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Running time 2:00 - one intermission
Homo-erotic play goes from exhibition to engrossing
v nudity
Click here to buy the script

In the early going - indeed, for most of the first act - this story of a gay prostitute who falls for one of his johns feels like a peep show. With full, even excessive nudity and simulated sex (at least one assumes it is simulated) the exhibitionism threatens to defeat both the drama and the humor that Alan Ball, creator of HBO's Six Feet Under, placed in the script. Its not that the script doesn't call for such open display of male bodies and functions. Its all there in the text. But the same text could be staged with a bit less abandon without doing a disservice to the play. The play would feel false without nudity, but there are gradations in presentation that could have allowed the audience a less visceral and more emotional involvement in the story at an earlier point. By the end of the first act, however, the world Serge Seiden has his cast creating for Ball's script has hit a stride. The second act proves to have two of the most affecting scenes of the play, and with the best one-scene supporting performance of the night, the impact of the play is fully engrossing and satisfying.

Storyline: A male prostitute, so used to role playing for his mostly male clientele that he looses his identity in the roles, falls for a disturbed young male client with emotional problems that complicate an already very complicated life.

Alan Ball created more than Six Feet Under. His credits range from television to movies to the legitimate stage. He wrote for the Cybill Shepherd TV series Cybill which gave him the material for American Beauty, the screenplay that earned him an Oscar. This latest of his plays is set in the underworld of Hollywood and includes some of the requisite swipes at the immorality and self-centered hedonism of the entertainment business, drawing the sometimes threadbare comparison to prostitution.

Carlos Candelario can be mesmerizing in his chameleon-like performance as the prostitute who is something different to everyone he deals with, whether customer or acquaintance (although all of his acquaintances seem to be customers in one sense or another). The fact that his ethnicity isn't easy to determine helps us accept the concept that he could claim different backgrounds to fit the needs of different clients. His sleek body and sense of physicality work as well as his capacity for a quick throw-away line or a dramatic zinger. As the client he comes to love, Parker Dixon takes the opposite tack, stressing the stressed out, physically the worse for wear image of a drug abusing, self-loathing but all-too-wealthy son of a rich man. The contrast between the two is striking. The string of supporting performers is impressive, as is almost always the case at Studio on either its main stages or the Secondstage productions here on the fourth floor. Chief among them this time is Richard Mancini who only gets about five minutes on stage but they are the five best minutes of the evening.

Luciana Stecconi's low platform set is placed in the center of Studio's black box Stage 4 with three-row risers on each side, giving a sense of intimacy and immediacy to the proceedings. Too intimate at times. Had the platform been a foot or two higher, the hot tub it opens to reveal could have been a foot or two deeper and the genitals of the actors could have been at least submerged a little for a scene that could well have benefited from an audience's concentration on the dialogue. Once the hot tub is covered back up, the language again takes center stage and the play proceeds to its final two marvelous scenes.

Written by Alan Ball. Directed by Serge Seiden. Design: Luciana Stecconi (set) Ana Marie A. Salamat (costumes) John Burkland (lights) Erik Trester (sound) Matt Goldenberg (photography) Solomon HaileSelassie (stage manager). Cast: John Kevin Boggs, McKenzie Bowling, Carlos Candelario, Chris Dinolfo, Parker Dixon, Leayne Freeman, Danny Gavigan, Richared Mancini, Steve Nixon.

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Running Time 1:45 with one intermission
t A Potomac Stages Pick for a potent look at urban gang life
 for one young woman
v mature uncompromising language and violence
Click here to buy the script

Storyline: A brutal look at fourteen years in the life of a pyrotechnics connoisseur and quietly ruthless ice-cold 16 year-old leader of a New York City girl gang through her life in the projects, prison, and finally her own brutal loss of power at the age of 30.

Kia Corthron must be admired for the mettle to develop the dazzling and unforgiving agit-prop that is Breath Boom! This is not a simple-minded piece of radical screeds and liberal angst with speeches designed to make an obligatory political point to a willing audience. Rather there are rich, complicated characters; none of whom gets off free from either their own cruel actions or crueler inactions. There is growth and change in the characters, at least those that survive the fourteen year time span of the play. Corthron is wise enough to not to make this a play without any respite. She has written rich, lyrical poetry masquerading as dialogue that, when spoken by Prix, is simply stunning … and more so since it describes the design of various fireworks displays that Prix dreams of accomplishing as her mark on life. Corthron has not overcrowded Breath Boom! with too much to follow. The play is effective because an audience will not lose its way into the hard life of the characters.

Turning a play about young women living without love, without hope, without caring parents and without boundary-respecting adult males into a theatrical work that audiences would want to see has been the task of director Nassri. Her casting is the key to the play’s ultimate success. She has assembled a very effective young cast that has the audience believing the words spoken and the actions taken; even if it is a head pounded all-to-visibly into a chain link fence, or a girl quietly going about her business tying a noose out of bed sheets and then told to “just do it!” As Prix, Victorian is compelling, a brooding presence whose face contorts into forceful authority that she uses to lord over her minions. There is no compassion in Victorian’s portrayal; compassion is weakness and weakness leads to powerlessness. She can summon coarse, surly expressions and mannerism from nowhere and the next moment be painstakingly quiet as she fiddles with colorful pipe cleaners trying to develop the design for a fire works display. The young ensemble provides a number of graphic performances. Ashley Ware meticulously and matter-of-factly describes the plans for her funeral as if it were to be the high point of her short life. Juliana Edeke thumbs through a scrapbook almost blithely counting off all her old friends and family who are dead. Lanett Proctor, as the last gang leader in the 14 year chain of events, is one fuming young lady and Monique Page, as Prix’s mother, shows the pain that life has brought her. Theodore M. Snead is the one male figure visible in the play, a ghostly apparition for most of his time on stage, but ultimately a most incensed presence with gnashing teeth and grinding hips to explain his part in Prix’s unhappy life.

Studio's Stage 4 is turned into an urban school yard with chain link fences between the audience and the set to start. Then as if by magic, the chain link fences are moved time and time again to make prison cells, prison waiting rooms, a tenement roof top and a seedy room. All is set to scene-changing hip hop music and the sounds of police sirens. The lighting is as sullen as Prix, except for the few bursts of light and cold warmth from the distant fireworks.

Written by Kia Corthron. Directed by Rahaleh Nassri. Fight Choreography by Joel David Santer. Design: Eric Van Wyk (set) Brandee Mathies (costumes) Harold F. Burgess (lights) Erik Trester (sound),  BettyAnn Leesberg-Lange (vocal coach). Cast: Shannon Dorsey, Nicki Gonzales, Tiffany Jillian Green, Tonya Upshur Hartwell,  Stefanee Martin, Monique Paige, Lanett Proctor, Natasha Rothwell, Theodore M. Sneed, Roxi Trapp Dukes Victorian, Ashley Ware, Abby Wood.

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Running time 2:00 - one intermission
t A Potomac Stages Pick for a spirited parody of a 1936 anti-marijuana propaganda film
Click here to buy the movie

Storyline: A lecturer traces the decline into degradation and decrepitude of a prototypically all-American teenage couple after a horrid pimp/pusher manages to get the high school baseball star to take just one drag off a demon reefer in the 1930s when Shirley Temple ruled the silver screen and the popular word for cannabis was spelled "marihuana" and not "marijuana."

Studney and Murphy's musical, obviously influenced by Little Shop of Horrors' success at musicalizing a less-than super movie, opened Off-Broadway in 2002 and Murphy was nominated for a Drama Desk Award for his lyrics. The score serves the gag well and has solos for most of the main characters that give them their moment in the spotlight. A movie version was released in 2005 with Alan Cumming in the role that Lawrence Redmond plays so very well here. We've included a link to purchase the movie version of the show rather than the disc. The off-broadway production of the show had a very brief run and wasn't recorded, but the Los Angeles production was a hit and a recording of that cast is available. Its price, however, seems so outlandish we didn't bother with a link - if you really want to pay $249 for the disc, contact us and we'll give you the reference.

Redmond is fabulously earnest as the lecturer who seems to genuinely believe each and every inflated claim about the danger of the evil weed he's heard from the head of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics or read in "the fine papers of William Hearst." Lauren Williams who has made a habit of chipper pertness in everything from Signature's A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum to Studio Secondstage's Dog Sees God gets to cross over to the evil side for a brief time and she seems to relish the ravishing. Andrew Sonntag matches her in the transition from clean cut to down and out. Bobby Smith is great fun at moments even if he seems to turn it on only when he has a big moment coming up. Channez McQuay, on the other hand, is simply superb throughout as the thug's moll. Ryan Murvin hits a few highs as a youth already well down the rode to destruction, and "The Youth of America," the young dancing/singing chorus of seven spice things up from time to time with the simple but effective steps devised by Matthew Gardiner, although they show signs of needing more rehearsal time to master the routines.

Giorgos Tsappas provides an extremely functional set with a few good gags of its own and Yvette M. Ryan's costumes are true to both the time of the period and the spirit of the show. Her angel costumes for Smith's winged chorus as he sings "Listen to Jesus, Jimmy" are a delight. Jason Cowperthwaite tries for lighting effects that seem a bit too complicated for the system and its operators. Who knows where Erik Trester came up with all the fabulous films projected on the center screen. A mixture of short subjects, trailers and newsreels from the time period of the story (including Shirley Temple and her dimples in the trailer for 1936's Captain January) entertains before the show begins. During intermission there is a truly amazing combination live action/cartoon, I'll Be Glad When You're Dead, You Rascal You, featuring Betty Boop and Louis Armstrong in a mind bogglingly racist short that would draw protest pickets today but was accepted entertainment in 1932. These could well have been projected on the screen without cropping the edges so severely. As it is, "Hop Along Cassidy" comes across as "op Along Cassid." Michael Todd serves up the poster messages called for in the script including the classic "Reefer Will Make You Giggle for No Good Reason." Even without a reefer, this show will give you good reason to giggle.

Music by Dan Studney. Lyrics by Kevin Murphy. Book by Kevin Murphy and Dan Studney loosely based on and satirizing the screenplay of Tell Your Children by Arthur Hoerl. Directed by Keith Alan Baker. Choreographed by Matthew Gardiner. Musical direction by Gabe Mangiante. Design: Giorgos Tsappas (set) Yvette Ryan (costumes) Jason Cowperthwaite (lights) Erik Trester (projections and sound) Michael Todd (video title designs) Miriam Yoder (stage manager). Cast: Kate Arnold, Mark Chandler, Zack Colonna, Emily Levey, Channez McQuay, Michael Mejia, Ryan Murvin, Lawrence Redmond, Marge Seibert, Andrew Sonntag, Bobby Smith, Joseph Thanner, Lauren Williams, Rachel Zempelli. Musicians: Brad Linde or James Guffey, Douglas Maiwurm, Gabe Mangiante, Robin Rhodes.

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Running time 2:00 - one intermission
A contemporary fantasy of alienation in
the workplace and family

Storyline: Genny's one day as a temp at a company that makes bombs goes from bad to worse, or is that to worst? "Last Day Girl" is supposed to see to her training but she sees to her tormenting instead. "Nepotism Guy" is supposed to supervise her but he's more concerned over making sure she doesn't break anything so he won't have to handle the paperwork of a requisition for a replacement pencil. Most off, "Dead Body Guy" puts the moves on her, takes her under his wing and then suffers the consequences.

After a fairly lengthy and somehow superfluous voice-over introduction, the day of a temporary worker gets underway with great energy. Dietz merges a facility for short, declarative observations with an imaginative use of space. A discussion of  black holes yields an elegant definition "where nothing meets infinity" which is illustrated with a zero and an infinity sign in a cleverly devised projection on Misha Kachman's imaginative set. Monologues are staged in elevator cars, the only place where workers may actually have a bit of privacy. Crises come over mundane elements of temporary work (how do you answer the phone when no one has told you the name of the company?). Deitz soon reveals that his heroine's insecurity goes way back to childhood when she learned to strangle chickens on her father's chicken ranch, and that her facility for causing death has blossomed - not a good thing for a person working for a company that makes bombs. The play has about one and a half concepts more than a single evening can effectively use, however, and confusion sets in quite early, leaving the audience enjoying the performances more than the material.

The performances are from a cast that brings a sharp intelligence to the project, highlight the strengths of their material and do their best to keep the weaknesses from doing too much damage. Mary Beth Fritzky is a marvelously inventive comic actress who can show the angst underneath an insecure surface (as witness her performances in 3/4 of a Mass for St. Vivian this summer at the Theater Alliance). She uses all of her skills here, getting every laugh that won't damage the flow of the story and giving thoughtful support to her colleagues for their comic moments as well. Those colleagues include Evan Casey, who is tremendously entertaining as the "Dead Body Guy" (his rolling head bit after a supposedly broken neck is great!) and Kevin Boggs, who returns the compliment by giving Fritzky solid comic support in her scenes with him as her father.

Kachman's set features Sallvador Dali-like touches like a wall of file drawers that goes on into infinity, cubicle partitions that are catawampus and tree limbs from Genny's memory emerging from the walls. It is matched by Debra Kim Sivigny's clever costumes including a bumpkin's plaid jacket festooned with chicken feathers  for Boggs and a grey dress and purple sweater that Genny wears which morphs from adult work clothes to an childhood outfit for a dream sequence. John Burkland's tight lighting design uses focused lights to create places such as the elevator car. This makes it important for the cast to hit their marks in order to be in the space of the scene. As the run continues, the cast will no doubt do a better job of hitting the marks. The sound design of William Burns includes a number of ambient sounds that work well, especially the elevator sounds, but the megaphone effect for the finale either malfunctioned on the night we saw the show or has an intentional unexplained intermittence.

Written by Dan Dietz. Directed by Christopher Gallu. Design: Misha Kachman (set) Debra Kim Sivigny (costumes) John Burkland (lights) William Burns (sound) Lacey Talero (stage manager). Cast: Kevin Boggs, Evan Casey, Misty Demory, Marybeth Fritzky, Cameron McNary.

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Storyline: In three free-standing but inter-connected monologues three women of different ages and position describe their lives in a world dominated by male drives - and the men in that world don't have any decent drives.

Mark O'Rowe is best known to Potomac Region audiences for Howie the Rookie, a two-monologue play which Dan Brick and Eric Messner brought to disturbing life for Solas Nua last winter at the Warehouse. As a master of morbid he's quite impressive, but with each play he seems to descend farther and farther into a world this reviewer would rather not visit. Others have chimed in with descriptions of the play and the playwright that match my reactions: "a dramatic poet of stomach-churning power" (Joyce McMillan, The Scotsman,") "Increasingly bizarre awfulness" (Thelma Good, Edinburgh Guide) but the best and most concise was the writer of the Washington Post's headline for Peter Marks' review: "Beautiful Words for an Ugly World." That says it.

Joy Zinoman directs Jennifer Mendenhall, Kimberly Schraf and Mari Howells, a trio of distinction who do marvelous work with the material. Howells is new to our region but sports impressive credentials from New York and international companies. Schraf just completed a stint right here at Studio Secondstage in Frozen, and Mendenhall Is well known for her work at Olney, Theater J and Woolly Mammoth. Indeed, Mendenhall is appearing in more appealing material right now at the Kennedy Center in Mark Russell's family-friendly musical Teddy Roosevelt and the Treasure of Ursa Major.

The entire piece is played out on a patch of floor between two ranks of audience seats on risers. As a result, half of the audience is watching the other half watch the ugliness which transpires. It emphasizes that, at least in O'Rowe's world, there's no place to hide.

Written by Mark O'Rowe. Directed by Joy Zinoman. Design: Luciana Stecconi (set) Brandee Mathies (costumes) Gil Thompson (lights and sound) Carol Pratt (photography) Elizabeth Zuses (stage manager). Cast: Mari Howells, Jennifer Mendenhall, Kimberly Schraf.

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Running time 1:40 - no intermission
t A Potomac Stages Pick for a clever unauthorized parody of everything Snoopy

Storyline: "CB" writes his pen pal on the day his dog had to be put to sleep. Seems the dog got rabies and ate the little yellow bird. Things aren't going too well at school, either. The boy who plays the piano (now known as "Beethoven" even though he plays Chopin on his keyboard) is having his life made miserable because he's assumed to be homosexual even though he says "I haven't had sex yet, so how would I know?" The boy who used to attract all the flies and dust in the neighborhood is now a macho clean-freak who is also a homophobe. The famous security blanket has been ground up and smoked by its owner who will sniff anything, and his sister has been institutionalized after setting the little red headed girl's hair on fire, although she still has a "The Doctor Is In" sign  when CB comes to visit.

You were expecting more syrupy sweet kids stuff? Not from Studio Secondstage! Artistic Director Keith Alan Baker selected this play after successful runs at the New York Fringe Festival in 2004 and Off Broadway in 2005-06. It had the potential to be a semi-sordid one-joke piece, but Royal's skill at plotting and Baker's skill at pacing combine to keep it fresh for most of the time. Then, too, the casting of a group of very personable performers helped a great deal.

That cast is headed by James Manno, a young man with charm and humor who gives CB a heart. Lauren Williams brings the energy and chipper pertness that made her such a perfect Philia in Signature's A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum to the role of his sister who is the sole member of the drama club. James Gardiner is both effective and affecting as the youngster driven to hiding out in the music room with his keyboard by the ostracism that so wounds adolescents. Robert Rector has the unenviable task of getting laughs in the role of a homophobic bully, and he does about as well as could be expected. The most fun, however, is Evan Casey as the pot-head we used to know as Linus.

The short show is presented in the large, unfinished space on the fourth floor above the Metheny Theatre in Studio's new facility. Giorgos Tsappas uses more floor space for the set than is taken up by the audience risers. Still, the episodic nature of the script (there are twenty scenes plus a prologue and an epilogue in just 100 minutes - about four and a half minutes a scene) and Baker's blocking keep the presentation from seeming to swing from extreme stage right to extreme stage left. The costumes by Yvette Ryan are colorful and take the originals so well known from cartoons and shows as the jumping off point for more contemporary designs. But, then, everything from script to performance to design takes the original "Peanuts" creation as a jumping off point, and that is the fun of the project.

Written by Bert V. Royal. Directed by Keith Alan Baker. Movement choreography by Matthew Gardiner. Fight choreography by Casey Kaleba. Design: Giorgos Tsappas (set) Yvette M. Ryan (costumes) Emily Lagerquist (lights) Erik Trester (sound) Scott Suchman (photography) David Dieudonne (stage manager). Cast: Regina Aquino, Evan Casey, Ryan Christie, Catherine Deadman, James Gardiner, James Manno, Robert Rector, Lauren Williams.

Reviewed April 21
Re-reviewed May 14
2:15 - one intermission
t A Potomac Stages pick for fabulous acting
Click here to buy the script

Storyline: Three characters interact in a series of monologues that evolve into dialogue scenes. There's the mother of a 10 year old girl kidnapped, raped and murdered twenty years ago. There's the serial killer who committed the crime. And there's the psychiatrist studying the phenomenon of serial killing. Each is forced to face aspects of their past that they had, at least thus far, been able to push under the level of their conscious minds.

The structure of Lavery's play allows the slow revelation of the details of each character's history. This works best for the mother (first Robinette, then Schraf for a while) and the killer (Long) because in one instance the mother's reluctance to face the horror is natural and the killer's inability to feel remorse or even understand the extent of his evildoing is at the essence of his nature. The details of the psychiatrist's troubles are less central, and thus, seem a bit theatrical when revealed, but her character is the connection between the other two.

The heart of the play - in more than one meaning of the term -- comes in the one scene between the victim's mother and the killer. As Robinette and Long played the scene, the mother's motivation and methods became apparent so slowly and subtly, and Long portrayed his character's reactions so naturally and compellingly, that it took a while to absorb just what you have seen. What you saw was tremendous acting - that's what! When Schraf took over the role, the persona of the mother changed but the level of skill and art didn't. Schraf's take on the key scene was a bit less purposeful but no less honest and heart rending. Early in the scene she seemed to cease breathing as this mother realized for the first time that she is actually in the presence of the man who committed such a heinous crime -- it is a moment that seemed to hang in the air forever.

Who knows why this is a Secondstage offering? Seconstage is studio's "developmental" company, which in their own words, provides "emerging theatre artists with the opportunity to share their talents." Some of the Secondstage productions have been in unconventional spaces challenging new designers. Others have introduced new faces on stage. Here it is three of the better known and reliable performers of the Potomac Region directed by a Helen Hayes Award nominee (for a Secondstage production, true - The Intelligent Design of Jenny Chow). All of the designers are well known in the region as well. This isn't so much a complaint as an observation - after all, who should complain that the tickets are $25 instead of $32 - $52? Perhaps the developmental aspect is the experience offered to the fourth member of the cast. There is a guard in the prison scenes. He has no lines, but he has gestures and cues. He isn't listed in the program and doesn't participate in the curtain call. Too bad, because he does his job well and doesn't distract from the superb work going on about him, so he deserves at least the pleasure of the sound of applause. (For the record, he is Shawn Helm.)

Written by Bryony Lavery. Directed by David Muse. Design: Milagros Ponce de Leon (set) Kathleen Geldard (costumes) John Burkland (lights) Ryan Rumery (sound) Lewis Shaw (fight coach) Carol Pratt (photography). Cast: Andrew Long,  Nancy Robinette (or Kimberly Schraf for a few weeks),  MaryBeth Wise.

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Reviewed January 15
Running Time 1:35 - no intermission
Seven brief but troubling conversations in cars

Storyline: Six playlets are set in the front seat of cars, most of which are speeding along a highway. Each takes advantage of the phenomenon that people are free to communicate without eye contact when the driver is supposed to keep both eyes on the road.  From a husband probing for details of his wife's infidelity to a wife looking for some possible explanation for her husband's abuse of their foster child, the "eyes front" demands of tooling along the autobahn are the mask behind which driver or passenger can hide while revealing more than could have been bared in a face-to-face confrontation.

From the old standby, breaking up is hard to do, to stronger interpersonal challenges like infidelity, abuse, sexual misconduct and the like, LaBute takes up topics you would expect of him and gives them the highly personal treatment that makes his material distinctive. The key feature is the way he manages to insert personality into dialogue with each character using his or her own vocabulary and dropping references to things in his or her own background. Those references never seem contrived or inserted just to give the audience background information. They flow naturally from the thought process of the speaker. Yet they do illuminate character and they give depth to even the shortest playlet. With six topics and 15 characters in one ninety-five minute performance, even a wrong note has precious little time to resonate, and there are very few of them.

Each of the members of the cast of ten is on stage for about a dozen minutes. This gives them the opportunity to polish their individual performances to a high luster, and many of them take advantage of it. Catch Jesse Terrill's reactions to Karen Novack's revelations in Road Trip, or James Konicek's hesitant attempts to probe for details from Vanessa Vaughn in Merge, to see the sheen that can be applied to wordless moments. Scott Kerns captures the insecurity of youth as he attempts to break up with Veronica Del Cerro in the opening Bench Seat and its hard to decide which is giving a brighter performance.

Director Erica Gould keeps things moving with a stage full of chairs which the cast assembles in twos and threes to represent car seats. There's a single steering wheel on a stand which is moved into position for each of the different playlets. Colin K. Bills' lighting design creates different pools of light to isolate the seats for each and Erik Trester provides the audio to complete the image.

Written by Neil LaBute. Directed by Erica Gould. Design: Colin K. Bills (set and lights) Kathleen Geldard (costumes) Erik Trester (sound) Carol Pratt (photography) Sara Allen Griffin (stage manager). Cast: Cecil E. Baldwin, Veronica del Cerro, Paloma Ellis, Scott Kerns, James Konicek, Karen Novack, Elizabeth Richards, Darius Suziedelis, Jesse Terrill, Vanessa Vaughn.

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Reviewed July 10
Running time 2:10 - one intermission
t A Potomac Stages Pick for enormously entertaining intellectual challenges

Storyline: A computer wiz suffers from compulsive obsessive disorder perhaps as a response to having been abandoned as a baby in her native China and adopted by a success addicted mother and her laid back husband. She wants to find her birth parents but her condition keeps her from leaving the safety of her home, so she builds an intelligent robot to travel around the globe on her behalf. The birth family doesn't exactly welcome the mechanical daughter-surrogate however.

As the computer wiz Jennifer Marcus, Eunice Wong makes her Potomac Region premiere in an outstanding performance that goes on from a slightly shrill beginning to capture the imagination and the hearts of the audience with humor and a touch of pathos. No such false start for James Flanagan as a neighborhood boy who delivers pizza to Jenny's home. From his first entrance he is the essence of the last gasp of innocence at the end of adolescence - a would-be Peter Pan who seems to draw his fairy dust from a bong.

Mia Whang is the robot named Jenny Chow, created by the computer wiz, and she does a splendid job of becoming more intelligent and knowledgeable with each experience - a vivid demonstration of artificial intelligence as her computer brain absorbs facts, impressions and lessons at an incredible rate. Charlotte Akin is appropriately hyper as the super-charged mom in America and understated in a refreshingly unmannered single-scene appearance as the Chinese birth-mother. David Rothman is touching as the father as well, but Cameron McNary has a bit of difficulty pulling off multiple supporting roles without seeming cartoonish.

Director David Muse may have selected an excessively shrill opening level, but he has his cast quickly settling into a very effective comedy romp mode. He also gets just a bit carried away a few times using the nifty set by Blythe Quinlan, violating the geography of the set when he has the computer wiz (who can't step outside her home) step through doors which appear to be exterior doors. Such distractions are exceptions and affect a very few minutes in these otherwise delightful two hours.

Written by Rolin Jones. Directed by David Muse. Design: Blythe Quinlan (set) Larry Baldine (scenic artist) Yvette M. Ryan (costumes) Esther Van Eek (properties) John Burkland (lights) Daniel Baker (sound) Matthew Suttor (composer). Cast: Charlotte Akin, James Flanagan, Cameron McNary, David Rothman, Mia Whang, Eunice Wong.

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Reviewed June 5
Running time 1:40 - no intermission
Six interconnected scenes about security in the modern age

Storyline: A man's flight is cancelled due to a bomb scare at the airport. He returns home to discover his wife tied up by her lover while at his office the relaxation room for stressed out employees is being used for suicide. These and other scenes add up to one seriously bad day for "the man."

As much as the events of September 11, 2001 weigh heavy on the minds of all American audiences, it is hard to believe that this up-to-the-minute, slightly absurdist view of modern paranoia was written before the attacks on the Pentagon and the Twin Towers. Still, it captures some of the contemporary dichotomy that marks our world at the moment. Its series of six scenes seems at first to be unconnected, sort of a selection of short plays. The connections between them develop slowly but inexorably, first as mere hints and finally as the cumulative reasons behind the emotional breakdown of the central character.

That central character is "The Man." James Konicek brings his distinctive voice and a facility for blending into practically any scene to the part. He is at his best when playing the "everyman" of the central character, but he is called upon as well to play a colonel in a scene in a military locker room which descends into cheap effects when he must deliver "Happy Birthday, Mr. President" in the style of Marilyn Monroe. There are fine supporting performances by Marcia Churchill, Rosemary Regan and Morgan Peter Brown as well.

The show starts at the unusually late hour of 8:30 including the Sunday evening performances which had earlier been announced as starting an hour earlier. The performance space is Secondstage's new space called "Stage 4" at Studio. It is up on the fourth floor with windows opening into Studio's new atrium and out to the street. Thus, in order to be dark enough for the lighting effects of the show to work, the show needs the late start. The primary effect is a set of red lights which, accompanied by alarm sirens, separate each of the scenes. The set consists of sliding glass partitions and some wheeled industrial steel structures serving as a bed, a table or even a teeter totter. The atmosphere of the hard edge, contemporary urban environment is enhanced by a soundscape that makes each of the locales feel unique.

Written by The Presnyakov Brothers. Translated by Shasha Dugdale. Directed by Keith Alan Baker. Co-directed by Amy Chouchoud. Violence choreography by Scott Kerns. Design: Giorgos Tsappas (set) Kathleen Geldard (costumes) Meaghan Toohey (properties) Colin K. Bills (lights) Erik Trester (sound) Peter Seckler and Hey Kid Nice Robot (music) Tim Aldrich (stage manager). Cast: Kevin Boggs, Morgan Peter Brown, Marcia Churchill, Catherine Deadman, John Geoffrion, James Konicek, Becky Peters, Rosemary Regan, Tony Simione.

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Reviewed January 26
Running time 3:00 - two intermissions

Storyline: The career of Russian director Vsevolod Meyerhold from his initial break with that other notable Russian director Konstantin Stanislavski through to his falling out of favor in Stalin's Soviet Union and his execution from crimes against the revolution is told in a style suggestive of his own, then-revolutionary theories of performance art.

It may take you a while to get used to the rapid fire pace of the speech patterns of this cast as director Rick Simas simulates the techniques Meyerhold himself advanced in the first quarter of the twentieth century which were in many ways the opposite of the naturalistic school of his early colleague and then rival, Konstantin Stanislavsky. Meyerhold preferred a more mannered performance technique utilizing what he called Bio-Mechanics to communicate emotion, intention and action.  While Simas wisely avoids overdoing the techniques which would be too distracting to a modern audience unused to the grotesqueries of the technique's wilder aspects, he gives us a feel for just how Meyerhold differed from either Stanislavsky or the then-reigning traditional classical performance practices.

In another nod toward Meyerhold's style, the entire performance is played out on a multi-level wooden structure of steps and platforms over, around and through which the cast scampers from scene to scene. Meyerhold preferred multi-level abstract sets, thinking that they allowed quick adjustment from one location to another without distracting the audience with either representational or realistic set decoration or too many props. Just as he tried to keep the focus on the action, so director Simas centers the audience's attention on the quickly unfolding plot and the relationships between the key characters.

Many of those characters are brought to life for brief moments as the cast of twelve play thirty-five named characters plus multiple members of ensemble scenes. Joel Reuben Ganz has to cover the role of Lee Strasberg as an "other duties as assigned" moment even though he spends the bulk of the evening as the main character, Meyerhold himself. A string of fine characterizations come from Richard Henrich (Stanislavski), Becky Peters (Stella Adler), Cecil E. Baldwin (Checkhov), John Townson (Clifford Odets) and others including Scott Kerns as a a fabulously insecure Shostakovich.

Written by Mark Jackson. Directed by Rick Simas. Movement and choreography by Beth Wilmurt. Design: Robyn Shrater Seemann (costumes) Katherine Osborne (properties) Erik Trester (projections) Colin K. Bills (lights) Jake Rodriguez (sound) Scott Suchman (photography) Kristen Bishel (stage manager). Cast: Cecil E. Baldwin, Anne Coventry, Katya Falikova, Joel Reuben Ganz, Andrew Greenleaf, Richard Henrich, Scott Kerns, Peter Klaus, Jason Lott, Becky Peters, Gregory Stuart, Jon Townson.

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Reviewed July 21
Running time 1:40 - one intermission
Performed in Studio's Milton Theater
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Storyline: Using all the material from the two-record album (back when albums were on phonograph records), the stage version tells the story of a boy put into a trauma-induced stupor by witnessing the cruelty of adults and then brought out of that mental isolation by the stimulation of the bells, lights, flashes and whistles of a pinball game.

The Who released their rock opera recording in 1969. Its combination of driving rhythms, distinctive guitar work, a few plaintive lyrics and a simple but touching story captured the attention of a generation of young people, who, a quarter of a century later, were thought to be ready for a Broadway mounting of the piece. Partially on the strength of the original work and even more importantly on the strength of the direction of Des McAnuff, who worked with The Who's Pete Townshend to expand the story to an evening's length, the show was a hit - running for over two years and spawning a number of tours and local productions. The hit "See Me, Feel Me" was the thread holding together the story and "Pinball Wizard" proved a satisfying conclusion for Act I, while "Listening to You (I Get the Music)" becomes an anthem for the finale of Act II.

The Tommy of this Tommy is Yuval Samburski who moves about the stage in a fairly mechanical manner even when his character is out of his trance, and whose voice never rises to the demands of the rock material for bursts of emotion and volume to dominate the chorus. With Samburski's role requiring his presence on stage practically the entire time of the of the short show (it runs about twenty minutes shorter than the recent revival tour), Samburski's lack of energy seems to affect the entire project. Only Jeffery Peterson seems to make the music rock, and he gets too little stage time as Cousin Kevin to really make a difference. Maddy Wyatt and Larry Baldine as Tommy's parents seem to be in a more conventional modern musical (Blood Brothers perhaps?) than one based on a rock classic.

None of this is helped by a sound system that, either by design or by execution, disrupts the evening time and time again with microphones turned on late (or not at all), choruses amplified at a higher level than the soloists they are supposed to support and a strange dominance of the bass line that hides some of the higher frequency guitar work. It is never an easy thing to handle a fully miked musical on a thrust stage in a small house - after all, the singers are sometimes downstage in the midst of the audience and at others upstage by the band, and the side to side distribution is very different for the audience members on the different sides of the playing space. Here, with all the principals wearing small microphone buds taped in place but the chorus sporting various boom mikes, the sound system is constantly drawing attention away from the music itself.

Music and lyrics by Pete Townshend. Book by Pete Townshend and Des McAnuff. Additional music and lyrics by John Entwistle and Keith Moon. Directed by Keith Alan Baker. Music Direction by Daniel Sticco. Choreography by Jeanne Feeney. Design: Girgos Tsappas (set)  Franklin Labovitz (costumes) Jessica Noble (properties) Colin Bills (lights) Bridget O'Connor (sound) Scott Suchman (photography) Lyndsay Stares (stage manager). Cast: Larry Baldine, Justin Benoit, Nazia Chaudhry, Sara Jo Elice, Michael Fizdale, Christopher Gallu, John D. Guzman, Rosanne Medina, Phillip Olarte, Jeffery L. Peterson, Maya Lynne Robinson, Yuval Samburski, Karissa Swanigan, Maddy Wyatt. Musicians: Yehoshua Fruchter, Shawn Galvin, Austin Gaughlin, Ken Hall, Daniel Sticco.

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Reviewed January 11
Running time 1 hour 40 minutes
Mature themes
Playing in Studio's Milton theater

Storyline: On the Fourth of July a sixteen year old boy meets up with a middle aged man for a date they arranged on an internet chat room for gays. They go for a ride, to a movie and then to bed. Simultaneously, a sixteen year old girl sneaks out of the house while her sick mother is in bed so she can meet up with a boy who takes a break from his drug running to take her to watch the fireworks and then to his bed. How many of them were virgins as the night began is left open to interpretation.

Even though the encounters are dramatic enough to be life-changing or at least life-defining moments for each of the characters, there is no sense that any one of them is different at the end of the evening than at the beginning. This may, of course, be the author’s point. These are thin slices of these lives placed on a specimen slide and held under a microscope for examination. They don’t learn anything from the events but one supposes that the audience is supposed to come away with an improved appreciation of what some people will go through to have a bit of human contact. It is a lesson pleasantly delivered but not driven home with much force.

Studio’s Secondstage gives this word play a classy production with style and grace. Gregg Mitchell’s set is a number of platforms on a platform with chain link background in front of a cyclorama that glows with Colin K. Bills’ lighting effects leading up to the fireworks display that ties the stories together. Director Kate Davis keeps the events moving about the stage by having the cast members move chairs around - four chairs, naturally.

The four actors give four distinct voices to the delivery of the diverse dialogue that marks the piece. David Lamont Wilson captures the touch of superiority in the voice of the middle aged chicken hawk designed to cover either guilt or fear of exposure while Scott Kerns uses an endearing hesitation to communicate the teenager’s shyness and the depth of his yearning. Maya Lynne Robinson tosses off the young girl’s sharply intelligent lines with aplomb while Cesar A. Guadamuz is just right at some of the drug dealer’s grasping for the right word.

Written by Christopher Shinn. Directed by Kate Davis. Design: Greg Mitchell (set) LeVonne Lindsay (costumes) Jennifer Moss (properties) Colin K. Bills (lights) Kevin Hill (sound) Scott Suchman (photography) Cassandra Domser (stage manager). Cast: Cesar A. Guadamuz, Scott Kerns, Maya Lynne Robinson, David Lamont Wilson. 

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Reviewed July 20
Running time 2 hours 5 minutes

Storyline: In a series of short vignettes, each of ten street kids tell their own stories and deal with each other’s presence and roles in their lives. Each has a story or situation vaguely resembling the mythology of ancient Greece and, while they use their modern names in the text, it isn’t difficult to guess which is Narcissus kneeling before a water trough to see his image or which is Dionysus bragging of his rank as a god. Not all characters carry mythological names, however. A boy who flies too high on drugs is called Skinhead Boy, not Icarus.

Studio Secondstage is working from a script by Naomi Iizuka that was developed as a commission from En Garde Arts in New York and first produced at the Humana Festival of New American Plays in Louisville. Her text is sometimes pretentious and always profane, echoing the language of the streets. Iizuka took as her inspiration the photo essay of street life in the big city by Jim Goldberg titled “Raised by Wolves.” Carrying the conceit of kids viewed through the myth of Romulus who was suckled by a she-wolf and grew to found Rome, she casts the story in mythological terms but draws on the real life experiences of street kids she interviewed for the project. It is an intriguing concept but one that leaves the individual characters devoid of that essential ingredient for satisfying theater -- character development.

There are a number of fine performances including those of Cesar A. Guadamuz as the Narcissus character so enraptured by his own appearance, Scott Kerns as the Skinhead Boy who rips off Dionysus for multiple highs and Elizabeth H. Richards as both Persephone and Semele. Mayo Best III served well as a narrator in the character of Dionysus. It is clear that director Baker has used the rehearsal period to have his talented cast of ten explore their roles and develop what actors usually call the “backstory” of their characters. Yes, the performers know who these kids are. But the audience doesn’t get the benefit of that exploration. Iizuka’s script has some of the characters tell the audience some of their stories, but theater is better when the audience discovers character through action than when it is delivered in a speech.

Giorgos Tsappas has designed a distinctive set for the evening which makes the presentation impressive. But it is spick and span clean, further distancing the play from the realities of street kids living in squalor. Costume designer Brandee Mathies, on the other hand, captures that world well in the costumes. Jesse Terrill composed an atmospheric score of incidental music and material for cast members to sing and play on a muted trumpet. It adds to the theatricality of this distinctively staged production of a somewhat disappointing script.

Written by Naomi Iizuka. Directed by Keith Alan Baker. Co-directed by Christopher Gallu. Music composed by Jesse Terrill. Design: Giorgos Tsappas (set) Brandee Mathies (costumes) Jennifer Moss (properties) Peter N. Joyce (lights) Jeff Poretsky (sound and video) Scott Suchman (photography) Susie Pamudji (stage manager). Cast: Regina Aquino, Mayo Best III, Veronica del Cerro, Catherine Deadman, Anthony Gallagher, Cesar A. Guadamuz, Scott Kerns, Jason McCool, Salma Qarnain, Elizabeth H Richards.

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Reviewed November 17, 2002
Running time 2 hours 40 minutes
Price $30

Story and book by Keythe Farley and Brian Flemming. Music and lyrics by Laurence O’Keefe. Directed by Mike Chamberlin. Choreography by Michael J. Bobbitt. Music direction by Daniel Sticco. Design: John Raley (set) Michele Reisch (costumes) Eleanor Gomberg (properties) Colin Bills (lights) Jeff Poretsky (sound). Cast: Patrick O’Neill, Buzz Mauro, Lauri Kraft, Tara Giordano, Mark Bush, Terry Crummitt, Kate Debelack, Carlos Offutt, Doug Sanford, Meghan Touey.

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Reviewed July 21
Running time 2 hours
Price $20

Written by Adam Rapp. Directed by Keith Alan Baker. Design: Giorgos Tsappas (set) Edu. Bernardino (costume) Tim Riodan (properties) Peter N. Joyce (lights) Evan Bliss (sound). Cast Scott Fortier, Timothy Rice, Brianna Gwen Parsonnet, Andrea Hatfield, Kelly Ewing.

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Reviewed May 23
Running time 2 hours 25 minutes

Written by Kenneth Lonergan. Directed by Serge Seiden. Design: Giorgos Tsappas (set) Brandee Mathies (costumes) Diane Graves (properties) Peter Joyce (lights) Jeff Poretsky (sound). Cast: Karl Miller, Jon Bernthal, Amy Montminy.