I liked how when you got the idea of what was happening, you were like "Wow. I didn't realize that before." Like, oh, Hattie was lying about her playing Nina from The Seagull. I also liked when it was a surprise that Lynn was so sarcastic and tore off her robe and was completely naked. It was strange because why would anyone take off their robe in complete public and be completely naked? They were talking about something she really didn't like the subject of, so she was showing her anger and being sarcastic.
So, it was a little confusing when they were talking about pool sharks because I didn't know very much about pool sharks because they are things that kids don't really have to know. I know what a pool shark is now because I put it together at the end of the show. I thought it was confusing when they would quickly change the subject. So when Lynn and Alfred had just finished a scene and they came in arguing, or at least it so seemed they were arguing. But they were actually rehearsing part of The Seagull, which I did not know til they stopped and started talking about how great the scene was and how good a job they did. I have seen lots of Chekhov plays, like Uncle Vanya and two Cherry Orchards, but I have never seen The Seagull. It would have been clearer to me if I had seen The Seagull.
The parts that I liked in the show were the funny parts. I liked when they were talking about how they had completely forgotten about The Seagull and that trip, and Sydney Greenstreet calls the play the one where the bird is saying "I'm the title! I'm the title!" Saying "I'm the title! I'm the title!" is a little bizarre because if you are saying "I'm the title!" you sound like you are crazy. I liked the scene where Louise threw the plates on the floor because she said "That was an accident," when she totally did it on purpose. Hattie was funny. She was always basically faking dramatic things that happened to her and cool things that she wanted to believe but were not actually true. I didn't want to be good friends with Hattie because she doesn't seem like a person that would really like a person like me, but I did think she was an interesting character.
In the scene where Alfred gave Carl the money to pay back the sharpies, I liked how Carl was like "I paid off the sharpies yesterday, but thanks for the extra." But he should have just been like, "I'll give you back this money because I already paid back the sharpies," but what he actually said was exactly the opposite of that. He was selfish and sophisticated and stealthy. I liked his character but not in way that you think he's good. You like him because he is funny, but you don't like him because he is a little bit evil.
There was something that I was a little bothered by which was that I thought they should have shown more things than they did. I mean, like, they should have shown Alfred going to the town and going to see his friend. They could have just done a quick set change or gone to a part of the stage that wasn't the house and shown you that. I also think they should have shown Uta Hagen not going onstage and being bit and kicked because it was an exciting and suspenseful moment. They should have showed it because they wanted it to be an exciting and suspenseful play. If you show things, then the play will have more meaning to that scene. The effect goes on you in a way that feels like it is actually real. If you just tell, then it doesn't have the exact same volume. It is quieter in a way that is concerning. You are not looking into this other world; you are just watching somebody telling you what might have happened.
People who would like this show are people who like famous actors, history, summer homes, and plate breaking. I think they chose some good characters that were interesting to put in a play. And this will make you, if you have never seen The Seagull, want to see The Seagull or see it again if you have seen it.
Photos: Michael Brosilow
In the scene where you first meet Bess (Carolyn Defrin), Harry Houdini (Dennis Watkins) was just ending his magic show and he had just said, "Now it gets really tricky when you start using the potato." This is one of my favorite scenes because it has lots of funny things in it. So, Bess said to Harry, "I forgot to thank you for giving me the seat on the trolley this morning" and then they weren't really paying attention, and she says, "I was on the trolley with you this morning," and Theo (Shawn Pfautsch) said, "I was?" thinking that he was the person on the trolley. So, when Theo starts paying attention he says, "Hi, pretty lady" like he's a little scared because she is so pretty. But his brother actually ends up getting Bess, and Theo turns out to be her brother-in-law. It tells us that Theo, when he was young, like his twenties, he was a little clueless. You still like him because he is funny in that way. And when he is so scared he can't stand it anymore, he leaves and says "Bye, pretty lady" in the exact same way. I think its really funny.
In the next scene, Harry and Bess go out in a boat--it is actually just a set piece that rolls around and he paddles with her ukelele. It shows you that they are very much in love because they are out in a boat and they are singing about how they could call each other anything--like, for example, the first line of the song is "Bessie, baby...can I call you baby?" "You can call me anything" "Good." Then at the end of the song Bess says, "Harry, are you presuming marriage, but I think I feel it too!" That tells you that they are about to get married. They are a good couple. They left love notes for each other around the house; I learned that in a Harry Houdini book. The play also shows you that they are a very good couple, except for something that goes on in her head. So when he was being a little inconsiderate when he bought a dress for Mrs. Weiss (Marika Mashburn) but Bess thought it was for her, she says, "I think I just got a little carried away," and then she shoots at him. And then they are all there standing still and then they explain what Bess has just done. And then when it comes back, Harry is handed a cup, and he looks sideways at her, and spits out the bullet. I think that is really funny because he is like, "That can't get me very bad. I am an escape artist, so don't try to shoot me because I have a few tricks up my sleeve, like being able to spit out a bullet."
In the scene where Harry Houdini goes to stop this weird Frenchman called Hilmar the Great (Kevin Stangler), or something along the lines of that, Hilmar says he is Harry Houdini's apprentice when he isn't. And when Hilmar came in and said "Bonjour bonjour bonjour," then his assistant (Trista Smith) came over with a pair of handcuffs. They are acting all like "Thank you! We are so happy to be here!" by being happy and having big smiles on their faces. They're not supposed to be realistic smiles; they are smirking because nobody knows that he is not actually Harry Houdini's apprentice. You feel a little sad for Hilmar, when Harry tells him to say that he is a fraud, even though he did something very bad. He was lying, after all, to basically all of France. You still feel sorry for him because he is very nervous because he has just gotten in trouble with his "master." He admired him, and then he got in trouble with him because he did something bad to Harry's accomplishments. There is only one Handcuff King. Hilmar could have been the Jail King. But he cannot say he is the apprentice of anybody if he is actually not their apprentice. But now he can open up a new magic show that tells the truth. It depends if he will actually tell the truth or he will keep getting in trouble with his so-called "masters."
In the scene where Rabbi Weiss (Abu Ansari) dies, Harry is very sad because the doctor is telling him it might be tonight, and by it he means Rabbi Weiss might die tonight. Death and his two girl assistants saw Rabbi Weiss in half, and his feet and his head and his arms are separated from each other. I thought it was a scary but cool trick. It is a good thing to represent death because it is being cut in half and being cut in half kills you--if you aren't doing magic. I think this was a good way to represent Rabbi Weiss's death because it gives you an idea that this is gonna be a scary play.
In the scene where Bess is getting tea for Mrs. Weiss, Bess gets angry because Mrs. Weiss is not being very considerate to her. And then when she asks for honey, she said, "Oh you want me to sing" and then she sings "I'm a little teapot." And then, when she says "tip me over and pour me out," she shows her underpants. I thought it was pretty funny because I was like, "I'm not sure what to do for Mrs. Weiss right now. I feel sorry for her, but I also feel very sorry for Bess because Mrs. Weiss was being pretty mean to her."
The narrator (Johnny Arena) is there because there might be some things you cannot understand, like why would Bess fire a gun at Harry? Then he can explain it. And when Harry come out on stage in a straightjacket upside down, then you won't just think "this is a trick that Harry Houdini does," you will know it is Harry being born. I think it is good that they had a narrator, because otherwise things would have gotten pretty confusing. He sounded excited and like he was about to tell you an exciting and death-defying story, not like he was about to tell you what was going to happen to Michaelangelo. They chose the style of the narrating to fit magic, to fit suspense, to fit excitement!
I think they used dance and music because it helps explain the story of Houdini's life better than just going on and saying "This is Harry Houdini's life" with no music or accompaniment or dance. There was a lot of music and dance in his actual life because Bess was a dancer and a singer. And it makes the story more exciting and adds a little bit of panache to it. He didn't have a regular life; he had a exciting life, and usually musicals are not about regular life; they are usually about exciting life. I liked the dance and song "We are the Brothers Houdini" because it had lots of jazzy stuff and I like jazzy things. And I also really liked "Bessie, Baby" because it was a nice, slow, and romantic song.
I really thought the magic tricks brought Harry Houdini's life to life. It made me feel surprised because it made me feel like I was really seeing Harry Houdini. And if it didn't make you feel like that it might not be a very good play. But it wasa very good play. I could never see him in real life, because Harry Houdini would be 138 years old and almost nobody lives to be that old. And anyway I don't think he could do the water torture cell because he would be so old, or escape from straightjackets. I don't know if he could even play a good game of chess. We don't have Harry Houdini, but we do have Dennis Watkins who is like another dimension of Harry Houdini. He even does the water torture cell trick. He also does the swallowing needle trick--which I have no idea how he does that! He also knows how to do the Metamorphosis box trick. The magic in the show helped get the story of Harry Houdini perfectly right
People who would like this show are people who like magic, music, excitement, and mystery. The mystery is how he does the tricks. I think this show should be for ages 6 and up. You should not get tickets for the next few weeks, because they are almost always sold out. So you should see it in the summer when it is remounted. The second that you start the show, you know that this show is going to be awesome, exciting, and amazing. And it is.
Photos: Michael Brosilow
Once upon a time I went to a show and it was called The Giver. The Giver is about this boy named Jonas who lives in this strange community in the future. It is a completely black and white world. Everything is very uncolorful colors and black and white. And I mean that metaphorically and literally. The metaphorically part is that you obey the rules which is the white or you get "released" which is the black. The scary stuff almost always jumps out at you, like "Oh, I didn't know that was going to happen" or "I didn't know this person would get hurt." If you have read the book, it won't be as jumping out at you, because you'll know everything that is going to happen. It was basically the book; it was a very good adaptation. It used all the subjects that were in the book and they didn't really add anything that was not at all like the book. Because there are so many exciting things in the actual book, they didn't need to add anything.
The set was really awesome. Jessica Kuehnau Wardell's set was like the actual world in the book. The actual world is completely black and white; it is very clean. It is not that scary at first; you just think it is a nice community. She made me feel like I was in another place even though this happens in the future and we are in reality in the present. The Giver's house was basically a bed and a chair and lots of books--that's what it is in the book too. At all the other houses they only have books on boring things because all the things that they have are all about the rules. If the community could read those books, they could have their own free little life, and they could make their own decisions. They would enable that because then they could get their own books that are actually interesting. When you read exciting adventure tales and stuff, they make you want to do the things that the people in the books actually do.
There were four people in the family: Jonas (Aaron Lawson), the Mother (Sarah Rose Graber), the Father (Carlos Rogelio Diaz), and Lily (Sindy Castro). And there was Gabriel, who was not exactly part of the family but became part of the family. Gabriel was a small little puppet that you could just move around his arms and stuff; he was more just a wooden guy and you could just control him. All the family got to play Gabriel, but Landree Fleming did the voice from behind the set. They chose to have a puppet because it is pretty hard to get an actual baby to do the part, or a doll. They had a puppet so they could actually control what it was doing.
I thought Sindy Castro was a good choice for Lily. She did a good job playing a young kid. She skipped a lot, and I skip a lot too. That is something that lots of kids do: they skip. She made her voice sound very young by speeding it up because kids are always saying stuff very fast. The Mother, I thought she did a good job of playing somebody that thought very seriously about the rules. She kept giving Jonas his medicine for the stirrings, which means he is starting to hit puberty and think about romance, and nobody wants that to happen. They make families by somebody choosing a mate for you and the babies are chosen at a ceremony and they are given to their new parents. Nobody can ever have romance with anybody that they like. Without romance they wouldn't have a true love, like they could never be in love with the people they wanted to love. The Father I think is a little confusing because you are always thinking, "why would he want to release Gabriel if he loves him so much?" The character is supposed to be a little confusing. I think the actor made his character just the right amount of confusing.
Fiona (Landree Fleming) is one of Jonas's best friends. Landree Fleming I thought had a good ear for what kind of person Fiona was. She was a very sweet person, and she thought about her friends first. But there was something a little scary about her. The scary thing was that she was learning the "fine" art of releasing, which is actually not fine at all. Fiona is not mean at all; she is just learning something mean. You like Fiona and all; she might be one of your favorite characters. I like her too. But teaching somebody who is a nice person to harm another nice person is just disturbing. It shows you that they are trying to make the perfect community, but then they don't make a good community that is good enough to everybody who lives there.
Kroydell Galima played Asher, and Asher is another of Jonas's best friends. I thought he knew what kind of story they were telling. I mean that the actor knew what kind of community it was, what relationship he had with the community. The character does not know about the releasing and how bad it is. Asher is a weird person; they say that Asher is somebody who doesn't obey every single rule because he is a weirdo. Like when he said, when he was only 4 years old, he said, "I want my smack," instead of "I want my snack," so he got his smack, which was a whipping. He thinks it was kind of funny, which is weird because he himself was the one getting hurt. And nobody thinks that they themselves getting hurt is funny; well, except for Asher. That makes him 1 in 6 million 3 thousand. I thought, "Yikes! I feel uncomfortable right here" when he is laughing about himself getting hurt. Just for grammar difficulty, they hurt him!
I thought John Ruhaak's impression of The Giver was believable. I saw The Giver reading the books, and I thought right away, "Oh, that's The Giver" because he looks like people would imagine The Giver looking like: a middle-aged man in an old-timey and different-style cape than everybody else's clothes. He is a good person but sometimes he can be very strict. The Giver loves Jonas, but his parents don't really love him, and they don't really love Lily either because they are not exactly real people. They are basically Frankenstein's monsters because the community is crooked and makes love weird. Like the monster's love for his father is just crazy. Everybody believes that The Giver loves Jonas in a way that nobody ever loved him.
Aaron Lawson I thought showed the way that Jonas would behave about the community. I thought when he was receiving the memories he would look like he was experiencing what The Giver was giving to him, and he did what it is like in the book. In some of the memories he looked scared and hurting. And in other memories he looked happy and like he was enjoying himself. I think I am most like Jonas because he wants to help his friends and other people by saving them from the control of the community. Memories are basically how he knows The Giver and how he is going to be The Giver. He is going to be The Giver for thousands and thousands of people.
The first thing that happens in the book and the play is a plane going overhead. They did a good job acting out a plane and people being scared about the plane and thinking about them being attacked. You think that this is going to be a scary story when the plane goes overhead, like there will be a fire and everything. But it is scary in a completely different way. It is not scary in the way of lots of fire and lots of scary monsters coming and trying to kill people. The play was disturbing in a different way. It is more about not like war but like destroying themselves.
People that would like this show are people who like memories, mystery, and using their imagination. I think this show should be for ages 6 and up. People should go see this play because it is a good adaptation of a good but scary story. It teaches you that if you are trying to make something perfect, you can't make it perfect, and you shouldn't try to make it perfect or you will end up doing bad things that you think are good.
Photos: Johnny Knight
So there was this character named Drummer (Thomas Kelly) and he wanted to get Pinocchio to be a drum when he was a donkey. So he would stretch out his skin over a pot or something and then he could use his bones for drumsticks. So, when Drummer is saying, "Oh we'll get to know each other. What is your favorite color? Oh and I bought you this beautiful leash and it has this beautiful rock on it. Let's look at the water. And let's put the rock in here" the rock pulls Pinocchio into the water and he comes back up a puppet. I thought Drummer was kind of animal cruelty-ish. He's not scary; he's mean and funny and a little stupid. So when Pinocchio came to come see the Milkmaid/Blue Fairy/Tien Doman and he saw Lampwick (Thomas Kelly) laying as on the ground and he's a donkey. And then these guys take Lampwick away and when they are off stage you hear "Oh! A dead donkey for my drum!"says Drummer. It is cool and weird because Lampwick is also the person who played Drummer so it is kind of weird to be saying "Yay! My other character is dead" and he's going to make himself into a drum.
I think in Pinocchio's tale, the sad one (the actual book) and the happy one (the Disney version), they should get Pinocchio to be homeschooled. He's told "behave, go to school, don't be different than all the other boys in the world." Him having to go to school, not be different, and not be his own self that he wants to be makes him be kind of a jerk. In the play, Pinocchio (Robert Fenton) treats people like they are idiots and like he is the smartest person in the world. He actually isn't the smartest person in the world because the Fox (Chris Rickett) and Cat (Tien Doman) trick him into thinking that there is this place where he can "grow money, " but money doesn't grow on trees. He just wants more of what he has; he is never satisfied with what he has. It is really inappropriate for kids to swear. That is really a grown up thing to do. You can say "oh my gosh" or "geez louise," but you can't say "oh my god" or anything really offensive. When I am angry I say "errrrrh." And Pinocchio swears a lot, so he is a very inappropriate child. So when he is swearing at the Fox and the Cat, Geppetto (Dan Kerr-Hobert) says "That is very inappropriate language for a little boy" because it is. Some people kind of think it is kind of funny, but I don't because I would never swear, at least not as big as he does.
Guy Massey is The Monster. The first impression that you got was that this was going to be a terrifying story that everybody dies in. It is the feeling of terror--well something that is not as bad as that but still cool. You are seeing him roaring, and there is big thunder and lighting and scary sounds. When you actually get into the story, you find out that it isn't as terrifying as in the beginning. The Monster also swears a lot. I think because he is kind of lonely, is one reason. And he killed his own father. And I suspect that wasn't very fun. I thought his makeup wasn't as much like the makeup in the movie--which I haven't seen but I've seen lots of pictures. This was more realistic, more like a real human, and not so cheesy. I think of The Monster as lots of scary body parts sewn together and come to life with different colored eyeballs. In the movie, he looks a little too cheesy to think that he is really weird or scary or real.
To be honest, I think there really isn't a main character. There are two main characters which are The Monster and Pinocchio. Even though they are both kind of jerks, you feel kind of sorry for them. You feel sorry for Pinocchio because he is not treated equally as other children. I feel sorry for The Monster because he feels lonely and sad. That makes the audience not be bad persons; it just makes us sympathize. If there is like somebody that is kind of mean to you and then they get hurt, you are going to feel sorry for them. The show showed me what it is really like to sympathize with someone who is almost a complete jerk. The Monster is also big and mean, but I kind of feel like The Monster is kind of actually a little bit nicer than Pinocchio even though he killed lots of people. They both kind of have an excuse for their badness. Pinocchio is not treated very well, and The Monster is treated like he is a slave. They both are not treated equally to other people. The Blue Fairy and Geppetto are people that love Pinocchio, but nobody really loves the Monster because everybody just screams and runs away when they should actually be thinking about his feelings. Pinocchio does lots and lots of cruel things to people--like when the Blue Fairy dies and he swears at somebody in the audience for doing what he asked them to do and like killing beautiful creatures like crickets. But The Monster only does one cruel thing at the end of the play which I am not going to give away. And if you don't get to see the play, just call me up.
The puppets I thought were really cool. I really liked the shadow puppets because they really had a cool meaning to them: they would show things that people couldn't really do onstage. The Punch and Judy was kind of like a real puppet show, only a little more violent; like they killed off a little girl. And that was really disturbing. The puppet theater is also a puppet. There is a guy in the puppet--kind of like Big Bird. I have never seen an actual Punch and Judy show. I have seen dancing puppet animals in the Puppet Bike. I saw a Christmas Bear puppet show in New York in the winter. But I have never seen an actual Punch and Judy show, so I didn't know what it would be like.
There was the ghost of the talking Cricket which was made out of ice, and it was very fantastic, and how they got that ice not to melt. So Pinocchio bit the Cricket's head off and that is how he actually bit off his head--because he was made out if ice! It was a little funny--Pinocchio biting the Cricket's head off and cutting his head off, and smashing him, and Geppetto eating him. It was funny because it was so absurd and crazy, not because a boy smashing a great part of nature is actually funny.
People who would like this show are people that like donkeys, puppets, and violence. It makes you ask yourself questions that you never asked yourself before. What is it like to have done something bad but not to think it is a bad thing? Does The Monster actually love Pinocchio? Can The Monster tell the future? Grownups should come see this show because it is sad, crazy, and fuh-larious.
Photos: Joe Mazza
So there is this scene where Boze is protecting Gabby from Duke Mantee (Jamie Vann). Duke Mantee is the criminal and they are running away because they had just killed a lot of people. And the police are running after them. And everybody is saying like, "Let's go," but they are waiting for Duke Mantee's girlfriend, and he wants to see his girlfriend. And when he is protecting her, Boze gets shot and there is lots of blood spraying from his hand. His hand it like completely red with blood. I thought it was creepy and awesome.
Duke Mantee is almost completely bad, but I think he likes Gabby. I don't think he like has a crush on her. I just think he likes her. I think Duke kind of wants something to do while he is waiting for his girlfriend: like shooting people, being mean, talking to Gramp (Walter Brody), and eating. While Duke is eating his food, this guy named Pyles (Travis Porchia) comes in and keeps saying "Hi, brother" to Joseph (Brandon Saunders), the driver for the rich people (Jim Poole and Janice O'Neill). Joseph and Pyles are both African American characters and are both not treated equally as the people that they work for. Pyles kind of feels sorry for Joseph because he doesn't feel like he's treated as equal with the rich people he works for. But Duke Mantee treats Pyles like he is just a pile of nothing. He treats him worse than his other employees because he has a different color skin than everybody else in his crew. Pyles seemed nicer than the rest of the crew that were always pointing guns at people. He wasn't always pointing guns at people, he was talking to people and being funny and talking to his "brother."
So Gabby was kissing Boze, and Squier came in. And they were talking about how he wanted to be buried in the Petrified Forest, and he was talking about how he was a writer, and she said, "I've done a few drawings, but they aren't that good." But he turned out really liking them. When he sees the pictures, it shows us that she's really good at expressing her emotions by drawing. You hope that she turns out going to Paris with Squier because that is what she wants and nobody is letting her do that.
Squier makes a bad decision. It is a very scary decision, and I don't think he really should have done it because it took away part of his world. He should have just married Gabby, and then when he died she would get the money still. I have no real idea why he did it--maybe because he wanted her to get to go to Paris that second, or sooner rather than later. Squier kind of wants to be like Cyrano because he gets badly hurt and dies. But in Cyrano he does not want to die and in this he does want to die. Squier wants Gabby to be happy, and he wants to die knowing that she loves him like Cyrano knows that Roxanne loves him. It makes the end seem touching when Gabby recites Squier's favorite poem that she recited to him when he first got there.
Since I am a girl of only 7 1/2, I do not know anything about true romance. I know about being kissed on the cheek, because that has happened to me, but I don't know anything about being romantically involved. Even for grownups, it is a pretty confusing play, because nobody knows why he didn't choose to be a happy family for a while. I know about how Romeo and Juliet works. Romeo kills himself because he thinks Juliet is dead. But she isn't dead, and she wakes up, and then she kills herself because she can't live without Romeo. The Petrified Forest is a good play; it is an awesome play. But if you are a child it is kind of hard to understand Squier's decision. But everything else is pretty understandable. Like this football player has a crush on a girl named Gabby, and then this writer comes, and then she tells him about how she wants to go to Paris, and then this bad guy comes, and then it turns into total destruction. It is really not a children's play. It is a grownup's play, but I don't mind thinking about things that are confusing, but not so confusing that you are like "what's happening? I don't understand a thing he's saying!" I can handle, "I don't understand what this means; I don't know why he made that decision" because it makes a mystery for you to solve after the play is done. And I really like the mystery.
People who would like this show are people that like mystery, romance, poetry, and Cyrano. It is a very interesting play. I liked it a lot because it kind of made me see through a whole new window in the world. You can make a bad decision, but other people seem to think it is a good decision. It is like a big pile of questions that you have to ask yourself that you have never answered a question that is even a little bit like it. After the show is finished you will feel happy, you will feel sad, you will feel mad--an assortment of different emotions, some of which I don't even remember the names to all of them. If you are young and you come to see this play, you will feel like you switched minds with your mom or your dad or the person sitting next to you because you will be able to know even more grownup things than you learn everyday. This is the end of my review, for which we twain are met.
Photos: Leigh Loftus
Once upon a time I went to a show and it was called A Midsummer Night's Dream. It was at Chicago Shakespeare. Shakespeare is actually one of my favorite playwrights. I don't know why; he just does all this great stuff that has to do with life, and death, and hilarity. If somebody asks, "The words are too hard; why do you like it?" I would say you just need to understand what the story is about. For example, Midsummer Night's Dream is about fairies, love, and comedy. Shakespeare puts things in a way that people years from then--which is now--they still understand what he means. He puts his words in a way that is funny, heartbreaking, and romantic. And in all his plays you just feel amazed.
When the show started, Bottom led a song that said his name sort of. It went buh buh buh botTOM. I think it is funny because it had Bottom's name in it. They switched the first scene with the second scene, so the actors getting together came first before Theseus (Timothy Edward Kane) and Hippolyta's (Tracy Michelle Arnold) meeting with Lysander (Andy Truschinski) and Demetrius (Matt Schwader) and Hermia (Christina Nieves) and Egeus (Kurt Ehrmann). By putting putting some of the funny stuff first, then you don't get the idea that it is going to be a dramatic death with a beautiful young girl dying for her love. You get that this is going to be a hilarious comedy.
The director, Gary Griffin, disguised Puck (Elizabeth Ledo) as Sigmund Freud who was a psychiatrist and he also was interested in hysteria and the unconscious. Hysteria is the research of women who have problems with doing things that are not good or appropriate...according to men. Sometimes men can really not like women. I learned about hysteria from The Hysterical Alphabet which was about hysteria which Sigmund Freud was famous about. It was made by Terri Kapsalis, Danny Thompson, and John Corbett. The unconscious is like when you do something but you don't know why you are doing it. It is kind of like Othello. He didn't know why he was killing his wife, and then he felt guilty and killed himself. And that's basically the whole story. It is a dramatic and not healthy story; you should not do what Othello did to himself or to his wife.
So Sigmund Freud was on stage for awhile, and Helena (Laura Huizenga) was talking to him for a few seconds, and then he stayed on the stage. Then he took off his hair. Then he took off his mustache. Then he took off his jacket, and then he took off his pants and his shirt, and he was in his Puck outfit. And then in big red letters on the screen over Sigmund Freud's picture it said PUCK! They used Sigmund Freud because people acted very weirdly in the play. For example, the flower is kind of like a hysteria flower because it made Titania (Tracy Michelle Arnold) go bonkers. She fell in love with a guy with a donkey's head, and that is not very smart.
You know that Puck is a fairy because he does things that human people cannot do. For example, he has lady parts and boy parts. He can fly, is another, because he says "I'll put a girdle around the earth in forty minutes." I think Elizabeth Ledo did a good job of pretending to be a boy. She would just smoke this cigar and nod her head and stuff. And then she would just walk around like a man would. She just seemed so much like a boy. And that is a very good thing because if she seems like she is a boy because she is pretending to be a boy that is a good thing. And I think the director chose it that way because in lots of Shakespeare plays girls are dressed up like boys to get the rights that men would have.
One of my favorite scenes was the scene where the four lovers were fighting. I liked the scene because it had my favorite lines in it. When both the boys, Demetrius and Lysander, were in love with Helena, Hermia gets really angry because they are both supposed to be in love with her, but she only wants Lysander to be in love with her. The whole thing starts when Helena calls Hermia a puppet because she is shorter. And then Hermia is really angry because puppet is a mean name--well, it used to be. Then Hermia calls Helena a painted Maypole. Then Helena gets super-duper angry. At the end of the scene, Oberon (Timothy Edward Kane) says, "What have you done, Puck?" because he has made Lysander not love Hermia, who is his true love. After all this dramatic I-don't-love-you-anymore stuff Oberon is like "What have you done!" in such a funny way.
The Changeling Boy played by Matthew Abraham was so cute and so talented for his age. The Changeling Boy is Titania's little boy who belonged to a good friend of hers, but then that friend died. And she loved the Changeling Boy so much that she decided she could take care of him very well. And she does. But then Oberon takes the Changeling Boy from her, but since at the end she loves Oberon again the Changeling Boy is going to be hers again.
On the second half, the lights come up on Oberon and he says "I wonder if Titania be awaked?" And that is just really funny because we know that Titania hath been awaked and fell in love with a donkey, or in this case, an ass. Puck does some magic on Bottom (Ron Orbach) to make him make some mayhem. The magic turns him into a donkey and then all the actors are scared away. Bottom is a part of this weird group that do these regular things for a living, but then they decide that they would try to do a play for the Duke and almost-Duchess. So, for example, Snug (Richard Manera), who plays the Lion, is a joiner. And Bottom is a weaver, so he weaves dresses and shawls and stuff. So when they all get together in the first scene, they all are given parts and scripts. Flute (Levenix Riddle), the bellows mender, is given his part, which is Thisbe, who is the lady and beautiful maiden who loves Pyramus so dearly. He doesn't like it because it is a girl's part.
While they are performing "Pyramus and Thisby, a most tragical mirth," most of it is actually a long song. And I think that is just really hilarious to have them sing because that is not what it usually is in the play. Thisby sings her lines like the song "Rehab"--and that's a good thing, because that just makes it more funny. The person that plays Starveling (Rod Thomas) was really funny because when somebody else was talking he would make his puppet dog talk and I thought that was really hilarious. Tom Snout (Michael Aaron Lindner), the tinker, sang his songs kind of folky, and I think that is a good thing for a wall to sing--folk songs. When Peter Quince (Tim Kazurinsky) came out in the wedding scene, he was really scared to talk to them, so he was like sputtering in the middle of his lines. He was kind of excited because they has been requested. It made me feel like Peter Quince is a very funny person but he can also sometimes be a little scared.
Mara Blumenfeld did a good job doing the costumes. I like Titania and Oberon's outfits. They were super crazy and creative. And Oberon seemed kind of Indian, which is a cool thing to add. And the fairies' hats were super fun. For example, Cobweb's hat was shaped like a big spiderweb. It was really cool. And Moth's hat was a big green moth hat made out of little moths. He took out one and put it on the fairy queen so then she could sleep well. So they are kind of like magical moth things. And the wedding outfits were robes and long flowing gowns--some of them were pants and some of them were long flowing gowns. I thought they were very very beautiful and also very cool to look at.
People who would like this show are people that like fairies, hilarity, and hysteria. This show is different from other Midsummer Night's Dreams because it has Freud in it, is one, and it also has singing. And it has grown-up fairies. I think this show should be for ages 4 and up. Just remind the kids that there is some kissing in it. People should come and see this play because it is funny, exciting, crazy, and it has costume creativity.
One of my favorite scenes was the scene where Victor tried to get out of his grandmother’s trunk to be like Harry Houdini. His grandmother’s trunk was locked, and he’d never unlocked it before. Houdini got out of a trunk that was dropped into the water—in less that 20 seconds! When Victor got into the box, the box shook and you could hear “Help, help, please. Somebody? I’m in here!” It is funny that he cannot get out and the box is shaking like in cartoons. I like cartoons, so I thought this was funny. It is kind of funny that the box is shaking, but it is not funny that he is failing to get out. He needs to know that he does not have “magical powers” like Houdini. He doesn’t have any special picks or anything in there.
I liked the scene where Victor was playing with his Harry Houdini doll and was making it do the water torture cell trick. But all he could do was get a honey pot to do the water torture cell trick. And the Barker (Derek Hasenstab) said, “The ONE! The ONLY! Harry Houdini!” and then Harry Houdini the doll came out and was like “Thank you, thank you, thank you!” This scene tells you that Victor cannot actually have the things that Harry Houdini could have. He couldn’t have the real water torture cell or even one that kind of looked like it. It makes you feel sorry for Victor but kind of happy that he likes to pretend that he has things of Harry Houdini’s.
Right before they left for the train station, Victor's mother (Sara Sevigny) tied a rope to his hand and she took him outside. I thought that wasn't exactly how moms are, except for the ones in Cinderella. She wasn't a bad mom, she wasn't evil or anything. She didn't make him do all the housework. She did kind of want the best for him, but it wasn't the best for him because he liked magic. Why doesn't she just let him have magic like he wants? There are no villains in this, and she is not a villain, but you kind of feel sorry for Victor that he can't have magic. Sara also got to play Harry Houdini's wife. Bess is Harry Houdini's wife's nickname, but that is what everyone called her. Even Houdini called her this. She was so nice and so truthful to Victor about Houdini's death. And she is giving him a present of Houdini's and he wanted to give it to him, which was a box that had the initials carved into it: E.W. And E.W. stands for Erich Weiss. I know it looks like it is going to be a w sound, but it is actually a v sound--Veiss. I'm not going to give away the ending, but I will tell you that Erich Weiss is the name of a person who I cannot give away his true identity.
I think the puppets were cool. One of them was the bus that would just move along and the puppets of the Mother and Victor getting on the bus and them getting off the bus, and them getting on the train, and them getting off the train, and them getting to Aunt Harriet’s house. I liked it because they were not like finger puppets, and they were not like hand puppets, and they were not like marionettes. They were like shadow puppets only they had faces and you could see them. And at Aunt Harriet’s house, when the actual actors were playing the parts of Aunt Harriet and Victor and the Mother, they had the dolls that they would talk to Victor with, and I thought that was cool because the dolls were so small and the person was so big that it made them seem like they were Borrowers.
There was one problem with the puppets, which was that there was Victor’s son and he was just a hat, and gloves, and a baseball bat. I didn’t like this because it seemed like Victor's son was some kind of ghost or something. And if you looked at it, you kind of felt sad for Victor because you kind of felt like his kid was dead. They could have gotten an actor to play it or at least a puppet with a face.
The play is based on a book with the exact same name. It is by Brian Selznick. The play did have my favorite part in it, which is a happy part, which is one of my favorite lines. It is not a funny one, just a happy one. And it is “Victor locked himself inside his grandmother’s trunk and escaped...in under twenty seconds.” In the play, he came out of a door in the room that was not connected to the box. It made you feel more happy for him because you actually got to see him escape and come out from somewhere else.
When you walked into the space, you knew it was going to be a good adaptation because the stage looked a lot like pictures from in the book. I liked how the actors could just bring apart the set, and there was a new set, and bring apart the set, and there was a new set, and so on. If you open a book, there will be another page behind it, so it was kind of like opening a book. Each set was like seeing another page. And I would like to say congratulations to Blair Thomas for making such a great set and directing very well and making the puppets good.
There are usually no songs in a book, but sometimes in comic books. I liked a lot of the songs (by Hannah Kohl and Mark Messing) in the play, but one of my favorites was “A Mother’s Day is Never Done” because it kind of showed kids what it would be like if they ever had kids. Victor sings it when he’s older, but this time “A Father’s Day is Never Done.”
In the scene where Victor is saying how "a father's day is never done," there are these things that pop out of the black curtain behind him. One is a work bag, two is a dinner, three is a story, and four is a pillow. And he would say "Work, dinner, story, sleep" over and over again. I liked how he was still straight up but there was a pillow that he would not actually lay down on. They would just bring it up next to his head, and he would close his eyes. He would do things over and over again and never stop; every day was just a regular old day. You feel sorry for him kind of because he never has time to do things that aren't everyday things.
People that like magic, mystery, and puppets would like this show. I think this show should be for ages 3 and up. People should go to this play because it is funny but also suspenseful. It is an awesome adaptation of The Houdini Box, and if anybody is born and misses it, I hope they do a remount.
Photos: Michael Brosilow
