Review: The Smuggler, Solas Nua’s instant hit at Allegory, has sold out. Extend it, please!

It is possible for a good solo show to deliver some of the greatest magic in theater. In Solas Nua’s innovative production of The Smuggler, actor and artistic director Rex Daugherty captivates the audience with 75 minutes of Irish-brogued yarns, clever wordplay, and mixology. It’s a gripping, one-man tragic tale, delivered in a remarkable 9,000 words of rhyme.

Eaton DC’s Allegory bar space is an ideal venue for Solas Nua’s tale of crime and ambition in America’s underbelly. The cozy, windowless bar has the feel of a speakeasy, all hardwood and leather and low lighting. After filing in, drinks in hand, we’re joined by Daugherty, our narrator and bartender for the evening. The affable Daugherty plays Irish immigrant Tim Finnegan, a struggling writer who came to the U.S. in search of the American dream – and found something much darker, instead.

Irish-born, U.S.-based playwright Ronán Noone based Tim’s character off his own immigrant experiences, along with those of many documented and undocumented immigrants that he interviewed. The result is an engrossing tale of people from different cultures and countries united by their shared position in the shadows of American society – and determination to do anything to climb the ladder.

Remarkably, Noone wrote Tim’s entire 75 minute monologue in rhyme. I thought this might be distracting, but Noone crafted the rhyming structure with such care and gravitas that it shades more toward Chaucer’s hallowed Canterbury Tales. Once you settle in, the rhymes become pleasant undercurrents that guide the epic story along.

[adsanity_rotating align=”aligncenter” time=”10″ group_id=”1455″ /]

When we first meet Tim, he’s struggling to support his wife and son on meager bartending wages. His wife calls their family “white trash.” His xenophobic father demeans him as a filthy immigrant. Then Tim meets a shady character named Macio, and everything changes. Macio pulls back the curtain on the seedy world of human smuggling and undocumented labor, where Tim mingles with Guatemalan laundry workers, Brazilian house painters, small time American grifters, and others operating outside the law. Daughtery channels each character with verve, switching seamlessly without skipping a beat – or rhyme. He brings to mind the work of great narrator Jim Dale, who created 134 different voices for the Harry Potter audiobooks.

The Smuggler has sold out at Allegory.  The show moves to Round House Theatre. Nov 1 – 9, 2019.  Details and tickets

Imaginative lighting from designer Marianne Meadows boosts Daugherty’s ability to cover a range of characters and scenarios on his own. Meadows has cleverly concealed a series of magnetic stage lights that gradually shift the bar’s mood from warm to sinister and back again, without the need for a single set change. They don’t feel like stage lights; rather they blend in with the typical bar uplighting. These subtle yet powerful light cues help Daugherty keep the audience in the palm of his hand for 75 uninterrupted minutes.

As Tim sinks deeper into the underworld, he conforms to the values of the lawless space. One can’t look away as Daugherty steadily morphs his character from sad-sack into remorseless criminal, much like Walter White in “Breaking Bad.” Tim acknowledges the problems of xenophobia and exploitation in our broken immigration system, all the while subtly embracing them more and more as he grows in ambition and ruthlessness. He becomes increasingly eager to kick people off the ladder of society, as he barely clings onto the rung just above them. It’s a credit to Daugherty that Tim retains an unshakable charisma even as his actions become ever more odious.

Throughout the show, Daugherty uses his dual role as a bartender for the front row of the audience in endlessly creative ways. Each drink he prepares offers him the chance to add a dramatic flourish to a particular scene. Confrontations climax with the angry churning of an icy cocktail shaker. Quiet exchanges between Tim and his wife revolve around a perfect Manhattan, topped delicately with an orange peel and handed lovingly to a female audience member. Daugherty even pulls out the good whiskey after a moment of triumph, fake-offers it to the audience, and then keeps the good stuff for himself anyway. This mixology-as-storytelling device weaves the production’s dramatic threads into one hypnotic string of drink orders.

Daugherty and director Laley Lippard have something special here. The Smuggler mixes pulpy crime story, slapstick comedy, and gut-punch social commentary, shakes them up, then pours out into an explosive cocktail that deserves to be enjoyed slowly. So belly up to the bar at Allegory. Tim’s holding a seat for you.

The Smuggler by Ronán Noone, directed by Laley Lippard . Featuring Rex Daugherty . Sound design by Matthew M. Nielsen . Lighting design by Marianne Meadows . Stage management by Sam Riley , assisted by Tess Wagner . Produced by Solas Nua . Reviewed by Ben Demers.