Cover; “Make Believe Animals.” Image Courtesy of Amanda Gilleland

Make Believe Animals

-Book Reviewed by Roger Market–

Make Believe Animals is the forthcoming short story collection by Amanda Gilleland. The book’s characters are performers at heart. From literal actors, artists, and psychics to everyday Joes, Gilleland depicts people going through the motions of life. Sometimes these people exhibit genuine personality, but more often than not, there is a facade. They are pretending to be someone or something they’re not: the girl next door, a happy couple, artistic…young.

The first story, “Four Quarts,” is somewhat soft and simple but by no means unremarkable. It eases the reader into Gilleland’s world before things get more lyrical, more imaginative, perhaps more literary. Depending on the reader’s tolerance for characters that take and talk about drugs, the story’s content can test one’s patience, but the author’s sensitivity for subtle human elements makes the prose shine. Gilleland brilliantly captures the grit of Baltimore’s less desirable neighborhoods and the strange experience of visiting a psychic to inquire about life’s most mundane and unimportant aspects. Themes of light vs. dark in a tormented world are vividly contrasted. Yes, real life is indeed present in the pages of “Four Quarts,” even for readers who can’t relate to the drug world.

“Betty Blue” and “Scenic Route,” the second and third stories, take a different turn that is both creative and thought provoking. An overt and humorous metaphor for the human resistance to change, the former story depicts our titular hero, Betty, angrily and perpetually stomping on tomatoes. Despite her best efforts, strawberries, green beans and peppers can’t satisfy this character’s destructive needs. Gillelend wonderfully evokes the gush of juice and the release of pent up frustration that only exploding fruit can provide.

“Scenic Route” steers us in a new direction. Humming with human emotion, and driven by lyrical verse, the story characterizes the beauty of nature in a way that may shock the most modest of readers. The story is well worth the read for those who aren’t afraid to get a little…well, sticky.

Although “Make Believe Animal” is the book’s centerpiece, and it certainly does epitomize the overall theme of people as actors, “Just a Trim” stands out. Who knew that a story about a haircut could be a bit of a tearjerker? “How do I look?” the husband asks when it’s over. The wife’s response is simple but effective, demanding an emotional reaction on the part of the reader. “Just a Trim’s” well placed setups are heartbreaking to watch unfold, and those last few lines may very well be the strongest parts of the whole book. If not for the preceding prose, they would seem mundane, too “everyday” to carry real weight, but with Gilleland’s careful pacing, the words reach new heights.

The ensuing stories, “Lobster Queen” and “Signal Hill,” allow for a well-deserved emotional breather. Then, after a short trip to the land of schmaltz (albeit lovely schmaltz) with “A Brief History of Love (Part One),” the reader arrives at “The Girl, The Princess, Trapeze Safety Awareness.” This final story is one of several that play with new structures, and it is here that the theme of life acting climaxes.

Make Believe Animals reveals a solid understanding of structure. Gilleland is always building toward something. Even when the effect is subtle, the action or detail has meaning for the reader. This book’s characters are role players in the stories of their lives, performers advancing from one act to the next. We witness them shining and fading away on stage, collectively waiting for the final curtain call. This is the only stage direction that can save them from the embarrassing encounters that bridge life’s common comedies and tragedies, providing adequate closure. Luckily for the reader, Make Believe Animal’s ending never feels achingly far off; the book doesn’t drag. That’s the beauty of a well-conceived short story collection. This one, in particular, will be available directly from the author in early May.

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Post Image Courtesy of Amanda Gilleland

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The Ants

-Forthcoming Book Reviewed by Kendra Bartell–

The scene: a lively underground reading in the heart of Pike Place Market, Seattle. Amidst the buzz and commotion of this year’s AWP conference, representatives of Les Figues, Ahsahta, Drunken Boat and Ugly Duckling Press, gather in The Alibi Room, where the poet Sawako Nakayasu and her Ants are being introduced. The “ants” really are hers.  No doubt about it.

Towards the end of the evening, Nakayasu takes the mic. Unabashed, in the dim light of the room, the author crawls on hands and knees toward the brightest point. There she kneels, reads from her book, and delivers intoxicatingly rich prose. Audiences are entranced by her energy and creative expression.

The poems in The Ants have such an incredible rhythm to them, and hearing them read in Nakayasu’s voice reveals mesmerizing intricacies. Imagine if you will, a tiny woman with a HUGE presence, crouching and reading the following:

The car very car is having a hard very hard very hard time getting started up again, and so we kick it very kick it in its ass very ass and the car is still having a hard very hard time and we are feeling lost all the more lost very lost in this desert very desert…

The room was enraptured by this performance. At the conference the next day, the books (available nationally July 1, 2014) were selling fast. This reviewer was sold.

As a collection, The Ants never disappoints. Through the span of 93 pages, Nakayasu explores an incredibly twisted and astonishing world of weird-yet-banal instances of life. The ants do not necessarily stand in for people in this world, but rather, serve as complements for Nakayasu’s investigations into human experience. Shifting narration and perspective changes provide the mechanism for discovery. At times, the narrator is obviously a human, as she interacts in the world and with the ants. Other moments, however, the narrator takes on a 3rd person omniscient view, focusing on the ants themselves. At still other intersections, a 3rd person limited perspective, derived from an ant’s mind space, is introduced. A form in which readers are complicit with the ant’s consciousness:

An Ant in the Mouth of Madonna Behind Locked Doors

Is there, is there, is there but can’t prove it to anyone, is small, is glistening and black, is determined, is hanging on, is at a loss for a good perch, is wet, is blown by the wind when she takes a breath, is happy, is uncertainly happy, is ardent, is devoted, warm and plenty…

The title blending into this wild narration pulls audiences into the poem immediately. The pace never lets up as readers delve further into the ant’s mind, a viewpoint that, as it turns out, thinks pretty similarly to a person in a time of struggle. An ant, like a human, Nasayaku suggests, “is an optimist at heart,” but “fearful in the moment.” In the above quoted scene, even though this ant is inside a person’s mouth, the insect is also a person trying to complete an arduous task. This amazing perspective of struggle allows Nasayaku to explore the mental trials humans commonly endure.

Many of the poems in the collection span only one sentence. The pacing and syntax in these brief verses, therefore, are carefully metered to keep the poem moving. Clauses build on each other naturally and vividly, creating the incredible stream of conscious that allows readers to identify with the ant and witness to Nasayaku’s penetrating investigation into human thought patterns.

Some readers may weary of the ant-ness or more ant-specific prose, but relief and fresh inspiration are never far off. “Ice Event 2,” for example, describes the physical ordeal an ant colony undergoes when the collective becomes trapped under ice. The distressed tribe must find a new queen to procreate. Unlike the one-sentence perspectives delivered earlier in the book, this poem echoes Thoreaus’ “battle of the ants” observations in an epoch 4 page long prose entry. Here the voice slows down, breaths are taken, and the urgency of the situation that the ants face is depressed by nature’s freezing force. Nakaysu’s engaging style resonates with intense rhythms, depicting bizarre events that develop a genuine connection between her human readers and her ants.

Delightful surprises occur throughout the text and our delivered with astonishing energy. Nakayasu is whimsical, yet her voice resounds of urgency and is immediately relatable, even in a stranger than fiction world where ants can work as communicator decoys and set up colonies inside bodies. The poems are tight knit prose blocks featuring gripping syntax and language. Read on a log, The Ants is the perfect afternoon snack. The prose reaches deep into reader’s minds, exposing humanity’s greatest desires, fears, and wildest thoughts. “The Great desire is to get inside of it—the poem, the painting, the movie, the music,” Nakayasu meditates in “Decay.” This is the recipe for the triumph of her Ants.

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Book Talk

–Diana Mumford reports on the “Virginia Festival of the Book” 3/19-3/23 2014-

The Virginia Festival of the Book is a yearly festival that takes place in Charlottesville, VA. The event invites published authors, aspiring writers, avid readers, and publishing industry insiders to take part in panels, writer and craft talks, book signings and sales. Panelists and published authors provide attendees advice and insight derived from their personal experience in the publishing industry and crafting their novels. The overall goal of the five-day festival is to “honor book culture and promote reading and literacy.” The 2014 festival occurred March 19 through March 23. Charlottesville was abuzz with bibliophiles eagerly anticipating the lively book talk.

Appropriate to its theme, the panel “Researching the Novel” took place in Jefferson-Madison Regional Library’s Central branch. The panelists, authors Susan Gregg Gilmore (The Funeral Dress), Mary Kay Zuravleff (Man Alive!), and Michael Parker (All I Have in this World) had all published novels that required extensive research in order to tell a believable story. The panelists began by reading excerpts from their most recent works. Audiences were entranced by their beautifully crafted and emotionally relatable prose.

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Part of the excerpts’ relevance stemmed from the authors’ efforts to craft realistic settings. Parker’s novel, All I Have in this World, the story of two strangers who purchase a used car together, is set primarily in Texas and North Carolina. When asked how he was able to capture the settings of these two very different locations, he said, with a genial smile, “to really get to know a place, a person must visit it for less than two weeks or live there for more than two years.” True to his word, the realistic places in his novels are based on where he’s lived and traveled in his own life. In order to inject more specific details into his writing, the North Carolina-based novelist went so far as to ask his native Texan friend to take him on a tour of the area. This research involved the seemingly mundane routine of pointing out local vegetation; the author inquiring, “What type of cactus is that. And that one? And that?” exhaustively collecting minute details that ultimately proved essential to the book’s setting.

Panelists also advised writers to fully know and understand what their characters do for a living. The recommended method for researching character occupations is to immerse oneself in the work, learn by doing on the job, and soak up professional experiences and perspectives. Because Susan Gilmore’s novel, The Funeral Dress, explores the experience of shirt factory workers, she took sewing lessons, learning how to construct the garments that her characters are tasked with creating. In researching her book, Gilmore also interviewed shirt factory workers in Tennessee. She established a sense of trust with her subjects that allowed her to flesh out her novel in intimate detail.

Mary Zuravleff, with her shock of orange hair, had the most process-based approach when it came to research. She mentioned using note cards, but also stated that the internet has changed the research playing field. It’s no longer necessary to visit a library and read through piles of books. Because of the wealth of information available, once on a web page, she only allows herself to click through referring links three times to prevent distraction and research tangents. She advised using the “3-click-rule” to avoid falling down the research rabbit hole.

The standout piece of research advice came from Michael Parker who advised writers to make sure the research doesn’t overshadow the emotional content of the novel. When incorporated properly, research should be seamlessly embedded in the work and not distracting to the reader.

After conducting research and writing a novel, what’s the next step? Moseley Writers Jennifer Elvgren, Deborah Prum, Fran Slayton, and Andy Straka gave insight on how to hook an editor in the first 100 words of a manuscript. In this panel, submissions of 100 words were crowd-sourced from attendees. The moderator read the manuscripts aloud anonymously and then opened the floor for critique from the panelists.

The aspiring writers in the audience were excited and nervous for this speed-dating-style workshop from published authors. The panelists’ critiques of the first 100 words of the unpublished works were spot-on, providing critical and thoughtful commentary. This proved constructive, and no feelings were hurt, the panelists remembering to sweeten their harsher reviews by also pointing out positive qualities as well. The main advice spurred by the crowd-sourced beginnings was to orient the reader in the story and clarify specific details. The panelists repeated their conviction that it’s possible to establish tension and interest without creating confusion and frustration. They also mentioned, of course, the ubiquitous yet oft ignored advice show! Don’t tell!

After putting so much effort into impressing an editor—do you really need an agent? Jeff Kleinman and Paige Wheeler of Folio Literary Management and Linda Pratt of Wernick & Pratt Agency held an open forum style panel where they addressed this question. Their message: Agent’s don’t just close book deals anymore. Their role is to provide authors with career guidance. According Kleinman and Pratt, agents can help author’s build a platform for launching their works and help sustain their presence by attracting and soliciting opportunities for clients to present and have their writing reviewed. Despite their confidence that literary agents continue to occupy an important niche in the ever-changing world of publishing, the panelists did concede, however, that they are only needed for certain types of books. For example, Kleinman mentioned that specialty and regional books don’t need agents. He then went on to admit that having an agent is not always the best career choice for writers.

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All panelists could agree, however, that, when finding an agent, it’s always a good idea to research them before submitting pitches. Research can help determine if an agent is reliable. In addition, when submitting pitches to an agent, the panelists said to always follow the outlined submission guidelines. Following guidelines indicates professionalism. Kleinman also said, in terms of writing style, he personally looks for a unique premise and a distinctive voice. For their closing note, the panelists mentioned that any critique from an agent that isn’t blatant dismissal is gold. This optimistic rejection shows the submitted piece has potential and is the best professional commentary one could hope to receive.

Want to forego an agent entirely? That’s possible with Amazon’s Kindle-direct publishing, which has led to an eBook content explosion. How can writers cut through the clutter and make sure their books are read? Publishing expert Jane Friedman offered attendees her advice.

Friedman’s positive stance on self-publishing stems from ideas of ownership and customization. She claimed the benefits of self-publishing are non-exclusivity (freedom to use multiple platforms to release publications), mostly free to use, and dynamic energy (freedom to change the cover, price, or simply experiment if something’s not working). Her best tip for self-publishing included the need to generate quality metadata. Metadata includes keywords readers might search for when looking for a novel to read, readily available book excerpts, and book reviews. High quality metadata leads to better discoverability, which leads to higher readership.

Friedman also cited that, in self-promotion, it’s important to think beyond the book itself. Authors should create enjoyable content for readers in order to stay relevant in-between novels. In particular, social media and user-generated content are the keys to doing so. Friedman’s well-informed presentation indicated authors have success with self-publication only if they are willing to put in the hard work of self-promoting.

The density of information provided by panels at The Virginia Festival of the Book is a valuable experience for any aspiring writer. The festival creates an open dialogue about reading, writing, and the love of literacy. To sweeten the deal, most of the festival events are free of charge. Interested in attending next year? Visit vabook.org to keep updated on the festival’s schedule.

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Fresh Prince of Darkness

-Album Reviewed by Jacob Kresovich–

‘Mic Terror’ of Chicago’s ‘Treated Crew’ hip-hop collective released his debut LP, Fresh Prince of Darkness, on March 4, 2014.  Coming off the ‘Closed Sessions’ label out of his hometown, he delivers an album that stays true to Chicago’s drill scene, but also offers more imaginative lyrics and creative flow than expected in the genre born out of the Windy City. Mic goes so far as to  include samples throughout his tracks from movies like “Network” and “Don’t be a Menace to South Central.”  It should be no surprise Mic is rising to the top of the Chicago hip-hop scene; Treated Crew was rated by Complex Magazine as one of Chicago’s top ten new rappers to look out for all the way back in 2012.

An intro track featuring an auto-tuned voice introduces the country to the increasingly popular Chicago style of hip-hop, “drill.” Next, Mic’s second song ‘Tourette Syndrome’ confronts the listener with a powerful ballad. Mic’s flow and lyricism are refreshing, his voice commanding. Sticking to topics common in drill—drugs, money and sex—he also tells listeners of his upbringing and how difficult it is to make it in the music industry. The emotion is palpable. There is no pressing stop.

A sample from the film “The Last Boy Scout,” leads the listener into the single of the album, ’15 Minutes.’ Again, Mic stays true to the common hip-hop topics of drugs and sex, opening the song with the lyrics “Pocket full of magnums, bitches on my phone… Gimme 15 minutes, I’ll be knocking at ‘cha door.” Mic’s first verse shows his lyrical creativity by shouting out other Treated Crew members as a lot of people’s “ticket out da hood,” imaginatively referring to them in Hollywood, playing in a band, or just chilling on “the damn machine gun.” The beat for ’15 Minutes’ deserves particular attention as it transports the feeling of the album to a slasher-style horror film without forgetting the essential components of drill.

In a move that shows this hip-hop collective is serious about their music and willing to go the extra mile, an accompanying film noir-style music video enhances the track’s experience for Treated Crew and Mic’s fans. The video, directed by Andrew Zeiter and Bryan Lamb, begins with a car pulling up to Lake Michigan on a cold night to dispose of a fresh body. We could be on the set of one of John Carpenter’s Halloween films; horror rhythms are in the air. In a nod to the slasher-feel of the beat, a member of Treated Crew pulls out a machete and offers to chop the stiff up although the proposition of the idea feels more satirical and facetious than it is serious. Once the body is tossed in the lake, the video reveals that what the viewer has witnessed is, in fact, a scene from a film that a couple is watching together on TV. The man seated on the couch impatiently calls his girlfriend who is in the other room. After failing to describe what she has missed, he presses rewind so she can catch up.

At this point the video replays in rapid sequence, quickly arriving at previously unseen footage. Seated in the front seat of a wide car, cruising down a snowy Milwaukee Ave, Mic raps the chorus and first lines of the song. By the time he gets to his second verse, the video has rewound to the scene preceding the intro, where the actors in the film are seen wrapping up their freshly murdered victim for transport. As Mic works his way through the track, the reason and method for the murder is revealed to viewers.

The rest of Fresh Prince of Darkness stays true to the themes and sounds of drill presented in the earlier songs of the album. Of note, ‘N.W.G’ focuses more on the violent aspects of living in the city but Mic uses this theme to smooth the album’s flow, at times delivering rhymes faster and with more firepower than the weapons for which Chicagoans are notorious.

With music and video performances every bit as engaging as those being produced by mainstream rappers, it’s clear Mic Terror and the rest of Treated Crew are about to break onto the national scene.  Chicago’s hip-hop style has evolved considerably since the days of conscious rappers like Common and Twista.  The change has opened the door for new and talented artists to burst through and it is only a matter of time before these names are known coast-to-coast.

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In Love In Spring Again

-Theatre Review by Kimberley Lynne–

William Shakespeare’s romantic comedy Twelfth Night is crammed with notorious Elizabethan tricks: mistaken identity, lost twins, unrequited love, costume gags, malaprops, French phrases, and a minor revenge plot. This production at Center Stage in Baltimore is a funny one with silly duels, triple takes, and zither underscoring.

The audience enters the Shakespearean world of Illyria through a props display in the inner lobby. Once inside the theatre, the doors on scenic designer Josh Epstein’s set establish that this is a farce. The obligatory phone message continues the screwball comedy tone as the clown Feste tries to answer the period phone receiver in her pocket. Director Gavin Witt transitions directly from that silliness into the poignant music of Edith Piaf and the heartsick plight of Duke Orsino. The Duke is pining over Olivia. Viola and her twin brother Sebastian are shipwrecked. Viola dons boy’s garb to search for her sibling. Acting on the Duke’s behalf, she inadvertently woos Olivia.

Witt embellishes the text’s discombobulation. When Viola enters the Duke’s house in her boy’s outfit, she’s pushing a cart, and the audience thinks for a moment that she is staff. She, therefore, appears, like magic. Witt orchestrates near twin misses throughout the play, and the audience loves each one because audiences LOVE to know something that the characters onstage do NOT. (Shakespeare understood this perfectly.) Witt shows the confusion, so when characters mistake the twins, it’s believable, despite their different genders.

Witt’s choice of casting the clown Feste as a cross somewhere between Imogene Coca and Dorothy Parker presents an older voice doling out all those pithy pearls of wisdom. The text supports an older fool, but her limited singing range turns the songs into religious blessings.

Witt continues to tease his audience. In the famous ring scene, Sir Toby Belch and company hide under giant beach umbrellas instead of the requisite hedges, although portable hedges are used as scenery in a much later sequence.

The scene depicting Viola as Cesario shaving the Duke like a valet in a romantic scene is somewhat jarring. The action interrupts the audience’s suspension of disbelief, causing viewers to wonder about Cesario’s role in the Duke’s household.

Costume designer David Burdick’s palette is a mix of subtle neutral shades until the most celebrated costume joke in the cannon. A forged love note convinces dour Malvolio that Olivia wants him dressed in more yellow, and the audience roars at his garters in a spring shade of daffodil. Olivia’s mourning dress is stunningly draped in 1940s high fashion. Belch is made even frumpier in linen.

The cast is so strong that the audience was concerned about the usual throw-away character of the Captain, entertained by attendant Valentine, and tickled by idiot Sir Andrew Aguecheek.

Caroline Hewitt as Viola is very sweet and sincere. At the end of her scene 2.2 time untangled speech, when she asks “How will this fadge?” the audience responds, “Aw.”

As Malvolio, Allen McCullough is so seriously snotty that the motivation behind the Belch trio’s silly revenge plot is clear. Complicit audiences will laugh at poor Malvolio’s sad turn of luck.

Walking that comedic edge, Brian Reddy as Sir Toby Belch wildly swings between camping it up like W.C. Fields and serious realism, but there’s not a bit of chemistry between him and his love interest, Olivia’s waiting-gentlewoman Maria.

As Duke Orsio, strapping William Connell barges through double doors with aplomb. His early and shallow pomposity makes his unraveling so poignant when he realizes that he’s in love with the boy Cesario/Viola. The human heart is mysterious. When the Duke brushes a tear from Viola’s cheek, the audience falls in love too.

And it’s good to contemplate love in spring, if spring should ever come.

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Post Photos Courtesy of https://www.centerstage.org/

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Godspeed You! Black Emperor

-Album Reviewed by Jacob Kresovich– 

‘Godspeed You! Black Emperor’ is a post-rock band from Montreal, Quebec lead by guitarist Efrim Menuck. Active from 1994-2003, the band took a long break from performing together, but in 2012 released their first new work in nearly a decade.  The members of the band have often been called anarchists, but no member has formally voiced anti-government beliefs. Nevertheless, there may be some merit to the tag.

Godspeed’s first studio album F# A# ∞ (pronounced F sharp A sharp infinity) was produced in 1996.  The first song, “The Dead Flag Blues,” features a sample of a Native American man discussing the scenery around him.  He says, “We are trapped in the belly of this horrible machine, and the machine is bleeding to death” illustrating an unsustainable capitalistic system that devours resources and confines individuals to a status quo existence.  A few fiddles join his monologue as he describes what sounds to be like the end of time.  “The skyline was beautiful on fire, all twisted metal stretching upwards…  I said kiss me you are beautiful, these are truly the last days,” the man speaks in a stern tone knowing the end to his way of life is near.  Then the music trails off until a guitar introduces a dark yet twangy phrase evoking scenes of the Western Plains. The strings emerge and retreat eliciting and maintaining a dystopian mood.

The second movement of “The Dead Flag Blues” starts with the sound of a steam engine starting up, ringing its bells and tooting its horn, again reminding listeners of a time when the United States was focused on Manifest Destiny. Initially the instruments are played off key, inducing stress. Gradually, however, the cacophony of noise falls away and a lone guitar is left strumming a more peaceful tune.  Bass and drums join in with other guitars, introducing a phrase with increasing energy.  As more instruments join, the tempo picks up. But this movement is not sustained. There is no climactic release.  On the contrary, the music stops short, the crescendo deflating as quickly as it was developed.

Godspeed has a unique talent for taking listeners to a deep, dark area of the mind, although by the end of the track they haven’t left their audience behind. A lighter, more upbeat melody prevails, relieving the tensions they have stirred. Their music toys with impressions of the American experience viewed from multiple perspectives, starting with those who lost their way of life in order to exhibit how others began theirs. The second song of the album, “East Hastings” transports listeners to a different time period, sounding more militant than the prevailing melancholy from the first composition.  The track opens with a man screaming about Jesus Christ in a foreign language. This song falls into the previous pattern, using layered instrumental bursts to build up a sense of impending doom. This time, however, the pent up energy is allowed release like an exoergic reaction.

The final track on the album, “Providence” begins with a sample of a man being interviewed in the street with a car idling in the background. He states, “The preacher-man says it’s the end of time, says that America’s rivers are going dry,” echoing the sentiments voiced by the Native American speaker in the first song, but in a modern era. “Interest is up, the stock market is down,” he says taking an additional stab at America’s renegade wealth inequality.

Much like the other tracks, the final song exhibits Godspeed’s ability to layer instruments and paint landscapes with sound. The significant contribution of each of the songs on the album is that it transports the listener forward through time, although the messages remain constant. Since America has embraced Manifest Destiny, there have been winners and losers. The tone of the instrumentals provided by Godspeed focuses on the latter, but never forgets the former.

The album F# A# ∞ is an excellent concept album that needs to be listened to in full.  The post-rock and modern style of Godspeed is evident through the structure of the album and its dominating instrumentals.  The first song is by far the most moving of the album as it does the best job of painting a picture of a failing utopian America through the lens of a saddened Native American. Listeners interested in experiencing a failing system’s crumbling sounds, and the growth of those who follow will be swept away by the powerful emotions evoked in the first track and relieved when the song draws to a cheerful close. Many will want to stop there, but the rest of the album has its rewards. F# A# ∞ gathers the sounds of American pastoral scenes through time, evoking all the angst of a transient culture too often at odds with itself and ever-grasping for a melody that puts the world at ease.

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Grey Gardens—No Ordinary Dysfunction

-Theatre Review by Diana Mumford– 

Charlottesville’s Live Arts’ production of the musical, Grey Gardens, now playing March 7-29, is a harrowing display of a dysfunctional mother-daughter relationship. The show is based on the 1975 documentary of the same name about two formerly wealthy American women, a mother and her daughter, who fall into impoverished squalor. They continue to live in their vast estate as it falls to ruin and neglect, the severity of which warrants a health department raid. The story, by Doug Wright, music by Scott Frankel, and lyrics by Michael Korrie, originally premiered on Broadway in 2006. The unbelievable lives of these two women weave an interesting story that proves truth is stranger than fiction.

Directed by Bree Luck, the play begins with gauzy white curtains swathing almost the entire set. Edith (Kate Monaghan) shuffles onto her porch with the aid of a cane, her figure only partially obscured by a yellow bathing suit and robe. Her appearance and her banter with her daughter, Little Edie (Perry Payne Millner now and in the second act), heard only offstage, gives the audience a glimpse of the eccentricities to come.

When the white curtains are pulled aside in a flourish to reveal a minimalist set with a piano taking center stage, the audience has been transported thirty years into the past. The journey into this family’s madness begins.

This first act depicts Grey Gardens in its prime, imagining how Big and Little Edie’s relationship used to be. The dialogue revolves around preparations for Little Edie and her fiancé Joseph Kennedy Jr’s (Jonathan Karns), upcoming engagement party. Edith (Millner, in the first act) is insistent on performing a few tunes for the party (musical direction by Kristin Baltes), and perform she does. Millner has lovely, strong voice, perfect for the spotlight. Monaghan and the rest of the cast hold their own, as well.

This act highlights the dysfunctional family dynamic of a mother with a perpetual need to be in the spotlight and a daughter desperate to escape her mother’s shadow. Little Edie’s absentee father has been replaced by George (Chris Patrick), platonic companion to and pianist for her mother. In Big Edie’s house of strays, Little Edie plays second fiddle for her mother’s affections.

Little Edie thinks her engagement is the key to finally leaving her mother’s house. When Edith discovers Little Edie’s fiancé doesn’t support her daughter’s show business dreams, she ruins her daughter’s engagement by sensationalizing Little Edie’s experience with men. Little Edie runs away from home, only to return as her mother’s caretaker for the second act.

The second act holds true to the film documentary. During a set change, the gauzy curtains are put back into place. Once drawn again, they reveal the innards of Grey Gardens, a decrepit house, now teeming with refuse and tokens of Little Edie’s life gone by.  Misfortune has characterized her life, leaving her a recluse in her family home.

A grown up Little Edie emerges. The sweet daughter heard offstage in the beginning of act one is no more. Instead, audiences will have the impression that they are spying on an older woman’s intimate moment of crisis. There is a hole in the wall. Little Edie is seen baring her soul, waxing poetic about her unsuccessful attempts to leave Grey Gardens and her feelings of emotional entrapment. Though her questions to the audience are rhetorical, her earnest and soulful eyes implore the audience to help.

Here, the dysfunction takes a perverse turn. Once-perfectly coifed actors are transformed into terrifying cats, creating confusion and demonstrating how far Grey Gardens has fallen into disarray. The show spirals wonderfully into the absurd with a full commitment from the cast. Monaghan’s portrayal of Big Edie in particular is lovely and endearing. Her warbling about her handyman, Jerry (Karns), loving how she prepares her corn among bedbugs is ridiculous, delightful, and sobering all at once.

As wonderful as the acting was, there was some confusion in the staging itself—the characters exit stage left and emerge stage right via Grey Gardens’ front door to enter the front lawn. This led to a few awkward transitions. There were also the overtly racist songs  in the first act (indicative of the clueless nature of the characters) that made the audience wince. The New York Times originally called the song Hominy Grits a “hilarious minstrel-show paean,” but watching an upper-class white woman pantomime the southern black mammy stereotype for laughs was truly cringe-worthy.

The play is full of endearing characters, despite their flaws. Bree Luck has sensitively recreated the times and trials faced by the real life Edies, without parodying their lives. Even in the thick of madness, the characters are believable. Obviously, a lot of work went into this musical. The show is filled with great performances, hilarious and touching. Audiences will leave the theatre humming a satisfied tune.

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joshua Beckman Reading, Photo Courtesy of Wave Books

The Inside of an Apple

-Book Reviewed by Kendra Bartell–

On first glance, Joshua Beckman’s The Inside of an Apple appears to be a humble undertaking. Published by Wave Books, the aesthetic presents a cream/off-white cover and uses a minimalistic typeface for the book’s title and author. This aesthetic is extended in the ensuing poems, which are usually only a page long, presented in the center of the page, and offer few words per line. The poems are typically untitled, and if they do have a title, the demarcation is an underline in the body of the poem. That being said, the poems themselves are rich in meaning and thought provoking. The book as a whole could be said to be showing us the inside of an apple; that is, the poems are exegeses into the deep insides of the connection between natural world and man.

Beckman’s poems read as if the speaker is taking you with him on his daily excursions into the natural world. Sounds tranquil, but readers will be challenged by the book’s language and structure. Should we view the poems as linked, or as individual moments? The table of contents presents each poem as an individual work, but the form on the page renders it impossible not to imagine a linked meditation on the speaker’s part.

Readers will also wonder about the author’s decision to break the book into sections. It is difficult to sense a different mode or line of questioning between the sections, when the central motif of engaging with nature was the common thread throughout the entire collection. The poems flow into each other, so perhaps the sections are offered as a device to slow readers down, reminding them to take breaths, and digest the material.

Beckman’s visual minimalism has its limits. In many instances the poems and word art in fact become incredibly expansive. While they are focused, generally, on small scenes of nature and the speaker’s observations of phenomena, the scope of the poems is existential. Reflective natures mirror readers’ expressions. They are participants and inhabitants of this earth, and oftentimes deal with questions of agency in experience. For example, one poem reads:

The Inside of the Apple Cream Cover. Photo Courtesy of Wave books

I live
and on one mountain
then the next
the sun shines down

a batch of metal pole clanks
and makes a music sound
in the quiet
air sound sounds

on the lit hill trees
tall before a white cloud mountain
and seen
I saw them yesterday
and again today they’re shown to me

This poem, while unassuming in form, opens itself up to the question of what seeing means. Is the speaker the active agent in this moment of seeing? Are we being shown things in the natural world, or are we seeking to see them ourselves?

Beckman’s poems present almost as little koans to be solved by the reader. At times, the lack of punctuation plays against the line, forcing readers to slow down and piece together the logic of what’s being depicted, but that work is fruitful in Beckman’s execution.

Overall, the collection reads as an engaging account of being a person in a world of both natural and man-made things. Sometimes we get snippets of city life, or items we are familiar with as made. Other times we are alone in the forest, looking at the trees. The book is primarily concerned with distinguishing the textural differences between man-made objects and natural templates, which results in a worthwhile and engaging collection. Beckman offers a unique, contemplative viewpoint that allows readers to swiftly step into his shoes and look right there with him. Spending time with each poem rather than rushing through the collection results in a richer reading. That being said, you will have to resist the urge to speed through the collection due to the visual aesthetic. Beckman’s [clappers clapping: offers an ars poetica for the collection as a whole:

Hazy warm presence of us too
being ourselves (each as a been thing)
our bodies devised it and then
made it what it said

O
and together

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The Inside of the Apple is available from Wave Books

Post Photo Courtesy of http://www.gwarlingo.com

Cast Photo Courtesy of: http://www.c-ville.com

Birdie in Barboursville

 -Theatre Review by Diana Momford–

The musical, Bye Bye Birdie was written in 1960 by Michael Stewart, with lyrics by Lee Adams, and music by Charles Strouse. The show later inspired a film by the same name in 1963. The storylines of both the musical and the film is based on Elvis Presley’s real-life antics and the pop-culture drama surrounding the 1950s American heartthrob being drafted into the army. Who could forget Elvis’ last civilian kiss? A picture perfect moment ripe with financial opportunity. In Bye Bye Birdie, Almaelou, a fictional recording company plots the same marketing gimmick for their own rock star sensation, Conrad Birdie.

Barboursville, VA’s Four County Players’ revival of the satirical musical is a sweet reminder of days gone by. The show boasts a large cast—over forty members—and is excellently choreographed by director Geri Carlson Sauls. Directing so many people’s movements in such a small stage area is difficult, but the majority of the cast danced with ease. The transitions between scenes and musical numbers are relatively seamless, aided by the cast staying in character during these times. Likewise, Steve Bliss’ two-story stage design is visually intriguing and offers additional space to spread out the large cast. Once the music starts, the actors move energetically, using the entire stage.

Starry-eyed Kim is excellently cast. Kylie Green is convincing as the naïve teenager. Her exuberant interactions with the rest of the actors as well as hitting the high notes in her numbers with ease make her a captivating performer. Kim’s idol, the smarmy Conrad Birdie (Steven Anzuini) is a vision in gold lamé. His posturing as the darling of quintessential small-town America, Sweet Apple, Ohio, also creates a persuasive performance.

Kim’s parents, Harry (Randy Clark) and Doris (Laurie Lowrance) also deliver terrific performances. At times, Clark lays it on a little thick, complete with over the top grimaces and exaggerated movements, but otherwise his role as the overbearing father is well played. Lowrance plays a great contrast to him. She presents a natural, relaxed demeanor that is still animated and interesting.

The play, however, is not without its flaws. Much of the younger cast comprising the ensembles are largely inexperienced and visibly uncomfortable on stage. Their scenes are rife with over acting—perhaps a result of opening night excitement and jitters. Additionally, the ear-splitting chorus of screams from Birdie’s fan club at each mention of their idol, force members of the audience to cover their ears. The cheers may be realistic, but their high pitch and volume detract from the viewing experience.

Criticism isn’t limited to the younger, inexperienced cast members. The lack of chemistry between Albert Peterson (Marc Schindler) and Rose Alvarez (Elena Taylor) renders their alleged eight-year romantic relationship unconvincing. Eventually, during her brief dalliance with leaving Albert, Rose comes alive as “Spanish Rose.” She dances and sashays across the stage, finally an independent woman. Though she is merely playing at being a loose woman by flirting with other men, Taylor’s portrayal of Rose’s alter-ego makes her character feel more three-dimensional. Her eventual reversion to the role of Albert’s second fiddle seems as improbable as it is dismaying.

There is more magnetism between Albert and his mother, Mae Peterson, played by Wendy Novicoff. Wendy’s portrayal of the martyred mother is spot on. Novicoff and Schindlers’ interactions as mother and son are amusing, with Novicoff’s humor carrying the scenes.

Regardless of palpable faults,  Bye Bye Birdie’s opening night was a success. The cast’s comedic deliveries, heavy-handed as they were, scored guffaws from the audience and the live music (directed by J. Tara Scott) was a treat.  In all likelihood, the cast members can overcome their opening night nerves and hit their stride in future performances. Bye Bye Birdie is playing at Four County Players in Barboursville, VA through March 30, 2014.

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Post Photo Courtesy of: http://fourcp.org/

Production Poster, Photo Courtesy of the Everyman Theatre

The Dresser

-Theatre Review by Kimberley Lynn–

The Dresser, by Ronald Harwood, now playing at Everyman Theatre in Baltimore plunges audiences into the crisis of 1942 Battle of Britain from its first line. The scene is a small British theatre where acting icon Sir’s (Carl Shurr) 227th King Lear performance is threatened by his failing mental health and Nazi air raids.

Sir’s dresser, Norman, fervently believes that veteran Sir can go on as King Lear. Her Ladyship, the actress wife who competes with Norman for Sir’s love, however, fears for her aging husband’s life. The stakes are high; Sir is the company manager as well as star and if he goes down, the company will certainly fail. Sometimes characters care more about Sir’s memory than the bombs raining on England, yet Harwood walks that thin line between comedy and tragedy. He wrote from experience; serving five years as a dresser to a Shakespearean actor. The script is not simply a series of gossipy quips but has considerable depth. Characters weave Shakespeare so smoothy that we believe, as they do, that our greatest goal is to support the Bard at any cost, risking friendship, love, and life itself.

Director Derek Goldman’s staging is seamless, and he masterfully shifts our point of view several times throughout the play, blurring the line between art and reality. Particularly transformative is the wild foley storm, whose crazed pounding conveys the tempest in Shakespeare’s drama. Applauding spontaneously, The Dresser audience doubles as the faux Lear audience, and suddenly there is a theatre inside the theatre.

Bruce Randolph Nelson as Norman, Carl Shurr as Sir and Deborah Hazlett as Her Ladyship.
Photo by ClintonBPhotography.

Scenic designer James Fouchard not only invites audiences backstage but includes them in his design. His details are meticulous. Sir’s make-up props are real, and the kettle even boils onstage. A decorative, hemp fly system hangs over the stage manager’s illuminated station. Sir’s dressing room wagon rolls in and out, expanding and contracting the space, as the interior castle scenes wrestles with the exterior heath scenes in King Lear.

Sound designer, Chas Marsh’s first cue is not the standard phone warning but paternal advice from Winston Churchill to keep calm (this recommendation is also painted on proscenium walls.) The theatrical presence is not only visual. When the actors faced the faux Lear audience stage left, their voices reverberated as if they were acting to an auditorium.

As the dresser, Norman (Bruce Nelson) plays the truth even in the comedic sections of this piece. Witness Norman’s pain in his jaw, in the roll of his shoulders, the slight shake in his hands, the rocking. The audience coos at him and giggles as he nips secret brandy in the face of disaster. They, like Norman, want everything to be “lovely” yet much of this piece is about “facing facts.” When he stabs the wig head behind Sir’s back, the crack opens in the complicated veneer of friendship, love, loyalty, hate, and ultimately abandonment that explodes at the end of the play. “The littler you are, the bigger the sorrow,” says Norman, and as he supports a stumbling Sir, we realize that Norman is his Fool.

Bruce Randolph Nelson as Norman and Carl Schurr as Sir. Photo by ClintonBPhotography.

As Sir, Carl Shurr is the perfect balance of towering strength and crumbling disintegration. He’s operating on several levels, showing us simultaneous abject terror, confusion and cunning as he manipulates his co-dependent compadres. His lope, the way he drapes himself on the fainting couch, speaks volumes, and his transformation into Lear is a magical, almost cinematic moment. The audience roots for him in his exploration of the Pirondella problem, an actor evolving into his favorite and most feared role.

In this play about company, Harwood’s dimensional characters are solidly portrayed, partly the result of Artistic Director Vincent Lancisi’s vision of a resident acting company. The Fool’s hilarious costume is way too small for Wil Love (casting is hard during war time and Love’s character is subbing in.) Love doesn’t need a funny outfit. He’s funny anyway.

Megan Anderson’s portrayal of the company’s stage manager is honest, crisp, and sincere. Deborah Hazlett’s performance as Her Ladyship is a layered aggravation over the terror that Sir is killing himself. Still, she understands that within the chaos of his illness, her husband finds the core of Lear.

As dramaturg Naomi Greenberg-Slovin says in her program notes, the play is the “ultimate swan song for a way of theatrical life that is no more,” but this story about performing theatre under air-raid conditions and in the face of dementia also displays our temporality. Underscoring the notion that all humans are trapped inside time, Sir says, we “can’t move what cannot be moved.”

Wil Love as Geoffrey Thornton and Bruce Randolph Nelson as Norman. Photo by ClintonBPhotography.

If you go see this show, as an added bonus you have the opportunity to participate in a meta experience. Don’t be surprised when midway through act two, you peer across the house and realize that you’re part of their onstage performance, lit rosily like a John Singer Sargent painting, and watching the actors perform Lear. Go to breathe in that moment.

Go if you want to laugh and yet be reminded that work is indeed noble.Go to see Bruce Nelson and Carl Shurr perform. This reviewer recommends sitting house left.

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Post Photography Courtesy of  http://everymantheatre.org