THEATER: The Surprisingly Heartwarming "P.S. Jones and the Frozen City"

Is there anything more important in the theater than confidence? Without it, Robert Askins could never have written his Obie-award winning Hand to God (in which a boy's Satanic sock puppet terrorizes a Christian bible group); without it, we'd never have seen his hyper-imaginative follow-up, the ode to old-school adventure comics (and perhaps a little Stephen King), P.S. Jones and the Frozen City. Without it, could you imagine Joe Paulik agreeing to walk around in a cape and goggles, smeared with the excrement that makes up his character's name, Pig Shit Jones? Or Sofia Jean Gomez trusting that Carla Bellisio's brilliant costuming and Eric Wright and the Puppet Kitchen's design could change her from a woman rolling around on an office chair into a Great Glass Spider, the menacingly sexy overlord of the titular Frozen City? (They're correct to trust: both actors come across brilliantly.)

Thankfully, there's no shell game going on in Askins's play: it's genuinely good. Jasons Simms' pop-art design (dotted storybook props that enhance Alex Koch's animated projections) sets the tone, E. Calvin Ahn's fight direction sells the idea of a giant's severed green fist going on a rampage, and Jose Zayas's direction has never felt so simultaneously loose and necessary, which is to say that while the actors appear to have freedom enough on stage for anything to happen, this is not actually a comic book, and so the action sequences and transitions must have been carefully planned out (albeit invisibly so). Few directors could so adroitly (and creatively) handle the call for an army of fire-breathing tigers, a cult of cannibalistic sirens (Jenny Seastone Stern and Diana Oh, putting the aces in menaces), and a spectral Gunslinger (Steven Rishard), to say nothing of Bobby Moreno's appearance as a befuddled giant named Lothar.

Photos/Jill Steinberg

Astute readers will note that I've jumped around plot points -- that's because P.S. Jones basically operates as a highlight reel, in which Pig Shit, our hero, accidentally stumbles onto a Quest of Great Importance that separates him from his beloved (and shriveled puppet) mother (Gomez) and sends him on a collision course with Benjamin (Preston Martin), his flamboyantly well-spoken and well-dressed opposite (his brother, naturally). Following the trail of a severed limb and a phantom cowboy through one of the many inhospitable deserts of the post-apocalypse, it's less about the plot of the journey than the experiences along the way -- eye-catching and rib-tickling stuff, and budget-stretching design miracles that ought to get terraNOVA even more nominations at the yearly NYIT Awards. (Hell, I was even impressed by the fidelity of the sound effects from Jane Shaw and Emma Wilk.)

Confidence is what allows me to wholeheartedly recommend P.S. Jones and the Frozen City: you will enjoy, or at least be impressed by, this madcap theatrical adventure.

THEATER: Luther

The very funny concept behind Luther, the second of three plays running as part of Clubbed Thumb's Summerworks festival, is that Walter (Gibson Frazier) and Marjorie (Kelly Mares) have adopted a shell-shocked veteran, Luther (Bobby Moreno), whom they treat as a cross between a teenager and a dog -- an animal who doesn't know better and therefore can't be held responsible for his actions. Ethan Lipton wants you to laugh, sure, but he's got a serious end in mind, one that's well-directed by Ken Rus Schmoll, who amps up the pathos so as to make the savagery more shocking. On the one hand, the show is fixated on the artificiality of a callous business class; on the other, it's remarking on the very real difficulty in reintegrating soldiers that we've conditioned to be killers into society. By merging the two worlds at a corporate party -- which are about as far as they can get from one another -- Luther makes some salient points on inhumanity in general, and the ways in which we're desperate to connect.

Photo/Heather Phelps-Lipton

The script, however, could serve from some thematic tightening: Marjorie is having trouble fitting in, too, but her story is overpowered by that of a socially awkward technician, Morris (the excellent John Ellison Conlee), who serves as a cross between the two worlds. (To be fair, he's infectious; I can understand getting swept away by this particular creation.) Moreover, by focusing on Morris, he steps back from the extremes -- illustrated to a certain degree by the sock-people that puppeteer Crystal Finn is parading about -- and too often uses him to directly comment on themes that may more effectively be left unspoken. (Again, Conlee absolutely nails his heartfelt speech about animals, bullies, and forgiveness, as does Moreno, given his own opportunity; it just feels too direct.) Some jokes, too, are a little hard to puzzle out: what to make of Captain James (Pete Simpson) and his arbitrator, Fran Leibowitz (Finn)? There's not much of a conclusion, either: Luther voluntarily goes to prison (after maiming or murdering two people), where he's apparently having a fine time, but what's Lipton trying to convey? That we should lock up former soldiers? That, unlike Marjorie and Walter, we shouldn't ignore the psychic baggage of our wards, trusting that love alone can set it right? 

Luther is asking the right questions, then; it's just not really answering them -- just entertaining them (and us). 

PLAY: "Seating Arrangements"

The Bats are to acting as the New Theater Corps would like to be for criticism: a local repertory company of upcoming talent who all share a passion and enthusiasm for the arts. On that basis alone, may The Flea, which hosts them, receive all the grants it needs, and many charitable donations. One such grant, from the Danish Arts Council, has brought the best out of what the Bats can offer with their young blood, as well as what The Flea can offer as a welcoming theater: in this case, Pold Worm Jensen's seating ARRANGEMENTS, or the most fun you can have at a banquet (that isn't really a banquet). Which makes sense when you consider that the play is based on Babette's Feast, but not at all about that famous short story-cum-film, save as a jumping off point for the actors, jumping in and out of characters in a semi-futurist style.

Since June 2007, Erik Pold (joined by set designer Stine Worm Sorensen and dramaturge Allan Richardt Jensen, all from Denmark) has been working with eight of the Bats to piece together a celebratory and revelatory piece about the values important to them -- not the modesty meets extravagance of the 1881 feast (these actors have great imagined lives, but as they confess, are mostly all without health care), but about their discomfort. In a stylized formality, these actors riff off the original material and jump into telling their own stories, the only ones they really and truly can, be that a hyperbolic rant against Donald Trump's SoHo zoning, or about recent immigration legislature.

Some of these brief conversations are paradoxic: a comfortable actress speaks about being uncomfortable having to discuss her Mormon roots (Jane Elliot). Some are familiar: an actor talks about how his repressed past in Ireland kept him from being who he truly was, until he found himself able to be persecuted for it in America (Donal Brophy). Some actors rap (Bobby Moreno), sing (Max Jenkins), or violin (Sylvia Mincewicz) through their frustrations, joys, and pains. Whatever the form, whatever the topic, it is all entertainingly intimate, not shared across a stage, but from plated seats beside you at the table. (Well, OK, if you're not early enough to snag a seat, you'll have to watch from a more formalized seating arrangement.)

Occasionally, the play is too formal; it would've been nice to see looser transitions, more natural moments of spontaneity, and more genuine conversation outside of the larger "numbers" that make the actors leap from their seats in outrage. At the same time, Pold keeps the "food" fresh by playing enough with blocking and lighting to make those events theatrical, yet personable. (I, for instance, was Riccardo, Assistant Sector Manager for a moment.) The thoughts are not unified, nor even complete, but the actors are, and I'll take the honesty of their clamor over the dissembling glaze of some flimsily commercial play any day.