After fourteen years at University Mall (plus a couple months at University Place), Chapel Hill’s Deep Dish Theater Company is moving on – but they’re going out with a bang.
Beginning on Friday, October 2, Deep Dish will be presenting two plays in repertory, for the first time ever: the classic Russian drama (comedy? tragic farce?) “The Cherry Orchard” by Anton Chekhov, and one of the hottest new plays of the last few years, John Patrick Shanley’s comedy “Outside Mullingar.” (The two plays will share a set – fittingly, as both works deal heavily with our ties to the land.)
“Cherry Orchard” will open on October 2, with “Mullingar” opening on October 9. Each play will run for two or three nights at a time – and there will be two days (Saturday, October 24 and Saturday, November 7) where Deep Dish will stage both plays. The shows will close on Saturday, November 14.
Deep Dish artistic director Paul Frellick (who’s also directing “The Cherry Orchard”) joined Aaron Keck on WCHL Wednesday, along with actors Dorothy Recasner Brown (of “Cherry Orchard”) and Tom Marriott (of “Outside Mullingar”).
For more information on the schedule, tickets, and special events, visit this page on DeepDishTheater.org.
As for the future of Deep Dish after it leaves the mall in December: Frellick says plans are still in the works and he expects to have more concrete information once “Cherry Orchard” and “Mullingar” wrap up their runs.
http://chapelboro.com/news/arts/deep-dish-wraps-up-u-mall-run-with-double-billChapel Hill’s 2014-15 theater season comes to an end this week as PlayMakers Repertory Company and Deep Dish Theater Company open their last shows.
At Deep Dish in University Mall, the last show of 2014-15 is “The Liar,” a classic French farce by Pierre Corneille translaptated by David Ives. (“Translaptated”? Master-of-wordplay Ives uses that word to describe his process – halfway between “translation” and “adaptation.”) Directed by Deep Dish artistic director Paul Frellick, “Liar” is about a French nobleman who’s a pathological liar, his pathologically honest servant, and the trouble they inevitably land themselves into. Deep Dish theatergoers will be familiar with Ives’ work: he’s the author (or translaptator) of two other plays previously staged by Deep Dish, “Polish Joke” and “Is He Dead?”.
Paul Frellick and actress Maryanne Henderson discuss “The Liar” with WCHL’s Aaron Keck.
For Deep Dish, “The Liar” marks not just the end of the season, but also the beginning of a transition: the theater company has been located at University Mall since its creation, but with changes ongoing at the mall, Frellick and the rest of the company are planning a move sometime around the end of 2015 (to a still-undetermined location). Frellick says the company will begin its 2015-16 season at its usual spot, though.
Meanwhile at PlayMakers Repertory Company, visiting director Cody Nickell brings “Mary’s Wedding” to the stage as part of the theater’s PRC2 series. “Mary’s Wedding” is an intimate play (two actors, three characters) by Stephen Massicotte – a “dream play” about young love in the midst of World War I. (This run of “Wedding” is part of UNC’s year-long commemoration of the 100th anniversary of WWI.) Nickell, a Chapel Hill native, has a close connection to the material: he played the male character Charlie in San Jose more than a decade ago, and he says the production brought him closer to his father – who flew from North Carolina all the way to San Jose, not once but twice, just to see it.
Cody Nickell spoke with Aaron Keck about “Mary’s Wedding.”
“The Liar” runs at Deep Dish from May 1-23; “Mary’s Wedding” runs at PlayMakers’ Kenan Theater from April 29-May 3.
Click here for tickets and other information about “The Liar.”
Click here for tickets and other information about “Mary’s Wedding.”
Pictured: Carey Cox. Photo by Andrea Akin.
There are many kinds of heroes. There are the ones who make the news, who emerge in a crisis and do something extraordinary; there are the ones who stand up and cry out against injustice, even at the risk of their livelihoods and lives…and then there are the quiet heroes, the ones who go about their business, the ones you never really see. They face their adversities, sometimes with courage, sometimes with resignation, sometimes with anguish and bitterness and rage – but they face them, always, and the world turns on, just a little easier, just a little better.
I’m thinking about heroes this week. On Sunday WCHL hosted our big annual luncheon for all the folks we’ve recognized as Hometown Heroes throughout the year; outgoing fire chief Dan Jones delivered a terrific speech about the heroism he sees every day and the value of “paying it forward.” We recognize all kinds of heroes – sometimes the special ones who come through in a crisis, but more often than not the everyday heroes, the quiet heroes, the firefighters and police officers and community builders and teachers and volunteers.
Down in Alabama, it’s not so quiet. It’s the 50th anniversary of the Selma marches, and there are thousands of people there now – including many from our own community – remembering the stand those marchers took in 1965, the risks they assumed, the sacrifices they made, the lives they gave, calling for justice even as the blows rained down around them. Heroism.
So it’s fitting that both of our local theater companies, PlayMakers at UNC and Deep Dish at University Mall, are running plays about heroism this month: the World War I classic “Journey’s End” at Deep Dish and the Henrik Ibsen/Arthur Miller collab “An Enemy of the People” at PlayMakers. Both shows are essential: challenging, troubling, disturbing, and difficult, but essential nonetheless. Check them out.
“Enemy of the People” is about a loud hero, albeit one who maybe didn’t intend to be. Thomas Stockmann (Broadway vet Michael Bryan French) is the official physician of a small town whose economy hinges on a single tourist attraction – a public health spa with water from a local spring. But the water is contaminated, Stockmann discovers, with germs from a tannery upstream. The town must know! But the mayor (fellow Broadway vet Anthony Newfield) cares more about the economy – the local muckraking newspaperman (Benjamin Curns) is a sellout – the business leader (Jeffrey Blair Cornell) refuses to upset the established order – and the nameless rabble of townsfolk are easily convinced that Stockmann’s just a malicious agitator. He’ll stand alone – the sole voice for justice and truth in a vicious and misguided world. Henrik Ibsen wrote the play as a critique of mob rule in a democracy; Arthur Miller adapted it into English as an allegory of those heroes who stood up to Joe McCarthy in the 1940s and 50s. (And its cultural reach extends even further: the struggle between the corrupt mayor and the sole-voice-of-reason scientist reminded me of “Jaws,” and indeed “Jaws” was reportedly inspired by this play.)
Anthony Newfield as Peter Stockmann and Michael Bryan French as Thomas Stockmann in “Enemy of the People.” (Photo by Jon Gardiner via PlayMakersRep.org.)
Meanwhile across town, “Journey’s End” takes us to the trenches of World War I, where six British officers are barracked just before a major German assault. Osborne (Eric Carl) is the “uncle” of the group, who keeps the rest sane – especially Stanhope (Gus Allen), a brilliant officer who’s having trouble keeping it together. Osborne and Stanhope are quiet heroes, caring for others before themselves, doing their best to soldier through, put on brave faces, and not let on that they too are afraid, anxious, bitter. In contrast to Stockmann of “Enemy,” who stands alone, Osborne and Stanhope and their fellow officers stand together – knowing that if one falters, the rest will fall. (Like “Enemy,” “Journey’s End” is historically significant: along with “All Quiet on the Western Front,” it’s one of the first pieces of literature to depict war realistically, without all the glorious/patriotic overtones you so often see. Playwright R.C. Sherriff was himself a WWI vet; he said he simply wanted to show the war as it was.)
Eric Carl as Osborne and Gus Allen as Stanhope in “Journey’s End.” Photo via DeepDishTheater.org.
You’ll want to see both before their runs are up. At Deep Dish, scenic designer Michael Allen has created a stunning recreation of a WWI barracks; you can smell the wood as you enter the theater. Carl’s stellar performance as the kindly Osborne holds the show together, bolstered by terrific supporting turns from Carl Martin as the unflappable Trotter and David Hudson (also great in DD’s “Life Is A Dream”) as Mason the cook. At PlayMakers, director Tom Quaintance makes full use of the versatile stage (the dark ending is particularly spectacular) and French and Newfield anchor the show as the main antagonists. (Did I mention their characters are also brothers?)
But it’s the celebration of heroism that stands out. It’s easier to cheer for Stockmann, the loud hero of “Enemy” who stands up to injustice – on opening night, the woman sitting next to me kept nodding her head and saying “Yes!” when the character was delivering his choicest lines. He’s a whistleblower, a crusader for truth, and we all like unfairly maligned whistleblowers and crusaders for truth. Then again, Stockmann is also a deeply flawed character in a way that “Journey’s” heroes are not: he’s prideful, stubborn, a blowhard, a hard-head, willing to throw his family into the line of fire even when offered an easy way to withdraw quietly and let the truth come out on its own. We sympathize with him, we might pity him, but we probably don’t like him. The heroes of “Journey” are more pristine: Osborne is fiercely other-regarding and quietly self-sacrificing; Stanhope is less sympathetic – given to drinking and angry outbursts – but we know it’s only the strain of war that’s made him that way. They’re not the sort of rah-rah heroes you stand up and shout for, like Stockmann is – but their quiet bravery is every bit as heroic as Stockmann’s brash stand. Maybe more so.
In the end, though, it’s not the fictional heroes on stage that matter so much as the real ones in the audience. “Journey” and “Enemy” both hold up a mirror to us as spectators and force us to examine ourselves: how heroic are we? In “Journey’s End” we see all kinds of soldiers, from the gung-ho and brave to the cowardly. (“Coward” here is a relative term: all the soldiers are terrified of war; it’s merely a question of how they handle it.) Where on the spectrum would we fall? In “Enemy” the mirror rises in an even more dramatic way: partway through the second act, the actors very purposefully look the audience in the eyes and give them the chance to speak out against the injustices they’re seeing on stage. (You’ll know what I’m talking about. It’s a palpable moment.) In that moment, the fate of the characters is in our hands: we could stand up, we could raise our fists, we could shout. It would alter the rest of the show, of course, but we could do it! But of course we don’t. We’re angered by the injustice, but we don’t speak. We’re just the audience. We’re there to observe. It’s not our place. It would upset the order of things. And we’d never upset the order of things. It’s a nice, respectable theater, after all. This isn’t Rocky Horror…
And so the moment passes, and the injustice proceeds.
And when the lights go up we stand and give a rousing, rah-rah ovation to the cast.
“Journey’s End” runs at Deep Dish from now through March 21; visit DeepDishTheater.org for showtimes and ticket info. “Enemy of the People” runs at PlayMakers through March 15; visit PlayMakersRep.org for showtimes and ticket info.
http://chapelboro.com/lifestyle/arts-entertainment/heroism-quiet-and-loud-at-deep-dish-and-playmakersAs I wrote last week, Chapel Hill’s 2014-15 theater season is already turning into something really special. Between “A Kid Like Jake” at Deep Dish and “Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike” at Playmakers, plus Roger Guenveur Smith’s one-man “Rodney King” and the launch of a year-long commemoration of World War I at both UNC and the ArtsCenter, it’s been a pretty good time to be a local theater buff.
But while those shows have been terrific, they were just the prologue. Deep Dish just opened “The Landing” – a new play from “Chicago” composer John Kander, running now through November 22 – and while opinions on it have been divided, I’m in the camp that believes it’s the best show of the season so far. (Bonus: Deep Dish’s production is the first time this play has been seen outside New York.)
What is “The Landing”? It’s hard to describe. (Check out the program: director Paul Frellick and dramaturg Jenni Rajewski are both given an entire page each to write about the play, and neither one even tries to describe it.) I could start by calling it a musical, but even that’s not really true: yes, there’s an orchestra, and yes, the actors sing, but there are only a couple full-blown songs. And is it one musical, or three? The play is divided into three parts, “Andra,” “The Brick,” and “The Landing” (which gives the show its title), and each part is essentially a separate one-act play – with different settings, different characters, and no obvious connection between them except for the fact that the same four actors appear in each. It feels like a night of one-acts, or something akin to “10 By 10 In The Triangle,” rather than a single production.
But there are themes, motifs, feelings, little threads that weave between the three acts and tie them together in subtle ways. Playwright Greg Pierce drew inspiration from “The Twilight Zone”: each act, each play, presents us with a family that by all outward appearances is happy and normal – but something, something, is amiss. Sometimes (as in “Andra”) that something is a common everyday thing; sometimes (as in “The Brick”) it’s a little more supernatural – but in all three, somewhere, there’s a jagged, uncanny element that threatens or undermines the whole foundation. “The Landing” is a series of plays about people who are a little bit lonely, or a little bit unfulfilled, who finally find that one thing, that missing piece, that makes them whole – only to learn there’s something juuust a little bit off at the core.
John Allore and Neil Bullard in “Andra,” the first act of “The Landing.”
Which sounds very maudlin, doesn’t it? But no. It’s a serious theme, but there are a bunch of different ways to present it, and that’s where “The Landing”’s triptych approach really works. “Andra” – about a lonely boy striking up a friendship with the handyman who’s painting his kitchen – is a sweet little piece with a quiet payoff. “The Landing” – the last act of the night, about a gay couple who adopt a teenage boy – has a more powerful dramatic punch. And in between, you have “The Brick,” which is about – actually, you know what, I’m not even going to tell you what “The Brick” is about. Let’s just say it’s a comic riff on 1940s noir and leave it at that. The point is that it’s funny. Same overarching themes, loneliness, unfulfillment, happiness not quite attained and all that – but it’s fun. (I couldn’t stop grinning all the way through it.)
So let’s talk about the production. Shout-out first to set designer Thomas Mauney, who had to design a set versatile enough to fit three different settings while simultaneously accommodating a four-piece orchestra, all on a rather small stage. He makes it work: the set looks crowded when you first walk in, but it’s perfect for the show itself. Shout-out second to musical director Glenn Mehrbach, who had to figure out a way to keep the music from overpowering the singers – which is hard enough to do at DPAC, let alone a tiny space like Deep Dish. I’d never seen a musical actually work in a small theater, but dang if Mehrbach and his orchestra don’t pull it off. The music’s terrific.
The four actors, John Allore, Mark Ridenour, Erin Tito, and 14-year-old Neil Bullard, also have a difficult task, playing three very different characters in the course of a single show. Each of them gets a chance to shine. Allore is the star: quietly heartbreaking as the handyman in “Andra,” broadly comic in multiple roles in “The Brick.” Bullard’s singing voice isn’t as strong as the other three actors, but he holds his own in three pivotal roles. And Ridenour and Tito are solid throughout – Ridenour in “The Landing” especially – but they’ll really blow you away in “The Brick.” (Their duet on the song “White Water” is the highlight of the show: it’s a noir-y, gangster-y song, and if you’d forgotten the music was composed by the same guy who wrote “Cabaret” and “All That Jazz” and “Mr. Cellophane” and “Cell Block Tango,” well, here’s your reminder.)
So how to conclude? I will say this: “The Landing” is a polarizing show. I loved it, unreservedly – it’s one of the two best plays I’ve ever seen at Deep Dish – but it’s not for everybody. You might really enjoy it, like I did, or you might just be confused as to what the heck is even going on. Different people have had different reactions. It is quirky, it is offbeat, it is weird – there’s a reason it opened on Halloween night – and if that’s not your thing, well, maybe this isn’t your thing. (And even if that is your thing, it’s still no guarantee. Several of my friends have seen it, and we’re all divided. But if nothing else, this play has generated more thoughtful discussion than anything else we’ve seen in a while. And one thing we do agree on: of the three acts, “The Brick” is the best. I was still humming “White Water” to myself two days later.)
But if you’re okay with something that’s just a little off-center, then see this play. “The Landing” absolutely crackles with life. It’s worth the challenge.
“The Landing” runs through November 22 at Deep Dish Theater Company, located in University Mall. Visit this link for ticket information, as well as a schedule of related events and discussions.
http://chapelboro.com/columns/aaron-keck/impressive-challenging-landing-deep-dishIt’s already been a strong theater season in Chapel Hill – and it gets even stronger this weekend, as an innovative new musical makes its Southeastern debut at Deep Dish and two stage classics open at Playmakers.
At Deep Dish Theater Company, Halloween is opening night for “The Landing,” a new musical – or trio of musicals, to be precise – from John Kander, the composer of “Chicago” and “Cabaret.” Kander and playwright Greg Pierce have created three mini-musicals, each with a four-person cast (the same four actors appear in all three) and a bit of a Twilight Zone flair. Deep Dish Artistic Director Paul Frellick directs the musical, which stars John Allore, Mark Ridenour, Erin Tito, and Neil Bullard (who’s only 13). Frellick says he’s particularly excited about this show, because Deep Dish’s production is the first time “The Landing” has been staged anywhere in the world outside New York.
Paul Frellick and Neil Bullard joined WCHL’s Aaron Keck on the air last week to discuss “The Landing.”
Meanwhile, previews begin on Saturday for two shows at Playmakers Repertory Company: Shakespeare’s classic “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” and the acclaimed Sondheim musical “Into the Woods.” Playmakers is staging the two in rotating repertory: previews run throughout the week, then both shows officially open on Saturday, November 8, and run through December 6. In addition to the Playmakers team, the shows feature a number of guest performers and directors – including Lisa Brescia, who’s playing the Witch in “Into the Woods.” (Brescia has some experience playing musical witches: she’s also played Elphaba in “Wicked” on Broadway.)
“Midsummer” director Shana Cooper joined Aaron on the air this week…
…as did Playmakers associate artistic director Jeff Meanza, who’s playing the Baker in “Into the Woods.”
“The Landing” runs through November 22 at Deep Dish Theater Company, located in University Mall. Visit this link for ticket information, as well as a schedule of related events and discussions.
“Midsummer” and “Into the Woods” run in rotation through December 6 at Playmakers on UNC campus. Visit this link for tickets to “Into the Woods,” or this link for tickets to “Midsummer.”
http://chapelboro.com/news/arts/strong-chapel-hill-theater-season-continuesTheater season is in full swing in Chapel Hill – this weekend, PlayMakers Repertory Company opens its 2014-15 season with “Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike” – and as things kick into high gear, you still have one more chance to catch the season’s first big don’t-miss-it production, the terrific “A Kid Like Jake” at Deep Dish. It closes this weekend after a successful run, with shows in the University Mall theater on Thursday at 7:30 and Friday and Saturday at 8:00.
Making its first appearance here after a successful run in New York last year, “Jake” is the story of Alex (Meredith Sause) and Greg (Jim Moscater), two parents trying to place their four-year-old son Jake in an elite private preschool. It’s harder than it sounds: there are dozens of applicants for every open spot, and the schools are looking for any excuse to rule candidates out. They even subject the kids to high-stakes placement exams. (It’d be farcical if it weren’t true.) Alex and Greg seek advice from Judy (Rasool Jahan), the renowned expert who runs Jake’s current school, and she suggests they emphasize Jake’s most distinguishing characteristic – namely his “gender-variant play,” the fact that he likes playing with dolls and dressing up as Disney princesses. Alex balks: she doesn’t want to force him into a label prematurely. (Her own parents, it’s hinted, had done a similar thing to her when she was young, and she’s still a bit resentful.) But is Alex right to be worried – or is her fear just masking her own insecurities?
Before the show began its run, I spoke on the air with Meredith Sause and Deep Dish artistic director Paul Frellick.
I got to see “A Kid Like Jake” twice, once with some friends at a preview and again on opening night. “Intense” was the word I heard the most, from audiences on both nights. “Jake” takes a little time to develop – there are many different sources of conflict at play, and the early scenes are there primarily just to set them up – but then tensions quickly simmer, build, bubble over, and finally explode in a pair of breathtaking back-to-back scenes.
In the process, we get an insightful look at a couple in crisis – two generally decent people who are just trying to do right by their son, but who are also very human, and very flawed. The play’s best feature is its naturalism, the degree to which Alex and Greg and Judy all talk like real people. To the extent that that’s the case, the fact that Sause and Moscater and Jahan are all Trained Actors actually works against them at first – the actors are well-rehearsed, but the characters are clearly making it up as they go, and that creates a bit of a disconnect. Once the play begins building to its climax, though, the emotion takes over, the actors let loose, and it’s a roller coaster from there on out. You’ll remember the two confrontation scenes near the end, but they’re bookended by a pair of quieter but equally powerful moments: Alex having a panic attack in a doctor’s office (wonderfully played by Sause) and a dream sequence where – well, I won’t give anything away. (Both scenes feature Jess Jones, effective in a smaller role.)
Jim Moscater and Meredith Sause. Photo via DeepDishTheater.org.
Extremely well-written by first-time playwright Daniel Pearle, “A Kid Like Jake” raises and explores a lot of difficult issues without pretending there are any easy answers. Liberal as she claims to be, Alex is squeamish when it comes to violating gender and sexuality norms, and that squeamishness clouds her judgment: she’ll gladly indulge Jake’s Cinderella fix behind closed doors, but she gets uptight whenever it’s mentioned in public. But is she wrong to want to avoid fixing labels on kids before they’re ready? “There is such a thing as a phase,” she says; we doubt her motives, but is she incorrect? Is Greg’s judgment any more trustworthy, any less biased? Is Judy’s? It’s telling that Jake himself is never seen and never heard: the play doesn’t revolve around him so much as his parents’ perception of him; and the heart of the conflict is in the fact that neither Alex, nor Greg, nor Judy, nor we in the audience, will ever know how closely the perception matches the reality. All we can do is guess.
Writing those last two sentences reminds me of the German philosopher Immanuel Kant, who also wrote about that gap between perception and reality: we can never know what’s really there, he argued; we can only know what our senses tell us is there. Kant, as it happened, is also the philosopher who developed this succinct rule for how to act morally: “Act in such a way that you treat (others) never merely as a means to an end, but always at the same time as an end.”
“A Kid Like Jake” is about raising a child, it is about family, it is about gender, it is about education, it is about a lot of things – but above all this it is about people who try to reach that moral standard, without ever quite getting there. We’re all in the same boat.
“A Kid Like Jake” runs through Saturday at Deep Dish Theater in University Mall.
http://chapelboro.com/columns/aaron-keck/last-chance-kid-like-jake-deep-dishPhoto via DeepDishTheater.org.
The Deep Dish Theater Company opens its 2014-15 season this Friday with Daniel Pearle’s “A Kid Like Jake,” a moving story about parents seeking a better life for their son.
Directed by Deep Dish veteran Tony Lea, “Jake” stars Meredith Sause and Jim Moscater as Alexandra and Greg, two parents trying to get their four-year-old son into a prestigious kindergarten. Jake loves dressing up like Snow White and Cinderella, and Alexandra and Greg are being encouraged to play that up in their application – and that in turn leads them to question their own beliefs.
Meredith Sause and Deep Dish artistic director Paul Frellick joined WCHL’s Aaron Keck on the air this week.
“A Kid Like Jake” just concluded a highly-acclaimed run off Broadway. It opens on Friday at Deep Dish and runs through September 20.
Deep Dish Theater is located in University Mall. For details and ticket information, visit DeepDishTheater.org.
http://chapelboro.com/news/arts/direct-nyc-kid-like-jake-opens-deep-dishLast Thursday, at my friends’ insistence, I finally saw the movie “Thor.” It’s a big-budget action spectacle, with lots of lights and noise and CGI, but the basic premise is Shakespearean: cast out of his family by the machinations of his scheming half-brother, left broken and penniless in an alien land, our brash, headstrong hero prince (read: he’s a jerk) must regain his status as favored son and heir by proving his moral worth to his aged, tough-but-kindly father.
So you’ll understand why I was feeling a bit of déjà vu the following evening, sitting in Deep Dish Theater for their production of Pedro Calderón de la Barca’s “Life Is A Dream” – a classic Spanish play (often likened to Shakespeare) that follows pretty much exactly the same plot.
Eat your heart out, Joseph Campbell.
Written in 1635 during the Golden Age of Spanish literature, “Life Is A Dream” is the story of Segismundo, a prince who’s been imprisoned literally from birth by his father the king. Seems he was born under a dark cloud—the stars have decreed he’ll grow up to be a tyrant—and so for the good of the country, his father has kept him locked away, ignorant of his rightful status as heir to the throne. (Why the king doesn’t just kill him outright is never entirely explained.) But as the king grows old—and his other would-be heirs begin sparring over succession—he relents: okay, he says, we’ll take Segismundo out of his cell, reinstall him as prince, and see how he handles it. If he behaves, terrific. But if he acts like a tyrant—we’ll simply drug him, lock him back up, and tell him the whole adventure was all a dream.
Meanwhile, subplots abound: a woman named Rosaura disguises herself as a man (seriously, have I mentioned Shakespeare?) to infiltrate the kingdom and take revenge on the prince Astolfo, who’s stolen her honor; the king’s closest aide discovers her secret and realizes he’s duty-bound to her too; and meanwhile Astolfo schemes to marry his cousin, the princess Estrella, to lay claim to the throne, but he may or may not still be pining for Rosaura. It’s not easy to keep up with it all: the plot is about as complex as “Hamlet,” but while that narrative unfolds slowly over three-plus hours, Calderón crams all his plot points into an hour and 45 minutes. (“I have no idea what is going on,” I overheard one audience member say during intermission.)
But as with Shakespeare, the plot isn’t as important as the underlying philosophy. Are we free to chart the course of our own lives, or are we fated to turn out a certain way? How can we tell the difference between dream and reality? Is there a difference, really? Is life itself not just as temporary and fleeting and inscrutable as a dream? And what does that tell us about how to live our lives? The intrigues of kings and princes and spurned lovers abound—there’s even a swordfight!—but the real heart of “Life Is A Dream” is in its philosophical musings, and those are handled primarily by two characters: Segismundo himself, and Rosaura’s companion Clarin, a stereotypically wise fool reminiscent of the one in “King Lear.”
Alphonse Nicholson as Segismundo and Amber Wood as Rosaura, in “Life Is A Dream.” Photo by Jonathan Young via DeepDishTheater.org.
So that’s “Life Is A Dream.”
But more importantly: how good is it?
By the time I took my seat, I was already excited about the potential. In the few minutes before the house opened, as all the playgoers milled around in the lobby, we could hear passionate shouts and the clinking of blades on the other side of the wall—just one more last-minute rehearsal, I guess, but it sounded so cool. And the set design (by Lex van Blommestein) grabs your eye as soon as you walk in: angles and windows and disheveled shelves and an ethereal backdrop that evokes mountains, oceans—attractive and forbidding and foreboding, all at once.
But the play itself takes a long time to find its footing. I still remember a production of Craig Lucas’s “Reckless” I saw in college, in which the first act was so bad I almost left at intermission but the second act was some of the best theater I’d ever seen—and I got a similar vibe from “Life Is A Dream.” It wasn’t quite that extreme this time around—the first act had its good moments, the second act had its flaws—but the difference was definitely there. The first act feels like community theater, with all that that entails: nice costumes, fine production value, and performers going through the motions of acting without really finding the emotional connection to their characters. This is not really the actors’ fault, incidentally: “Life Is A Dream” is a fine play, but some of the characters’ motivations are simply baffling, especially early on. Why, for instance, does the king choose to imprison Segismundo for life instead of simply killing him? Having chosen to imprison him, why does he then choose to give him a classical education? Having done that, why does he then choose to free him, and why does he go about it in a way that’s all but guaranteed to elicit the worst possible reaction? John Boni’s performance as Basilio the king is actually quite good (notwithstanding his New York accent), but the character himself is impossible to believe. Same goes for Amber Wood as Rosaura, Anne-Caitlin Donohue as Estrella, and Peter Battis as Clotaldo the king’s aide—all of whom deliver fine performances despite having characters who make a number of brow-furrowing life decisions.
But the second act ultimately redeems the first, and it’s all thanks to the play’s two philosophers, the wronged prince Segismundo and the wise fool Clarin—the two richest and most sympathetic characters, and (as luck or fate would have it) in Deep Dish’s production the two best acted as well. As characters, Segismundo and Clarin actually don’t figure too much in the first act—but they dominate the second, as Segismundo gets swept up in the royal intrigue and Clarin is left alone with his thoughts. And what thoughts! As Clarin, David Hudson is simultaneously hilarious and insightful and touching and tragic; unburdened by all the mounting plot points, he’s free to deliver a memorable performance.
But it’s Alphonse Nicholson’s dazzling turn as Segismundo that truly makes “Life Is A Dream” worthwhile. Sticking with the Shakespeare theme, Segismundo’s journey is a bit like Ophelia’s in reverse: he starts the play half-mad, muttering wild things to himself while life goes on around him, and the plot turns on his gradually reconnecting with sanity and society. It’s a tough part to play, and Nicholson nails it. Intense, fierce, passionate and sympathetic, he commands the stage from the moment the spotlight first falls on him—and it’s his intensity, plus Hudson’s, that finally win over the audience in the end, though it takes a while to get there. During intermission, I overheard an audience member in my row cracking jokes about the play; by the end, I heard the same person gasping (with real emotion) during Segismundo’s final speech. I felt roughly the same way.
(It’s also worth noting, as a side point, that Nicholson is the only black actor in the cast—including Boni, who plays his father. This passes without comment in the play itself—and it’s obvious from the get-go that Nicholson was simply the best actor for the part—but casting a black actor in that role also adds an additional dimension to a story about a man who begins his life in bondage, is freed in a callous and capricious manner by a king who doesn’t particularly care whether he succeeds, is cast back into bondage and is forced to regain his freedom all over again. But the play is seventeenth-century Spanish, not twentieth-century American—so the audience is left to ruminate on that for itself.)
In the end, if “Life Is A Dream” doesn’t quite reach the heights of Deep Dish’s last production, the quietly stunning “Arcadia,” it’s still worthwhile (stick around, it’ll win you over) on the strength of Nicholson’s performance as Segismundo—who never quite reaches a conclusion on whether life really is a dream, but resolves to make the best of it nonetheless. How that’s to be defined is up to you.
“Life Is A Dream” runs through May 31 at Deep Dish Theater in University Mall.
http://chapelboro.com/columns/aaron-keck/life-dream-deep-dish-redemption-just-timeSitting in the Deep Dish Theater on Friday, waiting for the start of “Arcadia,” I overheard a woman in the row in front of me.
“I looked up ‘Arcadia’ on Wikipedia before we came,” she said to her companion. “And thank God I did, because I probably wouldn’t have a clue what was going on otherwise.”
So it goes with “Arcadia,” Tom Stoppard’s sweeping, breathtaking magnum opus about knowledge, science, history and fate, now playing at the Deep Dish through March 22. Expertly directed by Paul Frellick (DD’s artistic director) and beautifully acted by a cast of twelve, it’s an absolute must-see—but your brain better come ready to work overtime.
Here’s the Wikipedia entry on “Arcadia,” incidentally.
To understand “Arcadia,” start with Tom Stoppard. Born in Czechoslovakia in 1938, he fled the Nazis with his family and traveled to Singapore, Australia, India, and finally England—picking up a world of perspective and insight along the way. His plays—“The Real Inspector Hound,” “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead,” the screenplay for “Shakespeare In Love”—are ruminations on the human condition, the nature of art, the certainty/uncertainty of knowledge, and the thin line separating reality from theater. (Are those four things all one and the same?)
And “Arcadia” is his masterwork. Set in a single room in Sidley Park, an English aristocratic estate, the play jumps back and forth in time between the present day—where three scholars are trying to unravel a historical mystery tangentially involving the poet Lord Byron—and the early 1800s, where we see the events play out as they happened. (Byron himself never appears: turns out he’s not as important to the plot as the modern-day scholars think he is.)
What’s happening? Well, in 1809, we follow a teenage girl, Thomasina Coverly (Nicole Gabriel), and her tutor, Septimus Hodge (Ryan Brock). Thomasina is a genius: like any teenager, she’s curious about “carnal embrace,” but she’s also about to discover the second law of thermodynamics decades before its time. What is the second law of thermodynamics? Entropy, the inescapable process by which things irreversibly break down. What is done cannot be undone, and order necessarily decays into chaos (this is paralleled by Sidley Park’s garden, which—off-stage—is being remodeled from its Enlightenment-era neat geometry into a rough, naturalistic, Romantic-era wildness). Eventually the pair realize the ultimate implication of Thomasina’s discovery: all the stars will flicker out and the universe will settle into a lifeless equilibrium. “We’re doomed,” says Septimus.
Meanwhile, in the present day, two scholars, the hilariously pompous Bernard Nightingale (Eric Carl) and the no-nonsense Hannah Jarvis (Dorothy Recasner Brown), join forces—reluctantly, as they dislike each other—to investigate Sidley Park’s documents in order to determine whether Lord Byron killed a fellow poet in a duel. Red herrings lead them astray—Hannah, for instance, misinterprets a doodle of Thomasina’s, and Bernard wrongly assumes that Byron wrote an essay that we know was written by Septimus—but gradually, very gradually, the truth (or most of it) comes out.
Also, romantic entanglements abound. By the end of the play, Septimus has been involved or nearly involved with three different people (one of them never seen); Bernard, Hannah and Thomasina have each been involved or nearly involved with two. And there are nine other characters I haven’t even mentioned yet. There’s a lot going on here.
Eric Carl is Bernard Nightingale and Dorothy Recasner Brown is Hannah Jarvis. (Photo via DeepDishTheater.org.)
Deep Dish’s production of “Arcadia” is tremendous. The set is deceptively simple—a large table, a few chairs, three doors and some windows, that’s all, but you feel the presence of the house, the gardens, the estate, the swirl of life both on and off stage. The leading actors disappear into their characters—I loved Ryan Brock’s wry Septimus and Dorothy Recasner Brown’s Hannah, and Eric Carl steals the show as Bernard (Bernard delivering his paper in the second act is a tour de force)—but the rest of the cast shines as well: notable are David Godshall as the clueless poet Ezra Chater, Erika Edwards and Adam Sampieri as the brilliant modern-day siblings Chloe and Valentine, and Nicole Gabriel (a high-schooler!) as Thomasina. The relationships between these characters are very delicate—the earliest buds of a romance between Septimus and Thomasina, the love/hate romantic-professional partnership between Bernard and Hannah—and it’s all performed so smoothly that the difficulty doesn’t even register. “Arcadia” requires its actors to shift back and forth, often mid-scene, between virtually every imaginable stage of romance—while simultaneously ruminating on life, death, science, art, history, mathematics, landscape architecture, botany, poetry, and fate—and each of the twelve actors here is more than up to the task.
And then there’s the play itself. What are the themes? Start with the title. “Arcadia” is a reference to the Latin phrase “Et in Arcadia ego,” or “Even in paradise, there am I.” The “I” is death: looming over the play is not only Thomasina’s discovery about the eventual decay of the universe, but also our advance knowledge of Thomasina’s own death—coupled with the end of the Enlightenment, symbolized by the remodeled garden, plus the fact that all the events of 1809, so important to the characters then, will either be forgotten or misinterpreted by history, even when intelligent people are actively trying to piece them all together. (The recurring motif is fire. Pay attention to fire.) It’s all very pessimistic. Or is it? The chaos which violates order is romantic love, “carnal embrace.” The play ends with a dance that reaches across centuries. And while Thomasina argues that things done cannot be undone, Septimus counters that knowledge lost can be regained—a theory that’s apparently confirmed by our present-day scholars, who manage to rediscover the truth almost in spite of themselves.
All of which is to say: good Lord, this play is smart. My friend and I walked out of “Book of Mormon” last week remarking how intelligent a play that was—but “Arcadia” operates on a whole other level. It’s the most intelligent play I’ve ever seen. The best? Well, not quite. But definitely the smartest.
“Arcadia” is two and a half hours long and doesn’t waste a second. There’s a phenomenal amount of dense dialogue here; if there’s a flaw in the production at all, it’s that the actors will occasionally stumble over one or two of their hundreds of lines. (But that’s just probability theory.) The knock on Stoppard, if there is one, is that his plays appeal to the head without appealing to the heart—and yes, there’s an extent to which that’s true for “Arcadia.” Stoppard is writing at the top of his game; there are thirteen characters in the play (one actor plays a double role), and by my count, at least six are certifiable geniuses. Probably seven. Maybe eight.
So yes, it’s not an easy play. (Between the two, I found myself more emotionally moved by “Book of Mormon,” a play that actively goes out of its way not to strike an emotional chord.) But you ought to see “Arcadia,” not in spite of its difficulty but because of it. You ought to see this play because it’s brilliant, because it will make you think, because it will make you smarter for having seen it. Its very intelligence will move you.
Will that motion fade? Yes, eventually.
But man, it’s worth it in the meantime.
“Arcadia” runs at the Deep Dish Theater (in University Mall) through March 22. Visit this link for tickets.
http://chapelboro.com/columns/aaron-keck/order-amidst-chaos-vice-versa-arcadia-deep-dishAt 10 a.m. on Tuesday, University Mall is holding a press conference to make an announcement. (“Reimagine University Mall,” they’re calling it.) We don’t know what they’re going to say yet, but Mayor Mark Kleinschmidt will be there along with town economic development officer Dwight Bassett and Chamber of Commerce president Aaron Nelson—so clearly they’re thinking it’s big. Dillard’s is likely going to be closing within a couple months, so the best bet is that they’ll be announcing a new anchor to replace it—and “movie theater” is the latest rumor—but we won’t know until 10:00.
In the meantime, to mark the occasion, I’m devoting my next two entries to writing about the U-Mall. Enjoy.
———————————
You know, it might just be the beer talking, but I think I’m really starting to like University Mall.
Wait, wait. Let me go back a bit…
It was Saturday. I was in my apartment and I got a call from my roommate Kit, who’s the new theater manager at Deep Dish: could I swing by with his cell phone charger? Sure. So I drove to the mall, dropped off the cord, and then proceeded to do what I always do whenever I’m in any mall at all: obsessively walk the entire thing, from one end to the other and back.
(Side note: I almost never buy anything when I’m there, but for some reason I really love malls. Whenever I’m in a new city, I’m always compelled to visit the mall; it’s how I judge metropolii.)
So. I wind up in Southern Season, a Chapel Hill institution that Kit recently overheard a guy describe as “Hillshire Farms on steroids.” (Yep, pretty accurate.) My plan was simple: walk around the store, admire all the fancy foods I can’t afford, grab a free sample of something if possible, and leave quietly without a trace.
(Oh my God, I’m Chapel Hill white trash.)
But my plan was cruelly thwarted! I wasn’t five steps into Southern Season before I was faced with an offer I couldn’t refuse, an opportunity I couldn’t pass up, a temptation I couldn’t resist:
It was Beer Extravaganza day, y’all.
Yes, Southern Season’s Beer Extravaganza: eighteen tables set up around the store, each manned by a pair of friendly brewers and local food producers, dishing and pouring out samples of their wares for anyone willing to drop eight bucks on a ticket to get in line. It was heavenly. I spent the next two hours ambling from table to table, stuffing myself with hops and goat cheese, chatting up the farmers and the brewers and eavesdropping on all the other extravaganza-goers in line with me. (Hipsters with beards, mostly.)
This is Doug from Mystery Brewing Co., which was offering two selections: an English ale called “Pickwick” and a Belgian IPA called “Fantine.” I recommend the Fantine, partly because it’s a damn good beer and partly because it’s a damn good musical.
I was buzzed by the time I got to Table Six. It was all a lovely blur from there.
By Table Nine, I’d already imbibed Duck Rabbit’s milk stout, Carolina Brewery’s winter seasonal (“Santa’s Secret”), and something from Double Barley Brewing called “Thrilla in Vanilla.” And those were just the highlights. At Table Ten I found Nikko and Kathryn of Starpoint Brewing in Carrboro, who kindly explained to me the difference between an “IPA” and a “double IPA.” IPAs are hoppy, they said. Double IPAs are—well, more hoppy. (Their double IPA was called “Duh,” which in retrospect I should’ve seen coming.)
This is Nikko and Kathryn. (The “Duh” was very good, by the way.) Starpoint Brewing doesn’t have a storefront right now, partly by choice and partly by circumstance: “We were going to open (a place) at Starpoint,” Nikko said, “but then they put a Walmart there.” There’s your impact of the Chatham Walmart on local business here in Orange, folks. (Incidentally, while you’re admiring the picture, get a load of that guy’s shirt back there. That was one heck of a t-shirt, let me tell you.)
At Table Twelve a server from the Weathervane came in with a tray of sweet bruschetta topped with honey jelly, candied pecans, and something the Lonerider Brewing reps called “goat cheese mousse.”
“I’ve, uh…never heard those three words in that order before,” I said.
It was quite tasty. Apparently it wasn’t the first tray either, because as soon as the Weathervane guy set it down, folks swooped in from three different directions to grab a piece. Things were getting pretty hot and heavy at the Beer Extravaganza, y’all.
Clearly it was about time to call it an afternoon. I hit the last six tables, doubled back for one more round of Duh, and staggered out, happier and lighter in the head. There’s a lot of good local beer out there, you guys. (And a surprising amount of good goat cheese as well.)
Someone had chalked this next to Table Eight (Gizmo Brewery and Sweet Reasons Barbeque), but they could have just as easily done it anywhere.
Now. Just what was Santa’s secret?
http://chapelboro.com/columns/aaron-keck/a-day-at-southern-season-or-from-beer-to-eternity
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