Execution of Justice (1985)

EXECUTION OF JUSTICE
by Emily Mann
directed by Elaine Vaan Hogue

Dan White … Ian Geers
Mary Ann White … Hayley Sherwood
Cop … Nick Carter
Sister Boom Boom … Ben Martin

Chorus of Uncalled Witnesses
Jim Denman, White’s Jailer … James Marin
Young Mother … Sonia Decker
Milk’s Friend … Stuart Meyers
Gwenn Craig, VP of
the Harvey Milk Democratic Club … Amber Williams
Joseph Freitas, Jr., D.A. … Edmun Donovan
Mourner … Edmund Donovan
Moscone’s Friend … Jesse Garlick

Trial Characters
The Court … Jahna Ferron-Smith
Court Clerk … Sonia Decker
Douglas Schmidt, Defense Attorney … Kate Hamilton
Thomas F. Norman, Prosecuting Attorney … Matt Lytle
Joanna Lu … Ellen Tamaki
Prospective Jurors … Charlotte Thomas, James Marin
Juror #3; Foreman … Harrison Brian

Witnesses for the People
Coroner Stephens … Jon Taylor
Rudy Nothenberg, Deputy Mayor … Jesse Garlick
Barbara Taylor, Reporter … Shelby Hightower
Officer Byrne, Department of Records … Amber Williams
William Melia, Civil Engineer … James Marin
Cyr Copertini, Secretary to the Mayor … Charlotte Thomas
Carl Henry Carlson, Aide to Harvey Milk … Edmund Donovan
Richard Pabich, Asst. to Harvey Milk … Ben Martin
Frank Falzon, Chief Homicide Inspector … Mason Sand
Edward Erdelatz … Nick Carter

Witnesses for the Defense
Denis Apcar, Aide to White … Sonia Decker
Fire Chief Sherratt … Harrison Brian
Fireman Frediani … John Scala
Police Officer Sullivan … Nick Carter
City Supervisor Lee Dolson … James Marin

Psychiatrists
Dr. Jones … Jesse Garlick
Dr. Solomon … Shelby Hightower
Dr. Blinder … Jon Taylor
Dr. Lunde … Harrison Brian
Dr. Delman … Mason Sand

In Rebuttal for the People
Carol Ruth Silver, City Supervisor … Shelby Hightower
Dr. Levy, Psychiatrist … Harrison Brian

People of San Francisco, Cameramen,
Mourners, Rioters, Riot Police … The Ensemble

TIME: 1978-1983
PLACE: San Francisco

Emily Mann’s EXECUTION OF JUSTICE is a courtroom recreation of the Dan White murder trial. In 1978, Mr. White shot and killed San Francisco mayor George Moscone and gay city supervisor Harvey Milk; swayed by the infamous “Twinkie defense”, the jury let Mr. White off with a verdict of manslaughter, resulting in gay riots (all this, and Anita Bryant, too). After serving five of his seven-year sentence, Mr. White committed suicide in 1985. Ms. Mann has fashioned her docudrama from court transcripts, interviews and reportage – there are too many sound bites posing as characters, whizzing in and out, but EXECUTION OF JUSTICE is a fascinating, thinking man’s entertainment; it played for only twelve performances on Broadway in 1986 but has found success in regional theatres.

And now Boston University’s Theatre Department has revived EXECUTION OF JUSTICE in a fresh, abrasive production, brought to life by Elaine Vaan Hogue’s urgent direction and a remarkable, even moving, student ensemble (nowadays, college theatres are the main place to view large-cast productions). EXECUTION OF JUSTICE calls for tabloid-acting and declamation, perfect for these still-green artists (though some lack the requisite lungpower); the centerpiece is Ian Geer’s Dan White, a Lost Boy in a strapping physique (possibly more accurate than Josh Brolin’s reptilian performance in the film MILK) – Matt Lytle plays prosecuting attorney Thomas F. Norman as a man who’s been to the rodeo all too often yet can still wax eloquent when the situation demands it (courtroom lawyers are actors, after all), and Mason Sand is convincingly scruffy as Frank Falzon, Chief Homicide Inspector (in Shakespeare, Mr. Sand would be Iago and Cassius rather than Othello and Brutus); Jahna Ferron-Smith listens quite nicely as the Judge. My only quibble is Ms. Vaan Hogue casting an actress as defense attorney Douglas Schmidt (yet the character is still addressed as “Mr.”) – this may have been to provide some gender-balance, acting-wise, but would Ms. Vaan Hogue object to Marcia Clark becoming “Marshall” Clark should a docudrama about the O. J. Simpson murder trial ever surface?

The production is staged somewhat in the round, with a section of the audience sitting onstage and with actors moving freely about the auditorium. Inevitably, the irritation of arena theatre soon seeps in: the actors must turn this way and that, making certain that everyone gets a fair share of them, yet how can one completely empathize with an actor who involves you, then turns his back on you? ‘Tis a problem that may never be solved …

“Execution of Justice” (17-24 February 2012)
BOSTON UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF FINE ARTS – SCHOOL OF THEATRE
Calderwood Pavilion at the Boston Center for the Arts
527 Tremont Street, BOSTON, MA
Tickets: (617) 933-8600
website: http://www.bu.edu/cfa

Monster (2002)

MONSTER
by Neal Bell, based on Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein
directed by Jim Petosa

Victor Frankenstein … Michael Kaye
The Creature … John Zdrojeski
Elizabeth … Britian Seibert
Walton; Clerval … Tim Spears
Father; Forster … Stephen Elrod
Mother; Justine … Cloteal L. Horne
Cat; William … Jake McLean

Time: The early 1800s.
Somewhere in the Arctic Ocean and Europe.

Neal Bell’s MONSTER is not so much an adaptation of Mary Shelley’s FRANKENSTEIN (1818) than an overheated fantasia on it. Though Ms. Shelley led a somewhat tempestuous life, she might have been shocked to see her heroine dripping her first menstrual blood before her beloved, to hear her creature bellow, “Why did he give me a cock?”, and to realize that she was not really writing about God versus Science but, rather, a dark male-male love story which ends with creator and creation expiring together in a fiery embrace. This may all sound new and daring, but it really isn’t: the Living Theatre and other avant-garde troupes were spinning plays’ subtexts into text in the 1960s and 70s – the difference being that those troupes had good and angry reasons for their deconstructions whereas MONSTER gives the impression that Mr. Bell read FRANKENSTEIN, didn’t care for it, and rewrote it to his own liking.

The Boston Center for American Performance’s production brought back memories of my own student-actor days when the New York experimental scene had begun to seep into colleges: forty years ago, my theatre department did an improvisational production of BAAL in its multi-level-in-the-round environmental theatre – this may not have been Bertolt Brecht’s BAAL but, at the time, who cared: it offered bared breasts, homoeroticism, and “real” things like one actor spitting in another actor’s face – it was an evening of DANGEROUS theatre. Every young adult needs some DANGEROUS theatre in his or her life, at least once, so BCAP’s MONSTER may well prove dangerous enough to BU students (happily, there were quite a few in the audience); under Jim Petosa’s direction, the student cast gropes and clutches to the nth degree whereas only the Creature should do most of the groping, being the primal force that he is (to the actors’ credit, they interact without fear or embarrassment). Mr. Petosa has failed to orchestrate his actors’ declamation, especially that of Michael Kaye (Frankenstein) and John Zdrojeski (the Creature) who square off several times and shred their vocal chords, though Mr. Zdrojeski makes some impressive sounds and twitches when coming to life and when mortally stabbed. Adrienne Carlile has correctly garbed her cast, period-wise, but her womanly costumes are cancelled out by her actresses who play their roles as anything but womanly (is it such a debasement, nowadays, for an actress to play a period role as sweet, docile, charming, feminine, with a voice “ever soft and low, an excellent thing in a woman”? must all female characters in corsets now be trotted out as suffragettes or valkyries?)

Still, I was impressed with these seven young artists – their training and potential held my interest. I hope some, if not all, of them choose to stay in the Boston area upon graduation. “My dear, my dear, it is not so dreadful here …”

“Monster” (9-25 February 2012)
BOSTON CENTER FOR AMERICAN PERFORMANCE
Boston University Theatre, Lane-Comley Studio 210
264 Huntington Avenue, BOSTON, MA
Tickets: (617) 933-8600
website: http://www.bu.edu/cfa

The Voice of the Turtle (1943)

THE VOICE OF THE TURTLE
by John Van Druten
directed by Carl Forsman

Sally Middleton … Hanley Smith
Olive Lashbrooke … Mega Byrne
Bill Page … William Connell

Time: A weekend in early April, 1943.
Place: An apartment in the East Sixties, near 3rd Avenue,
New York City

I caught the final Saturday matinee of John Van Druten’s THE VOICE OF THE TURTLE at Merrimack Repertory Theatre, and I’m glad I did. I had read this charming war-romance light-years ago but had never seen it performed, and any regional or community theatre company looking for an audience pleaser with a small cast and one setting should consider this valentine about an aspiring young actress, a handsome soldier on leave, and the catty sidekick who has stood him up – and need I mention that TURTLE chalked up a Broadway run of 1,557 performances? (The lead role – Sally Middleton – was played by the popular stage and screen actress Margaret Sullavan, best remembered today as James Stewart’s love interest in THE SHOP AROUND THE CORNER (1940).)

In his friendly, informal manual PLAYWRIGHT AT WORK (1953) – recommended reading for all playwrights – Mr. Van Druten offers the following to those who want to create “universal” characters: a Mr. or a Mrs. Smith with whom everyone can identify:

I would like to take an illustration from The Voice of the Turtle. In Sally, the heroine of that play, I drew what I considered a somewhat odd girl. Or, rather, she drew herself for me. I liked her, I was amused by her, but there were times while she was writing herself, when she seemed to be getting close to being a goon-girl, a near half-wit, though she remained consistent and appealing. The one thing I never thought of her as being was Everywoman. I never thought she could be identified as Miss Smith. But she was. I have had letters and comments from women telling me that Sally was themselves, and asking how I could possibly have known so much about their insides and thoughts and dreams. The play had achieved that kind of universal identification that is every playwright’s best desire, which can almost never be achieved by aiming at it.

When Mary McCarthy reviewed the original Broadway production, she was lukewarm about TURTLE itself but added:

… John Van Druten has discovered for the theatre a new American type, a type with whom we are all familiar in life but have not seen behind the footlights. This is the character played by Margaret Sullavan; she is the well-brought-up American girl who, at twenty-one, has had two affairs, yet remains at heart a virgin, an innocent, a perennial spinster who will always be more in love with her apartment, her flowers, her possessions, her treasury of quotations from poetry, than with any man she sleeps with, whose bed the morning after a sexual adventure will always be made up, with the spread indented under the pillows, while coffee for two drips in the Silex and toast pops out of the electric toaster. This is the eternal college girl, who will be windswept and hatless at forty, and whose old age no one so far can predict.

… which could well describe many a chick-flick heroine of today. No doubt, Sally must have raised a few eyebrows back in 1943 by having had two affairs (one, with a married man) before the curtain has risen and is now delightfully worried she might be turning promiscuous (Olive, the sidekick, indulges in guilt-free sex) – I’ve not seen the 1948 film adaptation (with Eve Arden as Olive, natch) but I wouldn’t be surprised if the era’s censorship had scrubbed away Sally’s past till she was spotless as the Lamb …

The original Broadway production of TURTLE must have been an immediate and poignant entertainment, what with New York being filled with aspiring actresses and soldiers on leave, making Times Square seem like New Year’s Eve, night after night, yet it holds up well, today – Act One shows Mr. Van Druten at work, closing many little doors so that the big door can (must) open: Sally and Bill going out to dinner en route to romance; when Sally enters in Act Two, giddy from a cocktail on an empty stomach, the fun kicks in (much laughter, here), and the closing duet of Act Three is genuinely tear-inducing (happy tears, not sad) – the play allows its designers to wax nostalgic: Theresa Squire’s 1940s costumes (right down to Olive’s snood) were pleasing, and Bill Clarke’s three-room apartment seemed period, enough (rose-pink for Sally’s bedroom, soothing-blue for the living room where Bill spends most of his time, mint-green for the kitchen that they share).

Carl Forsman’s direction was smooth, smooth, smooth but humanly so, though missing a desperate urgency (after all, Bill is being shipped off to war!) – only once, did the face of Neil Simon poke through the valentine when Sally fled from Bill’s embrace-and-kiss, leaving him in a frozen clinch to milk out a laugh – and a nice little chuckle could have occurred in Act Three had Sally flourished only half a stick of butter instead of a whole one, the humor stemming from such fuss over so little but – ah! – think of how many ration stamps such smallness would have cost Sally! In all my years of reviewing, I’ve yet to see a local production, set in New York, where the actors’ body rhythms evoke crowds, subways, small apartments … nor did I see it on the Merrimack stage … but I still hope to see it, someday, rather than a suburbanite’s view of the Big Apple.

Speaking of rationing, Mr. Forsmans’ cast of three was appropriately trim and quite likeable – in today’s theatre, where new plays are collections of sound-bytes and whisk-away scenery, where HOT-ness and closed hearts have replaced emotional danger and sincerity, what a pleasure to have watched this trio perform for long stretches at a time with nothing but each other’s give-and-take (thus, they had to constantly edit themselves to remain stylized and on pitch) (I wonder, in rehearsal, did they ask Mr. Forsman, “Gee, were people really this NICE, back then?”) Hanley Smith, tall and willowy, frisked about as Sally – I was glad to see she did not distance herself from her “goon-girl” nor did she mug to the point of dementia – plus she was feminine – since today’s woman-iconography boils down to a pair of crossed arms, a thrust-chin and a defiant stance, again I declare that Ms. Smith is a feminine actress, as creamy as a vanilla milkshake.

The role of Bill Page can best be described as Operation Dreamboat, a sensitive swain who cooks and rolls the poetry-ball back on cue (not unlike a Jane Austin hero – but, then, Mr. Van Druten was an Englishman in America), and William Connell filled the bill handsomely; still, Bill is a drone – as Mr. Van Druten wrote, “The man in the play seemed more usual to me, more like the ordinary man. Perhaps that is why he was less individual, and why few men have identified themselves with Bill Page.” (Years later, after creating the role of Paul to the ditzy Corie in Mr. Simon’s BAREFOOT IN THE PARK, Robert Redford summed up the Sally-syndrome, “All the guy ends up doing is looking at her with his hat in his hand and saying, ‘You’re wild and you’re mad, and I love you.’ ”) Sally was a fresh creation but Olive was already a stock character, and Mega Byrne could have scrunched up her face and coasted on wisecracks, alone, but (happily) buffed them to a sparkle and gave her role a touch of class (Olive is not a villainess).

At the performance that I attended, the main floor was filled with members of Sally’s generation (i.e. those who remember the 1940s); the side balconies became a peanut gallery with bussed-in students of junior-high age – and, oh, the contrast! The elders smiled and remembered and enjoyed themselves; the youngers sat in puzzlement, most of the time, uttering oooooEEEEE’s each time Sally and Bill kissed; during the two intermissions, they reached for their cell-phones and ‘pods as if they were lifelines. But at least they experienced good, solid Live Theatre – now, how many of them will want to see more? (And where were the 20-somethings? Here was a play right up their alley, having experienced their own recent war ... )

In closing, should I mention that Mr. Van Druten also wrote I REMEMBER MAMA, I AM A CAMERA (featuring another Sally: Sally Bowles of (later) CABARET fame) and BELL, BOOK AND CANDLE, you may (hopefully) say, “Ah, that Van Druten!” Yes – that Van Druten – and his plays deserve resurrecting.

“The Voice of the Turtle” (5-29 January 2012)
MERRIMACK REPERTORY THEATRE
Liberty Hall (adjacent to Lowell Memorial Auditorium)
50 E. Merrimack Street, LOWELL, MA
Tickets: (978) 543-4678
website: http://www.merrimackrep.org/

The Glass Menagerie (1945)

THE GLASS MENAGERIE
by Tennessee Williams
directed by Bill Doscher

Amanda Wingfield, the Mother … Janet Ferreri
Tom Wingfield, the Son … Jason Tennis
Laura Wingfield, the Daughter … Alexandra Harrington
Jim O’Connor, the Gentleman Caller … Mark Damon

The fate of plays that reach classic-status is that there is no burning need to either produce them or attend them and yet we should, every few years, not only because they are cultural touchstones but because they offer new perspectives as they (and we) grow older. Take Tennessee Williams’ first masterpiece, THE GLASS MENAGERIE, his autobiographical memory-play set during the Great Depression: did Amanda’s husband skip town on his own free will, or was he nagged out by his wife? (Notice how much of the Amanda-Tom clashes sound like marital squabbles rather than parent-child ones.) How much of Laura’s being crippled is really mental than physical? Jim O’Connor, symbolizing hope and a brighter tomorrow, harkens back to Mr. Williams’ rediscovered social dramas of the 1930s (Jim’s breezy dialogue is light years away from the over-poeticizing that bogged down Mr. Williams in decline – and Jim is proof that not EVERY young man in Mr. Williams’ canon is a stud and/or Angel of Death). And Tom? How far are we now to view him as Mr. Williams, himself – i.e. is the character, homosexual? Tom goes to the movies on a nightly basis – yet if you know his creator’s stories “The Mysteries of the Joy Rio” and “Hard Candy”, what exactly lures Tom to the movies, night after night until two in the morning? Finally, you may come to view Mr. Williams’ Amanda no longer as a hatchet-job of his mother but as a tender, compassionate portrait of a conventional woman so tied to the past that she wounds more than helps her children struggling in the present (to quote Mr. Williams’ original description: “There is much to admire in Amanda, and as much to love and pity as there is to laugh at. Certainly she has endurance and a kind of heroism, and though her foolishness makes her unwittingly cruel at times, there is tenderness in her slight person.”)

The 7A Series at the Footlight Club offered a solid bread-and-butter GLASS MENAGERIE with two insights of its own: (1) the more intimate the production, the more involving this play becomes; and (2) the play works beautifully as a domestic drama when shorn of its memory-aesthetics (though the Wingfield family miming meals did jar a bit amidst the solid old furniture so artfully arranged in so small a space – which, in turn, hinted that this was furniture from happier times, now squeezed into a tenement flat). Apart from Tom’s opening and closing monologues being placed inside the home than outside where the fire escape would have been and Laura NOT blowing out her candles at the end, Bill Doscher’s staging was respectful and drew out the play’s humor shimmering beneath the pathos (this is NOT a dysfunctional family comedy!).

I have yet to see a “bad” Gentleman Caller – Jim O’Connor seems to be an actor-proof role – but Mark Damon’s husky eagerness, so sound-alike to Mickey Rooney’s Andy Hardy, made him extra-”period” despite his hair not being Brill Cream’ed. Jason Tennis’ Tom was breathy and hollow in declamation (imagine shouting in a whisper to evoke his sound); he was more at home in little moments, especially with Mr. Damon. I’ve yet to see an indelible Laura: actresses are prone to make her a twitching neurotic, constantly on edge, and Alexandra Harrington swelled the ranks – no one seems to consider that, perhaps, Laura’s inner world is one of gently falling snow which would lend her an eerie tranquility (and thus make her all the more hopeless in dealing with the real world) – in Mr. Williams’ story “Portrait of a Girl in Glass”, Laura communicates from a distant planet; still, Ms. Harrington is new to me, and I look forward to seeing what she can do in future roles that will allow her to straighten up, keep her hands still and smile as winningly as she did at curtain call.

Janet Ferreri is always worth watching, for she takes chances (or is given them) and she has yet to disappoint (oh, the colors she must have on her pallette, by now!); this may sound odd, but may she never reach Equity status so that she can continue to pick and choose from the community theatres in and around the Boston area. She is not beautiful in a cosmetic sense but there is a trembling radiance in her eyes which goes hand-in-hand with Mr. Williams’ wounded heart. Vocally, Ms. Ferreri’s Amanda began on too broad a note (not unlike Puccini’s Turandot opening with “Un questa reggia”), but she soon warmed to the subtleties of Mr. Williams’ music and made a touching, even lovable Amanda; you felt for her even in her cruelty and, possessing a thin but shapely figure, Ms. Ferreri made a party-dress entrance next door to a fairy tale (at the end, trumped again by Life, she unplugged her own wattage). Now give Ms. Ferreri Serafina (THE ROSE TATTOO) and Lady (ORPHEUS DESCENDING), please, and keep her growing.

I smiled to see that the omnipresent father-on-the-wall was local actor Mark Bourbeau, a charming fellow onstage and off – whenever Ms. Ferreri (who has acted with him) turned to praise the husband’s charm, she (and Amanda) could only have told the truth.

“The Glass Menagerie” (19-22 January 2012)
THE FOOTLIGHT CLUB – America’s Oldest Community Theatre
Eliot Hall, 7A Eliot Street, JAMAICA PLAIN, MA
Tickets: https://www.footlight.org/store/commerce.cgi
website: http://www.footlight.org/