DETERMINED: Lewis (top) and Budd. |
Some people feel uncomfortable dealing with those, even friends, who look and act normal but are among the walking wounded with some deadly disease or another. They don't know what to say. A fringe benefit of Amy Lynn Budd's The Thing That Ate My Brain . . . Almost, at Perishable Theatre through May 10, is that Budd is demonstrating to them that such victims don't tend to wallow in self-pity. Self-deprecating humor, dark and blunt, is a time-tested coping mechanism that has the side benefit of making sickness, and the sick, approachable by others.Subtitled "A Neo-Burlesque Sci-Fi Extravaganza," and directed briskly by Connie Crawford, we get everything from fringe-shaking go-go dancing to a sexy, vampirish villainess. Clearly, this is about living.
It is 1-1/2 extravagant hours, indeed, if only because it presents itself as being directed by 1950s schlockmeister Ed Wood, who is making a film of the life of her disease. Before the show, we see clips from his legendarily low-tech and faux-scary Plan 9 from Outer Space, and from Glen or Glenda, a documentary account of transvestism that was unintentionally hilarious not only because Wood played Glenda in drag but also, and ironically, due to its heartfelt sympathy.
Those films beautifully set up Budd's fears here, not the one about dying — that's a background drumroll that can remain unspoken — but of having a profoundly serious subject laughed at rather than with. (Wood was himself a transvestite, and he wanted his Plan 9 sci-fi/horror mashup to be better than it turned out.) A filmed introduction of Perishable artistic director Vanessa Gilbert, in scarlet lipstick and in shadows, sets the "Mwahhahaha!" tone perfectly, as she declares that the theater is not responsible for any ensuing heart attacks.
The first action we see is also spot-on: Budd, playing herself, jiggling to beat the band in fringed bikini and lime-green vinyl go-go boots. Actually, she is imagining being her mother back in her carpe diem youth. (Mom's tumors started popping up when she was 15, not 28 like Lynn, which adds another unspoken dimension of guilt.)
Budd's wanting to remain attractive and vivacious comes out in such activity rather than dialogue. While filming her, director Wood (Brien Lang) has to remind her that she is playing "a bombshell with a brain tumor," and she's momentarily forgotten that she wrote the script.
Wanting to take over the story, for purposes of metaphor as well as solipsistic self-regard, is Voldemort (Sarah Lewis), her brain tumor that wears a coal-black Elvis wig. When Budd tells her to go to hell, her tumor reminds her that a soul is required for that undertaking, so if anyone is going to hell it's Budd herself. Nice. It's jokey enough that a rimshot could have followed, but it's also a glimpse into Budd's reality.
An earlier version of this play, staged at Perishable three years ago, was one-third the length as it took us through the same trip. This 90 minutes doesn't seem padded, nor does it waste time as it wheels us in and out of hospitals and through the playwright's experiences, as well as that of her mother, who died of the same hereditary disease at 44. We see lots of family photos, another way that mother and daughter merge.
The acting by this trio always does its job and now and then even works overtime. Lewis is appropriately matter-of-fact as the tumor, which is sometimes snarky but usually just goes about the business it likes and does well. Lang gets into the bustling eagerness of Ed Wood — especially amiable because he also loves his work — who has so much to shoot but so little time. Budd has pitch-perfect tone in every scene, whether dancing with gonna-beat-this-thing spunk or just tired, so tired, after a day of hospital tests.
There's so much insincere tugging at our sleeves for sympathy these days, what with 24-hour news of tragedies and American Heroics. We have pathos fatigue. So it's clever and fitting that The Thing That Ate My Brain . . . Almost speaks to us through stylized exaggerations such as Pluck and Determination. Unzipping from those gaudy, comical costumes by the end are nothing less than, ta-daa . . . pluck and determination.
Editor's Note: In a previous version of this article, the play was misidentified as The Thing That Eight My Brain. . .Almost, the name of the play has been corrected above.
