Yvonne Cone (Photo by Zev Rose Woolley)
Reviewed by Steven Leigh Morris
Coeurage Ensemble and Los Angeles LGBT Center
Thru Dec. 17
RECOMMENDED
Confession: As a cis-gender Boomer, I’ve believed that gender politics at a time of ecological collapse is a bit like yelling about a leak under the sink while the house is on fire. Fly Jamerson’s fantastical play, Frozen Fluid, particularly as staged with such beguiling whimsy by Amanda McRaven, has put a dent in my stubborn predisposition. It felt a bit like getting smacked on the head with a rolled-up magazine, and I’m grateful for that, and to Coeurage Ensemble and the Los Angeles LGBT Center for putting this play on. What’s the point of going to the theater if all it does is affirm our values rather than challenge them? True, Frozen Fluid may be preaching to the gender-fluid choir, but that’s not the entire world. And for those who may have old-world binary inclinations, there’s considerable wit, visually and textually, combined with what might be called an investigatory impulse, i.e. an attempt to figure stuff out about who we are, how we got named, what those names do to us, all while the ice-caps are melting.
The play is set in Antarctica, whales are beached and dying, icebergs are thawing. Three scientists (Yvonne Cone, Jalana Phillips and Steph LaHane on the performance I attended), are conducting research for reasons even they can’t quite fathom, which is sort of amusing it itself, a Godot-like clown-show set on a polar plain. And clowning around, in the face of despondency, defines director McRaven’s tone.
One scientist, Herman (LeHane) — they go by Herman, though the birth certificate reads Vernon, and this becomes an issue — is building an ark. This is one in a series of creation myths that float in the frigid landscape, summoning T.S. Eliot’s “Four Quartets” (“In My Beginning is My End.”). Eliot is not referenced in the play, but Plato is: his discussion with Aristophanes about people originally having four arms, four legs, and two faces. There were three genders: male, female and androgynous, and these creatures were so powerful as to be a threat to Zeus. And so the god sliced them in two to reduce their strength but double their capacity to worship. Zeus then healed their wounds, but they were miserable, eternally yearning for their other, missing half.
The performances, like this legend, are potent and sassy, but the show’s star may be the Joe Calarco’s sound design and Dean Harada’s music (written for the play) underscoring and thereby elevating entire passages of text into a poetical realm.
There’s a complaint by one of the trio (repeated actually) that everybody gets named without being asked, and they must live with that name. Two thoughts come to mind: Should a parent withhold naming their child until the infant reaches some age of consent? I mean, really. Any person can change their name whenever they want. (I believe that’s still legal, though who knows what the future holds.) Secondly, they’re scientists. Pretty much all that scientists do, especially these kind of scientists, is name stuff. Naming is a gateway to scientific comprehension. Even the characters confide that maybe this issue of naming doesn’t really matter. Those kinds of reflective second-thoughts are what make these characters so endearing.
And yet, the issue of a name, set in this white, dystopic place, forms an almost lyrical centerpiece. In the beginning was “the name.” And we’re stuck with it until the end. Is the name responsible for the end of things? This may actually be so, and that had never occurred to me before this production. If the name fuels the bigotries that are gnawing at our social and cultural fabric, then naming may be something far more toxic than I’d imagined.
To its profound credit, there’s nothing pedantic about this play, and even less so about this playful production. (In a couple of scenes, the scientists strut across the stage in a kind of penguin dance.) The production is an earnest attempt to figure something out, a noble impulse, and, for this audience member, it offered an invite to do the same.
Jeanine Ringer’s set hides the intimate theater’s black wall with over-hanging white gauze. The floor is white, with blue hues from Diana Herrera’s lights. I don’t know if the scenic design contributed to the impression of a refrigerated space, or if instead it was the actors bundled up in parkas, but there are thermal blankets provided for each audience member. This may just be some immersive illusion, but those blankets are as thoughtful and effective as the performance.
Los Angeles LGBT Center, 1125 N. McCadden Place, Hlywd.; Fri.-Sat., 8 pm; thru Dec. 17. https://www.coeurage.org/frozen-fluid Running time: 90 minutes, no intermission.
