An Invasion of Decency!

Reviewed by Gray Palmer
HYNPT, a warehouse downtown
Through November 13

Think of it as ipecac from a porcelain dish. John Sinner’s current installation-cum-theatrical, An Invasion of Decency!, combines gallery exhibit, slide-show, fashion promenade, animation video, poets theater (as stupefied writing), bad acting (not necessarily pejorative), two distinguished guest-stars — Alan Mandell and John Fleck, both appearing in video-projection — indifferent choreography, and almost no humor. That it is not at all funny is actually kind of funny. This fractured B-movie gallery event is also a period piece — with costumes and wigs (one of them looks like three feet of powdered hair) that seem to refer to the ancien régime, or, let’s say, better, Sofia Coppola’s ancien régime.

As it unfolds, everything is frozen except for one crawling idea at a time. One thing at a time, miserably underlined, only one thing before the next thing, sometimes simultaneously illustrated by literal gesture, then amplified by unison chorus. Jesu! I was reminded of a particular childhood delirium induced while watching “Synchro-Vox,” the sick-making cartoon technique used in shows like Clutch Cargo: Onto the face of a motionless animation cell were superimposed live, black, speaking human lips. Sometimes the eyes blinked.

I don’t want to discourage theater-goers from this cruel adventure. (But warning: This is not a show for members of the Prostate Club. No bathroom is available until after the performance. Patrons will be directed by a staff member in a bee-keeper’s costume to a bar two blocks away.)

The bad mommy in the grim story is played by Julia Prud’homme, her ruined off-spring by Ariel Barber, Christina Giagos, Betsy Moore and Eddie Vona. They valiantly display declamatory acting of the worst kind. Sometimes it’s hard to hear the text through the acting noise, but does it matter? The critic for KCRW, trying to be nice, described this material as Grimm told by Foreman, an insult to the brothers and the great theater-maker. The same critic also said that the work had roots in the celebrated theater of Reza Abdoh. Aside from collaborators in common, I can’t think what. (All this is a red-flag marker for the piece as an example of bourgeoisvant-garde.)

Everything is fabricated beautifully, but An Invasion of Decency!, like Marie Antoinette’s toy farm at Petite Trianon, aroused the mob in me.

“… After the royal family was imprisoned in 1792, a mob invaded the Tuileries—their palace in Paris—and made straight for the queen’s wardrobe, to festoon themselves in her rich garments and then rip into shreds whatever they didn’t take…”

That’s from a recent edition of Slate, some of whose readers might enjoy the show. And this from Apollinaire, which by coincidence I was reading on the bus on the way home: “Thus, confronting Art, there is the appearance of Art, against which men are not sufficiently on their guard…” The Poet Assassinated, trans. Matthew Josephson.

HNYPT, 212 W. 12^TH ST., Downtown LA; Fri.-Sun. variable curtain times, through November 13. www.theatrerevelation.com. Running time: one hour and 40 minutes without intermission.