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Peer Reviews
Becky Shaw By Gina Gionfriddo Reviewed by Cristina Martin Entire contents copyright © 2008, Cristina Martin. All rights reserved.
It's not every theatrical performance that leaves one with the kind of churning thoughts and unsettled emotions that Becky Shaw does. Playing at Actors Theatre of Louisville as part of the 32nd annual Humana Festival of New American Plays, Gina Gionfriddo's dramatic comedy reaches far beyond the image of the eponymous character's puffy, pastel-colored cocktail dress which, according to the playwright, inspired the rest. A newlywed couple arranges a blind date between a female co-worker of his (Becky) and a lifelong male friend of hers (Max); what ensues is a wrenching and humorous study of human fragility and the reactions it elicits. If the blind date is what drives the plot, the play's first scene can be seen as a prelude of sorts. It takes place several months before the date and features Suzanna Slater (Mia Barron) and the friend and quasi-brother with whom she grew up, Max Garrett (David Wilson Barnes). Suzanna is still grieving over the relatively recent loss of her father and is indignant that her mother, Susan (Janis Dardanis), has already taken up with another man. Max, extraordinarily stiff and self-important, is trying to get her to pull herself together while delivering news of the grim state of the family's finances in his role as their money manager. It is as a result of Max's encouragement to stop "wallowing" that Suzanna eventually meets and marries Andrew Porter (Davis Duffield), who works with Becky Shaw, who gets set up on the aforementioned date with Max. In retrospect and in relation to the superior quality of the rest of the play, I found this first scene somewhat wanting, particularly because it is so seminal. Mia Barron does an excellent job of portraying Suzanna's neurotic vulnerability later on, but here I wish she had been slightly less whiny and more convincingly depressed. If it were workable, even a touch of makeup making her look a little the worse for wear would go a long way toward suggesting the emotional Sturm und Drang she is undergoing or believes herself to be undergoing. Despite Max's off-putting attitude and constant sarcasm, we are willing to accept that he and Suzanna have been extraordinarily close since childhood, but we need to see just a glimmer of warmth from him in order to make their mutual fondness truly believable. With Susan Slater's entrance in this first scene as well, we learn instantly from whence Max comes by his detached arrogance. Janis Dardaris is frighteningly good here and throughout as the embittered, pragmatic older woman. Her character has multiple sclerosis, a fact underscored by an exaggeratedly contorted walk which gives rise to laughter not because the disease itself is the least bit funny, but because of Susan's extraordinary haughtiness in spite of it. When we first encounter her, glaringly overdressed for her date, Becky Shaw (Annie Parisse) comes across as an insecure, rather ditzy thirtysomething with no promising career, no car, no cell phone ("Is my date Amish?" Max asks drily), and no relationship with her family. Clearly, she has "issues," but she also demonstrates surprising insight into people, a quality which counts for exactly nothing in the eyes of pompous, laconic Max. Initially a jumble of nerves in lime-green satin, Parisse plays Becky brilliantly and evolves such that her acquired wisdom and reserve by play's end are positively striking. Davis Duffield seems born to play the part of Andrew Porter, Becky Shaw's empathetic co-worker and Suzanna's husband. We all know this guy or someone like him who really, truly cares; the sincere, struggling writer with a heart of gold seems to have just walked out of the nearest coffee shop. Ultimately, it is the balance and interplay among this cast of characters which is most impressive, however. There is something uniquely compelling in the relationship of each to each, a symmetry that makes for an endlessly fascinating web of connections and counterweights assembled with intricacy and dexterity. The play's humor is often dry and always smart. Suzanna has grown up in an environment of "the most epic Faulknerian chaos" from which her husband rescues her. One of Susan's wry matter-of-fact statements regarding the different degrees of intelligence with which various people are endowed is, "Some people are retarded and eat paint, others split atoms and write symphonies." About Andrew, of whom he takes a predictably dim view, Max tells Suzanna, "Five hundred dollars says he thinks 401-K is a band," and later, after Suzanna criticizes him for his general callousness and for not communicating with Becky since their date, Max retorts, "I have a very full schedule between laughing at rape videos and sneering at the truth." A theater-in-the-round such as the Bingham Theatre presents its own inherent staging challenges for a production such as this one, to which Peter Dubois's direction rises admirably. The actors bring all of their expressive faculties to bear in creating their characters so fully that on those occasions when they have their backs to us briefly, we feel as though we're not missing much. While I had no trouble hearing, my seatmate claimed she missed a few lines of the dialogue now and then, particularly some of those delivered in Max's sardonic tone. The play is filled with so many penetrating zingers, it's a shame to miss even a single word. Becky Shaw manages to raise trenchant questions about human relations while keeping us very much amused. We leave with a heap of ideas to mull over, certainly, but also with a renewed sense of awe at the wealth of theatrical talent we are given the opportunity to discover thanks to vehicles like the Humana Festival. It is refreshing to become acquainted with well-crafted new works like this play, whose wit and poignancy ensure that it will not soon be forgotten.
Becky Shaw Posted March 18, 2008
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