Dog Sees God
⊆ July 19th, 2006 by courtney | ˜By Fiona Zublin
Dog Sees God: Confessions of a Teenage Blockhead — Studio Theatre
It is the dream of every young playwright to shatter cultural icons, to change the way we see things, to make people uncomfortable. Bert V. Royal, the playwright behind Dog Sees God: Confessions of a Teenage Blockhead is a young playwright, and it shows.
Royal has taken one of the most American of cartoon icons, Charlie Brown and his gang of peanuts, and tried to take us past the comic strip to see what neurotic children might become. You guessed it: neurotic teenagers. The concept comes off as unfortunately sophomoric—it is something that might be proposed in a college playwrighting class by a kid who wants to challenge boundaries but really understand which boundaries are worth overstepping. Luckily, Royal’s execution is skillful, which somewhat redeems the forgettable idea behind it.
The actors are mostly alums of Studio Theater’s conservatory, and they are generally talented—though obviously young, taking a little too much pleasure in mad scenes and lines that they know will shock. A standout is Lauren Williams, as Sally Brown, taking pleasure in overacting her overwritten character—and somehow striking a perfect balance.
As always, Charlie Brown—now known as CB (James Manno)—is the linchpin of the play. But instead of a sweetly uncertain loser, he’s now . . . a jock? He and fellow jerk Matt (Robert Rector), who as a child was encased in a cloud of dust, make life hell for shy “Beethoven” (James Gardiner), who still plunks out tunes on his little piano. As for Snoopy? He ate Woodstock and died of rabies.
Some of the playwright’s leaps from cartoon child to flesh-and-blood teenager are reasonable, but most defy logic, and, most importantly, our knowledge of the characters. The shock of seeing Charlie Brown as cruel or Peppermint Patty as popular is greatly diminished by cognitive dissonance: we know that the characters as Charles Shultz created them would not have turned out this way.
Occasionally, Dog Sees God hits all the right notes: for instance, when Royal perfectly captures the adult ideas and speech patterns that made Shultz’s characters at once endearing and a little spooky. Giorgos Tsappas has designed the perfect set, reminiscent at once of cartoon panels and of the institutional architecture of a high school. But despite the lovely packaging and a host of committed performances, Dog Sees God comes off as nothing more than a well-done writing exercise.
