God's Ear

Photo/Carol Rosegg

"I lost my umbrella," says Ted, struggling to find a place within in the stifling normalcy from which he can speak to his wife. "You could have bought a new one," responds Mel (short for Melanoma, but more appropriately, for Melancholy). "I wanted to get home," he punches back. "I'm glad you're home," says Mel, clipping into the rhythm (a sort of verbally repetitious but vocally fresh beat, the sort relentlessly fueled by subtext). "I'm glad I'm home, too," says Ted, pausing only for a moment before adding, "I missed you." "I missed you, too," Mel replies, simply. "No, but I really missed you," says Ted, with the sort of banal logic on which the fate of the world, or at least God's Ear, hangs. "Those are just words to you," he continues, "but I mean it." And that's the miracle of Jenny Schwartz's writing: for all the patters and patterns, underneath the monologues steeped in cliché or those surrounded by trivia, she means it, every last word. (I'd expect no less from a playwright who retypes every word in every draft.)

This literary aestheticism is necessary, too, for God's Ear is about a family trying to cover up their sadness, first by burying it under the surface, then by refusing to talk about it, and finally by shushing it away, either with streams of directed nonsense or with an anesthetic and forced normalcy. The play pits the dark truth against the pretty fiction, at times speaking entirely from subtext (imagine a commercial Chekhov), and then turns to a magical realism in which figments like the Tooth Fairy, GI Joe, and "a transvestite stewardess with a gun to my head," take on flesh. As they burst to the surface, the characters descend into their own personal underworlds, meeting in the midpoint of reality and fantasy, though always grounded by the gentle cadence of the text. At one point, when Ted is asked what he wants by a "transvestite stewardess with a gun to my head" that he has conjured up, he faces his son's tragic death:

I want to watch my son grow up and get married. Or grow up and not get married. I don't care if my son gets married. I just want my son to grow up and be happy. I just want my son to grow old and be safe. I just want my son to outlive me by a million and one years. By a million and two years. I just want my son to outlive me by a million and three years. I just want my tears to roll up my face instead of down my face. I just want my tears to defy the laws of gravity. I just want my son to defy the laws of nature. I just want a drink.

This is the sort of exaggerated truth that leads to deep revelation, a technique on par with the off-kilter plots and characters of, say, Sarah Ruhl's Dead Man's Cell Phone. In another scene, Mel -- provoked by the powerful prodding of her daughter's "Why?" -- quickly crescendos through a series of accusations: her husband uses call-girls because he's lonely, bored, weak, and pathetic. That this isn't true is beyond the point (Ted attempts an affair with Lenora, another lonely soul, looking for the right mix of compliments and liquor to drown out their grief); in the wake of their son's death, all that exists for these characters is what is within their own minds.

If the play sounds difficult to digest, worry not: the show is superbly directed by Anne Kauffman, who takes the text -- off-kilter as it is -- literally enough to make it work. Kris Stone's staging is a smooth blue-paneled floor, shiny and unblemished at first, but slowly pockmarked with problems, as characters surface from beneath the panels, metaphors springing to life from the repressed underground. The same goes for Tyler Micoleau's lighting, which one could almost call poetic, in the way it dabs, dashes, and caresses the action -- never brightly illuminating any one thing, but always keeping our attention fixed on the drama. Aesthetically, the design is as pitch perfect as the dialog -- even Olivera Gajic's costuming fits the characters, with loose, baggy clothing (or a disheveled suit) given to the mourners and a tattered wings for the Tooth Fairy.

As for the cast, there's a reason most of the actors from last year's production are being used again. These lines live within them, and I can't imagine hearing Mel (Christina Kirk) speak without that lisp, or Ted (Gibson Frazier) speak without that stubbly regret. The one newcomer, Rebecca Wisocky, is the right choice: she now steals the show -- so infectiously giddy that her Lenora's vulnerability is all the more sad. From the menace in Matthew Montelongo's stewardess ("There's no need to panic, but you certainly shouldn't relax") to Judith Greentree's matter-of-fact Tooth Fairy ("Aloe is nature's way of saying sorry"), these actors find otherness, but never abandon the basic humanity that anchors the entire play -- in particular, Monique Vukovic, who, as the daughter, Lanie, delivers a long monologue comprised of trivia ("Did you know that avocados are the good kind of fat?"). As she speaks, she emulates other people, but the effect doesn't make her seem too old -- rather, she seems too young, trying to hide her age with an impersonation of TV wisdom. All the actors -- and let me not leave out Raymond McAnally's rootin'-tootin' "normal" Guy -- have such remarkable ranges that the staggering scale of this script seems to be no trouble at all.

God's Ear is highly recommended, on all levels, as an alternative play that manages to be more than an original voice or a clever device. I'm not repressing anything beyond a wall of grief, so whereas Jenny Schwartz has to take the long road, I'll be direct: you must see this heartbreaking show. It is fresh, funny, poignant, and a phenomenal use of talent.

PLAY: "Have You Seen Steve Steven?"

Photo/Jim Baldassare

Remember that time when you were a kid, and you thought you knew better than your parents? Or that other time, when you got older and you realized that, for all your rebellion, you were becoming your parents? Or that last time, when you were really old, and you didn't remember either of these times? Anne Marie Healy's new play, Have You Seen Steve Steven? is appropriately funny as it dredges through the truths of the first two things, reflected in a homey Midwest McFamily, the culturally klutzy (yet obsessive) Clarksons. But it's the third thing that at last turns the work into a frightening satire, with an affectingly disaffecting series of onstage dismantlings of both family and memory, those tenuous connections to actual life.

Unlike other modern satirists like George Saunders, Ms. Healy grounds her work in the laughable concerns of the Clarksons as they prepare for their old friends, the Dudleys. But wait! They're out of Shiraz, there's a bean dip stain--pimento!--on the sofa, and neither Mary (who's been boastfully preparing a "hot dish" to go with the Ritz Bitz) nor Bill (who's been basking in the glow of his SONY 9877 projector system) has showered yet. If anything, things are too normal, which leads us, along with the daughter, Kathleen, to suspect (in that Eerie, Indiana sort of way) the intentions of the soft-spoken, neon-orange-hatted, bear of a neighbor that is Hank Mountain. (Rightfully so, but still...)

Our concerns are whisked away, however, by the speedy and efficient pace of Healy's script, and Anne Kauffman's disconcertingly cheery direction (similar to that in The Thugs). Our concerns are set aside by the arrival of Jane and Dudley, who come across as a slightly more in-the-know (i.e., pretentious) version of Mary and Frank. In other words, they're the sort of people who "order" an exchange student so as to seem concerned, but can't pronounce her name (Anlor), nor care to learn it. Tommy, their son, doesn't buy into their consumerism, for which he is rewarded with the sobriquet "Mister Ex-Pat," nor is he especially interested in reliving old times with Kathleen, except for mentioning their old imaginary dog, Steve Steven.

The play operates at first as a farce, with pratfalls from Frank as he tries to cover up the bean-dip stain and sight gags from a parade of personality-stealing puffy coats. But between the creepy neighbors (Hank is joined later by a sprightly old maid, Vera) and Tommy's gloomy realism, the show keeps transforming into something more sinister. The smiles we took to be genuine are quickly exposed as screw-on, and though there's love between the parents, it's one of deadening comfort, not livening passion. At first, the mispronunciation of Anlor's name (Rumbone, Rambone, Randor, Ranflor, ultimately the commercially captivating Rambo) is amusing, but as the night goes on, it becomes more like a sick joke on everyone involved.

As for Have You Seen Steve Steven? itself, Kaufmann has nailed the mood, Healy has caught the rhythms, and the cast has vibrantly brought it all to life. There's certainly room for the quirky discomfort to be repetitious, and the play's conclusion is so extremely--almost militarily--staged that it's hard to follow ("NETWORK IS PANINI!"), but the production itself is so crisp, so genuinely warm, that we follow these families into the hell of growing up (as Thomas puts it, right before breaking down, "Yeah. I'm. Totally taking this like a man..."). By no means is Steve Steven an easy play (I'm not sure I understand it all), but it is enjoyable, especially in the quiet, honest and awkward moments between the performers--moments where, for a second, it looks like they're just about to really connect, only to just as suddenly dismiss the impulse with a well placed Midwestern "wull." The whole cast is exceptional, but Alissa Ford and Tom Riis Farrel (Mary and Frank) pivot between needs particularly well, and Matthew Maher (Hank) is easily one of the year's most memorable villains.

The one gripe I will take up with the play is that it's hard to take Anlor seriously, and her role in the play's conclusion confuses more than it coheres. It's not the actress's fault--Jocelyn Kuritsky is alarmingly funny--but given that there are already two strangers at the dinner party, and that the play is mostly an attack on the walled-in American lifestyle, there just isn't any need for another Other.

What there is room for (as fresh young plays like God's Ear, The Thugs, and Dead City have demonstrated) is for discomforting comedy, for we are now, more than ever, living in a world where our laughter comes veiled in the shadow of our collective nervousness.

PLAY: "God's Ear"

Language is all the spectacle we need. English's forced protestations, easy convolutions, logical revolutions, and verbal tantalizations are full-throttle in Jenny Schwartz's comic drama, God's Ear. New Georges has done well in the past at tapping artists who are fully utilizing rhythm to tell a story (past productions include Sheila Callaghan's excellent Dead City, and Lisa D'Amour's Anna Bella Eema), and Schwartz is a perfect match for them. The fast-paced repetition of David Ives' Sure Thing colliding with the linguistic sparring of Tom Stoppard's Rosencrantz and Guilderstern Are Dead makes for the surface; her own lively imagination (both the Tooth Fairy and G.I. Joe are interlocutors in this production) is what lends the text its groove and its edge.

But there is more to to this cavalcade of language than simple logorrhea. Mel begins the play trying to explain the difference between "critical" and "crucial" to her husband, Ted, in regards to the health of their son, Sam. In short gasps of muted suffering, Mel can only dance around the words, and Ted, grief-stricken, makes for a willing participant as he slowly distances himself from the wife he cannot come to terms with. While Mel remains at home, caring for their six-year-old daughter Lanie, Ted flees to the nameless Lenoras of airport lounges or the aptly generic Guys who frequent sports bars and sing songs about what can't be sold on eBay. These characters share a surreal sincerity brought to life by Schwartz's quirky and repetitious humor, and God's Ear is entertaining because of the truth clinging to the fascinatingly facile jokes.

As the play progresses, the words become like music, and not just in the interstitial songs. The staccato desperation, the pleading falsetto, the unexpectedly shrill shrieks, these notes strum directly on the heartstrings. The fabulous cast are virtuosos of their own voices, but they also command equally fine performances from their partners, and I expect that Anne Kauffman's masterful direction brought a lot of cohesion to this difficult script. Kris Stone's whimsical set, a combination of pop-up book and Rubik's cube (all trap-doors and compartments), adds a grounding for the type of world where Schwartz's language runs free, and the fantasy costumes of GI Joe and The Tooth Fairy excuse the unmistakable clash between God's mind and God's ear.

There are segments of God's Ear that could do with a little paring, and Schwartz could be a little less obfuscating when it comes to the tragedy beneath the tumultuous text. But there's nothing wrong with a play that demands our attention as much as our sympathy, and the forceful contrivance of language here does more to liven the stage than anything Disney can throw at us. In the end, we are what we say we are, the products of our own stories, and the tight, powerful narrative, tangled as it may be, is one hell of a dramatic web.