with the compressed, unhappy conclusion. Still, the actions of the cast are clear, especially from Quinn Mattfeld and Rebecca Henderson, and it's been a long time since I felt such empathy for an apathetic character (Christopher McCann's low-key portrayal of Ben).

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John Goldfarb Please Come Home

If Rip Van Winkle started his nap in 1964 and woke up this week at this (Fringe Festival) musical, he'd think he hadn't slept a day. As if untouched by time, the miserably unfunny early '60's comedy is now - for no good discernible reason - a miserably unfunny stage musical, presented reverently as if the tired, hopelessly square material is timeless comic gold: is there anything more dated than the toothless satire of yesteryear? Set mostly in the fictional Middle Eastern kingdom of Fawzia Arabia, where an American pilot is coerced into coaching a football team and an American gal reporter is belly-dancing undercover in the King's harem, the smell of mothballs competes with the stench of curdled jokes long past their expiration dates. There are a few good melodies in the score, which does its job of approximating the style of the era, and there are a couple of standouts in the supporting cast: Hope Cartelli does a deadpan turn as a Russian spy masquerading as a harem girl, and Adam Hargus steals focus whenever he's on stage even with his groanworthy material as The President. Otherwise, this is a waste of time.

Mark Baratelli's Improv Cabaret

Is it crazy to thumbs-up a show that will be completely different at each performance? Maybe, but I'm going to do it anyway, because Mark Baratelli's completely improvised forty-five minute cabaret set (at the Fringe Festival) slapped a huge, silly smile on my face. With no planning and no suggestions from the audience, quick-thinking Baratelli not only makes up the cheesey imitation American-songbook numbers on the spot but also the faux-confessional banter in between: the result is a light, affectionate send-up of the genre's illusion of emotional intimacy between performer and audience. The joke is that the intimacy here is fake but he delivers it with the portent and the heightened emotional pitch of the real thing: at the performance I saw, his increasingly ludicrous story about a childhood spent with corn husks for friends segued into a ridiculous uplifting anthem about finding one's way home to the corn. Mark Baratelli knows a thing or two about shucking corn and getting a bite out of it.

Tragedy! (A Musical Comedy)

I've never walked out of a show before; Tragedy! has the dubious honor of winning that distinction. I can't, in faith, review something I didn't watch all the way through, but after the amateurish first act, I'd seen enough of this Titus Andronicus satire. Aside from the tinny, MIDI-like sound quality, and the poor, straining voices (most notably that of Titus's son, Lucius), I found the musical to be offensive. "Rape's Just Another Way of Saying 'I Love You'," would have to be far cleverer to work, and "You Can't Spell 'Moor' Without 'B-L-A-C-K'," is the first rap song I've ever heard to be racist against itself. Satire and irony are dangerous tools when cast about blindly; Trey Parker and Matt Stone managed to harness this in Cannibal! The Musical!, but Michael Johnson's overly indulgent, recklessly bad production is just a mess.

Hail Satan

The first act of Mac Rogers' smart, darkly funny play (at the Fringe Festival) scores largely as a straight-faced satire of the soullessness of corporate culture, as wishy-washy new employee Tom discovers that all of his ambitious co-workers are part of a small prayer circle of Satan-worshippers. They're so reasonable and welcoming when they say so that it's not long before doubting Tom is sharing at their Sunday meetings and getting used to thinking of the devil when they greet each other with "The lord be with you". While carefully laying the solid groundwork for a tidy chiller, Rogers plays with our notions of religious tolerance and of our cultural acceptance of selfishness: this is clever, pitchfork-funny stuff. Although the second act - more plot-driven, more serious in tone, and focused more on family than on corporate dynamics - includes a plot twist that is thematically justified but not adequately prepared for dramatically, the play is always bold and effective both as swift, engaging entertainment and as needling social comment. As played by a virtually weak-link-free ensemble, Hail Satan is, ahem, a hell of a good show.

Also blogged by: [Aaron]