FringeNYC 2005 Reviews - Page 1

Genius Famous
reviewed by Martin Denton

I have to admit to feeling a bit confounded by Genius Famous. This facetious new musical comedy by Jason Atkinson boasts an energetic cast, a talented director, and a couple of neat and probably workable concepts. In places it has the self-referential jocularity of an Avenue Q. But too often the show seems rudderless and/or fuzzy; you'll note that I mentioned two concepts just now, and Genius Famous feels very torn between them.

On the one hand, the show is about a young artist's obsession with celebrity. At the top of Genius Famous, we're told that songwriter Richard Bantam is both of those titular adjectives—or at least he's got genius now, with the fame expected to follow very soon. Apparently Richard is more worried about being prominent than staying true to his art, and one of the tracks in Genius Famous's plot tests Richard's resilience to help him learn a (presumed) lesson about humility and being true to himself.

On the other hand, there's a character named Barkley Vordenstein, a one-time punk- or acid-rocker who is now a prisoner in a jingle-writing factory, which he is plotting to take over and adapt to his own dastardly ends—something along the lines of creating music that is so painful that it kills people. (There are, alas, a few examples of such music—intentional—in the score.) The Barkley plotline is vaguely sci-fi and deliberately kitschy, a la Ed Wood.

Atkinson doesn't manage to blend the two stories very dexterously; in fact they collide frequently with each other, and also with the jokey style in which the entire show is performed: actors break the fourth wall all the time, talking to the audience and, occasionally, to the pianist; characters seem to be aware that they're in a musical; and for some strange reason Barkley serves as narrator for approximately the first 20 minutes of the show. Atkinson and director Ryan J. Davis seem to be reaching for parody by emphasizing elements that are deliberately corny (such as the Carole King-ish song called "Yellow Sneakers" that eventually "defeats" Barkley and his nefarious scheme) or deliberately silly (like the rainbow-colored jump rope with which Barkley is tied to his chair). And Atkinson's music and lyrics seem intentionally designed to be un-musical and un-lyrical, for the most part. (There's a song called "I'm the Shit," for example.)

At least I think all of this is deliberate; ultimately I was unsure of precisely what the creators of this piece have in mind. The cast works hard, but they don't clarify things: Carson Hinners is very likable as Richard and Kat Ross is earnest as his love interest, Candace; and the five-member ensemble (Sarah Bunker, Elle Chauviere, Matt David, Sarah Jenkins, and Topher Mikels), who probably have the most stage time, all make good impressions.

The Redemption
reviewed by Kaipo Schwab

The 1960s was a time of civil unrest and political action, not only for the United States but for places as far away as West Bengal, India. 45 years later it seems that one man cannot escape those turbulent times, despite having moved to America and made a fine life for himself and his family.

The Redemption, written and directed by Sudipta Bhawmik, introduces us to the private struggle of Subimal, a man who was once a follower of the charismatic leader Charu Mazumdar and a Communist rebel in a small village called Naxalbari in his native India. As the play opens Subimal and his son Somu, a junior at Harvard, are packing boxes in preparation for a move to a bigger house when Somu comes across an old diary of his father's. In it are details of Subimal’s capture by the police and his subsequent betrayal of his comrades, including Subimal’s brother-in-law, while under extreme torture. In Somu’s quest to understand how his father could have possibly betrayed and murdered his friends and family and wreaked such havoc on the lives of his countrymen, both father and son come to understand the full weight of the burden Subimal has carried with him all these years and begin to put his self-chastisement to rest.

Sankar Ghoshal as Subimal carries the bulk of the story and his overall work is solid although at times he looked a bit under-rehearsed (some lines seemed flubbed or he would jump his co-stars' lines). Amitav Roy as Somu and Mayuresh Khare as Bhaskar, Subimal’s brother-in-law, don’t seem as comfortable in their roles yet, but they approach the piece with gusto nevertheless. Keka Sarkar’s elegant, soft-spoken portrayal of Chandrima, Subimal’s wife, comes off best, being memorable in what amounts to a four-minute cameo.

The Indian music by Partha Sarathi Mukherjee and sound by Indranil Mukherjee nicely complements the work on stage. Arunansu Dasgupta does what he can with the few lighting instruments available at Dixon Place.

The simple set consisting of moving boxes and a random assortment of books and magazines is also standard FringeNYC fare, but in this case the starkness works well enough to convey the emotional space Subimal has boxed himself into all these years.

The Social Affair
reviewed by Eric Beckson

The six men and women who perform in The Social Affair, as well as the non-performing co-executive producers Michelle MaClay and Tasha Space, collaborate to write and direct a dozen comedy sketches running 71 minutes.

Billy Wood kicks off the show with a silly dance routine reminiscent of the little old man dancing in the ubiquitous Six Flags theme park commercial. Later, he demonstrates his versatility in a spot-on impersonation of Rodney Dangerfield. With his timing and charisma, he is obviously a veteran of the comedy club circuit.

Theron Steiner (short balding white guy wearing glasses) seems like the antithesis of a hip-hop performer. But his rap sketch is sneaky funny, as he drifts off into lyrics from light rock. In another sketch, his vulgar haiku about bodily functions and anatomy flops. (Being disgusting is only a promising start in comedy.)

Matt McCarthy is very funny as an Irish Catholic priest taking roll call at a public school. Facing the audience, he mangles the students’ names as he interacts with them (we hear only his side of the conversation). McCarthy’s naïve, sheltered disposition contrasts with the ethnic diversity of the student body.

Michael Muldoon has the good looks and poise of a successful model or actor. He might even be funny if he wasn’t doing the played-out "weekend update" routine or Darth Vader at a job interview (promising, but goes nowhere). Batman as a night club comedian is funnier due to the innovative use of props.

I’m still wondering if "Mein Eggs" is funny. Jenny Rubin reads Mein Kampf as if she were reading Dr. Seuss to children. Alternating, Matt McCarthy reads Dr. Seuss like Hitler giving a speech at Nuremburg. And that’s the sketch! It’s another study in contrast—short and straightforward. Jenny Rubin, in another sketch, plays a male movie director from the studio era, but the cliché of a fast talking, demanding Hollywood character kills the piece.

Allen Warnock plays a bizarre spectacle of a human being, first as an intentionally bad auditioning actor (very grating), and the other as a CEO giving a pep rally to employees. Mr. Warnock is a gifted comic actor. Just a curl of the lip or a sideways glance from him can make one smile. The auditioning actor sketch simply goes on too long without variation, while the CEO sketch is burdened by the cliché of a money-hungry corporate sleazebag.

The youngest members of the audience roared with laughter in the first fifteen minutes, and then settled down to moderate, sporadic laughter. I laughed much less; hardly, in fact. I’ve seen sketch and standup comedy for a long time, so by now I must be hardboiled.

Slow Children Playing
reviewed by Rachel Macklin

With a warm, easy smile on a hot August night, Anna Marie Agniel tells us to slow down. Only by slowing down will we be able to truly understand the world of Slow Children Playing, Agniel’s solo performances piece about her sister, Mary Kate.

As an infant, Agniel’s sister, Mary Kate, was diagnosed with Isodicentric 15, a chromosome abnormality. In short, she is developmentally disabled, but as Agniel soon shows us, these mental weaknesses do not dampen the often comically unique idiosyncrasies of Mary Kate. The piece is presented as one long monologue broken up by occasional voiceovers of Agniel describing a particular event or moment in Mary Kate’s life. Within this monologue we also catch a glimpse of Agniel herself, as well as the rest of her family.

Agniel is a fine actor who pulls us into her sister’s environment with beautiful precision and focus. She does not merely imitate Mary Kate, which would be a disservice. Instead, she constructs her sister intricately with her own body: her mannerisms, speech patterns, and thought process reveal a woman with good-natured wit and charm whose struggles are real and poignant. Even Mary Kate’s voice is a vast departure from Agniel’s own, and we have to listen carefully to catch every word. Yet, as with any foreign dialect or language, it slowly becomes familiar to our ears and we begin to enjoy its strange musicality.

Agniel consistently reintroduces the definition of the word “slow” into the piece, a motif that I felt was unnecessary after its initial reading because the meaning was quite clear. Occasionally, I was unsure why she had chosen to show us certain moments and felt that the progression of Mary Kate’s story could have been more strongly shaped. However, her goal seems to be to give us a sincere portrayal of her likewise brutally honest sister, striving to take us beyond her condition and connect with the hopes, desires and dreams we all share. She succeeds admirably with Slow Children Playing.

Hit
reviewed by Alyssa Simon

American popular culture is known throughout the world for its icons. The Cowboy, the Action Hero, the Blonde Bombshell—all have their place in the lexicon. It seems, however, that the most popular of them all lately is the Gangster. Whether it's Tony Soprano revealing his feminine side in therapy or writers using gangster characters to make statements about the American Dream and capitalism, "made men" have found their way into mainstream entertainment and are romanticized as secretly sensitive and even noble.

Shannon Weaver, of A Chick & a Dude Productions out of Austin, Texas, has written and stars in such a production called Hit. There is a welcome twist though. Although the characters are funny and do have endearing qualities, their lives are not glamorized. In this case, "hit" is not only a verb as in "to whack," but also a noun to describe a person who does the hit. Weaver's character Asher, is a hit man who was rescued as a boy by two other hit men, Wyatt, played by Joel Citty, and Ervin, played by Ken Bradley.

Wyatt and Ervin take young Asher to raise as their own after they finish their assignment of killing a man, a man who is Asher's terribly abusive stepfather. We see through a series of flashbacks how they teach the boy their trade. They give him a set of rules to remember ("two shots to the head, get in, do your job, get out," etc.); teach him strategy through chess; and scold him for trying to sneak a beer or use foul language. In the funniest and ultimately most disturbing part of the show, Wyatt and Ervin stay up late worrying about Asher, who has gone out on his first job assignment. The two behave like it's the kid's first date and you realize, despite the laughs, how terribly warped all their lives are.

Director Melissa Livingston has done a fine job of creating tight and crisp scenes, and the dialogue crackles. The three actors fully inhabit their characters and fill every moment. There is very little empty space between cues and given the Mamet-esque dialogue, that's how it should be. This may be because so much has been written about men in organized crime, but it took me out of the story somewhat when I recognized so many bits from other gangster movies I have seen. However, the ending is a surprise that you don't see coming, and the acting, especially Ken Bradley and Joel Citty as Ervin and Wyatt, make this show more than worth your while to attend.

As Much as You Can
reviewed by Matt Schicker

Paul Oakley Stovall’s play As Much As You Can intelligently deals with a variety of social issues, including racism, homophobia, and religion. It succeeds in being very naturalistic in style while remaining stageworthy and dramatically compelling. The excellent team of actors, some of whom the Dog & Pony Theatre Company have imported from a Chicago production earlier this year, bring heart and skill to their utterly realistic portrayals of the characters.

When Jesse returns home to Chicago for his brother’s wedding, he surprises—or, as his best friend Nina says, “ambushes”—his family by bringing along his Swedish boyfriend, Christian. It’s not a comfortable situation for anyone. Jesse’s three siblings have varying reactions to the couple: half-sister Ronnie is supportive and anxious for the family to fully accept Jesse and Christian as a couple; younger brother Tony, once he conquers his initial homophobia, is resistant to welcoming a white man into their African-American family; deeply religious sister Evie thinks that Jesse is betraying the memory of their deceased parents by “choosing” what she considers a sinful, unnatural lifestyle. When Christian reveals that he has a 12-year-old son in Europe, things become even more confusing for some, and more complicated for everybody.

As Much As You Can is made even richer because Stovall has artfully woven the complex themes of his story together through meaningful references to unsung civil rights leader Bayard Rustin and writer James Baldwin. Evie is studying Rustin for a college project, and as a connoisseur of African American literature, she loves Baldwin’s novels. When Christian reveals his deep admiration of Rustin as pioneer of gay rights as well as black rights, and Baldwin for his novels dealing with the connection between race and sexuality, the two characters who would seem to have the least in common discover that they share more than just Jesse.

The committed performances add to the impact of the piece. J. Nicole Brooks is winningly feisty as Nina and Inda Craig-Galvån expertly navigates the emotions of Evie, a woman who struggles to accept change while remaining true to her beliefs. Angela Walsh is wonderfully warm as Ronnie, who becomes the mediator for her half-siblings’ squabbles. Jeff Alba brings quiet dignity and, in a speech near the end of the play, genuine emotion to Christian, who patiently waits for Jesse and his family to come to terms with each other. Will Owens convinces as Tony, a man whose love for his brother leads him to reconsider his prejudices. Only Kevin Douglas as Jesse doesn’t ring entirely true in his role, and this is mostly because his appearance is too youthful for us to believe that his character “practically raised” his brother Tony, who appears older.

Director Krissy Vanderwarker keeps the action moving and has nicely guided the actors to some rich characterizations and relationships. Lighting by Jessica Barnedello and set design by Geoff Curley are necessarily simple, but Curley has managed to cleverly work actual copies of novels referred to in the script into the environment. Sound design by Scotty Iseri is evocative and assists in the smooth scene transitions.

While I enthusiastically recommend As Much As You Can as a very worthwhile entry in the FringeNYC Festival, I also recommend that you arrive extra early to secure a seat in the first couple rows; I sat in the fifth row and had quite a bit of difficulty seeing everything happening on the stage, which is on the same level as the seating.

A Family of Women
reviewed by Sharon Fogarty

Congratulations to this fine cast and playwright of A Family of Women for taking possibly the world’s most difficult issues and displaying them vulnerably, without theatrical anesthesia. I am still recovering.

Imagine The Triplets of Belleville on acid: sweet, soft women in print dresses pouring cup after cup of tea, eating stale cake, completely grief stricken. In fact, there is hardly a break in their misery. Writer/director Karlton Parris’s work is daring in that it begs us to ride this barely tolerable tide of pain.

The play features five women, all played a bit humbly by talented actresses who may have been a bit under-directed. Set in 1950 at a birthday party for Mum, played brilliantly by Margaret Boschi—though some of her best moments were played facing upstage—who has the difficult task of flying from senile tangents to lucid words of wisdom: harpooning truisms upon her daughters in denial. Boschi’s character is really at the helm of the play. “One day I’ll go wondering off inside this silly mind and I’ll never come back” aptly describes the pace of this piece.

Wendy Laurence James modestly portrays Mum’s daughter Silvie with the blind hysteria of a woman who has tragically lost all those who need her. The visiting sisters are Vivian, well performed by Virginia Miller with the desperate chic of a woman escaping her past; Doreen, a welcome presence to the stage played with comic down-to-earthness by actress Helen Gresty; and finally Violet whose flight from the family seems the most extreme, here played by Ali Townsend, an attractive woman who manages the grotesque expressions of her self-loathing character.

In 90 minutes time, the characters reveal their darkest secrets and the stories become almost macabre, with graphic descriptions of an abortion, a few horrid deaths, perpetual sobbing and, as the lights fade, an acceptance into an inevitable purgatory.

I wanted the more heartrending bits to be isolated so that I could grasp them properly, but they're pureed together as though for a feeding tube. The show needs layers of presentation, adjustments in timing, or perhaps lighting or stage pictures to further define the play’s more profound moments.

SUV: The Musical!
reviewed by George Hunka

If you’ve got a show that can keep the audience laughing through the scene changes, you’ve got a very special thing indeed. SUV: The Musical, with songs by Marc Dinkin and a book by Newsweek Online columnist Gersh Kuntzman, is a perfect show for the hot and humid summertime blues: a breezy, sloppy, all-over-the-place crowd pleaser with a few mordant observations on the American love affair with All Things Large just to keep things sharp.

The plot, so far as it can be summarized, has something to do with the size-obsessed Dick Johnson (Christian Maurice), who is anxiously looking forward to his Behemoth Motor Corporation’s unveiling of a new, gigantic, gas-guzzling, environmentally-hostile SUV, the Destroyer. This raises the pained ire of career environmental activist Max Blank, who seems to have transported in from the 1970s (Adam Wolfsdorf). An automobile accident involving Blank and Johnson’s wife Sarah (Dina Plotch), however, leads to romance and unforeseen consequences. Add to this mix a lovelorn crash test dummy (Jerry Miller) and a chador-chasing Saudi Arabian bureaucrat (the striking Derek Roland), and … well, you get the picture. That it all ends up in a kooky courtroom presided over (in this production) by the playwright is predictable, but not excessively so.

Unfortunately, in juggling all these disparate plots, Kuntzman sometimes reveals his virgin status in the musical-comedy world by dropping one or two of them now and again. The story complications sometimes threaten to overwhelm the general careless cheer of the enterprise (and also add up to more than two intermissionless hours of playing time, which stretches the patience of audiences these days). Still, his light touches here and there—including a delightful reference to Watergate’s Deep Throat and All the President’s Men that I won’t ruin—keep cast and audience on their toes.

Dinkin’s ‘70s-pop-influenced score is well-performed by a four-piece band that he leads himself, and his lyrics are as clever as Kuntzman’s book. Those of them I could hear, anyway; the opening performance was plagued by some Satanically-possessed body-miking system that, sadly, robbed Jen Kersey (as Johnson’s preternaturally irritable daughter) of her entire solo number. At the end of the show, Kersey wisely returned to the stage with a hand-held wireless mike. (The program lists no credit for sound design, and believe me, that’s just as wise.) Fortunately, this audio problem didn’t hinder the appreciation of Eric Oleson’s energetic staging, Katie Workum’s choreography, or Gian Marco Lo Forte’s minimalist and often imaginative sets.

To fill things out, a tip of the hat to the rest of the cast, too, particularly the three-strong chorus, who play multiple roles. Stephanie Roy and Chris Griggs brightly contribute to the general festivities, but a special shout-out must go to Kenny Wade Marshall as Spiros. I haven’t heard songs belted out like that since Ethel Merman bodyslammed “There’s No Business Like Show Business” in the '50s; no problem with a non-functioning body-mike there.

The New Bohemia
reviewed by Eric Winick

Epicurean Productions’ The New Bohemia is billed as “a burlesque murder mystery musical.” I can’t help but feel that there are a few too many words in that tag. Had Epicurean chosen to narrow-cast, they might have hit the mark. As it stands, the show’s unwieldy melding of striptease, slapstick comedy, magic, erotic choreography, opera, and, oh yeah, a whodunit, is a bit more than its company can handle.

Given that we never really get to know the characters or their motivations, the wafer thin plot—a traveling company’s diva is poisoned, leaving everyone to ponder which performer had the nerve/foresight to do her in—is negligible. Which leaves the burlesque, performed in high camp fashion by players ranging from fairly talented to amateurish—which begs the question: with much of The New Bohemia performed in a winking, we’re-all-in-this-together style, how much of it is intentionally “bad”? Are we supposed to snicker when body mikes crackle, feedback blows out the audience’s ears, or costumes malfunction mid-frolic? There’s value in purposeful awfulness, but only when it’s performed artfully. Director Dennis Hinson, who apparently encouraged his cast to act as broadly as possible, wants to have his camp, and eat it too. And there’s the rub.

Playwright Patrick Bonomo and playwright-lyricist-composer-musical director Shelly Watson get one thing right, assuming that, as long as you’ve got flesh, audiences will forgive a nonsensical plot, characters that don’t register, and jokes that continually fail to land. Which does little to dull the veneer of vanity surrounding the project. Watson, who also plays the ill-fated diva, seems to have crafted her character primarily as a showcase for her operatic talents—at one point, after the character has expired, she mysteriously reappears to warble a song that serves no dramatic purpose. Most offensive is the creators’ failure to credit the authors of the published songs utilized throughout the production.

The show has its highlights, namely the witty costume design of M’Arion Talan, the antics of gum-smacking, hula-hooping comediennes Carmen Armillas and Krista Amigone, and the show’s bizarre “Serengeti” dance sequence, a Busby Berkeley-esque number complete with skintight cat suits and palm fronds. It’s moments like these that make you believe The New Bohemia could have been something more; by focusing on the burlesque, and leaving the drama at the door, the show might have made for an enjoyable, if workmanlike, evening at the theatre.

Screwball
reviewed by Hieu Tran

A lot of people say it is harder to do comedy than drama. Some would go further to say that it is especially hard to do “smart” comedy and make it work. After having had a chance to see the comedy ScrewBall, I would like to contend the opposite: that it is infinitely harder to do “dumb” comedy and make it work. That is, to actually make such fare consistently funny. By “smart” and “dumb” I could just as well mean high-brow and low-brow forms of comedy. ScrewBall, written by Douglas McFerran and directed by Aaron Mullen, falls decidedly into the latter category.

Which is fine, if only they had managed to wring a fresh and hilarious perspective out of the tired clichés of a nebbish mama’s boy, a macho alpha-male, and the dubious vixen both men are intent on seducing. The story begins when Clarence, the mama’s boy, played by Ben McGroarty with a manic energy that never lets up through the course of the play, asks his studly roommate Chuck (Sean-Micheal Longstreth) for advice on how to score with a hot Ivy League chick from New England. Chuck sits Clarence down and doles out advice that is supposed to pass as his worldly take on the art of seduction, but amounts to little more than getting her drunk with champagne and taming her as “a horse whisperer would to his horse.” What? On one level I suppose McFerran and Mullen are trying to point out the absurdity of such simplistic male psychology, but by the way the “male-speak” is written, and the way the actors are directed to perform (in a hyper-stylized, emotive manner that is more annoying than ingratiating), they have done very little to elevate their play above the bland male machismo they are attempting to satirize.

The second scene shows more promise, as Clarence meets his date Madeline, played by Wynn Tu Hall with a mysterious air about her that sucks a little more intrigue into proceedings. Her frank, self-confident comportment contrasts nicely with Clarence’s manic (and this time drunken) declarations and ramblings—as he does most of the drinking and she wisely abstains. Ben Duhl, as their Russian waiter Boris, also offers a light touch to the scene, even if his character—or rather characterization—is shaped mainly by a stereotype.

The next night, with little explanation, Chuck goes on a date with Madeline. By the necessity of plot he is much more successful in his seduction of Madeline than Clarence—though we see or hear scant evidence of his smooth-talking ways on the actual date. Madeline goes home with Chuck, and the next day, in the roommates’ apartment, all hell—or rather plot-points—breaks loose. The characters proceed to do things that are completely arbitrary and make little sense (especially Madeline, whose air of intrigue is replaced by inexplicable actions intended only to further the story), and a play that offered the promise of a better second half succumbs to, well, its own low-brow intentions.

Electra Votes
reviewed by Josephine Cashman

Electra Votes, written by Sheila Morgan and directed by Rhonda Dodd is a re-telling of story of Electra, Orestes and Chrysothemis and how they avenge their father’s death by killing their mother Clytemnestra and her lover Agiesthos. The playwright and director combine this ancient Greek tragedy with the current wars and politics of the 21st century, and sadly, these themes do not combine gracefully. Between scenes of Electra plotting her revenge and bringing her brother and sister into her plans, a screen acts as the Greek Chorus to comment. It flashes images of the bloody and violent war in Iraq and the terrorist bombings of London and juxtaposes them with various images of Michael Jackson, Princess Diana, and other media figures. While these images are effectively and brutally compiled and edited, they confuse rather than highlight the action onstage.

The sound design by Stephen Riscica is spare but effective and excellent, as is the fight choreography by Brad Lemons and Dan Rankin. Clytemnestra’s death is fierce and powerful, and the eastern rhythms and whistle of a cold and unforgiving wind are haunting.

The acting is good, especially Richard Maddox as Orestes and Cidele Curo as Clytemnestra. But the dialogue is swamped with strident political speeches that at times impairs the actors’ ability to connect with one another. Then there are times, as when Orestes and Electra bond over the loss that war and corruption brings, that the actors light up the stage and the scene is quite touching. Unfortunately, the playwright’s fiery political agenda seems to get in the way of the story and sometimes it appears that Electra and Orestes are almost as bad as the mother they are trying to overthrow. “Evil demands evil” is a phrase that is often repeated throughout the play, and it seems to indicate that it’s okay to be as monstrous as one wishes, as long as “God is on our side, not theirs.”

The play is most successful when it focuses on the family dynamic among the members of the cursed House of Atreus. All its members have cast their vote and taken their sides before the play even begins, and watching them play out their personal vendettas is enthralling. Regrettably, the script’s weaknesses hamper an otherwise energetic and passionate effort by all involved.

Lynndie England Followed by No Space
reviewed by Matt Freeman

In the middle of the 15-minute performance of David Tretiakoff’s Lynndie England at P.S. 122, it occurred to me that I had forgotten my New Yorker at work. The reason this occurred to me is that I realized that I had gathered far more information and insight and even shock from factual retellings of the events at Abu Ghraib from actual news sources. For all the bizarre artifice of this piece, and some interesting ideas, it fails to amount to more than it’s closing statement: “violence begets violence.” And indeed, because of the slight and esoteric nature of the piece, this pat editorializing fails to provide much satisfaction or new insight.

Sitting on stage with a paper shopping bag on his head, Tretiakoff speaks into a microphone, breathing heavily and whispering derivations of “Don’t touch me.” All the while, our stand in for Lynndie England, dancer/actress Charlotte Schioler, bucks and feigns intercourse with his voice as it comes through an onstage speaker. If this is a piece about war violence and torture, it’s hard to see where they factor in, although I can infer that there is a sexual component to domination. Unfortunately, the images (Schioler wandering around in front of the audience repeating that she is testing the microphone, giving the audience flashlights to “choose what they want to see”) are so unspecific that Tretiakoff has to resort to speechifying to bring us back to the central theme. All in all, an interesting experiment, but too short to grow into its images, and written with clumsy, if earnest, directness. In the program, it is said to be “very troubling,” but this lionized Lynndie is far less troubling than the frank pictures of actual and thoroughly normal-seeming Lynndie England.

The companion piece, No Space, is a bit more successful. It’s another dance piece, performed by the physically powerful Schioler, that starts with a great deal of controlled chaos and more passion. She begins in a pool of light, with quick thrusting gestures, as if she is batting away a swarm of flies. It’s impressive, but loses the thread when she takes the rest of the stage. Only her natural charm allows us to enjoy her at this point, as she sweetly begs for our sympathy, explaining that she has, in fact, “no space” and needs her “inner space” and can’t breathe. Unfortunately, as she runs from one half of the stage to the other, her complaints start to feel hollow: she has a lot more space to move and breathe than her audience, who are trapped and passive.