Candace Nicholas-Lippman (Photo by Jesse Watrous)
Reviewed by F. Kathleen Foley
The Robey Theatre Company at the Los Angeles Theatre Center
Thru June 29
RECOMMENDED
Typically, when solo show practitioners disclose the details of their pathological upbringings, it amounts to a painful confessional that invites us to place blame as well as share pain.
In her one-woman show, A Rose Called Candace, presented by JuVee Productions and The Robey Theatre Company in association with the Los Angeles Theatre Center through this weekend, Candace Nicholas-Lippman takes a more generous tack.
The piece, written by Nicolas-Lippman and co-directed with Bernadette Speakes, does delve into the harrowing details of Nicolas-Lippman’s past — particularly the paranoiac, drug-addicted mother whose psychological abuse was punctuated by bouts of frightening violence, including choking her daughter to near-asphyxiation. However, throughout the evening, Nicholas-Lippman talks about how much she loves her mother—a sympathetic perspective that largely humanizes a woman who might otherwise be construed as monstrous.
As the lights go up, Nicolas-Lippman bursts onto the small LATC stage like a force of nature. Almost manically ebullient, she talks about the “joy and energy” that has seen her through difficulties and triumph. Among the challenges she faced were her mother’s reliance on welfare and Section 8 housing to sustain Nicholas-Lippman’s siblings (five sisters, one brother), the college sweetheart who jilted her after an unwanted pregnancy, and the fact that, to this day, she has never really known who her father is. (A wealthy, Harvard-educated grandfather was always good for a handout when things got tight, but it came at a distance and at the cost of any true emotional engagement.)
Through it all, Nicholas-Lippman found a source of courage and inspiration through her religion, frequently referencing the crucial role it has played in her life. She even gives a “shameless plug” to her pastor, present in the opening night audience.
The first in her family to graduate college, Nicholas-Lippman moved from Sacramento to L.A. to pursue a career as an actor, with some success. However, the double strike by WGA and SAG/AFTRA caused such a long period of unemployment that she ended up unhoused, sleeping in her car. (At one point, she shares that she is still unhoused and will leave the theater tonight to once again shelter in her car—a claim that we hope is exaggerated.)
Nicholas-Lippman eventually segues from the solo show format into a spoken word segment that ends the show. It’s a poignantly poetical epiphany in which she realizes that she can’t save her troubled mother but must save herself first. Her realization – “I choose me, I choose free”— is a moving testament from an indefatigably upbeat survivor.
The Robey Theatre Company at the Los Angeles Theatre Center, 514 S. Spring St., L.A. Fri.-Sat., 8 pm; Sun., 3 pm; thru June 29. https://ci.ovationtix.com/28125/production/1240993. Running time: one hour with no intermission.
