REVIEW: Durang Double-Bill at Vagabonds in Baltimore

There is a moment in each act of the Christopher Durang double-bill now showing at The Vagabond Players in Fells Point, Baltimore that really shows what could have been.

 

In the first play, "An Actor's Nightmare", where an accountant named George Spelvin (Donald Cook) is thrown into a world where the play is going on, and so is he, but he doesn't know the play or any of the lines. The moment that really works here is a soliloquy that George, in a sheer panic, starts reciting lines from any play, book or popular saying he think of. He is hoping that if he gives the powers that be what they want, the nightmare will stop. For about 3 minutes Mr. Cook is completely believable, hysterically (both in panic and in laughs) virtually screams everything from A Streetcar Named Desire to The Pledge of Allegiance. In those three minutes, you can see what impasse George has come to, and why, most likely Donald Cook was cast in the role. Unfortunately, there are the other 35 or so minutes in the act to get through. Here, the actor never really seems to get a grip on his character, so the rollercoaster of emotions the character goes through either doesn't register at all or registers, but in a completely flat way. Oddly enough, it is the supporting characters that really shine here, particularly Amy Jo Shipiro's theatre-diva turn as Sarah Siddons who tries valiantly (and with a good measure of self-preservation) to make the show go on. Equally funny is Tim Elliott as the grand Shakespearean actor who goes deliciously WAY over the top in order to save a production of Hamlet. And KC O'Connor's turn as the trash can inhabitant in a Beckett play shows just how good underplaying in a satire can be. Her dry delivery is both Beckett-ish and a hilarious send-up of the same.

In the second play, "Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All For You," the moment that really works here is a sequence where the titular nun's former students come to support her lecture by performing a nativity pageant. It is an absolute scream. The line delivery is sharp and fast-paced, and the movement is a childlike frenzy of madcap proportions. These 6 or 7 minutes are wonderful. Alas, the other 45 minutes or so range from mildly humorous to resoundingly dull. As Sister Mary Ignatius, Amy Jo Shapiro has all the right moves. Her opening stare elicited both a giggle of recognition and the silence that that glare requires. Her opening sequence (the mildly humorous part) where she goes over the basics of Catholic beliefs – the Creation, Heave/Hell/Purgatory, etc. – is well-timed and the accompanying diagrams are cute. But the rest of it, including the question-answer period, interludes with her 7 year old assistant (played not too cutely – a great thing – by Seamus Woods) and a few periods of anecdotes, is played at nearly the same emotional level, with little variance (The resoundingly dull parts). It drives home the point that she is not a nice nun who clings desperately to the letter of Catholic doctrine and her disgust with changes made by Popes past. But with little warmth shown (even her affection for the child onstage doesn't seem convincing), there is no build up. Mean is mean is mean. The problem is that when the surprise ending comes about, we understand the motivation, but the shock of the Sister's actions is nearly non-existent and at the same time utterly unbelievable. In fact, I found myself routing for everyone but her. Maybe that is the point, but as played it certainly does not come across. Again, the supporting cast here saves the act. Strangely enough, Donald Cook gives a great, panicked performance as the man who needs to use the bathroom but is not allowed to leave until recognized by the Sister, who patently refuses to do so. He builds from annoyance to frustration to an agonized terror that would have suited his act one George Spelvin to a T. Again, both Ms. O'Connor and Mr. Elliott's turns, this time as wronged students longing for revenge, are funny and offer depth that makes their characters realistic even in a satire. Also of note is Jennifer Johnson who offers up a humorous take on the Virgin Mary and as a woman who has aborted babies. But overall, the act comes across flatly and seems much longer than the hour it takes to complete.

Part of the problem here is that these staples of 20^th century satire have really not aged that well. The surreal satire of "Nightmare" might have played well in the 70's, but it doesn't say enough still about our times today to make it relevant. In this case, keeping it in the time it was written makes the whole affair dated. I would suspect that most of the audience in attendance that night had some trouble seeing the humor in "Nightmare" because they probably don't have enough knowledge of Private Lives, Hamlet or the Beckett play. It is also why, when the aforementioned bright spot of act one occurred, it was funny. These are lines and sayings we know whether we know the original source or not. Act two suffers from being poorly carried out. The actors playing students are clearly in their mid twenties, so when they say they are from the class of 1959, assuming they meant high school, it would put the play in the mid to late sixties (and even if they mean elementary school, we'd be mid-seventies). None of the costumes (designed? by Ann Mainolfi) appear to be from either decade – well, maybe if you really stretched you could say late 80's. Since the issues brought up (abortion, gay rights, clergy issues, controversial Papal pronouncements) are still relevant to today, some updating might have made this more interesting. Aside from the cast, I may have been the only person in the room who knew who Comden and Green are/were and why their inclusion on a list of "straight to Hell" people was allegedly funny.

As presented, the evening, unevenly directed by Barry Bach, is mostly dull, completely uneven, and makes both lead characters secondary. According to the program, Mr. Bach is an attorney. Perhaps that is what informs this production – Sister Mary Ignatius comes across like a lawyer presenting evidence, and George Spelvin comes across as a bored judge. Neither really works, despite the actors' best efforts.

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