By: Juliet Moser
Mirrors. We use them every day, find them in all sort of obvious locations. One could almost say that we even take mirrors for granted, simply assuming that they will always be there when we need them. But what if you were never to see a mirror again – could never glance at a reflective surface as you walk past, making sure your tie or lipstick is straight, nor spend hours perfecting your hair? Surely you would be self conscious at first, but we can assume that if no one had a mirror, we could let things like crooked ties and stray broccoli crowns bother us much less.

Estelle Delaunay is not one of those people. Remove her mirror and you have removed her soul. Remove her mirror and she becomes uncontrollably panicked. Estelle, as the great philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre might have explained, exists, but her essence is in her mirror. The critical tenant of Sartre’s existentialism is, of course, that humans exist first and then define their essence. Estelle is one of three characters is Sartre’s classic work in the theatre of the absurd, “No Exit,” now at the Warehouse Theatre, staged by the Scena Theatre Company. Portrayed with prim snootiness by Maura Stadem, Estelle at first refuses to accept her new situation, and requests that her roommates refer to their present state as “absence.” “If we absolutely must give a name to this state of affairs,” she sniffs, “let’s call it ‘absence.”
But her companions have no such illusions, immediately accepting the fact that they are indeed, in hell – even though it looks like a sitting room furnished with Second Empire furniture. Inez Serrano (Elle Wilhite) was a lesbian postal clerk, while the sole man, Vincent Cradeau (Regen Wilson), was a journalist who treated his wife with ultimate cruelty. The banality of the room in which they are placed emphasizes Sartre’s belief that hell is not a specific physical location, but a state of mind. Sartre wrote and first performed “No Exit” in 1944, 3 months before the liberation of Paris by Allied Forces and surely, living under Nazi occupation must have seemed a hell on earth to him.

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By: Walter Ruff

Meat and Potato Theater’s production of Poe 2000, a collection of Edgar Allan Poe’s works mounted at the Playbill Café is just in time for Halloween. Playwright-director-actor Tobin Atkinson has succeeded in bringing something different and exciting to the stage while preserving the aberrant and ghoulish nature of Poe’s poems and writings. Previously Atkinson wrote, directed and appeared in Meat and Potato Theatre Company’s Infantry Monologues “an insider’s look at America’s armed forces and the effects of September 11 on our shared culture”. Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken! Leave my loneliness unbroken! — quit the bust above my door! Neon glasses, black lights, and a stuffed raven are featured in Meat and Potato’s vision of The Raven certainly Poe’s most well known work and one of Poe 2000’s best portrayals. The spooky, glowing visuals and Atkinson’s eerie reading start the evening off on the right foot. Lucille Ball meets Edgar Allan Poe is up next in Atkinson’s whimsical and stylish take of The Tell Tale Heart. Featuring Katie Taylor-Rollins as a 50’s housewife, Atkinson uses an easel and one word cue cards to tell the speechless story that held some of the evening’s most entertaining moments. The Cask of Amontillado (1846) gets a modernization that works very well and The Bells gets a Hip Hop treatment that had the small black box jumping to a rap beat. All told the troupe performs ten vignettes; all incorporate various masks, puppets, storytelling, farce and audience participation true to the company’s mission. Atkinson and Taylor-Rollins with help from Jeffrey A. Wisniewski create amusing original theatre that is ambitious and edgy. The staging is imaginative and intelligent and the performances are enthusiastic but respectful of the material. Do yourself a favor and see this show, it is fine fall fun and 1409 is a great place to have dinner or drinks.

Adapted from the writings of Edgar Alan Poe and directed by Tobin Atkinson. Cast: Tobin Atkinson, Katie Taylor-Rollins, Jeffrey A. Wisniewski

By: Walter Ruff

Every generation reinvents child rearing, thinking they have new insights the previous generation did not, almost as if their generation was the first to raise brilliant scientists, authors, painters, inventors and statesmen. The current breeding class puts an immense amount of pressure on themselves to find the BEST preschool, getting put onto waiting lists and using acceptance into a good program like Bright Ideas as parental bragging rights.. Didactic Theatre and this play’s Director, Christopher Carroll, have mounted Bright Eyes, a very funny, thought provoking comedy at the DC Arts Center in Adams Morgan. This play is all the more relevant because of the wave of young successful couples moving back into the upper North West area of the city near Adams Morgan where the DC Arts Center is located. Every Saturday one can see couples making their weekly stroll to the grocery pushing “Maggie” or “Seth” in an expensive baby carriage to the Whole Foods Store near Logan Circle. Didactic Theatre has captured the blissful family experience and twisted it ever so carefully to portray the darkly funny side of finding a good nursery school. Murder? 45 Caliber Hand Guns? All Natural Poisons? All that and more makes up the dark comedy in Eric Coble’s play that is as sarcastic as it is funny. Big ABC baby blocks, colorful and happy, become the minimal stage design, while cool children’s tunes and nursery sounds make up the excellent musical montage.

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Quite a few years ago I lost my mother to cancer and to this day I wonder what it might be like to see her one last time. What would I say? What would she say? What would I feel? All these thoughts came to mind after seeing Michel Tremblay’s play For the Pleasure of Seeing Her Again currently mounted at MetroStage in Alexandria, Virginia. Mr. Tremblay, one of Canada’s most popular playwrights and certainly one of its most respected has written a wonderful tribute to his Mother whom he lovingly refers to as Nana.

The play takes us through the Narrator’s (Bruce M. Holmes) life with his mother Nana (Catherine Flye), from his early years of pranks in the streets of Montreal, through his teenage years when he receives gifts from his mother that guide him down the paths his life would take as a playwright and a man. They discuss their different tastes in literature (her thoughts on French orphans are hysterical) and the mechanics of the family wringer washing machine (that always sucks in arms up to the arm pit) with equal amounts of humor and motherly wisdom. When Nana has to face cancer Ms. Flye gives her best performance, comparing the act of giving birth to the growing cancer inside her. It is when she falls to the stage in pain, giving “birth” to her death, that our Narrator reveals a wonderful send-off for the woman who guided his life. Through the translucent screens and misty fog we see a golden swing that waits to carry her to her heavenly reward. As she pulls herself up into the swing there is not a dry eye in the audience. Moments later, the lights dimmed, I could only think how fitting such a send off was for such a colorful character.

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By: Walter Ruff

It’s a classic story of supernatural love and crafty trickery. Bell, Book and Candle is a wonderful play, originally brought to the stage in 1950 and to film eight years later. Vpstart Crow has mounted a fantastic production of this off beat love story for the Halloween season. John William Van Druten’s play is pleasantly nostalgic and a great choice for this feisty troupe of suburban players. VPstart Crow is the theatre in residence at the Cramer Center in Old Towne Manassas where the surroundings are perfect for a Fall afternoon away from the city.
The tale takes place in New York circa 1950 where a fetching, alluring and powerful witch Gillian Holroyd (McCall Farrell), acquires a romantic interest in an upstairs border Sheppard Henderson (Matthew Craig) and plots to win his affections with a bit of spell casting of a seemingly harmless nature. Not as harmless as she had envisioned, Sheppard is preparing to propose to his fiancé (a former catty college friend) that very night! Already forewarned by her whimsical aunt Queenie (Jan Boulet) — who practices sorcery in an upstairs apartment – that falling in love could take away all of her powers, Gillian decides not to be road blocked by such a minor detail and proceeds to cast her spell. Poor Sheppard is immediately caught in her web of romance and he places a call to his future wife to break the engagement.

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By Luke Edward

Publisher’s note — This is our second review of this play, both Luke and I attended the production.

Spotlight center — a Man atop a stone, gun in hand, as music reminiscent of Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odessey plays about. It is a gloomy beginning, creating a mystique about the stage which does not rise; we are entranced, seduced by a theatrical display worthy of high compliments. John (Scott Graham) is a “virgin” screenwriter, lost in his first major effort, torn from both wife and child. Driven to an almost insomniac state by his work, he begins to hallucinate an amoral character of his own creation. What results is a both tragic and hysterical show, meshing visual media with brilliantly painted lighting and a scarce stage aptly appropriate for Ami Dayan’s intelligent work. [Read more...]

By: Walter Ruff

The Boys Next Door by Tom Griffin is the kind of play that makes you laugh in an uneasy way. One question this wonderfully acted production asks is pointed and direct — can a play about four mentally challenged men living together in a small apartment be humorous without the focus of the joke being the handicap? The answer in the case of The Boys Next Door is yes. This play is not hilarious because the characters are mentally challenged but instead because they say and do things that are comical. Jeff Keenan who directed last season’s Colorado Catechism for Journeymen Theater is able to balance the laughs and poignant moments in such a way that there are very few times that the laughs feel misplaced. The Boys Next Door is truly inspiring and thought provoking–the characters seem to become your long time friends by the end of the show.

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By: Luke Edward

Suffering can be humorous; this the Three Stooges understood. The trick is context. Generally, being involved in a car wreck is not funny. Curly, sprinting from a knife-wielding gorilla, is. Natural Theatrical’s latest presentation, Alexa’s Necklace, an original work by Paula Alprin (of Natural Theatricals) and directed by Susan Alison Keady, is a classical example of great wit out of context. Alexa’s Necklace is the story of Esther (played wonderfully by Karen Doubek), a mother literally delusioned by the sudden death of her daughter, Janine (portrayed by both Molly Bennet and most notably by Aimee Meher-Homji). Grief leads to blame, and we expect to be indulged in the psychological battles of a distraught mother.

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