Review: PILLAR RABBIT Hops Lively At Spotlighters through Sunday, August 25th

The Baltimore Playwrights Festival tradition continues at Spotlighters Theatre in Baltimore. Pillar Rabbit is an entertaining title that reveals little about the show, so I'm in for a surprise. I’m excited to learn that Opening Night is sold out. Play festivals can be a hard sell, since audiences perforce don’t know what they’re getting. For reviewers, however, we are at the very least assured of not sitting through yet another production of that thing we’ve seen several times already.  

The Baltimore Playwrights Festival has long been a feature of summer in the Baltimore area. In years past, as many as a dozen shows, produced by five or more theaters, offered a wealth of acting and production opportunities to local talent. This year, one theater produces one play, and that’s Pillar Rabbit at Spotlighters Theatre.

It’s hard to watch a show about Alzheimer’s when the show presents things inaccurately. Dot, produced recently by Cockpit In Court at CCBC Essex, got all the details right. This sort of accuracy is a product of up-close, personal involvement and observation which playwright Mel Holley may not yet have experienced. Though some bits of the script may need further polishing, on the whole, it's a gem.

Act I is by and large excellent. The actors are expressive, the relationships believable, the situation all too common. The setting is one of my favorite places- New Orleans- and the production has a lot of New Orleans flavor, particularly Lunelle Pillar’s clothing. We are introduced to characters at an absorbable rate, with given names appearing in the dialogue quickly enough to identify, and identify with, our protagonists. The dialogue is snappy, funny and fast-paced. We begin to sort through the assortment of relationships, no small task, with 3 generations represented by eight people. Director Ta'Von Vinson assembles an excellent cast, and gives them naturalistic movement, brisk but unhurried conversation, and amps up the comic timing of both script and cast. 

Lunelle Pillar is our main protagonist, and Tarita Turner gives such a solid, vibrant performance that I’m surprised to learn she hasn’t acted before; well done, both on the actor and on the part of the director who cast her. Portraying Ethel Green, Lunelle’s longtime friend and neighbor, is Kay-Megan Washington. Her wry humor is a delight, and she says more with a look than many do with half a page of dialogue

Terena McLorn, playing Lunelle’s daughter-in-law, Tracey Pillar, has an extremely expressive face and I’m fully entertained watching her. Ethel’s adult son, Bryton Green, is staunchly played by Chris Reed, who is believable as a straight-laced military man nervous about pushing boundaries.

Patrick Bean Jr. is given a difficult character to portray in the role of Lunelle’s son Armand “Kong” Pillar, and he deftly walks a fine line between loveable but sketch and irredeemably lazy. Shelbi Nelson, playing Angelle Pillar-Harrison, Lunelle’s daughter, convinces us of Angelle’s dislikable qualities, then hauls us back to feelings of compassion and sympathy for her in Act II. Props to the strength of her talent as an actor. Together, their two performances hint at the probable complexity of their absent sibling.

As Marshall Amparo, Nicholas Friend plays a tender-hearted, familially challenged youngster, with subtlety and relatable emotion. Possibly the most expository of the characters is grand-daughter Lizzie Harrison, played with vim and sass by Amari Chambers.

Act II features an overly rushed timeline, an overpacked agenda of subplots and an overabundance of melodrama. A less bombastic, more intense second act was my hope for the show. Even so, as we’re already invested in the characters, we are willing to sit through the strum und drang, including an extended audio sermon with only a gobo of a church window for visual engagement. The concluding sequence, featuring a tender and touching solo performance by Kay-Megan Washington, is satisfying and believable. 

Sound design and sound quality are excellent, and after the first few moments of the show, the actors adjust their volume and are perfectly audible.  Sound Designer Ta'Von Vinson creates a soundscape that gives us a sense of where we are and what’s happening, and also designates an additional character. Lighting, by Lighting Designer Jen Sizer, effectively creates an environmental palette which helps the audience understand when we are, regarding the time of day. 

Set design is by local visual artist Justin Nepomuceno, his second set at Spotlighters. Nepomuceno avoids the iconic architectural elements of The Big Easy, perhaps deliberately invoking an “Anywhere, USA” ethos. He delivers a charming, detail-rich back yard which allows for plenty of movement, gives different focal points for onstage action, and an abundance of entrances.

Wardrobe for the characters is remarkable, as each character has a specific ‘look’ through every costume change. Spotlighters Wardrobe collection, Director and Cast collaborate to assemble character-informative outfits that speak to age, occasion, social status and personality that carries throughout the show. A particular piece of jewelry is symbolically significant by the play's end.

Support live local theater, support Black theater, support the dual traditions of Audrey Herman’s Spotlighters Theatre and the Baltimore Playwrights Festival. See Mel Holley’s tale of a family in crisis, in a script which doesn’t shy away from some extremely difficult issues. It presents enough points of view, in an assortment of alternative narratives, to make us ponder things we thought we’d understood, and didn’t. You’ll meet characters you feel you already know, and laugh and cry with them. Don’t miss this one.

Photo:

Photo Credit: Machpe photography

Run Time: 2 Hours, 45 minutes, with one twenty- minute intermission

PILLAR RABBIT is produced by The Baltimore Playwrights Festival at Spotlighters Theatre 817 Saint Paul Street, Baltimore MD 21202-2472 - (410) 752-1225

on Thursday, August 22, Friday, August 23, Saturday, August 24 at 8 PM and Sunday, August 25 at 2 PM. 

Ticket prices- 

Adults:  $24;  Seniors, Students, Military:  $21, Ten Spot Thursday (Aug 22, 2024, 8pm)  $10

Tickets are available online.

Final Factoid: Downtown parking is tricky. Please allow yourself extra time to find some, or use public transit or a ride service instead.

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