Tag: Arthur Miller Theater

REVIEW: Somebody’s Children

Joann Leave a comment

Somebody’s Children, a tale of children who lives just next door to the land of the fairy tale, Disney land, but whose life isn’t so fairy-tale-like, asks the audience whether it’s really ok that some people are actually living in sucn unstable homes and clearly provides the answer-it’s not Ok. The play is written by José Casas, assistant professor at the University of Michigan, and the actors were consisted of students in SMTD. The setting takes place in a run-down motel just outside Disneyland, and while their personal stories are told in beautifully and powerfully written vignettes, the sorrows in characeters’ lives expands into a problem of social structure by the contrast of their unsafe living place and children who laughs happily in Disneyland, which is so close to where they are living. The stage design made this interesting setting even more clear – there was a huge and gorgeous sign that spells out ‘Disneyland’ on the right side of the stage. Glowing white, the sign had an aura that made sure that the audience was not missing it, but the actual shape of Disneyland was not shown; as if symbolizing that the real Disneyland did not existed to children living in the motel. With this direct contrast, the deprived feeling and anger that the characters are feeling is strongly delivered while raising the point that they could have also been the careless children who have a great time in Disneyland, and highlighting the brutallity of reality in which the children were pushed into. They were somebody’s ‘Children’. Their sorrow is valid and raw, but they are children, who should be kept away from those things. Who are to protect them? the play asks.

I want to highlight the actor’s amazing performances – as mentioned before, the play mainly consited of vignettes, so the lines were symbolic and poetic, rather than straight to the point. The actors expressed out the emotion that the children is reciting the vignette so well; the sad but happy, nostelgic look of a girl who danced with her imaginary quinceañera dress, how two boys exchanged roles to between a police man that stopped them on a night’s walk to get some ice and the boys who got pinned down even though they did nothing wrong swiftly was just awestrucking. Production was amazing as well – using sitting actors as poles to put up police line was not only visually intersting but also symbolized that the children in the motel were deeply embedded in all the tragedy happening in the place.

In all, Somebody’s Children was a beautiful and socially-conscious play that used experimental lines-vignettes-to deliver the theme and did it, not over-dramatically but emotionally affluently. Highly recommend to anyone looking for performances that speaks about the modern world.

REVIEW: Water by the Spoonful

Angela Gosselin Leave a comment

SMTD’s production of Water by the Spoonful does not deal with light subjects. The play follows a family coping with death, a chatroom for recovering drug addicts, and the way these two groups intersect. Another key point is how Elliot, the son of the deceased Ginny, copes with PTSD resulting from his time spent in Iraq. Though the play finds itself confronting all these difficult situations, it leaves audiences with hope and a heightened sense of one’s priorities.

 

This was my first time at the Arthur Miller Theater. I found its layout really interesting, especially in the context of Water by the Spoonful. The theater is square with the stage at the center. Only a few rows of seats radiate from each of the three exposed sides, both on the ground level and balcony. The performance feels so immediate and three-dimensional when viewed in this way; I could see the smallest changes in an actor’s face, feel the movement of a fight scene, and watch the water fall as it is poured on the stage by the spoonful. When a sizable portion of the dialogue takes place in a chatroom, four different locations need to be created. By angling certain rooms towards different sections of the audience, the staging created this dual sense of dislocation and togetherness in a really interesting and effective way. The section of the stage farther back by the wings was also used in conjunction with an elevated balcony and the central space to explore some of the collage-like overlapping sections of the work. As characters inhabit all three spaces with various lines and music weaving in and out of the scene, the different spatial contexts allowed a type of visual overlapping to coincide with the aural and theatrical pastiches going on.

 

The use of space was intriguing in this work, but what is space if not filled with characters and lines and interaction? The performances in Water by the Spoonful gave life to a plethora of diverse and complex characters. Notable performances include Alyxandra Ciale Charfauros and Vincent Ford as Orangutan and Chutes&Ladders, respectively, as the two bring a realness to their characters that becomes amplified in their back-and-forth conversations. Kyle Prue’s performance as Fountainhead, a man with an addiction who can’t quite face his reality, was also one that I found highly immersive.

 

Ultimately, I found Water by the Spoonful to be a great performance. The material was used in really thoughtful ways in terms of both direction and performance, and I look forward to trekking to North Campus again to see more work in the Arthur Miller theater.

REVIEW: Passing Strange

Angela Lin 1 Comment

The lights dimmed in the Arthur Miller Theater. Before I knew it, someone ran up to me offering me a lollipop, surprising me yet bringing me a giddy joy. The contagious energy of the cast started from the very first second and continued all the way to the end. Passing Strange was a very contemporary musical. Actors took turn acting as props, the stage was very open with a lot of objects being thrown around onstage and falling from the ceiling, and all the actors remained on the stage the entire time, sitting on the sides and being engaged throughout.

We follow the story of the Youth, played magnificently by Liam Allen, a young musician who discovers a newfound revelation and, under the guidance of his closeted gay choir director, turns to marijuana and rock and roll. He decides to leave his mother behind in Los Angeles and travels to Europe, seeking musical inspiration and a life worth living and writing about. However, after he spends some time with free-spirited artists in Amsterdam, getting high and making love every day, he claims that he must leave because everything is too good in paradise and there is nothing to fuel his music. Paradise doesn’t allow for pain and suffering, a very real and natural thing to experience. Without the ability to create art, he runs away. Though he is trying to find something real, he builds a fake persona in Berlin in order to be accepted by the Nowhaus artists with his Blackness. The Youth struggles to understand what life and love is about, and as he faces grief near the end, clings to art to resurrect the only real thing in his life. Finally, the Narrator, who turns out to be an older and more mature Youth self-reflecting on his life’s journey, realizes that love is more powerful than “the real.”

The loud rock & roll and punk rock music of this musical was compelling and performed brilliantly, and the directing was absolutely phenomenal. There were plenty of comedic moments, and the underlying seriousness of the musical really came alive in its final moments, all of which were delivered in an enjoyable yet thought-provoking way. The final scene with everyone standing in a line shining a light let the artistic message of this coming-of-age and self-discovery story linger.

Mr. Venus’ Riot Cabaret contained some striking lines that Matthew Sanguine delivered in a brilliant performance. Though it is supposed to come across as avant-garde and over the top, there is an existentialist truth to this little show that resonates in the heart and mind. He sings over and over: “Ideas are dependable there’s a new one every week / Emotions are expendable because they aren’t unique / Culture is cosmetic / What’s inside is just a lie.”

The fourth wall was nonexistent in this show. As the Narrator, Justin Showell provided striking commentary throughout the show, interacting with the actors occasionally and even talking directly to the audience. In a meta story about the Pretzel Man, the Narrator reveals that the Youth was trying to find something “real” in art that could only be found in art. Passing Strange was deeply moving and provoked a lot of self-reflection about the purpose of life that will change how I interact with myself and others as I strive to find my own version of love and “the real.”