Listen: Theater: Santaland Diaries
Saturday, December 01, 2007
MARY COLURSO
News staff writer
David Sedaris' writing is as pointed as an icicle.
The celebrated commentator for National Public Radio doesn't aim to warm the heart with his essays and monologues. Sedaris seeks to pierce the brain with witty, sarcastic humor.
His two holiday pieces, "The Santaland Diaries" and "Season's Greetings," stand in sharp contrast to the avalanche of seasonal sweetness that comes crashing down in December.
They're dark. They're smart. They're snarky. At times, they're laugh-out-loud funny.
Hidebound traditionalists and those with rigid Christmas spirit might want to steer clear of Birmingham Festival Theatre's production of Sedaris' works, which runs through Dec. 15.
The rest of us can attend without a trace of holiday guilt, reveling in the wickedly amusing situations laid out by Sedaris. They are skillfully interpreted by a local cast of two.
Director John Batson bravely and wisely decided not to weaken "Santaland Diaries" (performed by Shawn Castle) or truncate "Season's Greetings" (performed by Beth Kitchin).
Instead, Batson has chosen actors who appreciate the playwright's sensibility, understand his sense of timing and know how to manipulate his language.
Castle - chunky and marvelously cynical - relates Sedaris' experiences working as an elf in a department-store Santaland. He offers the unrepentant confessions of a subversive sprite, one who undermines the relentlessly cheerful atmosphere at Macy's and makes scary comments to the kids.
Kitchin - angular and mock outraged - recites a prim Christmas letter to family and friends, relating the newfound woes of her previously "perfect" family. It seems their smooth and prosperous surface has been ruffled by an unwelcome visitor: the daughter her husband fathered 22 years ago in Vietnam.
Each monologue lasts about an hour, which seems exactly right, and provides many opportunities for the solo performer to sparkle. In Sedaris' world, that translates to jabs of evil glee ("Santaland") or heights of farcical disdain ("Season's Greetings").
On opening night, Castle made a few small goofs in his lines and failed to offer a convincing imitation of Billie Holiday singing "Away in a Manger." (Don't ask; it's in the script.) Elsewhere, though, he was precisely on target.
Kitchin was extremely effective, as well, using a stilted, acidic accent that suited her character and underlined the monologue's black comedy.
What could be better? Seeing the masterful Sedaris perform his own works on stage, of course. But in his absence, Birmingham Festival Theatre offers a near pitch-perfect substitute.
See the full review here on al.com's website.
Wednesday, October 31, 2007
ALEC HARVEY
News staff writer
Doug Wright's "Quills" is not an easy play to like.
This fictional account of the last days of the Marquis de Sade - the French aristocrat who spent his final years in an insane asylum in the early 19th century - pulls no punches when it comes to the Marquis and his writing, which many considered pornographic. The language is vulgar, the situations depicted are at times depraved, and Stephen French, who plays the Marquis, spends the better part of the long, long play naked as a jaybird.
That being said, Birmingham Festival Theatre's production of the 1995 play (turned into an award-winning movie starring Geoffrey Rush) is often fascinating, if a bit uneven and unnerving. And the play - perhaps even more so than the movie - hammers home the underlying themes of "Quills," both about freedom of expression and whether excessive punishment sometimes exceeds the boundaries of humanity.
Director Dane Peterson, so good as the star of Wright's "I Am My Own Wife," obviously has an affinity for the playwright's work, and his production jumps full force into all that "Quills" requires, both good and bad.
At the center is French's fine performance, a whirlwind of a part that takes him from one extreme to another. One moment, he's hysterically funny. The next, he's talking about things so sadistic you don't want to listen. The next moment, he's, well, naked.
French sheds his clothes at the end of the first act, when the Marquis' writing leads to a tragedy at the asylum. The beginning of a torturous punishment - meted by Dr. Royer-Collard, who runs the asylum, and the Abbe de Coulmier, the young priest who assists him - is stripping the Marquis of everything he can write with or write on, although he finds a hideous solution to this dilemma.
French's Marquis is a marvel, but Elmo Ranelli and James Lee Griner, as the Abbe and the doctor, don't fare quite as well.
Some fine support is given by David Roberts and Karla Stamps, who are hysterical as Monsieur Prouix and Renee Pelagie, and Jessica Tyner Rushing as Madeleine and Sara Carroll as Madame Royer-Collard are adequate.
Peterson uses strobe lighting between scenes, an effect that wears thin early on
Still, if you can stomach the subject matter, this "Quills" is worth a look.
See the full review here on al.com's website.
Listen: Theater: Quills
Saturday, September 15, 2007
ALEC HARVEY
News staff writer
Frankly, my dear, "Moonlight and Magnolias" is hit and miss.
When it's operating on all cylinders, it'll make you laugh out loud. But at times it feels as long and drawn out as the epic book and film that is at its core.
Ron Hutchinson's play imagines what happened during a time that Hollywood lore says is true, when producer David O. Selznick shut down production on "Gone With the Wind" and holed up in his office for five days with a new director and writer to create what would become one of history's iconic movies.
Birmingham Festival Theatre's production of "Moonlight and Magnolias," directed by Mark Castle, is bolstered by four actors who keep the sometimes plodding action moving along as best they can.
Doug O'Neil is pitch-perfect as screenwriter Ben Hecht, brought in to adapt a beloved book he has never read. Jonathan Goldstein is enjoyable as Victor Fleming, whom Selznick rescues from "Wizard of Oz" duty to take over the reins of his Civil War epic. And Ginny S. Loggins, given very little to do, makes the most of it as Selznick's thankless secretary.
As Selznick, Edwin Booth is fun, but he might have benefited from one more night of rehearsal. The role is a difficult one, filled with funny, blustery dialogue, and there were a number of stumbles on opening night. He's at his funniest playing the role of Scarlett, as Selznick and Fleming act out "Gone With the Wind" for a bewildered Hecht.
A problem with "Moonlight and Magnolia" is that it doesn't seem to know what it wants to be. Most often, it's a comedy, as the three men try their darndest to bring "GWTW" to the big screen. But it veers into heavy drama at times, with Selznick and Hecht - two Jews - at odds over their treatment in Hollywood during Hitler's reign of terror.
The jump between comedy and drama is uneasy, and Hutchinson might have been wise to stick with one or the other and maybe in the process trim his own little two-hour-plus epic.
Still, fans of "Gone With the Wind" will revel in this behind-the-scenes look at the making of a classic and just how close it came to disaster.
See the full review here on al.com's website.
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
ALEC HARVEY
News staff writer
"Fuddy Meers" isn't going to sound very funny.
It's about an amnesiac. Each day when she wakes up, her brain is a blank slate. On this morning she's re-introduced to her drug-addled son and is kidnapped and taken to the home of a stroke victim who has trouble forming sentences.
Barrel of laughs, huh?
Oddly enough, it is. David Lindsay-Abaire has concocted a rollicking ride, and Birmingham Festival Theatre's production, which runs through Aug. 4, is a hoot.
The play is a little less than two hours of pure lunacy, and director Janelle Cochrane and her cast are certainly up to the task.
"Fuddy Meers" is another day in the life of Claire, a woman with amnesia who wakes up each morning with her husband, Richard, and her son, Kenny, trying to fill in the many gaps in her memory. On this particular day, she's kidnapped by a Limping Man and his strange friend, Millet, who take her to Gertie's house, where the secret of Claire's amnesia and who these crazy characters are unfolds.
Some of the actors, like Howard Green as Richard and Amy Donahoo Light as Claire, play it straight; others, like J. Heath Mixon as Millet (and his trash-talking hand-puppet) and Aaron White as Limping Man, are as loony as they come; the others - Evan Miller as Kenny, Sarah Schiesz as Heidi and Debbie Smith as Gertie - fall somewhere in between the two extremes. The overall effect is a play that is always a bit off-kilter, which is exactly where it needs to be.
There isn't a weak link in the cast, but shining brightest on opening night were Mixon and Smith. Mixon manages to take the silliest of characters, a man who speaks most honestly through the puppet on his hand, and make him one of the sanest characters on stage. Smith, as the speech-challenged Gertie, is more than up to the task of reciting the gibberish that Lindsay-Abaire has written for her character.
"Fuddy Meers" is violent and sad and filled with foul language and adult subject matter. But it's also darned funny, a nice summer treat from the folks at BFT.
See the full review here on al.com's website.
Saturday, June 09, 2007
ALEC HARVEY
News staff writer
Dane Peterson has made such a name for himself as a director in Birmingham in recent years, it's easy to forget what a fine actor he can be.
But "I Am My Own Wife" - the Pulitzer Prize-winning one-man show that opened Thursday at Birmingham Festival Theatre - provides ample opportunity for him to remind us.
One-man shows are tricky, and in the case of "I Am My Own Wife," it's about as tricky as it gets.
Doug Wright's play, which also won the Tony Award for 2004, is about Charlotte von Mahlsdorf, a transvestite who survived the Nazi and Communist regimes in Berlin. That in itself would be a challenge for an actor, but "I Am My Own Wife" offers much more.
Peterson plays 40 characters, including Mahlsdorf as a confused young boy, the overbearing father that he murders, and the playwright, who is a central character in his own show as he goes through the process of writing a play about von Mahlsdorf.
It's a wonderful piece of writing, weaving a tale that spans decades and countries. The show is harrowing, humorous and touching, and director Barry Austin and Peterson ably capture the many mood changes along the way.
They're helped tremendously by Amanda Thomas' set, the lush parlor of von Mahlsdorf's "museum," and her lighting design, which is used to great effect throughout the show.
But none of this would work without Peterson, who seamlessly jumps from character to character, always returning to the quiet, surprising and somewhat mysterious Charlotte von Mahlsdorf.
"I Am My Own Wife" certainly lives up to its hype.
Listen: Theater: I Am My Own Wife
Birmingham Festival Theater's I Am My Own Wife runs through Saturday, June 23rd.
