Wistaria is, as their website claims, “an intimate meeting of people that questions and may threaten — through text, action, and song — the stories we use to placate our minds.” It is as much a political discussion as it is a strange rhythmic cacophony of quotes from The Crucible and the Bible blended with old American folk songs (and even a hilarious few verses of Bush’s Glycerine), all accompanied by the almost ritualistically precise and sometimes erratic movement of its actors.
Wistaria, in this way, finds a ready home in Hillyer Art Space, as it is as much a slideshow of abstract and expressionist art as the paintings that hang on the museum’s walls.
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Wistaria
90 minutes
at Hillyer Art Space
9 Hillyer Court NW
Washington, DC 20008
[/wpcol_1quarter]In short, Wistaria is a thinly connected assembly of vague scenes, whose metaphors and symbolism can fly over the heads of unprepared audience members. This is not the case with all — one particularly memorable sequence juxtaposes Richard Sheimmel discussing how crazy in love he is with his wife even after six months of marriage with a corny joke told by Goren; this preparation, by contrast, implies that marriage is as much a joke as a duck walking into a bar and asking for grapes.
Overall, Wistaria is experimental, but the cast is charming and talented, polite enough that with a little encouragement they had the whole audience singing “glory, glory, hallelujah” along with them.
If that kind of production isn’t your cup of tea, this isn’t one for beginners — it can be confusing, even uncomfortable, but rewarding, in that it encourages reflection and critical thought about how we each experience our political and cultural identities, whatever they may be.
