Dizzy Miss Lizzie’s Roadside Revue

• Dizzy Miss Lizzie’s Roadside Revue — The Orestia
• Reviewed by Steven McKnight

To see Dizzy Miss Lizzie’s Roadside Review, get there early to have a drink, find a good seat (the shows are selling out), and generally enjoy the whole DMLRR experience.  It’s an old-time carnival in the Baldacchino tent, complete with costumed performers juggling, telling fortunes, and selling fans while the music plays.  The fun starts even before the performance does.

The Master of Ceremonies (Mike Kozemchak) starts off with amusing background on this “sick and twisted yet utterly fascinating tale.”  Clytemnestra (Maria Engler with a charismatic Mae West persona) then opens with a song about the vengeance she will gain against her returning husband Agamemnon (Steve McWilliams).  In a flashback we see how Agamemnon sacrificed their daughter Iphigenia (Debra Buonaccorsi) ten years earlier at the start of the Trojan War.  Clytemnestra explains that she’s a “woman of action”. Her daughter Electra will later describe her as a “vile whore.”

The deaths of Iphigenia, Agamemnon, and later Clytemnestra (killed by her son Orestes) are all enacted as carnival show events.  The story is told both through narration and a series of comical songs in genres ranging from rock to bluegrass (including mandolins and a washboard).  Later poor Orestes (Jake Koenig) is tormented by three beautiful Furies clad in black fetish wear and unnaturally colored wigs.  Are you getting a sense of the production?

Fortunately, the goddess Athena (the always memorable Felicia Curry) shows up to save Orestes from the Furies, help the Furies find a new purpose (“fertility is better than hostility”), and lead the whole cast in a feel good number praising cooperation and conciliation as the audience is showered with confetti.  

The creative team of Debra Buonaccorsi and Steve McWilliams had an inspired idea for an entertainment experience appropriate for the tent at Fort Fringe.  It may not be a great musical, but it is great theatre. 

• Running Time:  60 minutes
• Tickets:  Dizzy Miss Lizzie’s Roadside Revue – The Oresteia
• Remaining Shows:  Wed. July 16 at 8:30 . Thurs, July 24 at 6:30 . Fri, July 25 at 7 . Sat, July 26 at 2
• Where:  The Baldaccino at Fort Fringe, 607 New York Avenue, NW