Review: Humor and Moral Dilemmas Play Hand in Hand at ANY GIVEN MONDAY

Take one college philosophy student, her two Jewish parents, one an English teacher, the other an event/wedding planner, and an Irish Catholic uncle and throw thiem in a South Philiadelphia aparment for a Monday night football game. This eclectic mix of characters on stage ponders moral questions from a mutilayered, throught- provoking perspective and offers a hilarious evening when In Tandem Theatre opens there season at Tenth Street Theatre producing Any Given Monday.

Playwright Bruce Graham's award-winning career includes a 2010 Barrymore honor for this complex and comic play about anger, vicarious violence, and a Chinese American man named Dang who committed suicide after four homeless poeple jumped on the subway tracks in front of his train. This perhaps appears slightly reminiscent of Athol Fugard's The Train Driver, where a homeless woman and her children step in front of a train to end their poor existence. Any Given Monday places Dang and this tragedy in the background and surrounds the event with verious social dilemmas. In Graham's American exploration of this event, an irreverent and comic spin complete with an affair, another murder, foul F-language and what a human's deepest inner thought life might be to solving injustice in society suddenly becomes an exhiilerating entertainment.

Yet, an audience approaches Sarah;s character, the philosphy major who contemplates the existence of free will, teenage suicide, white guilt and the classic phrase, "out of evel can come good," so any audience leaves the theater in a whirlwind of laughter and serious discussions concerning contemporary society--especially with another recent school shooting in the headlines, a presidential election ahead, and Syrian refugees streaming into Europe from a war they had no choice or vote in. What can a philosophy student similar to Sarah do or say?

Four marvelous actors give Graham's pithy two hour play pitch perfect timing under the master of comedy Director Chris Flieller. Doug Jarecki embodies Lenny, the English teacher who "does the right thing," including pulling out a chair for his wife at a restaurant, and then will be ridiculed for observing this lost gentlemanly art. As Mick, Lenny's best buddy and brother-in-law who works in the subway, Todd Denning shows Milwaukee his grittier side in a great performance far from the First Stage theater. Tiersa Ferrano, a returning to the stage actor, debuts in the role of Risa, a conflicted woman in her Jewishness and domestic life who misunderstands her daughter Sarah and herself.

Former Milwaukee Rep intern Leeanna Rubin steals several scenes playing Sarah, the daughter who narrates and questions these moral actions from her Jewish heritage and under the guise of philosophical theory. Of course, she firsts tells the audience her father's favorite movie is To Kill A Mockingbird, which adds another iconic element to the play's backstory. After a Monday night football game night, Sarah discovers the theoretical becomes practical and intensely real right before her eyes, while Rubin demonstrates a sublte panache and theatrical understatement for a young actor in this role.

Theoretically and practically, an audience could revisit this play and the mulitple themes several times. Discover a radically new event or phrase to ponder from their seats or afterwards the following week. Challenge themselves with thinking similar to Sarah, why and how and for what reason? Do these events make a a difference? How will we solve these dilemmas..perhaps the current one circulating regarding gun control? In Tandem's amazing Any Given Monday should be seen on any given night---to awaken through laughter the sleeping subconscious of the personal and cutural mindset that can often be taken for granted on any ordinary day.

In Tandem Theatre presents Any Given Monday at Tenth Street Theatre, 628 North 19th Street through October 25, whcih is best suited for those 16 and over. Or purchase a Milwaukee City Tin-Performing Arts in the next two weeks and donate to In Tandem Theatre by contacting https://citytins.com/non-profit-products//np=in-tandem-theatre. For information on their upcoming season, and their December 7 and 14 fundraiser "The Eight Reindeer Monologues," performance scheudule or tickets, please call; 414.271.1371 or www.intandemtheatre.org.

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