The Devil and Thomas Briggs

(Disclosure: I was not given anything in return for this review -- I paid for my own ticket, and in fact have not informed the People's Theater Lab that I am writing this review. However, the playwright is a friend of mine who I lived with for a semester a year ago, and the two of us have briefly discussed the possibility of me publishing his script.)

Friday night, I went back to the Bleecker Theater to see the latest version of Nik Walker's The Devil and Thomas Briggs at the Bleecker Theater, with a skeptical eye and my arms crossed. A year ago, it had gotten staged reading, before which I had written a feature article on their company (The People's Theater Lab) for the Washington Square News. Back then, Nik Walker had said to me in a moment of triumph, "'What Shakespeare did for blank verse, I want to do for spoken word."

Sitting in the theater last night, I noticed that the same aim, which had also been expressed in the program for the staged reading, was not in the program this time around. But I still remembered that end goal, and that was the metric by which I was going to measure the company's performance.

What a relief that they achieved it!

The Devil and Thomas Briggs is a soulful, blues tragedy; it focuses in on a town named Babylon "where God and the Devil aren't just names," and where a singular man whose blues music and bad living is the city's heartbeat -- until the day he's shot dead at a bar one night. From that moment forward, the family he leaves behind is torn between moving forward, or struggling against the Devil herself to bring him back.

Thomas Briggs has found a sweet mixture between 2 parts blues, 1 part blank verse, and 1 part Shakespeare that hits the spot. The writing is surprisingly tight despite the languorous, silky tone and rhythm, which leads to some fantastic surprises when the plot turns on a dime, or a character whips out a one-liner that cracks the audience up. And, of course, there's one advantage this play has over Shakespeare -- I can honestly say that in almost every moment, I had no idea where it was going.

The play could have come off as pretentious -- the imagery, unlike the narrow, earth-bound imagery of a lot of contemporary writing, dances among the stars and leans on hyperbole like it was a walking stick. But the astral lyricism is mixed with a deep, heavy, grounded sense of soul that only this heartbreakingly genuine cast could sell.

Nik Walker, in addition to having written the play, plays two central characters; Cicero Briggs, the dead blues man who used to hold a city together, and Billy Bones, an earnest young deputy in the town. He plays both with a dangerous edge with a genuine heart that drives home the uncertainty of where the play is going. Thomas Briggs, the man who risks everything to bring Cicero back, is beautifully drawn into life by Sam Encarnacion, drawing us into the world of deep love and fear that was the Briggs family.

The rest of the cast were equally superb -- Bianca Rutigliano as the Devil herself, so dangerous and sexual that she makes the air crackle, Jesse Goldwater as Remy Gin Rummy, who bravely pulls a character that could be an insufferable ass into the realm of believability, and Chivonne Floyd, the glue that holds the Briggs together. And it would be remiss of me to write about this sultry blues opus without tipping my hat to the band, cheerfully dubbed Bad Ass Mother 4000 v2.0. The band, featuring Alex Goley, Travis Artz and Alex Kveton, holds up the world of the play through the music -- without the music, all those words would be about nothing.

There's one more opportunity to see this fantastic production live, so if you're free at 3:00, saunter over here to buy tickets, or make it to the Bleecker Theater (45 Bleecker St) and see what the fuss is about.

Review: Pericles, Prince of Tyre

The most exciting part of seeing a rarely produced Shakespeare production is that it is a rare event--although we may see plenty of Hamlets or Macbeths in our lifetime, we will only see a few shows like Pericles, Prince of Tyre. This is a risky proposition: the reason that these plays are less produced is usually because they are simply not as good as their more-produced counterparts. But as New York University's Classical Studio proved this weekend, even the Bard's less brilliant plays can still be excellent productions if they are produced with care.

The pitfall of the script of Pericles is that, though it has an interesting, Shakespearean plot, the language does not have all of the bells and whistles of Hamlet. Yet on the other hand, the sparser, plainer language actually lends itself to being understood easier. Indeed, Director-Choreographer John Farmanesh-Bocca has tackled the production in a way which makes it far more accessible than the average Shakespeare play. The movement pieces are cunningly arranged to break up the play without disturbing the flow, and to illustrate elements of the script which (without the movement) would be too briefly hit upon.

The other support which this production leaned upon was the humor. The script is not a particularly funny script to begin with, but Farmanesh-Bocca teased out a lot of humor in ways that, although not necessarily the original intention, harmonized with the script and made it even better.

The cast was extremely talented in bringing these visions to light. Jabari Brisport, Michael Eisenstein, and Juan Grafton-Delgado, playing the role of the Fates, performed the movement pieces with grace and intensity, and managed to invest themselves in all of the portions of the play which they were silently observing. Terence Stone, as a Bill-Pullman-esque Pericles, was also well-performed, and although sometimes he had trouble keeping up with the boundless enthusiasm of the rest of the cast he usually served as an excellent straight man against a background of exciting and enticing characters.

It is difficult to highlight all of the actors who should be highlighted; suffice it to say that there was not a single performance, from Pericles all the way down to the three prostitutes, which was not performed with a grace, enthusiasm, and delicate handling of language which brought what on the page is a mediocre production into full life.

Pericles, Prince of Tyre was being performed in Rep with a production of Hamlet which I saw last fall and is being performed again, and this production succeeds in every way that I thought that production of Hamlet had fallen short. But the growth and grace of the cast was such that I regret not being able to go back to Hamlet to see if it has become a completely different, effortless production.

Review: El Grito Del Bronx

According to Aristotle, the aim of tragedy was to evoke pity and fear by watching a noble character have his life torn apart through a series of tragic incidents, fueled by character flaws; on the other hand, Migdalia Cruz's play El Grito Del Bronx (a New York University mainstage production) places a serial killer at the crux of the tragic formula. But by joining the story of a killer with the story of his sister, by pairing his cruelty with his tender love, and by showing the roots of his past, this story manages to evoke pity, fear, and even humor.

The play begins by splitting the story between Jesus and his sister Magdalena into two sections, one taking place in 1977 and the other taking place in 1991. In 1977, Jesus (Anthony Souza) and his sister Magdalena (Monserrat Barrera) watch their mother Maria (Nicole Ramos) being abused by their father Jose (Norberto Briceno). In 1991, Jesus is now named Papo (Ismael Enrique Cruz Cordova) and is in prison for a string of murders. Meanwhile, Magdalena, now called Lulu (Audrey Esparza) is attempting to move on with her life with her fiance Ed (Alex Fast).

This production arrives to existence from last spring's Hot Ink Festival, which stages readings of new plays from across the globe. The school was right to recognize the potential of Cruz's work, although it might have been profited by pushing Cruz to rewrite some of the earlier scenes. One of Cruz's talents is an ability to shift from tragedy (of which there is much in this play) to humor and back in short spans of time. Usually this is effective, both in preventing a dreary march of constant sadness and in humanizing characters who without these moments of humor would be unsympathetic, but in the beginning of the play this shift happens often too rapidly, lurching from humor to abuse without giving the audience time to adjust. The early part of the play also has other problems in the way it is produced; director Candido Tirado chooses to portray a rape onstage, but it seems shoehorned into the moment, and is not properly dealt with.

But the production is overall powerful and touching. One of the most striking, successful elements is the set design provided by Andy Yanni. Eschewing the usual floorplan of the Loewe Theater which this Mainstage took place in, Yanni chose to create a long, narrow set which heightened the tensions and created distinct separations between the 1977 plot on one side and the 1991 plot in the middle and the other side. The prison which Papo is serving his sentence is especially effective; it is a long and thin set which rotates to change the diagonal of the space.

By far the most effective element of the production was the high caliber of performance from most of the cast. Although Audrey Esparza's Lulu was somewhat histrionic and at times tiring, Ismael Cordova's Papo was a stunning and gut-wrenching performance. It is difficult to encapsulate both violence and tender love; Cordova's Papo had not only both but even managed to eerily demonstrate them at the same time. Papo's cellmate, played by Josh Segarra, was a fantastic addition to the production. His stage presence was imposing and his gentleness and strength was a fantastic complement to Papo. The three mothers in the production, played by Stacy Osei-Kuffor, Morgan Lynch, and Nicole Ramos each brought a very different pathos to the production, whether it was Osei-Kuffor's haunting lack of comprehension in the face of tragedy, Lynch's sad humor, or Ramos' all-forgiving love.

There were many "hot-button" issues throughout El Grito Del Bronx; spousal abuse and its effect on its victims, the criminal justice system, and racial relations between the latino community and its neighbors. El Grito Del Bronx did not treat them as subjects to be expounded on, but rather as facts of life which establish a backdrop of the deeply personal life of a single family. The only statement on politics which El Grito Del Bronx seemed to state unequivocally was that all of politics comes down to human lives, that all of these issues are mixed in a deeply woven tapestry of emotion. And although the characters have a wide pantheon of groups to blame, whether justly or unjustly, the most tragic thing about El Grito Del Bronx is that in the end, there is no one to unload blame on or to completely absolve.

Review-Idea: Bad Plays; Frogs

Yesterday, I was working on a friend on the Onion's crossword. One of the clues was "Where 'good' is 'bad.'" The answer was "in slang," but today I'm thinking the answer might sometimes be "the theater." This thought dawns on me because I've just come from the play Frogs, or Old Comedy, or Another Play Entirely; a play so chaotic that it has three names, depending on where you're hearing about it from.

The conceit, although confusing to sort through, seems to be thus: a production of Aristophanes' Frogs is being put on. Aristophanes' Frogs is a comedy wherein Dionysus, god of wine and drama, takes his slave Xanthias into Hell to try and find Euripides. Dionysus wants Euripides to come back and save Athens through his beautiful poetry. But the production of Another Play Entirely is not in any way 'faithful' to the original production; chaos reigns onstage, actors swap roles continually, texts from John Lennon, Bob Marley, MLK, and Charles Cavendish Clifford impose themselves on the text.

This play is very problematic to review because, by any of the usual standards of theater, it is terrible. But precisely for every reason that the play would normally be considered 'terrible,' it actually succeeds. The key is in the deep sincerity of the actors and the need to tell the story. The irreverence and the childishness is not in a spirit of opposition, where the actors condescend or assault the audience; rather they are trying to help the audience understand, to tell them a story. It is rather like having a child tell you an important story.

Take, for instance, the music, composed by Thomas Cabaniss and the cast as a whole, and performed with accompaniment by Jonathan Hart Makwaia. The songs are chaotic, sporadic, and often overpowering; there is a bluntness of style that helps convey the rawness of the material being sung about. At one point, for instance, the ensemble appears as frogs (for which the play bears its original name). They sing the original Greek chant which the frogs traditionally sing ("brekekeke koaxkoax") in loud, brassy tones, and cavort around the stage in a faux-ballet, mimicking all the while closeminded critics. The tone is too sharp and (ironically) too chaotic to be arrived at by accident. There is a distinct, unsettling effect which all of this mayhem aims at.

And this is not unpleasant. The characters are endearing; John Kurzynowski's Dionysus is a truly empathetic character, no matter how flagrant his show-queen attitude is. He provides one of the windows through which the audience can watch this strange spectacle and not be completely alienated; he continues to long for a show without the constant interruption of liberal politics and heavy cynicism (both of which pervade the play). At one point he sings about wanting another number about show queens, because they're tame and uncomplicated; several times he repeats the phrase "This was supposed to be a comedy."

There is, often in art, a strain of almost anti-artistic art; art that takes bad taste or blunt content and use them to stir up stronger feelings in the audience than the usual tame, formally pleasing fare. And yet, in order to succeed they need a heavy reliance on comedy. Bertold Brecht, for instance, constantly strove for a way to overthrow the traditional ways of looking at theater, and often held up 'bad' theater as examples of better ways of approaching his theater. And often audiences have embraced shows despite their violations of all the rules; neo-classical scholars had to exempt Shakespeare from their perfect Aristotelian unities. Certainly, Another Play Entirely makes a sporting event to throw all the rules it can lay its hands on out the window, and despite the odds against it makes itself an enjoyable evening.

Review: Imminence

Things do not happen quickly in the play Imminence; tensions build slowly and passively until the moment where pressures are let loose in a shuddering quake. As the play progresses, it charts three generations of a family, through memories and simple moments, slowly illuminating their lives and how they cope with the loss of one of their own. Realizations and understandings steal slowly over the audience as the storytelling moves quietly forward.

The opening moments of the show are crucial for setting the stage. A simple domestic scene is set, with pedantic, everyday talk. But other actors stand at one side of the stage, humming and singing a tender acoustic song composed by Ellen Maddow. The talk at the table and the movements of the actors become part of the music, providing their own unique rhythms and melodies to the music. The care with which each actor performs their role, and the quiet, unassuming emotions with which the music is embued, allowed me to tune my ears to hear much subtler and more potent strains of conversation.

From that moment forward, the dialogue and the actions onstage became surreal, even though they were simple actions in life. Writer-Director Paul Zimet provides a highly minimalist script, understanding that if each moment is simple and highly specific, it can have the power of an entire television epic. The actors perform in such roles with an openness and simplicity that drives such moments home: Will Badgett, as Victor, can turns a scene where he does nothing more than shuffle to the bathroom and back in the middle of the night into a quiet, potent scene. He performs roughly that same scene three times; only the third time, he addresses the audience with a heartbreakingly beautiful monologue.

The technical elements were, for the most part, as minimalist as the show. Carol Mullins' lighting design matches the tone of the show, creating the effect of streetlamps through shutters at night with a poetic precision. The exception which proves the rule of minimalism is the set, two black platforms designed by Nic Ularu, which split in half, and over the course of the play drift further and further away from each other. At times, this set choice didn't seem to be used as powerfully as it could have, but when it was fully utilized--such as for Hilary Easton's choreography, Will Badgett's monologue, or a scene in which Rory (David Brooks) confronts his family from across the divide--the result was simple and powerful.

There were, admittedly, some scenes that were less effective overall, and could have been jettisoned without damaging the experience. But because of the gentle pace and the wonderful gifts which I received, I was not bothered too badly. It is very rare that I form such a deep empathy with the performers onstage, and--as if reciprocating the performer's welcoming spirit--I cannot judge them for a few missteps.

Review: Macbeth

Shakespeare seems so dry, so removed from our times, that it is hard to imagine it having a deep, visceral impact. Richard Foreman once said that all theater is about death because in the act of freezing it and performing it exactly, over and over, we've killed it. If that's true, then Shakespeare has been dead for hundreds of years. The production at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, directed by Rupert Goold and staring Patrick Stewart (Macbeth) and Kate Fleetwood (Lady Macbeth), does create that visceral feeling. This is what a remounting of a classic should be: absolutely grounded in our guts.

The set, designed by Anthony Ward, provides an immediate base from which the play can already begin its powerful effect. It is gray and dingy, at once recalling ugly kitchens, sinister morgues, interrogation rooms, or whatever gloomy industrial needs one might have. As the play progresses, a few small moving set pieces are all that is needed to transform this set into whatever locale is needed.

Meanwhile, an equally sinister story is being told onstage. Macbeth and his companion Banquo (Martin Turner) come back from the war as heroes, but a prophecy from three demonic sisters (Sophie Hunter, Polly Frame, Niamh McGrady) gives him an appetite for more: he and his wife collude to murder the King of Scotland, and everyone who stands in their way.

The play has a very distinct tone, set in place not only by the set, but also by powerful sound choices from designer Adam Cork, subtle lighting design by Howard Harrison, and video/projection design by Lorna Heavey. The tone was very distinctly set, creating a very heavy and sometimes overpoweringly suspenseful backdrop to all of the character's actions.

Sometimes, early on, this was not ideal--it seemed as though the choices were so powerful that they'd have nowhere else to go as the play progressed. The video projections in particular were often less helpful; it seemed to me as though they should have either been used more, or used less. Some visions, such as the appearance of a ghost near the end of the second act, were accompanied by strong psychedelic projections. But others, like the infamous "is that a dagger which I see before me?" were played without any projection at all. I found it difficult to understand what the logic was behind certain choices of projection versus others. But there was no denying that even before the end of the first scene, the show's tone and mood was very powerfully set, and that all of the design elements had played a part.

Of course, had the mood prevailed in one tone for an entire show, it might have become overpowering, even stifling. And it is here that the director and the actors are to be commended for balancing out the mood. The heavy tones of the play could have been insufferably relentless, but at times became a springboard to turn even the subtlest humor into a real joy and release. In one scene, Macbeth is discussing ordering a murder. As he does so, he prepares a sandwich for himself and for the murderers, putting it in one murderer's mouth to stifle objection. The choice brought humor into a stark moment, but the care with which the choice was deployed turned an intellectual concept about greed into a human moment of hunger.

This transformation of intellectual concepts into visceral, emotional experiences was clear in each of the actors. Patrick Stewart's Macbeth was a very human incarnation, whose soliloquoys seemed to be honest conversations with the audience. No matter how many murders, or how vile his actions were, there was a human being looking for something, whether it be from the audience or from other members of the ensemble. Kate Fleetwood's Lady Macbeth was equally invested with life; like Lady Macbeth she seemed to be able to slide from one end of Lady Macbeth's existence to the other without destroying the integrity of the character. Neither character ever milked the "great lines" of Shakespeare any more than the moment dictated.

The term 'modernization' is bandied about a lot in reference to Shakespeare, but it seems strange to talk about this production as 'modernizing' Macbeth. Although the prop elements (also from Anthony Ward) and the costume choices (supervised by Christine Rowland) were 'modern,' the feeling was not that this is what Macbeth would look like if it happened in the 21st Century. It looked to me as though this story was a universal story, and that all of these 'modern' elements had been selected for no other reason than to make the story work. The time in which the play took place was not important--what was important is that it was happening now, in the visceral sort of way that theater has of always happening now.