Maple & Vine: Another Humana Hit

"Oh look," I said to Roommate as we passed the "Warning" sign as we entered the theater to see today's matinee of MAPLE & VINE.  "It says partial nudity."  This is one of our bazillion private jokes. I nudged him in the side and said: "Woo hoo!"

"Eh." He shrugged. "It probably means boy-butt.  It usually does." And that's his standard response.

We got seated in the Bingham Theater and continued the conversation.  I said: "Dude, the play is in the round.  It can't mean boy-butt.  You can't reasonably do boy-butt without doing boy-front.  And boy-front, my friend, ain't no partial nudity."

Yes you can.

When you have an awesome theater reviewer in town, as we do with Erin Keane, it's hard to say anything new or different that the critic didn't already mention.  (So, I bring you "boy-butt"-- if you can't go deeper, go lowbrow, I say.) So go look at Erin's review.  It's spot on, and I second everything she said.

I loved Maple & Vine.  I love when theater puts Big Ideas out there and puts those Big Ideas in really appealing, funny packages.  Unlike A DEVIL AT NOON, which ran a little long, Main & Vine felt perfectly-paced.  I wasn't ready to leave the people or the world when it was over.

The Big Idea of the play had to do with harried modern New Yorkers surrendering their iPads and sleep noise machines to join a "not-cult" of 1955 re-enactors.   For me the Big A-ha wasn't that the modern world makes some people too fraking busy to appreciate... anything; it was that the modern world makes some people who thrive on challenge and adversity terribly, terribly bored.

I can't remember a more elaborate moving set in the Bingham.  The number of set changes was staggering and led to a couple of snafoos.  One of those snafoos, however, yielded the best on-stage "save," I've ever seen by a performer.  When one of the set elevators actress gave Jeannine Servalles a bit of a ride, up and down, and then jolted her off of a piece of furniture-- during a particularly serious scene-- the audience howled with laughter.  And she said, "See, I'm so upset I'm levitating!"  Bravo, sister.  Well done.

On a serious note: as someone who has suffered through the same personal tragedy that leads main characters Katha and Ryu to abandon their hectic lives, I thought the emotional toll of such an event was very well-handled and authentic.  It made me root for them even more.

Go see it.  This is great theater, y'all.

Oh, and Moon Off.

Humana Fest 35: The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

If you live in Louisville, which you probably do if you're reading this, I'd like you to take a moment.  Put down the mouse. Take your finger off the scroll pad.  I'd like you to reach up and pat yourself on the shoulder.  Good girl/boy/neutral/questioning.  Be proud of yourself.  You live in a city that hosts one of the premier theater events in the country.  Not only do you live in a city that hosts the Humana Festival of New American Plays, but this city has hosted the HECK out of this festival for thirty-five years.

I have theater-nerd friends in other cities who got all twitterpated and jealous when they found out I was moving to Louisville.  "Oooooohhh... Louisville... Actors Theater... How sexy are YOU?!"  


The answer is Damn Sexy.  And so are you.  You live in Louisville, the home of the Humana Festival of New American Plays.

Roommate and I hit DEVIL AT NOON by Anne Washburn last night, and hot damn, kids, the game is on!  I love, love, loved it... although I can't really say that I understood all of it.  Some seriously brilliant acting-- perhaps the most authentic-feeling characters I've seen on Actors' stage since last year's PHOENIX.  Authentic-feeling in a very... inauthentic (?) world.  You know that character Zooey Deshanel (et al) plays in every single movie?  The young, quirky waif who brings chaos and joy to a downtrodden (usually older) man by being crazy-- perhaps even dangerously so-- and living close to the edge?  (There's a name for it, by the way, The Manic Pixie Dream Girl.)  Rebecca Hart's character is ever more endearing and memorable because by every rights she should have come off as a MPDG and not a real human being.  Real, of course, being a relative term.  All six actors put on a heck of a performance, but she's the one I'll really remember.

It's long.  Very long.  Maybe a little too long?  And (you'll understand this when you see it), I wish they'd had live foley artists.  I mean, if you're going to do THAT many sound effects, you should show us what the art looks like.

But seriously: good stuff.  I'd see it again even.  Go see it yourself.

Moon off.