blastedgoat

This play was performed in an intimate setting that caused the line between audience and action to blur. The action of the play was situated so that everyone had a unique perspective. The seating mirrored the v-shaped stage that was set with a piano, table and numerous rocking chairs. Everything was strikingly monochromatic. The whiteness of the character’s dress and surroundings did not always suggest a pristine world with pure figures gave off the air of dinginess.  The set had a certain amount of fluidity to it; this made the play artificial but it was balanced by the “reality” of servants working behind the scene like little mice, cleaning up after everyone. It was necessary to move the set around by people who seem connected in some way to the action. The space is “magically” transformed several times throughout the play which adds to the feeling that time has passed. I found the contemplations of the characters and their conversations with each other to be interesting. I noticed similarities between this play and Chekhov’s last play The Cherry Orchard which are both preoccupied by the deteriorating wealthy class in Russia as well as the passing of time. Russian literature to a large degree is about suffering but also learning from suffering if you want to survive. Overwhelming emotion and lack of continuous action on stage might have annoyed some people but I don’t mind listening to people talk, as long as they are talking about something interesting. I found the to be very much so and could tell the actors were submerged in their roles. I loved the leaves in the last scene which were symbolic of the approaching coldness of winter. The falling leaves also foreshadowed the death of the Baron and gave it finality. What was supposed to be happy ended on a sad note but the characters are strong and go on. Music is essential to Russian culture and its presence throughout the play emphasized that cultural difference. They sing, they experience loss and they live on to see more winters, more suffering, more death. I was impressed that the production was able to pull off a play as grim as this one with a cast of such young actors. Their ages certainly clue the audience into the sense that the scene is entirely constructed; as did the strange hanging lamp in the bedroom. What was so impressive to me was how they captured their characters quite well and presented the heavy themes of Russian literature in a fairly believable way.

[a play]

Trevor—12
Emma—11
Amanda—11

Scene 1:
In an overgrown yard strewn with debris, two knobby-kneed kids huddle under a prefabricated swing-set. The slide and swing-set combination is haphazardly positioned on a sandy area of the yard far away from the shabby porch that seems nailed to the small house but not exactly connected. The house itself is a little more beat up than the other houses on the block but the entire town possesses the stale air of negligence. The two kids are eleven and twelve. It’s 1996.

Emma: (Somewhat of a tomboy, sits cross-legged on the ground next to the swing-set.. Trevor, a boy with a bowl haircut, lights blades of dead grass on fire. Emma breaks a long silence.) Where did you get that?

Trevor: (Holds up the red Bic and nods towards the house.) Found it. (He puts the lighter back in his jeans pocket and looks at Emma.) How old are you?

Emma: Eleven, I just turned a few months ago.

Trevor: So you’re younger than Amanda—

Emma: Just a little bit. (She pulls out blades of grass in handfuls) I act mature for my age.

Trevor: I can see that. (She stops pulling out grass and looks at her hands, examining them for dirt.)

Trevor: I’m twelve. (Emma gets up and brushes sand off her jeans. She has reddish brown hair that is tied back into pigtails, she is wearing a faded rock t-shirt. She sits on the swing. Trevor gets up and leans against the slide watching Emma drag her sneakers in the sand. The sneakers have designs drawn on them in permanent black marker. Emma can be clearly read in loopy handwriting.) Have you ever smoked?

Emma: A cigarette?

Trevor: Of course a cigarette. (he laughs.) I swipe butts from the ashtray all the time and my parents never notice.

Emma: That’s sick. Read the rest of this entry »