THEATRE REVIEWS:
“ELEANOR” at North Coast Repertory Theatre
& "ANGEL IN BETWEEN" Fritz Theatre @ 6th @ Penn
KPBS
AIRDATE: January 25, 2002
It's a great time for
single women…that's dramatically, not socially speaking. This month, there are
four solo female shows in town-- two at San Diego Rep, one at the Fritz and one
at North Coast Repertory Theatre. Sisters are doin' it for themselves…
"Angel in
Between" and "An Evening with Eleanor" may be widely disparate
thematically, focusing on a sexual ambivalent and a former First Lady, but
they're fairly similar in strengths, weaknesses and structure. Both evolve from
the historical record. Both feature an unfortunately unseen metamorphosis. Both
are magnificent showcases for very talented actors, but in each case, the
evening drags and the text is flawed.
The concept for
"Angel in Between" evolved from the character of Cherubino in
Mozart's Marriage of Figaro, a
"pants role" in which a female plays and sings a male role. Here, a
woman of operatic voice alternates between femme chanteuse and sensitive
tough-guy, but the boundaries blur. Sexual identity is slippery. In every
incarnation, Roseanne Ciparick is a dream. Her voice is lovely, her acting
impressive. Some of Kate Kaminiski's text is lyrical and lovely. But some is
slow, overwrought or repetitive. The sound design is wonderfully evocative of
New York, but the initial costume change is interminable. How much more
powerful it would be if we witnessed the transformation! The music in this
semi-musical is rangy… from a Mozart aria to Daniel Shamir's darkly atonal,
Sondheimian songs, peppered with hip-hop, which actually works best. The images
are potent, the performance divine, but 'drag' has more than one meaning in
this long 70 minutes.
Up at North Coast Rep,
the production also plods. Ironically, if we believe the text, derived
completely from the words of the intelligent and provocative Eleanor Roosevelt,
she'd never go on for 2 1/2 hours. Her motto was, Have something to say, say it
and sit down. This retooling of an early, imperfect Lawrence Waddy script, by
Rosina Reynolds and Jeannette Horn, tries a new tack, showing the evolution
from actor to character, but it doesn't work, and with the collaborators
serving as star and director, there may have been less objectivity than a new
script requires. The rehearsal conceit is too timid, and we're never quite sure
who we, the onlookers, are supposed to be. We aren't really privy to her
process, and we don't see Reynolds become Mrs. Roosevelt; she just
rotates the set, puts on pearls and repeats one monologue three unnecessary
times. While illuminating the astonishing evolution of Eleanor from wallflower
to world power, her devotion to the unfaithful FDR, and perhaps casting a
slight, suggestive shadow on her own sexuality, the script jumps back and forth
in time, and each act ends abruptly and jarringly. The improvements aren't… but
the performance remains sublime.
©2002 Patté Productions
Inc