Review: Don't Miss Eugene Ionesco's Hilarious, Horrifying RHINOCEROS at the Asolo Repertory Theatre

"Life is an abnormal business." --A line from Eugene Ionesco's RHINOCEROS

Teachers see it all the time. Good students verging on the geeky side trying to fit in with the cool kids. I remember one particular 12-year-old student of mine ten years ago, a nerdy little blonde kid who looked nine or ten and wore thick glasses and talked like Yogi Bear's pal, Boo Boo. "Mr. Nason," he said to me. "I have made a decision. I think I'm going to become a Goth." The next day he arrived to class with his hair dyed and his fingernails painted black. He looked like Marilyn Manson's Mini-Me. He started hanging out with the Goth kids--just another clique in the hall. Back then Goths may have seen themselves as outsiders, but the entire lot of them sure sported the same painted black fingernails and dyed hair. They may have preached anti-conformity, but we know when anti-conformity for its own sake becomes just a different method of conforming.

I thought of that kid, and others like him, while watching Eugene Ionesco's Absurdist masterpiece--an anti-conformity classic--RHINOCEROS at the Asolo's Mertz Theatre (which runs thru April 14th). Ionesco's world was far bleaker than my land of wannabe Goth-kids and Geeks-turned-Jocks. He was dealing directly with fascism. Imagine seeing your friends, or people who you thought were your friends, suddenly succumbing to Nazi philosophies, most of them changing, even agreeing with the anti-Semitism that peppered their world into darkness. It must have been shattering. So he captured the feeling of this using the broadest strokes possible--instead of Nazis, they turned into rhinos.

But what makes RHINOCEROS so utterly riveting today is that this particular production is playing during a time of "fake news" and "post-truths." We may not be there yet, but we see a myriad of people, seemingly good people, family and friends alike, drinking the current chaotic proto-authoritarian Kool-Aid. Can RHINOCEROS, nearly sixty years old, really be this timely?

The show is also quite funny, and you will find yourself laughing out loud during it, but you may also find yourself holding your gut at the same time. It's quite chilling--like The Walking Dead or Invasion of the Body Snatchers, but with rhinos instead of zombies or pod people. Absurd, yes, but just as unnerving.

It also helps that the production at the Asolo is top-notched. It will be a difficult task to find a better production of this anywhere--not Broadway, where the original featured Zero Mostel, Eli Wallach, and Jean Stapleton; and certainly not the 1974 movie that reunited Mostel with his co-star of The Producers, Gene Wilder.

This RHINOCEROS has plenty of aces up its sleeve, the best of which may be its cast. Is it overstatement to suggest that David Breitbarth is one of the finest actors in all of Florida? Throughout his career, he has a versatility that is hard to match--from haunting Puritans to hilarious reporters to Southern villains. He can play Everymen and character types with equal aplomb. And you never see a moment of untruth with him onstage--everything is real, in the moment, and the stakes are always high.

As Berenger, the last man standing in Ionesco's Rhino Land (Paris), he has one of the more difficult roles. Here's an Average Joe, a semi-slacker who is suddenly faced with the horror that he may be the only human remaining. It's a draining role, Absurdism's Hamlet. But there's not one false note here; it's a totally alive, searingly real performance. We find ourselves glad that he is our last chance amid a wild pack of perissodactlys.

Equally as good is Matt DeCaro as Gene, whose transformation into Rhino-hood is a sight to behold. Here is a fierce actor who leaves nothing left on the stage. It's hilarious and horrifying, and yet there is a sadness underneath it all. It's a brave performance, more showy than most, and yet DeCaro keeps it grounded, never over the top...or at least as grounded as one can be when turning into one of the titular beasts before our very eyes.

Matt McGee once again shows off his drag chops as the café' owner who opens the play singing an Edith Piaf tune. It is an obvious stunt--putting Piaf in a French café is like playing Dean Martin in a pizzeria. But McGee sings so deliciously that we forgive the cliche being forced upon us. He may sound like Edith, but he looks more like a different Edith--Edith Bunker melded with Ethel Mertz. And when he removes his wig in a nightmarish moment in Act 2 (a terrific Ionesco in-joke--a bald soprano), he's like the Second Coming of Rachel Rosenthal, the great L.A. performance artist. His Mr. Papillon is given equal gusto and helps once again display his versatility.

The rest of the cast does stellar work as well, including Andrew Bosworth, Amy Helms, Laura Rook, Dustin Babin, Chirstopher Carlson, Anthony J. Hamilton, Nolan Fitzgerald Hennelly, Amber Lageman, Brandon Dahlquist, Matt Mueller and Peggy Roeder as a very odd Mrs. Boeuf. They play Berenger's co-workers, the café clientele and the townspeople. And seeing them become rhinoceroses as the play moves forward is harrowing and quite entertaining. Make no mistake...there's no other play quite like this one.

The true star of this Ionesco treasure chest is director Frank Galati. He has guided an incredible production--where all aspects (acting, tech, set pieces) come together to give us more than just a memorable stage production. This is a life-changer, where a nearly 60 year old play is just as horrifying, just as gut-wrenchingly funny as it was when first written.

Robert Perdziola's set pieces, especially a gargantuan rhinoceros that rears its Goliath head in Act 2, are to die for. Perdziola's costumes and Michelle Hart's wigs hit just the right note. Chirs Ostrom's lighting, where the show gets gradually darker as it moves on, could not be better. Joe Cerqua's sound is one of the best parts of this incredible production--a constant seat-rattling rumbling, so effective that the show should be retitled RHINOCEROS: IN SENSURROUND.

Rarely do I find my jaw dropping in awe while watching a show. It's a rarity, but when it happens, it must be noted. That is what is so incredible about the Asolo Theatre's production of Eugene Ionesco's Absurdist classic: My jaw dropped TWICE. Literally. I was sitting there, mouth agape, at two moments in the show: One during Act 1 when a backdrop slowly rises and the actors are in a freeze tableaux behind it, and the other during Act 2, when we first see the monstrous rhinoceros set piece. It's rare to have one jaw-dropping moment, but two? It must be one off-the-charts production. And that's what this RHINOCEROS, balancing both hilarity and horror equally, most certainly is.

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