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Rock Out

nytheatre.com review by Leslie Bramm
August 15, 2005

“Rock out” v. 1) To blast your favorite music. 2) To wail on an air guitar. 3) To dance like a banshee in the privacy of your living room and or office.I liked Gregory Jones’s Rock Out for encompassing all three of those definitions. A play with no spoken words, the narrative is communicated via the songs the characters lip-sync, to each other and when they’re alone. The songs themselves are eclectic and include works by Marvin Gaye, The Cars, and The Beastie Boys; any play that opens with Led Zeppelin’s “Over the Hills and Far Away” already has me in its corner.It’s a simple yuppie boy meets yuppie girl story. They are both lonely in an age where our ability to communicate has reached new heights. Empty voicemails, empty emails, empty answering machines, “you have no new messages.” Nobody loves you, nobody wants you, not even your cat. What else is there to do, but crank up your favorite song and rock it all out?Gregory Jones writes and performs, while the choreography is courtesy of his co-star, Tiffany Hodges. Both Jones and Hodges portray our romantic wannabes, Gary and Mary, with agility and aplomb. Both actors are charismatic and I never tired of watching them.The play has an ensemble that helps create various locations for our music-crossed lovers. Office party, subways. They support the play well and include: the talented Lee Barton, the amazing Jenna Harris, the wowing Juliet Heller, and the spectacular Laura Lance. The production also focuses nicely on the details, from painted backdrops used to suggest the locations (they were rolled in and out on garment racks; you need to tape those edges down, people) to my favorite, the CD cases that don’t bear the appropriate album covers for the music, but this year’s sunflower FringeNYC logo. Credit also to the Linhart Theatre for providing an awesome sound system.I wish the play was a bit longer; the author may have thought that the device of the song-a-scene could easily play itself out, and it might have, but at 40 minutes the piece needs a bit more fleshing, or rocking, out. I never understood what Mary would see in her co-worker Gary, nor did I really believe that these two good-looking and charming people would ever want for dates and or the attentions they desired. I’m sure these types of folks do suffer and I would have liked to understand it.Rock Out is light, fun, and fast. It won’t leave your head filled with the wisdom of the ages, but will leave your feet tapping and a song in your voice.