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A CurtainUp Report
Philadelphia 2008 Fringe Shows
The Philadelphia Live Arts Festival & Philly Fringe, with thousands of artists of all kinds in 200 shows presented at 115+ venues runs from Aug 29 through Sept 13. Philadelphia Live Arts Festival is the invited artist portion of the 16-day event. Philly Fringe is the larger, unfiltered wing of the festival. Together the Festival and the Fringe feature new theater, dance, and all kinds of performance art from across Philadelphia, the U.S., and the world. We will cover a small sampling of the events here. For more festival info including complete show listings, venues, times, and box office procedures, go to www.livearts-fringe.org.
Animal Tales | Disco Descending | Sweet By-and-By | A Streetcar Named Durang: Two Burlesques and a Nightmare | Pichet Klunchun and Myself |A Priest Walks into a Bar | Another Sleepy Dusty Delta Day | The Melting Bridge
Animal Tales: Eleven Short Animal Plays
Among the many animals in Don Nigro's Animal Tales: Eleven Short Animal Plays are a cat looking for meaning, a baboon who's appalled at the very suggestion that he's a distant cousin of humans, a philosophizing groundhog, and a mouse and turkey taking chances. In the most entertaining piece, a parrot who hates crackers and wants a cheeseburger and a shake, seeks intelligent conversation. He's tired of compulsively "repeating vacuous phrases"e; and fed up with his cagemate, who will parrot anything. Although a more physical approach with less straight reciting would serve them well, the company's work includes special moments where the actors ease into their soul-searching animal roles.
Galloping Abbey Productions is an independent theatre group composed almost exclusively of students from York College of PA. These kids care enough about theatre to participate in the Philly Fringe and take their show to Harrisburg before returning to present their play in York. Nigro's Animal Tales is a good choice for them with its monologues and pieces for 2-3 actors. Its manageable structure allows flexibility in rehearsals and the minimal set without light and audio requirements can be set up for a performance anytime, anywhere, including up in the wilds of NE Phila in a hot clearing in the woods of Pennypack Park. Welcome and "Break a leg!" to this new theater company. Actors: Bryan A. Caine (also director), Jamie Caponera, Ashley DeVoe, Allyson Frick, Alan Scott, Philly Fringe at Verree Venue #2, 8600 Verree Ave. 60 mins includes brief intermission.
Disco Descending
Disco Descending is the kick-off event for the 16-day Philadelphia Live-Arts, Philly Fringe Festival. Part two of a planned trilogy, it picks up the story of the folks in Suburban Love Songs (Live Arts 2006) when they're in their mid-40s. A comic, text-less disco/techno dance version of the not-so-funny Orpheus myth, Disco Descending is peopled by actors who dance, rather than dancers who act. This visit to a fanciful Hades, not hellish like the real place (which everybody knows is an endless, tedious Alley Cat dance), features director Karen Getz's lively, intricate choreography, full of personality and quirks, performed by droll actors in fun costumes. The Orpheus story occasionally seems to have been misplaced somewhere in this intersection of a couple of myths, and there are moments of incomprehensible action that tend to slow it down a tad. But this is a grand piece of entertainment. Dave Jadico's brilliantly acted and danced, sensitive Orpheus is accosted by a gay, roller skating Morpheus (who also seems to be a Hermes type). Jennifer Childs' perky Eurydice attracts Pete Pryor, the delightfully over-the-top ruler of the underworld. Add a magician-Hermes and a Cerberus played by three skilled dancers, and this show is hot! Live Arts Festival at Suzanne Roberts Theatre. 55 minutes.
Sweet By-and-By
Sweet By-and-By is an atmospheric take on the story of Swedish immigrant Joe Hill, who became a union organizer for IWW (Industrial Workers of the World) early in the last century. A laborer, song-writer, and activist who moved from job to job across America, Hill was tried for murder and executed. But Joe Hill lives on in working class myth, folklore, and songs, where the case is made that he was the innocent victim of anti-labor forces.
This play is a collaboration of Pig Iron Theatre Company and Teater Slava. Pig Iron's Dito van Riegersberg and Dan Rothenberg shared in concept development and writing with Swedish actor and musician Daniel Rudholm. Rothenberg directs. Swedish-based Teater Slava was founded in the 1990s on Rudolph Steiner's philosophies and a Polish-style ensemble physical theater tradition. This work showcases Daniel Rudholm's talents. An appealing performer, he plays the banjo, harmonica, and a beautiful concertina. Acted, sung, and spoken -–partly in Swedish, the hard luck story is told with letters and envelopes, prayers, fire, and ashes. A cobbled feel could partly be attributed to the show's episodic nature, and partly to inconsistency with regard to the 4th wall. Sometimes it's observed, as he performs without "seeing" the audience, while at other times it's broken, even to the extent of his leading a sing-along. The production has a distinctive approach to audio, and tracks are recorded live and layered upon tracks just recorded. Rudholm's singular animation work is projected upstage on a wall made of envelopes. Rudholm is a fine solo performer, yet this unique show might be enhanced by opening it out to encompass company ensemble work, a tradition of both Pig Iron and Teater Slava. We have come to expect exploration, brilliant conception, and singular vision from Pig Iron, and this productive hybrid effort with Teater Slava has yielded a highly unusual and inventive work. Live Arts Festival at Arts Bank, Avenue of the Arts. 65 minutes.
Kid Simple
Azuka Theatre takes on Jordan Harrison's Kid Simple, an eclectic and weirdly cerebral quest story. A very young genius has really put herself into the making of her invention, a machine that operates on the border of the audible and the inaudible. When it is stolen by a devious mercenary, she and a companion set off in dangerous pursuit. Traveling companions Amanda Schoonover and Delante G. Keys hit all the right ironic notes, and Keith J. Conallen handles the gamut of roles from seducer to satyr to fig tree. Joe Mallon and Kathryn Petersen change from apple pie parents to old radio stars to German-accented villains and back again. Zura Young nails the multifaceted narrator job. Kevin Meehan deftly produces sound effects from a Foley booth that resembles some tinkerer's dream. SFX are matched to vintage titles overhead, and both operate on a number of humorous levels. When episodes of a play-within-a-play radio show about the infrasonic waves of a cello leak into the main radio play, you can bet that things get complicated. A Will Shorts of playwriting, Jordan Harrison hooks phrases together like letters in a crossword puzzle. His language bursts with fresh nonsensical intelligence, satisfying cravings for wit and soulful whimsy. This play garnered seriously mixed reviews at the ‘04 Humana Festival for a production that must have lacked director Kevin Glaccum's capacity to visualize action and handle precise coordination and timing, and the help of an astonishingly good design team like this one: Alisa Kleckner, costumes: Troy Herion, sound design/orig music: Joshua Schulman, lighting; Steve Organ, projection. Together all of these artists have come up with a show worthy of the work's hybrid, playful appeal and great potential. Playwrights and companies like these are part of a growing cadre of artists nudging theater into an authentic 21st century sensibility. Azuka's Kid Simple is magic on the boards, and professional down to the tips of its high-heeled cleft-hoof shoes. At The Latvian Society, 531 N. 7th St. 90 minutes.
A Streetcar Named Durang: Two Burlesques and a Nightmare
The Idiopathic Ridiculopathy Consortium presents Christopher Durang’s Desire, Desire, Desire, The Actor’s Nightmare, and A Stye of the Eye. These three short burlesque works evidence Christopher Durang’s enduring interest in Tennessee Williams, Noel Coward, and his own Catholic upbringing. Durang’s tendencies spew all over the place as manic characters explode from his pen. For those who know and love 20th century playwrights-- the stars in Durang’s sky-- the evening is a gas. For those not so familiar, the reference-saturated shows will be funny, but may prove even more bewildering than they were intended to be. Beckett, Shepard, Shaffer, f***ing Mamet, John Pielmeier, Robert Bolt, Noel Coward, and more collide with Tennessee Williams in frantic, fractured tales. In Desire Desire, Desire, although Stanley bought Blanche Du Bois a bus ticket to Glen Garry Glen Ross years ago, Blanche never left. So Blanche and Stanley have been waiting for six years for Stella to return with a lemon coke to calm Blanche’s nerves, and they are visited by a census taker and a couple of Maggies off a Hot Tin Roof. In the next short play, an accountant is caught in an actor’s nightmare as a Woody Allen Hamlet who gets lost in a free-for-all where the distinctions between Private Lives, A Man for All Seasons, and Godot blur, and the accidental actor has no idea of his lines. Finally Shepard’s people and Agnes of God conflate with the Equus-blinded, and heaven knows who else, and they all sail right off the edge. These works seem to have been written in a fever hotter than a pepper sprout, intended for riotous private parties filled with serious theater enthusiasts. The actors and directors in the consortium have great fun bringing the plays to life, changing costumes at lightning speed, and playing it way over the top. Philly Fringe. At the elegant L’Etage Cabaret. 70minutes.
Pichet Klunchun and Myself
"Myself" being Jerome Bel. Pichet Klunchun is fromThailand, and Jerome Bel is a Frenchman. Their planned-out conversation is vitalized by good-natured impromptu elements and dry, offhand humor on both sides. Dance moves illustrate the long two-way interview. Klunchun is a choreographer, teacher, and a master of Kohn (King) dance, a ritual Thai dance. His dancing is handsome and deliberate, with excruciatingly delineated, contained movements that carry specific meanings. Klunchun is the perfect foil for Bel, a former dancer and celebrated postmodern choreographer, who favors leveling experiences where ordinary is made a virtue and the performers dance more or less like anyone else. Klunchun’s beautiful simplicity of bearing and delivery contrasts with Bel’s nail biting and slightly fidgety posture. They talk a bit about their lives. Klunchun is not married "Yet".Bel is not married but has a child. The Thai tells the Frenchman: Marry first. Baby second. Here East meets West, tradition meets avant garde, formal meets informal, and elegance meets letting it all hang out. Yet both artists have disciplined approaches to their art and serious ideas about performance. Klunchun regrets that Khon dance largely has become relegated to history and exists now as a cultural curiosity for tourist packages to Thailand. He sees performance as an event where artists with special training display skills. There is no careless gesture. He is about discipline, history and concern for audience expectations. Bel, on the other hand, is all about concept over details, the here-and–now, and less responsibility for audience approval. He seeks self-aware, " real" performance that acknowledges the existence of an audience, but claims he’s not interested in pleasing them. "That’s not my job." In a representative exchange Klunchun asks, if this is the way Bel thinks, why would people pay to watch? "Do they want their money back?" "Sometimes they ask for their money back. " ":After the show?" " Sometimes during the show." --- Bel is concerned that due to excessive watching of performance (TV, movies, theater, dance, etc) people are too much spectators and not enough participants in their own lives. "They spend their lives watching representations of life." He is concerned about how to reconcile this idea with the fact that he designs performances. While this meeting of Thai and French is not fusion, it is a demonstration of mutual artistic respect. As to what constitutes performance, here Bel’s notion of performance-- watching two guys counterpoint, encompasses his own and Klunchun’s point of view. It’s theater about dance. (This show has ended, but Jerome Bel’s The Show Must Go On, a major Live Arts show, is at the Kimmel Center Sept 11-13.) Pichet Klunchun and Myself at Arts Bank. 104 minutes.
A Priest Walks Into a Bar
Four young women and a guy walk into a bar. They are members of the Vagabond Acting Troupe responding to a challenge from Artistic Director Aileen McCulloch: Come up with an original piece based on a joke, for a specific site (a bar), and do it in 10 rehearsals. The result is quite charming. There are a lot of walk-into-a-bar jokes. Richly deserved nun jokes and skits on topics like church/ money issues cover well-worn territory with wit. There are quips on religion from famous names, commentaries on various religious traditions, heaven, hell and flaming desserts. Cute sketches include one in which Gandhi says "apeshit". Laughs aside, it looks like this exercise became a process of discovery for Vagabond members. Each delivers a heart-felt, if often understandably sophomoric, little monologue laced with humor about elements of their own spiritual journey. Notable quote: "Jesus loves me, this I know. But He doesn’t love my sister." The ensemble comes across as talented young people having a little laugh at religion. But this fun acting troupe, while earnest and eager, would benefit greatly from more exposure to formal acting training. There just is no substitute for it if the goal is to perform in acting company big leagues. The promising ensemble is based in Norristown, but is in residence in Philadelphia this year, upstairs at L2. Bar above L2 Restaurant 22nd and South St. 45 minutes.
Another Sleepy Dusty Delta Day
The question emerges, what, if anything, does the artist owe to the source? Bobbie Gentry’s memorable Ode to Billie Joe is a sad and romantic mystery. Missing in this innovation are a sense of the tormented boy Billie Joe, an appreciation of the girl’s family’s indifference, and any concern about the secret at the heart of the song. Instead the suicide is turned into a philosophical position. Billie Joe has left behind a letter, a manifesto which performer Ivana Jozic reads at interminable length. It goes on and on about choosing death: "Death by choice is my vision of freedom," and so forth accompanied by speculation on how he’ll fall and die and face the void. Replacing Gentry’s soft, country sound is harsher edged music with noise, strong percussion, and discordant elements, very well performed by accomplished musicians. The song is begun a couple of times and later sung through, slightly flat at times, in a Croatian accent that is jarring for this Southern song. The story, transported far from the Deep South, occurs in a metaphoric coal region represented by piles of coal with very small model trains and bridges. Jozic in a vivid yellow dress drinks European beer and scares symbolic, but real caged birds. A skilled dancer, she performs an off-putting, jagged dance that’s part seizure, part shovel-dozer. Sometimes frenzied and berserk, sometimes apparently angularly floating, sometimes walking around, it begins to look self-indulgent after about half an hour. Certainly far from a Delta day, the story is transposed into something else entirely, seen through a markedly different lens in this dance installation by Jan Fabre. Philadelphia Live Arts Festival. At Suzanne Roberts Theatre. 55 minutes.
The Melting Bridge
The Melting Bridge, the third part of Lucidity Suitcase Intercontinental’s Americas Trilogy, explores native cultures in the Americas. A businessman who represents a German toilet paper company that genetically engineers trees in Brazil has arrived in Mexico City to expand the business. He receives a dire fax from his father who warns him about parallel realities and claims that society is at a crossroad. Repeated attempts to call his father fail. The father, a professor, long ago lost a prestigious faculty position by challenging the prevailing Clovis theory that the first arriving prehistoric Americans walked across the Bering land bridge. Instead, he postulated multiple migrations from all directions. Shown trekking in snowshoes, he conducts research on an island in the Bering Strait. But he may be on his way to South America. Meanwhile the son, passing through Mexico City’s Zocalo subway station with its Aztec ruins, encounters a mysterious newsstand lady. The idea of tracking down his father begins to overtake him. His unintended odyssey magically takes him to the Bering Strait and on journeys inside Brazil. A good deal happens along the way including inhaling tiny particles of happiness, championship wrestling, and a strange shaman. The production features staging that is beyond merely imaginative. It is a major feat of engineering and coordination. The set involves two levels, a large foot bridge and an apparatus with a vertically movable screen, projected super titles, and extensive props. Then there’s the unique lighting, the layered sound design, original musical score, and extensive video footage. Red subway cars pass through the station, and Amazon boat tours put you there. Actors on stage often fit right into the videos. Due to projection size some footage is a bit fuzzy, but still well worth seeing. The performance is eventful but the pace is unhurried, despite the fact that timing has got to be a critical issue. Actors take the time to perform ordinary little actions although the exotic scenes shift quickly in unanticipated ways. The plotting is subversive, and trajectories of the lines of inquiry continually collide, making it more murky than lucid. Yet there is a thru line among the themes. With its public transportation, tour boats, planes and a strange portal through a newsstand, this is another Lucidity Suitcase travel-intensive saga, like their Flamingo/ Winnebago last year. Except in Flamingo a young man desperately seeks his grandfather and the past, whereas here a man seeks his father and the future. The Melting Bridge is a theatrical event not to be missed. Unfortunately the Live Arts—Philly Fringe Festival is drawing to a close. But thank goodness we can count on Thaddeus Phillips and company to be out there on the edge, still doing what they do —finding ever more creative ways to express complex ideas and to reconcile theater performance with our media saturated world. In collaboration with Tatiana Mallarino and Juan Gabriel Turbay (composer). Live Arts Festival. At Plays & Players Theater. 75 minutes.
South Pacific
In the Heights
Playbill 2007-08 Yearbook
Leonard Maltin's 2008 Movie Guide
