6-8-07
Great Characters Lack Focus in Escape
Joslyn Jones and Gerrit O’Neill in Live Bait’s Escape.
Many of us think we know way more about cops than we actually do. “Law and Order,” “Cops” and the like purport to give us the behind the scenes scoop. But Sharon Evans at Live Bait has had the inside look at the police profession through Police-Teen Link. This 8-year-old program brings together Chicago police officers and young people to bond through theatre games. While Live Bait’s current production, Escape, didn’t necessarily emerge from that program, the experience of getting to know police officers clearly influenced the work.
Jim (Gerrit O’Neil) is a detective in Special Victims, dealing with rape cases primarily. Unfortunately, he’s getting a bit burnt out and when he treats a drug addict’s questionable complaint with less compassion than he should, she puts a curse on him, calling the Furies of Greek mythology into this world to hound him.
Basically, this means his relationships with his co-workers begin to fall apart. In particular, his former partner gets moved into his department, sparking tension. And to top everything off, it turns out Jim is very, very sick.
There’s an unquestionable authenticity to Evans’ dialogue. It’s as easy to buy his rapport with his partner, Terri (a nicely natural Heather Ireland) as it is her off-duty obsession with ballroom dance. The history between him and his former partner Nora (Lori Myers offers a compelling and tightly wound performance) sparks convincingly. Even his rocky relationship with his lieutenant (the brisk Joslyn Jones), while rooted in cop stereotypes, plays out well. And the tall O’Neill has a convincing weariness about him that suggests his job might be getting to him.
But there’s not much plot here. We hear a lot about Jim’s impending burn-out, but when it turns out he’s truly and seriously ill, that takes the wind out of that plot line. Reaching into Greek mythology for the Furies could have been an interesting spin on a TV sort of plot, but it really feels tacked on and generally irrelevant. In truth, his relationship with his boss is on the rocks before the Greek ladies show up, and his history with his former partner guarantees that interaction won’t go well, regardless of supernatural activity.
So it’s an interesting idea that doesn’t do enough to justify its presence. The characters are strongly written, though, and the actors fully embody their roles, making this a satisfying behind the scenes, real-life looks at cops in the day-to-day, even if it fails as a theatrical fusion of styles.
Escape, Live Bait Theatre
Kerry Reid, Tribune—“Evans has thrown together a stew of sexual tensions and gender and racial differences here. Jim, who is white, clashes frequently with his black female commanding officer, and his past relationship with Nora, whose father is a captain on the force, is also difficult. But just when we start learning more about these flawed but potentially fascinating characters, in come the Furies, clad in Frances Maggio’s deconstructed goth ballgowns that look like Vivienne Westwood rejects circa 1996, babbling nonsensical portents and generally stopping the action in Peter Amster’s staging cold. Now that’s infuriating.”
Hedy Weiss, Sun Times—“[W]hat is most interesting about this slightly offbeat police drama is the way Evans captures human reactions and interactions, and all the attendant flaws, prejudices, misguided hopes, gross insensitivities and even surprising bursts of compassion that are the essential stuff of life… Director Peter Amster and his capable cast manage to dance on both sides of the line—from seeming realism to surrealism. The play offers just enough humor and dark surprise to keep you listening to the snappy patter. The play would work better without an intermission. As it is now, the strong first act is full of Evans’ quirky sensibility while the second act ends far too abruptly, even unsatisfyingly. But maybe that’s like real life.”
Albert Williams, Reader—“Sharon Evans’ portrait of a Chicago sex-crimes cop, Jim, boasts an intriguing concept: Jim’s glib detachment crumbles after a rape victim he’s disrespected places a curse on him and he’s pursued by three Furies. Evans and director Peter Amster’s excellent cast convey police work’s odd mix of drudgery and danger and officers’ psychological stress as they deal with perps and victims. But Evans’ uneven juxtaposition of police-procedural realism and mythic fantasy gives the play the patchy feel of a work in progress.”
Christopher Piatt, Free Press—“Despite its jagged structure and uncertain direction, Escape might be able to emerge as movie-of-the-week material if it weren’t for its worst, unironic element: three ‘fates’ in black veils and wretched Courtney-Love-at-the-Oscars gowns who whisper to the characters throughout the evening. But since they vacillate from speaking inner monologue to foreboding oracles to conscientious advice, it seems that even the fates can’t decide what this play is supposed to be.”
Catey Sullivan, Windy City—“Escape isn’t about the crimes that the officers encounter, although they aren’t glossed over. But it aims deeper than that, delving into the psychological impact the job has on three officers. The loop Evans throws into the script is the presence of the Greek furies, that unholy trinity of avenging anti-angels known to drive mortals mad. Haunting the police station, the Furies bring a whole new level of pressure to an already tense job. Director Peter Amster keeps the performances low-key and thus subtly effective. These are not, after all, screaming crime stories, they are human interest stories that were shaped by crimes. A bit more shaping, and a few less abruptly dangling ends, and Evans could have an open and shut hit here.”
The Bald Soprano, The Hypocrites
Nina Metz, Tribune—“Color-saturated performances collide with Courtney O’Neill’s super-stylized black-and-white set and [Sean] Graney’s monochromatic costumes. The final result is the strongest and loosest effort from the company all season. It has been a long time since Graney displayed his sense of humor—not since 2004, when he winningly combined commedia and pop culture in the 19th Century fairy tale Leonce und Lena. It is a directorial talent he should tap more often; he has access to the kinds of actors (including the stellar cast here) who understand his experimental vision and willingly follow him down the rabbit hole, exploring their own silliness along the way.”
Hedy Weiss, Sun Times—“Frankly, Ionesco’s work doesn’t always connect with contemporary audiences. But in Graney and his actors, he has found ideal interpreters. They understand precisely how to be true to his vision, in which bizarre behavior barely masks a profound sense of panic and desperation. And it’s not just the way they’ve updated the script with the lightest dusting of timely references to pop music and other markers. It has much more to do with Graney’s very special kind of imagination, and with his flair for dizzying language and buried emotion. All of the play’s verbal jousts, sexual clowning and complex musical beats are realized with clockwork perfection. But an essential humanity always prevails.”
Kerry Reid, Reader—“During the first performance of The Bald Soprano in 1950, Eugene Ionesco was ‘amazed to hear the audience laugh at what he considered a tragic spectacle.’ Sean Graney’s wry staging for the Hypocrites doesn’t suffer from any such confusion. Ionesco’s study of two addled, cliché-spouting couples is somewhat shopworn, but it gets a giddy Terry Gilliam-esque makeover here. Exquisitely designed and performed, Graney’s hopped-up-on-goofballs staging delights from start to finish.”
Scott C. Morgan, Windy City—“Director Sean Graney has assembled a sparkling cast (largely drawn from The Hypocrites ensemble) who can spur belly laughs from the smallest of facial expressions and uncomfortable pauses. Each of the couples plays off marvelously as sparring husbands and wives, and each take Graney’s challenge to throw in modernistic improvisational touches to make this classic 20th-century play breathe as if it were penned yesterday.”
Megan Powell, Free Press—“The Bald Soprano might be intuitively staged in ambiguous shades of gray, trite dialogue dripping with gentility to emphasize Ionesco’s belief in the futility of language, but the Hypocrites render the increasingly frustrating verbal maneuvers of an English suburban household in thick, comedic brushstrokes of black and white, dotted with pop references from Eric Carmen to Neil Patrick Harris… Graney and his expert cast members, who are as dexterous with stillness as they are balls-out with slapstick, attack Ionesco’s ‘antiplay’ just as blithely. And if the entire set tumbles down at some point during the run, there’s no doubt they’ll ‘just keep going.’”
Crossing California, Lifeline Theatre
Chris Jones, Tribune—“But despite the whimsy, affection and young talent on the stage, you can’t help wishing that Crossing California were more satisfying. I don’t think the problems lie with the source material. The issues lie more with the adaptation. Alan Donohue has yet to find a theatrical story in Langer’s prose. Narrative voices come and go without apparent reason. You don’t have a clear sense of whose story is being told and why. And the show lacks an overall arc. John Hildreth’s production is a mixed bag. In places, it’s richly and truthfully performed… But too often, the characters, especially the adults, lapse into comic cliché. The overplayed show badly needs a step in the direction of veracity”
Hedy Weiss, Sun Times—“Lifeline Theatre is presenting a stage version of Langer’s book, and while the attitudes ring true, the overall tone tends to be too cartoonish. Perhaps this was the intent of both adapter Alan Donahue and director John Hildreth. They seem to have taken their cue from the little experimental films created by one of the show’s most likable characters, Muley Scott Wills (played by the appealingly low-key Darren Myers). Muley describes the way his films begin as cartoons and then morph into reality. To some extent that’s how this production (with a clever set by Grant Sabin) also feels.”
Kerry Reid, Reader—“Alan Donahue’s earnest, witty adaptation of Adam Langer’s 2004 debut novel aims to connect the dots of this sprawling work: the late-1970s setting is evoked mostly through news snippets about the Iran hostage crisis, while Langer’s central metaphor of California Avenue as a class divide never comes into focus. John Hildreth’s staging charges along in the first act, but in two and a half hours we don’t learn much more about the characters than we knew at the start.”
Novid Parsi, Free Press—“Rather than creating a theatrical through-line, adapter Donahue crams in so much of Langer’s novel that this balloon looks ready to burst. The aggravating condition: Director Hildreth has his actors act at (not in) their characters; as wisecracking Michelle, Katie McLean alone brings comic timing and the tinkle of truth. Yet these symptoms are so widespread among staged adaptations, it’s a near epidemic. But just maybe, as with other maladies, early exposure is the best inoculation; if so, future adapters, take in California.”
Mary Shen Barnidge, Windy City—“The ensuing scramble of plot lines so obstructs the intimacy necessary to elevate the sketchy personalities above stereotype that we discover ourselves losing interest long before the script wraps up their destinies in conveniently-insular happy-ever-afters. Make no mistake, there’s fascinating human insight to be found in every one of Langer’s characters. There are just too many to fit into a single play.”
Mad Dancers, Piven Theatre Workshop
Hedy Weiss, Sun Times—“It’s a serpentine journey, to be sure. And its mystical, surreal narrative spins itself into more stories-within-stories than it is possible to keep track of fully, to the point where it all feels exhaustive, but also exhausting, and too precious for its own good. Nevertheless, there is much to admire in The Mad Dancers, and in many ways it seems custom-made for the Piven style. Jennifer Green, the theater’s gifted director, along with her inventive choreographer, Allison Kurtz, and her mostly young and exceptionally graceful cast, certainly create moments of great humor and magic. And there is a central performance by actress Ravi Batista that is so artful, so beguiling and so confident that Chicago casting directors should make a special trip just to see her.”
Mary Shen Barnidge, Reader—“Playwright Yehuda Hyman might have adapted the Hasidic tale of the seven beggars as a contemplative spiritual allegory or as a fast-paced action-adventure fantasy. But he seems undecided which course to take in his account of a reluctant hero, assisted by a bevy of exotic companions, who rescues a sleeping princess. Though the first act brims with promise, the second unravels into a tangle of enigmatic analogies and unanswered questions. The production’s spectacle more than redeems the narrative fuzziness, however: songs and dances reflect the many roots of Sephardic Judaism, and Ravi Batista is dazzling in a variety of roles.”
Scotty Zachar, Gay Chicago—“Unfortunately, even with all of these artistically successful elements, Mad Dancers eventually slides into a stressful mess. Well into the second act we see that Elliot is finally meeting the seventh stranger, rightfully assuming the play will soon come to a close. But the playwright throws in a hitch that plunges us back to the beginning of the quest, where all the strangers need to be discovered anew… Director Jennifer Green has a talent in creating innovative blocking and pictures on the stage but, given the grueling task of presenting the quest two separate times, runs out of steam.”
Jonathan Abarbanel, Windy City—“It’s the Jewish ecstatic experience, channeled through dance and music, explored in The Mad Dancers. The Piven Theatre production is well-acted, well-danced and sometimes lilting with flourishes of Sephardic and Hebrew song, but is limited by the play itself… The Mad Dancers could be a splendid 100 minutes without intermission, but Hyman’s too-long, two-act script isn’t poetic enough for the rich material. In a classic quest, the hero at some point must fully embrace his destiny and singularity and drive the story forward. Elliot never does.”
Quote of the Fortnight:
“Art for art’s sake. Now there’s a pretty fiction, almost as pretty as the one about the noble artist who desires neither wealth nor fame and toils only in service of his muse.”—Barbara Vitello reviewing Janus Theatre’s production of Murdering Marlowe in the Daily Herald.