TOO INTENSE? Blanchette and Sanda [seated]. |
Who needs snakes on a plane when they infest so many stage families? At 2nd Story Theatre, Wave 3 is upon us, the last and scariest of this summer’s Short Attention Span Theatre short-play presentations.The infested family is in the closing play by Christopher Durang, but a scarier point could be made about the snakes writhing in the minds of two characters in the inclusion by Tony Kushner, about a troubled psychotherapy patient and his equally tormented ex-shrink.
The presence of two edgy plays on the light summer bill shouldn’t be surprising. As the theater’s Lynne Collinson reminded the audience on opening night, artistic director Ed Shea has al¬ways promised in these grab bags at least one play to make you laugh, one to make you think, and one to make you go: what the heck was that about? Well, this time there was trepidation over the above closers being too much for ticket-buyers looking for the theatrical equivalent of light beach reading. So a big deal was made over one’s money’s worth being delivered in the four plays before intermission, and that what came after was a bonus, a freebie for anyone who cared to stay.
In Kushner’s Terminating, psychoanalyst Esther (Marina Mihalakis) has terminated client Hendryk (Rudy Sanda) after five years because his intensity frightened her. But he’s back, insisting that she take him back. Hendryk doesn’t believe a god is watching him, but she has been the closest possible substitute. As for Esther, she may be psychologically terminal, suicidal because she doesn’t trust the word “surely” uttered by her faithful lover (Juli Parker). It’s the shrink who says “ambivalence is the soul” but Hendryk who laments that his lover (Kyle Blanchette) is soulless when he loves him without reservation. This all is a Talmudic thought experiment by Kushner rather than convincing characterization.
I’m giving up on fully conveying Durang’s dark but brilliant Death Comes to Us All, Mary Agnes. The evil, filthy rich patriarch is dying upstairs and the family is assembling to squabble over the spoils. But, detesting everyone, he’s leaving all to evil daughter Vivien (Collinson) as a lesson in how cruelly the world works. The title character (Erin Olson) is introduced to universalize this lesson through her lower-class problem. (Puppy torture by her new hubby — sorry you asked?) Durang cleverly subverts the “all you need is love” payoff of similar black comedies by suggesting that you’d better define your terms before you draw that conclusion.
Preparation for such serious subtexts is provided by another Durang play, Naomi In the Living Room. Peggy Melozzi plays the title dingbat with the comic agility we’ve come to expect from her past work here, an especially useful trait for a character self-characterized by psychotic mood swings. The writing doesn’t get points for character development. It’s all just an exercise to let Naomi’s son (Aaron Morris) and his wife (Peggy Becker) enable her abuse and provide a cross-dressing sight gag.
The most substantial piece in the opening four is a good chunk of Molière’s The Imaginary Cuckold, rhymed verse and all. As Sganarelle, who is convinced his wife (Dillon Medina) is unfaithful, John Michael Richardson provides farcical explosiveness and internal cross-currents of approach-avoidance conflict. The object of his venomous suspicion, the young Lelie (Ryan Maxwell), is actually in love with Celie (Maryellen Botvin) but thinks she has broken her vow to him and married Sganarelle. Opportunities for dialogue at cross meanings abound.
