Go See This

The autumn colors linger into November, deepening into reds and oranges not usually seen, a nice contrast with the morning showers.  Now the sun has come out, and the gray is lifting.

On Tuesday, I saw "Mr. Burns, a post-electric play," by AnneWashburn/Michael Friedman, dir. by John Langs, at ACT.  It was $20-ticket night, the house was full.  I don't want to review it here, only to say that it's worth seeing.  It's exciting work, provocative, not as in titillation, but in that it fills my head with ideas, (and I'm trying to write about that, not where I want to be with it yet), and even if some people commented that it was hard to follow, I found it to be the type of theatre that thrills me (the whole big concept of the thing.)

The basic story is Act I, survivors of a nuclear catastrophe gather around a campfire and piece together the re-telling of the Simpson's episode called "Cape Fear," a story involving the movie "Cape Fear" as well as "Night of the Hunter."  There is a ritual also of whenever someone new comes along of naming names to see who is alive.

Act II, same characters, seven years later.  In some sorta' town or city, making "movies" of scenes in order to survive.  A nice dance/song mash-up, routine here.

Act III, seventy-five years later, a musical/re-enactment of story, as it's evolved by that point.  I'm gonna say that last one is open to interpretation as to what's going on, exactly, there might be a specific, but I don't want to know it, it's more interesting to wrestle with what exactly is happening, more fertile ground for thought and exploration.  (What happens to stories as they are passed down over time through oral traditions?  What gains and loses significance depending on the teller or the audience?  Or what drives the need to repeat the story?  What do we do with it?  How does it shape our culture or our identity?  What do we accept as unassailable "truth" over time, where did it come from?  Are we willing to seek the source or do we blindly accept the way things are assuming they were always that way?  How do societies change or advance over time?  Who controls the message?)

A fantastic cast: Anne Allgood, Christine Marie Brown, Andrew Lee Creech, Erik Gratton, Claudine Mboligikpelani Nako, Bhama Roget, Adam Standley, and Robertson Witmer.  An especially fine job of physical acting by Standley (Mr. Burns), Mboligikpelani Nako (Itchy), and Creech (Scratchy) as the heinous "bad guys" in Act III.  So good.