I would be less than honest if I failed to point out that this year’s “ Best of ” list is woefully marred by exclusion. There was an impressive number of compelling shows throughout 2011, but the following list contains the shows that touched me most deeply. When you see a lot of theatre, the pieces that break new ground, take more chances, resist traditional classification, tend to grab your attention and linger in your brain. In a year of abundantly entertaining and confident theatre, the pathos, audacity, ferocity, playfulness and sheer ingenuity of these ten shows stood out.
Spring Awakening (Water Tower Theatre) Following the touring company that appeared in ATTPAC, Director Terry Martin brought the local premiere of Spring Awakening to Addison. Steven Sater and Duncan Sheik’s musical adaptation of Frank Wedekind’s drama (written in 1891) Spring Awakening grapples with all the exhilaration and excruciation that comes with adolescent sexuality and love. The characters are lost, elated, enraged, despondent and Dionysian, but it all seems valid. It all works. Spring Awakening was no candy-ass reverie on sweet, gentle, puppy love, but a howl of loneliness in a downpour. Martin’s powerful cast (including Lulu Ward, Kayla Carlyle, Erica Harte, Adam Garst) tore up the stage with titanic, equine choreography by John de los Santos. The result was a volcanic evening of anger and tears.
Oleanna (The Dallas Actor’s Lab) Carol, a student with serious self-esteem issues, shows up at her professor's office for an unscheduled meeting. John is in the midst of a telephone conversation, discussing details of closing the sale on his home. From this premise playwright David Mamet drags us into unexpected, nightmarish realms of vindictiveness, confusion and despair. Oleanna was brilliant, aggravating, unnerving. Savvy and intense. Natalie Young and Kyle Lemieux were stunning in this merciless piece that takes us to the ugly realms of cunning, manipulation and political expediency. Never have I left a theater feeling so conflicted. Or clobbered.
Red Light Winter (Second Thought Theatre) Many of us remember the buzz this show ignited as the promotional material warned there would be prolonged frontal nudity. Few were prepared for the irony that nudity was the least of it. Two American best friends share a flat in Amsterdam. Matt is a writer and Davis is a publisher. Matt has been wrestling with isolation, depression, and a persistent bout with illness. Not ten minutes into Red Light Winter we witness his failed suicide attempt. Davis returns with Christina, a French sex worker who seems quiet and subdued. Davis has decided a sexual encounter just might have a healing effect on Matt’s despondency. Red Light Winter drags us deeper and deeper into the abyss these three lost souls inhabit. Heartbreaking doesn’t cover it. Neither does painful. Playwright Adam Rapp has fashioned a compass to guide us through a blinding shitstorm. Or maybe it just leaves us there. Director Regan Adair, Alex Organ (Davis) Drew Wall (Matt) Natalie Young (Christina) have done phenomenal work here. Nothing less. This kind of material is so difficult and dangerous, so brave and unrelenting, you can’t help but admire the dedication it must take to explore these dark, angry, elegiac realms.
The Violet Hour (Upstart and Project X Theatre Productions ) Imagine a play that’s comedic, yet tragic, pensive, yet playful, full of bravado, yet somehow frail. The premise of The Violet Hour is quizzical, yet playwright Richard Greenberg manages to excavate an astonishing, visionary plot from simple ideas. Should we base our decisions on possible outcome or unequivocal ethics? John “Pace” Seavering, a fledgling publisher at the beginning of the twentieth century, must choose between publishing the unwieldy, gargantuan first book of close college friend, Denis McCleary, or his paramour, Jazz chanteuse, Jessie Brewster. Pace is torn between this devotion to his best friend and his lover. The Violet Hour reinforced my faith that theatre can still rattle, delight, provoke, seduce and yes, gladden our hearts. It invited us to a glittering universe of the possible
The Crowd You’re In With (Rover Dramawerks) Jasper and Melinda are throwing an informal July 4th party for their friends. They are considering pregnancy, which sparks the revelation that Karen and Tom are childless by choice. What follows thereafter is a volatile debate over parenthood versus living without progeny. Before long emotions are running high. Feelings are bruised and the party ends abruptly. The folks at Rover Dramawerks in Plano continue to demonstrate a knack for finding rich, highly intelligent, compelling drama that comes in under conventional radar. The actors are skilled and subtle. The narratives surprising, engaging and provocative. Rebecca Gilman’s The Crowd You’re In With raised the question of why and how we procreate, and far more unsettling questions. It makes you wonder about issues like social pressure, honesty, and the elusive dream of tolerance. Despite the fact that American Civilization continues to get older, will we ever truly evolve?
In the Next Room or The Vibrator Play (Kitchen Dog Theatre) Anyone with the audacity to name a piece : In the Next Room or The Vibrator Play better know what they’re doing. Playwright Sarah Ruhl has proven she has those chops, and more. The title suggests something frank and salacious, yet mysterious. I’m not sure if it’s feminist (or gender) epiphany masquerading as sexual satire, or tragedy in the guise of class struggle, but despite an unmistakable tone shift, The Vibrator Play is an astonishing fusion of disparate elements. It flouts our obsessive need to categorize shows and pretty much makes its own rules, juggling strong, raucous or tender emotions like fine Limoge, mocking us as we wince. It took what might have been merely clever, and turned it into poetry, bathos, epiphany.
Cabaret (Dallas Theatre Center) Cabaret was an ode to the necessity of cynicism, shattered by its better angels. It tempted audiences with the confection of sumptuous depravity, proffered by the Kit Kat Club of 1930’s Berlin. The dancers were girls and boys, in suggestively torn clothes, flirting brazenly with the audience. Cabaret exploited our ambivalence about sex, pleasure, happiness, virtue. When Sally belts the tale of roommate Elsie, who fought despondency with promiscuity and substance abuse, it made perfect sense. We’re all going to die, anyway, so why not numb the pain? This is when the beautiful corpses inhabiting the The Kit Kat Club seemed less innocuous. And this is the genius of Kander, Ebb and Masteroff. The milieu is so enticing, so vibrant, we hardly realize we’re glimpsing the Nazi underbelly. Cabaret held us all accountable.
Next to Normal (Uptown Players) Bryan Yorkey (writer) and Tom Kitt (composer) took on quite a challenge with Next to Normal. Like attempting to write a piece about, say, death or Christmas or orphans, the topic (one woman's struggle with Bi-Polar Disorder) is so fraught with emotion, it’s difficult to say anything relevant or genuine without stooping to manipulation. Similar to Ordinary People, Next to Normal might have more to do with unresolved interpersonal conflicts, than the triggering event. Is full-on grief a path to self-destruction, or a necessary step in the healing process? Kitt and Yorkey avoid pitfalls of the genre. The lyrics in Next to Normal lean more towards accuracy than cleverness, though there’s plenty of sardonic wit. Even intense moments are subdued, and the poignant, blissfully free of spin. Next to Normal sought out the unvarnished truth of the matter, while ultimately, avoiding blame. It was coherent, deeply affecting, and surprisingly, life-affirming.
Requiem for a Heavyweight (Level Ground Arts) Originating as a teleplay written by Rod Serling for Playhouse 90 in 1956, Requiem for a Heavyweight is a stirring, deeply affecting drama, aching with pathos and humanity. Director, Billy Fountain chose to retain the squalid fifties milieu, with its blue collar urban lingo, and it worked surprisingly well. Fountain knows just how to manage chemistry and tone, and kept this painful material from spilling into melodrama. At 33, Mountain McClintock is finished after 14 years of being a formidable prizefighter. Now he must start from scratch, overcome by loyalty to a manager who may not have his best interests at heart. Requiem for a Heavyweight was a powerful story about the cost of caring in a world that encourages cannibalism and rage. Daylon Walton led a crackerjack cast of colorful, sometimes cynical characters. Rhonda Durant brought an exceptional, beatific energy to the story, as the tremulous social worker, Grace. Walton was overwhelming in the difficult role of McClintock, and his scenes with Durant blinded me with tears.
Black Comedy (Rover Dramawerks) Director Lisa Devine never chooses a project (it seems) without challenging herself and the audience. The result is an implacable mixture of the wrenching and sublime. In September she selected an early, experimental play: Black Comedy by Peter Shaffer (The Royal Hunt of the Sun, Equus and Amadeus). Originally staged in 1965, Black Comedy is predicated on an ingenious conceit : if a group with hidden animosity were plunged into darkness, how would they behave towards one another? For logistical reasons, the actors must pretend they are obstructed in this way. But you begin to realize this premise is a launching pad for pondering the nature of truth and salience. What aspects of reality are we simply unwilling to confront, even when they’re unmistakably on display? It all happens with such unexpected verve and velocity that it takes awhile to process. A lot of came together after the fact, but it doesn’t matter. Any literature of substance has much going on between the lines, and Devine had the expertise and inspiration to explore subtext, while keeping the narrative thread connected. Kudos to Devine (and Rover) for having the vision to risk this marvelously unorthodox and compelling show.
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