Kacie Rogers and Carolyn Ratteray (Photo by Robert Huskey)
Reviewed by Dana Martin
South Coast Repertory
Through May 3rd
RECOMMENDED
Sheldon D. Brown and Anne Gee Byrd (Photo by Robert Huskey/SCR)
Talene Monahon’s Eat Me is like a hearty, satisfying meal with a bitter aftertaste. This South Coast Repertory world premiere explores obsession, consumption, transformation, and what it means to be truly satiated. It will leave you feeling full — and then some.
Chris (Sheldon D. Brown) has quit his job as an administrative lawyer and is living in full-blown addiction. He has “Gourmand Syndrome,” a rare (and fascinating) addiction to gourmet food — the result of a brain injury he’s recently suffered. His current obsession is with an online forum called The Gourmand (Jeorge Bennett Watson), which is designed to entice those who crave the most rare and special culinary adventures. Chrissalivates over every update.
Chris’s addiction to ordering and eating gluttonous amounts of meticulously made gourmet food should be a red flag for his new romantic prospect Stevie (Jake Borelli), but Stevie is too preoccupied with being validated by Chris and satisfying his own carnal desires to notice. He neglects his pregnant sister Beatrice’s (Kacie Rogers) constant bids for attention, especially as her body transforms. Beatrice’s relationship with her wife Jen (Carolyn Ratteray) is strained; Jen’s need for attention is regularly rebuffed, and she relies on exercise to shape her body into something worthy of a good meal.
The only person Chris confides in is his best friend/roommate Cindy (Anne Gee Byrd), who obsesses over her cats, Eleanor Roosevelt and Coconut Joe, and pontificates about her late soulmate; a cat named Milo. She is the one Chris truly trusts with the intimate details of his life, including his obsession with food, while she sustains herself on a diet of iceberg lettuce, cigarettes, and diet Coke.
Caitlin Sullivan’s direction is captivating: it’s tight, tense, and carefully executed. Nicholas Ponting’s scenic design is largely overlapping living spaces, which lends itself well to the play’s fluidity of time and space. It’s never quite clear if we’re in fantasy or reality, and this vagueness serves the story. Isabella Byrd’s moody, poignant lighting design casts dramatic tension and uses extreme shadows and stark light in interesting ways. Evan cook’s sound design along with Lee Kinney’s composition creates a moody and unsettling atmosphere. Samantha C. Jones’ costumes round out the characters’ personalities.
Sheldon D. Brown’s Chris is solid, stoic, and deeply layered under the armor that shields his addiction. Jeorge Bennett Watson adds a mysterious, foreboding element as The Gourmand, a larger-than-life figment of Chris’s imagination and desire. Anne Gee Byrd’s performance as Chris’s cantankerous and caring roommate Cindy is fascinating. Kacie Roger’s Beatrice is the voice of reason and Carolyn Ratteray’s Jen hits all the right notes; she’s earnest, self-conscious, and heart-breaking.
Eat Me explores obsession and addiction and the primal desire to be loved, and need for validation. Each character seeks to satiate their own personal starvation, and each experiences some kind of transformation: growing, shrinking, sculpting, decaying. It’s a strange, unsettling, and extremely interesting story. Any adventurous palate will be intrigued.
South Coast Repertory, Segerstrom Stage, 655 Town Center Drive, Costa Mesa; Wed.-Sat., 7:30 pm, Sat.-Sun., 2 pm; thru May 3rd . www.scr.org Running time: 97 minutes with no intermission
