Annapurna

In Sharr White's Annapurna, a by-the-numbers but diverting two-hander, Emma shows up in ex-husband Ulysses's dilapidated trailer 20 years after she took their son and disappeared while he slept off a major drunk. Now Ulysses is dying, and Emma has just left her (second) husband of 20 years. Why is she there? Does she want to mend fences? Take care of Ulysses? Is she still angry? Does she still love him? These questions, and more, will be answered over the next 95 minutes.

Nick Offerman brings full life to the hurt, puzzled, and gruff semi-hermit and poet Ulysses, a porcupine of a character, full of quills. Ulysses is not quite able to protect his soft underbelly, particularly since it sports a huge post-surgery bandage. He also carries an oxygen tank and is so weak that putting on a shirt is an effort. But his emotional pain is larger, and more important to him, than the physical.

Megan Mullally is not quite Offerman's equal. Her thin voice undercuts her power, and she has a leaning toward whiny. Also, she wears glasses, and they block part of her performance from the audience. She and Offerman also have less chemistry than one might expect, since they are a couple in real life.

The Rivals

Decades ago, the brilliant and beloved acting couple Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne were doing a play together. Lunt was surprised and pleased when his line asking for a cup of tea received a large laugh. Over time, however, the laugh disappeared. Lunt asked Fontanne if she had any idea why, and she said, "You've been asking for a laugh. Before you were asking for a cup of tea."

It's possible that this story is apocryphal, but that doesn't matter. Its point is absolutely true. Asking for a laugh is almost never the way to get one. The better choice is to play the character's reality, want what the character wants, do what the character does, and let the laughs take care of themselves

.

In the Pearl Theatre Company's current production of Richard Brinsley Sheridan's classic play, The Rivals, the performers don't ask for laughs--they demand them. And the harder they demand, the less funny and more tedious they become. Since many of the actors have previously given multifaceted, beautifully timed, wonderful performances, I have to assume that it was director Hal Brooks who led (or pushed) them into the vast vats of shtick on display. (Oh, and since it's 2014, I think the Pearl could have done better than to cast only one person of color and then have him play a servant.)

The flaws of this production underline the flaws of the play. The plot is familiar: person A loves person B but doesn't have enough money to suit person B's guardian (person C), but person A is secretly rich, and person C is disguising herself in letters to person D as person B, and so on. Parts of it are wonderful satire, but parts are simply boring, particularly in this production where it is impossible to care about anyone. An even bigger problem is that the silly, neurotic jealousy of 1775 reads nowadays as creepy possessive borderline-stalking. And while Mrs. Malaprop is the Ur word-mangler, we've seen so many of her descendants in so many plays, movies, and TV shows that her humor seems almost cliche.

Of course, there are reasons that The Rivals is still performed in 2014. But this production, far below the Pearl's usual high quality, does it no favors.

(sixth row center; press ticket)

(Other People's) Musings on The Tony Nominations

It's that time of year again. No, not quite time for the Tony Awards ceremony itself--that won't be broadcast until Sunday, June 8th. Rather, it's the time of year where everyone celebrates the Tony nominees, gets their underpants in a bunch over the shows and performers who got the shaft, and opines on what the hell the annual list of nominations says about the state of Broadway in the broader sense.

Full disclosure, which has nothing at all to do with underpants: I have absolutely no idea what the hell the annual list of nominations might say about the state of Broadway in the broader sense. I used to think I did, but then I realized that (a) every time I came to some grand conclusion about the state of Broadway as it relates to the Tonys, I turned out to be totally wrong, and that, ergo, (b) clearly, I'm sort of a dope, at least when it comes to reading the minds of Tony voters.

So while I am quite sure I'll have plenty of opinions about the Tony broadcast itself, I plan to spend the weeks leading up to it seeing as much theater as I can, entering as many Tony pools as I can (none that requires me to bet big money on the outcome, though, because of item b above), and reading up on what other, smarter people think about what the Tony nominations say about Broadway at present.

Luckily, an awful lot of people are weighing in on the distinctive weirdness of this year's list of nominees, which you can link to here.   And some of the writing has been very interesting, informative, and lively.

DonJuan, or Wages of Debauchery

The often delightful (but too frequently slow) DonJuan, or Wages of Debauchery, adapted from a Czech classic, is conceived and directed by Vit Horejs and presented by the Czechoslovak-American Marionette Theatre. This Don Juan is not a charmer. His seductions often veer into molestation territory, and he's not above a murder or two. It doesn't help that Horejs plays him in an endless monotone that manages to remove all traces of charisma and warmth. Luckily, however, Don Juan is only the titular lead.

Kasparek
Photo: Jonathan Slaff

The true star is Don Juan's servant, Kasparek, performed with wry humor and great panache by Theresa Linniham. Kasparek is a familiar type, kind of dumb yet brilliant when it comes to self-protection. Linniham provides him with warmth and humanity, and it's a pleasure to root for his passive-aggressive silliness. The hoariest humor is somehow fresh in Linniham's capable hands. The press release refers to her work as "a comic tour-de-force," and you'll get no argument from me.

The humans are visible and interact throughout Don Juan, and on the whole they are pretty wonderful. (The rest of the cast includes Deborah Beshaw-Farrell, Otis Cotton, and Tess Wonson.) The costumes are endearingly ragtag, the scenery the same. The puppets range from fairly stiff to multifaceted, but they are all animated by the cast's joy and energy. Some of them are stunning.

DonJuan, or Wages of Debauchery has an appealing "let's-put-on-a-show" vibe. If it were 15 minutes shorter, and if Horejs gave Don Juan even the glimmer of a personality, it would be a complete success. As it stands, it is still a lovely evening in the theatre.

(press ticket, first row)

A new post on an old favorite

Hi, all:

It's mid/late semester for me, which is why I've been largely absent from this blog of late. But I've missed you all dearly, and I promise to be back in full force in late spring and summer, which is when I catch up on a lot of the shows I don't get the chance to see during the school year.

Meanwhile, I wanted alert anyone who is interested to a blog post I did for the Society for Ethnomusicology's new Sound Matters blog, which came out beautifully, thanks in large part to its fearless, brilliant editor, Jim Cowdery. You can link to it here. Be sure to check out the clips embedded in the essay!

The Most Deserving

Catherine Trieschmann's new play, The Most Deserving, aspires to be both entertaining and significant. It is completely successful in the former regard, and not so much in the latter.

Kristin Griffith, Veanne Cox

A small arts council in Kansas has a $20,000 grant to bestow to an artist who "must demonstrate both artistic excellence and financial need and should preferably be an underrepresented American voice." Jolene, the founder and fierce protector of the arts council, wants the grant to go to a local artist who is one eighth Native American--or is it one sixteenth? Liz, an assistant professor of art, wants the grant to go to Everett, a paraplegic African-American who makes art out of garbage--but Everett hasn't applied, and the deadline has passed. Edie, who funded the grant from her late husband's fortune, turns out to be surprisingly slippery as Jolene and Liz vie for her vote. Ted, Jolene's husband, is mostly interested in getting Liz's attention. Dwayne, unemployed and in desperate need of cash, wants to receive the grant himself, despite fitting none of the requirements.

The show's lively 90 minutes are stuffed with broken allegiances, revealed secrets, and bad behavior. Is the play trying to show us the parochialism of the Mid West? Perhaps, but the setup is a bit by the numbers, and the characters aren't convincing as actual people. The one point the show does make brilliantly, however, is never to think that grants (or jobs, for that matter) are bestowed to "the most deserving"--or that the logic behind the ultimate decision has anything to do with, well, logic.

Trieschmann is well-served by efficient direction by Shelley Butler and a talented and game cast, led by the wonderful Veanne Cox, who gives the best massage you are ever likely to see in a play. The cast navigates the play's twists and turns with aplomb and makes the most of Trieschmann's genuinely funny situations and dialogue. Whatever its flaws, The Most Deserving is a great deal of fun.

(8th row, press ticket)