THEATRE REVIEW:
KPBS
AIRDATE: April 16, 2004
Fame -- everyone wants it, few get it,
and it weighs heavily on those who have it. The price of success features
prominently in two vastly different plays: the Greek drama "Oedipus at
Colonus" and the 20th century tragicomedy, "The House of
Blue Leaves." In one, a man can't get back to his homeland; in the other,
a woman never leaves her home.
"Oedipus at Colonus" is part
two of the great Sophocles trilogy. The former king of Thebes has already
murdered his father, married his mother, blinded himself and been exiled. Now,
an old man, broken but unbowed, he's come to fulfill the final element of the
prophesy, to die at Colonus in Athens. In this clear, comprehensible and timely
translation by Dr. Marianne McDonald, Oedipus still rages with passion -- love
for his daughters, hatred for his sons. The play is about searching for
identity, making a life of quality and dying with dignity. At 6th @
Penn Theatre, George Ye has assembled a compelling cast, with Jack Banning's
frail but riveting Oedipus at the center, bounded by the potent performances of
Von Schauer, Jim Chovick, Beth Bayless and Robin Christ. "Fame," says
the fading monarch, "trickles away and comes to nothing."
But don't try to tell that to anyone in
"The House of Blue Leaves." They'd die for a little attention, and
several of them actually do. John Guare's highly lauded but controversial
creation won the Obie Award and the New York Drama Critics Circle Award for
Best American Play in 1971 and snagged four Tonys for its 1986 revival. But
it's a tad schizophrenic: a dark stew of black humor, farce, tragedy and social
commentary.
Set in Sunnyside Queens, 1965, the day
the Pope arrived in New York purportedly to put an "end to the Vietnam
War," the piece focuses on Artie, a wannabe songwriter who works at the
Bronx Zoo, and his unstable, delusional wife, Bananas. And a number of other
wackos, including their nutcase son who wants his five minutes of fame for
assassinating the Pope. Then there's Artie's sexy/cheesy, micromanaging
mistress Bunny, a couple of stray nuns, a hearing-impaired movie star and a
Hollywood producer who flies in at the end, kind of deus ex Malibu, to
set things right. Sort of.
The Lynx Performance Theatre production
boasts some finely etched performances, notably Michelle Burkhart as the
ethereally nutty Bananas, Laura Bozanich as the motor-mouth mistress and Tim
Curns as the tightly coiled son. Fred Harlow makes Artie a pathetic loser, but
under Al Germani's direction, it's all more serious and psychological than it
should be. However bleak, with its stiletto stabs at religion, celebrity and
the American Dream, this is still a comedy. Here laughter, like fame, remains
elusive.
©2004
Patté Productions Inc.