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And What Of The Night?
Reviewed by Sarah Tuft
The Vagrancy at Studio/Stage
Through Nov. 2
RECOMMENDED:
The celebrated Cuban-American writer Maria Irene Fornes’s play is about sex, power, institutional failure, human frailty, betrayal, dreams and madness. In other words, it’s a play about money.
Fornes, clearly influenced by the works of Samuel Beckett, was a Pulitzer Prize finalist in 1990 for this very play, which is now more relevant than ever, because of the way poverty exerts such a gravitational force in this world. What of the Night? follows an extended family whose lives are intertwined even as they try to escape the ties that bind them. Financial bankruptcy leads to moral bankruptcy, and the subjugation of the poor leads to the subjugation of women.
So when the just-married 14-year-old Birdie (Lisa Jai) leaves her impoverished home to seek a better life, she unwittingly sets in motion a sprawling epic told in intimate vignettes that spans across time and geography. Rainbow (Alex Marshall-Brown) finds love. Charlie (Marc Pelina) finds solace in loyalty. Ray (Thaddeus Shafer) finds the trappings of success. Though their yearnings are briefly rewarded, the lyrical story lays bare the difference between the hunger of the soul and the hunger of the ego.
Director Caitlin Hart illuminates the deepest corners of the play’s dark soul with a magical touch that makes great use of light, sound and minimal set pieces. Simple blocking becomes choreography. Her evocation of the play’s dream sequence is a small miracle, while sound designer Martin Carrillo’s haunting music deserves special notice.
The actors deliver riveting performances that are at once wrenching and unfussy. Jai is otherworldly as the woman/child Birdie, capturing the shrill enthusiasm of her name in every muscle. Her transformation to a wiser, older Birdie shows a remarkable command of her instrument. As Ray, Shafer is electric, with a chilling sexuality built on palpable despair. The raw vulnerability that Pelina brings to Charlie is heart- breaking. Marshall-Brown’s self-possessed vitality adds dimension to Rainbow’s story of exploitation and betrayal, proving you can’t be shamed if you don’t allow it. Gino Manziello brings knowing compassion to her mother/whore character, revealing the capacity for all of us to be whores. Elitia Daniels, as a smiling angel, and Linn Bjornland, as a wife with the frozen smile, reveal layers both tender and haunting.
The play is produced by The Vagrancy, a company that continues to present new, lesser-known and classical works. While many theater companies exist for the sole and much-needed purpose of creating vehicles for their own company members, The Vagrancy appears more focused on the challenges of provocative work, a strategy for keeping Los Angeles theater one step away from the spiritual impoverishment Maria Irene Fornes warns of in her play.
The Vagrancy at studio/stage, 520 N. Western Ave., Hlywd.; Fri.-Sat., 8 p.m.; Sun., 7p.m.; through Nov. 2. (323) 793-2153, https://thevagrancy.com/what-of-the-night/
