Review of Charles Ives Take Me Home at Strawdog Theatre Company

Once upon a time I went to a show and it was called Charles Ives Take Me Home. It was by Jessica Dickey and it was directed by Keira Fromm. It was about a man named John Starr (David Belden) and his daughter Laura (Stephanie Chavara) who wanted nothing more than to play basketball. And she is getting older and older and Charles Ives (Jamie Vann) is leading them on, so basically they don't kill each other because John doesn't like basketball, he likes music. Charles Ives likes music and sports. It is about fathers, daughters, love, and music and basketball. It is saying that all of these have their faults, but there are good things about them. I remember that Charles Ives was talking in the show about how value and importance are not the same thing. The father and the daughter are both. Basketball and music are valuable, but they are not super important. Some people need them to live, but some people can live without them. I really liked this show and I think it tied together very well. The lesson of the show is to be open to other people's passions. And it makes me not want to fight with my dad ever again.

I think this show is very funny but also very sad sometimes. I thought it was really funny how John Starr played for a second, then he talked, then he played, then he talked. And he kept mentioning the college he went to. "I went to Juilliard." Then he played. Then he talked a little bit about women's private parts. And then he went back to playing. Then he talked about his daughter. Then he went back to playing. This showed you that he liked music but he also liked to chat. So he decided to make music-chatting. I also really liked when Laura started bouncing her basketball to the rhythm of her father's music. I also liked how shocked her father looked when she said she looked up about Charles Ives and read his book and listened to his music. I just loved that expression so much. Basically that was my father's expression when I said Batman was one of my favorite super heroes. It is also sad because Laura has to live with her mother and she doesn't really seem to like her mother very much. There is another thing that is pretty sad, but I can't talk about it because it is one of the last things that happened in the play.

I think that basketball and music are a very big part of this show. Sometimes there is basketball music! Something I know about Charles Ives is that his music is very mixed up. My violin teacher, Geoff, told me to play one song while he played another to show me what Charles Ives' music was like, like two songs being played at the same time. I think they chose for this to be about Charles Ives because the father and daughter's relationship is very mixed up. They like two things (violin and basketball) that don't seem to go together, but they still work. I don't play basketball but I do play music. But you kind of shift sides as the play goes on, from violin to basketball and basketball to violin and back and forth. If you see this show, you will not be able to decide which is better. I personally like violin better, but my uncle I think would like basketball better. It is literally your opinion. And there is no better one of the two; they both have their rights and they both have their wrongs.

I liked the direct address in this because it was like John and Laura were also talking to Charles Ives. And Charles Ives also talked to us, but he was kind of like a ghost. The ghost was talking to us. If you don't know he is Charles Ives when he comes out, you think he is the narrator. And he kind of is. He is Charles Ives but Charles Ives is the narrator. You do like Charles Ives even though he is a crazy lunatic. He is crazy in a good way--kind of like me. He talks crazy--like in music class he starts talking about sports. He's like, "When your father dies, the trees bend down." That could be true, but it is kind of crazy. He is the voice of music and sports. He is like both of them put together: the violin and the sports. He is the voice of what the father should be and what the daughter should be.

The father and the daughter love each other, but they have a lot of fights. My family doesn't have a lot of fights, but we fight. These fights did seem realistic because if your dad is working and you disturb him he can get angry. My dad is not at all like that dad, but it just seems realistic. I think that it must be very hard for her to have a mom and dad that don't live in the same house and don't love each other. And it is also hard for your family to like such different things and you are the weird one. That is not like my family. All of us like theater; all of us like writing; all of us like books. Except my dad does not like Restaurant Impossible because he thinks it looks too planned. The father and daughter relationship made me feel emotional because it seemed very realistic and it showed me what should not happen when I become a teenager.

People who would like this show are people who like Charles Ives, basketball, and music-chatting. People should definitely go and see this show. I think it is funny, sad, and bittersweet. This show will help people who are having fights with their families be a family again and not just be fighting. I loved this show very much and I think it is awesome.

Photos: Chris Ocken