(Im)migrants of the State

Reviewed by Socks Whitmore
The Actors’ Gang
Through May 13, 2023

RECOMMENDED

Six months ago, the Actors’ Gang celebrated their 40^th anniversary by returning to their roots with a revival of Ubu the King, the anarchic satire play that sparked the company’s beginnings. This spring, the King has been joined in repertory by a second momentous item in the Gang’s ambitious season: (Im)migrants of the State, a one-of-a-kind production co-created by an ensemble of alumni from the company’s Prison Project with the Director of Programs, Jeremie Loncka. The play is an extension of The Prison Project’s mission to provide theater programming to the incarcerated and to shift the societal conversation around prison culture, giving fourteen formerly incarcerated Californians the chance to retell their true stories on stage.

The show begins in the lobby with two “guards” who address and corral the audience into the theater in the style of a prison onboarding, though the level of immersion is thankfully mild and humorously flavored. The piece quickly seg ways into a series of vignettes exploring the lives and hardships of the various inmates before and during their incarceration, offering crucially humanizing insights into a community that is too rarely discussed with public compassion. The satirical humor and steady pace throughout make for a gratifying watch, though even in theatricalized form, the harsh realities of each actor’s life can weigh heavily; from gunshots and overdoses to rape and self-harm, the interwoven storylines address a wide variety of harrowing traumas and injustices. In particular, the play illustrates the pervasive impact of race and racism on gang culture and the criminal justice system, both before and behind bars, and the dehumanization inmates experience at the hands of criminal justice officials.

Like other Actors’ Gang productions, (Im)migrants of the State draws from a distinctly stylized form of physical theater, ranging from the comedic use of cardboard cutout props to the out-of-time, slow-motion dramatization of a gang jumping. The medium feels fitting for the project; the technical simplicity keeps the focus on the performers and narrative, which captivate effectively on their own. The script covers an unusual amount of linguistic ground, including bilingual conversations, explanations of cultural terms, and, curiously, several monologues in verse over the course of the show. Audience members can recognize the clear authentic voice behind the writing, and the disquieting truths about the system it seeks to expose.

The show’s ending almost doesn’t feel like it truly ends; the cast transitions to a group therapy-esque chair circle, providing a short but sweet opportunity for formerly incarcerated audience members to share their own stories with the actors, and the impact of visibility is palpable. It perhaps goes without saying that stories about incarceration are almost never told by those who’ve lived them, and (Im)migrants of the State is a necessary, smartly crafted disruptor to the pattern.

The Actors’ Gang, 9070 Venice Blvd, Culver City; Fri.- Sat., 8 pm; Sun., 2 pm; thru May 13.https://theactorsgang.com/events Running time: 90 minutes

FOOTLOOSE

Reviewed by Martίn Hernández
Simi Valley Cultural Center
Through May 14

RECOMMENDED

Songwriter turned screenwriter Dean Pitchford took the gist of a 1980 news story about high school students challenging an 80-year-old ban on dancing in their small Oklahoma town and turned it into a script for the hit 1980s film, Footloose. Further success followed in 1998 when the film was adapted into a Broadway musical, with a book by Pitchford and Walter Bobbie, music by Tom Snow and several songs from the movie by Pitchford, Kenny Loggins, Eric Carmen, Anne Wilson, and others.

In this stellar production, co-directors Barry Pearl and Michelle Elkin, with Elkin doing double duty as  choreographer, have assembled a gifted cast that is as committed to the incongruous storyline as it is to an earnest portrayal of teen angst, inter-generational conflict, young love, and the redemptive power of music and dance. With an ensemble skilled at delivering assorted lyrics as well as Elkin’s exuberant and at times acrobatic dance moves, the show is a toe-tapping delight. From the looks on the cast members’ faces and the drive in their steps they looked like they were having a blast. You may have one too.

After his father deserts him and his mom, Chicago teen Ren McCormack (Thomas Whitcomb) burns off his anger dancing at local clubs. Broke and unemployed, Ren’s mom Ethel (Renee Cohen) relocates them both to the small town of Bomont in an unspecified rural state where they move in with Ethel’s sister and brother-in-law. City boy Ren’s ire only grows as he gets teased and bullied by his new country neighbors, but when he learns the town has outlawed dancing, his fury gets turbo charged. Reverend Shaw More (Paul Panico), a pillar of the community and the force behind the ban, is at wit’s end with daughter Ariel (Hannah Battersby), who, along with her put-upon mother Vi (Ronna Jones), chafes under Shaw’s rising severity. Ren finds a kindred spirit in Ariel, and they join forces to challenge Rev. More’s dance damnation and find solace in each other’s arms.  

Played as thematic background music in the movie, cast members now perform the tunes, giving them a deeper and cathartic meaning for the character to whom they are assigned. Whitcomb’s buoyant rendition of  “I Can’t Stand Still” and his tender duet with Battersby, “Almost Paradise,” reveal the vulnerability behind Ren’s bravado. Jones, Cohen, and Battersby lament their characters’ subservient status as women in the melancholy “Learning to Be Silent” – though Battersby’s part leaned toward the flamboyant. Jones also stands out with a haunting solo on Vi’s plea to Shaw for moderation in “Can You Find It In Your Heart?”

Tyler Marie Watkins as Ariel’s best friend Rusty rips it up on “Let’s Hear It For The Boy,” aided by the comic antics of her childhood crush and Ren’s best friend Willard (Andreas Pantazis). And when Lily Targett as Urleen, and Megan Vargas as Wendy Jo – more of Ariel’s homegirls – join Watkins on a sultry rendition of “Somebody’s Eyes,” a critique on small town gossip, the trio are a force of nature. While Battersby jumped ahead of musical director Jeffrey Gibson’s stalwart sextet on the ensemble piece “The Girl Gets Around,” she acquitted herself with her lead on “Holding Out For A Hero,” with robust backing from Watkins, Targett, and Vargas.

While the musical eschews darker moments from the film, such as the neo-fascism of one taut scene, there are still plenty of distressing themes to go around — parents losing children, the stifling of women’s voices, domestic abuse, religious contradictions. There is also plenty of humor, mostly from the audacious dancing and roaring voice of Pantazis who, as Willard, can deliver simple but sage advice in “Mama Says (You Can’t Back Down)” – backed up by the melodious trio of Hunter Uliasz as Bickle, Noah Heie as Garvin, and Casey Ryan as Jeter – but gets tongue-tied any time he is around Rusty. Directors Pearl and Elkin get great musical and dramatic performances from their cast, such as Panico’s conflicted preacher, Whitford’s abandoned Ren, and Battersby’s confused Ariel. Maybe their characters can be salvaged by a little dancing – what could it hurt to just cut loose?

Simi Valley Cultural Center, 3050 E. Los Angeles Street, Simi Valley; Fri-Sat., 8 p.m.; Sun., 2 p.m.; Sat., May 6 & 13, 2 p.m.; through May 14.  https://simivalleyculturalartscenter.thundertix.com/events/209730 (Running time 2 hours, 30 minutes, including 15 min. intermission)

Midnight Screening

Reviewed by Julia Lloyd George
Write LA at the Zephyr Theatre
Through April 30

RECOMMENDED

Midnight Screening is, quite simply, a play about a meet-cute in a movie theater. It’s the kind of straightforward, appealing premise that isn’t as common as it used to be. Original rom-coms, whether they’re on screen or on stage, seem to be in rather short supply these days, supplanted by fantasy worlds and established IP. For that reason, watching two people fall in love without any frills attached has become surprisingly refreshing and writer/director Tim Schildberger’s take on the genre is spiked with nostalgic sweetness.

That retro atmosphere begins with its throwback setting, a near-empty movie theater that somehow still has a film projector in what appears to be the present day. It’s also run single-handedly by a cranky old woman, Doris (Denise Moses), with serious memory issues, an ancient popcorn machine, and a strong fear of communists. The only two people who have showed up to the midnight screening of The Sure Thing are a young woman named River (Mouzam Makkar) and a young guy called Henry (Ari Frenkel). They don’t meet until the film stops working and they emerge back into the lobby, only to discover that Doris has left the theater and absentmindedly locked them in.

Thus begins a bizarre night of wandering around the various nooks of the theater and talking through their emotional baggage. Though Henry initially suggests that they call the police to get them out, River refuses and seems content to wait all night for Doris. Henry also gives up quite quickly, apparently happy to be locked in with a cute girl. Though their relaxed attitude to the situation stretches credulity as the hours pass (aren’t they tired?) and they get sick of each other at various points, it’s worth suspending your disbelief a bit to watch River banter and flirtatiously tease Henry for his nerdy formality.

The less successful scenes involve the points of conflict, which revolve around their respective approaches to their significant others and past trauma. Despite being total strangers, they seem entirely comfortable calling each other out on their bullshit and doing a bit of yelling in the process. Though there’s one moving scene related to River’s past relationship and Mouzam Makkar does a remarkable job, there are a lot of contradictions in her character and it’s not entirely clear what motivates her.

River and Henry also don’t seem to have a ton of chemistry or that much in common beyond their experiences with grief and relationship troubles; their passions, their dreams and their hopes for the future do not really come up. In contrast with Annie Baker’s The Flick, which is also set in a movie theater and features a degree of young romance, films are barely a topic of conversation. The setting then feels somewhat irrelevant, as if the story could be in any other contained location with nostalgic value.

Despite its flaws, however, Midnight Screening is certainly a charming play that had me rooting for an unlikely couple to work through their issues and find their way to each other in strange circumstances. That’s a classic storyline for a reason.

Write LA at the The Zephyr Theatre, 7456 Melrose Ave, West Hollywood; Fri-Sat 8pm, Sun. 3pm through April 30^th; https://www.write-la.com/midnightscreening; Run time: 90 minutes, no intermission

The Laramie Project

Reviewed by G. Bruce Smith
The Group Rep at Lonny Chapman Theatre
Through May 21

RECOMMENDED

The horrifying murder of college student Matthew Shepard — a small-framed, 21-year-old man who was beaten and left to die strapped to a fence outside Laramie, Wyo. — created a haunting image indelibly imprinted in the minds of many Americans. His death in 1998 also marked a moment of reckoning for Americans on how we think about and treat members of the LGBTQ community, as well as serving as a wake-up call to the lack of hate crime laws in many states.

Also out of this tragedy came The Laramie Project, a groundbreaking play by Moises Kaufman, Leigh Fondakowski and The Tectonic Theater Project that premiered in Denver in 2000. The collective of theater artists conducted more than 200 interviews of  Laramie residents over a one-year period — resulting in an insightful and sometimes moving work, now in a production by The Group Rep in North Hollywood.

The play focuses on a wide range of Laramie inhabitants — from a rancher to a University of Wyoming theater professor to a preacher, and many more. Reactions to the murder ranged from shock to silence (from the conservative clergy) to rationalization — one townsperson says Shepard’s murder was partly his own fault because “If I don’t tell you I’m a fag, you won’t beat me.”

Underlying many of the interviews is a defensiveness. Laramie is a good town. People love the climate. It’s safe. “Hate is not a Laramie value,” says one resident.

And yet. . .

“It’s hard to talk about Laramie now,” one inhabitant says. “It’s a town defined by a crime.”

Act II covers the guilty plea of one of the murderers and the trial of the other, both of whom received prison life sentences. Again, just before and during the trial, the reactions of Laramie residents vary. Some say Laramie “needs to own this.” A 52-year-old gay man is moved by the sight of 100 people marching for Matthew Shepard. Two meth-heads treat the murder almost as a joke. Some townspeople favor the death penalty for the two defendants.

When the Rev. Fred Phelps and his followers stage a vile protest at Shepard’s memorial, waving signs like “God Hates Fags,” a group of area activists dons costumes with huge angel wings to block out the Phelps group. It’s something of a teary-eyed moment.

In The Group Rep production, director Kathleen Delaney keeps the action moving smoothly and swiftly, but the play is too long and could do with some judicious cuts (for example, one character, a theater student at the University of Wyoming, adds nothing of value to the narrative).

Eleven actors play dozens of characters. The ensemble does good work portraying a host of very different people, inhabiting them with authenticity.

The action takes place on a mostly bare stage (set design by Mareli Mitchel-Shields) that successfully keeps the attention on the characters. Toward the end of the play, a fence is built, log by log, by members of the ensemble — creating a powerful image. The use of slides to set the location of the action is not needed; the barer the stage, the greater the power of the text.

The Laramie Project has been staged thousands of times throughout the world. It was followed up by The Laramie Project: 10 Years Later, and was made into an HBO film in 2002.

Which begs the question: Why produce it now? As director Delaney says in the program, the play is still relevant today. “Our world is still on a quest for humanity and we must remind ourselves of the brutality and injustice in the world in order to change it. We need . . . to remind the next generation of the abundance of love, hate, violence, media frenzy, intrusion and activism there is in our world.”

True — but in a post-Trump nation dramatically divided, it would be interesting to see what Laramie inhabitants would say today.

Lonny Chapman Theatre Main Stage, 10900 Burbank Blvd., North Hollywood. Fri.-Sat., 8 pm; Sun., 2 pm; thru May 21. (818) 763-5990 or https://thegrouprep.com. Running time: Two hours, with a 15-minute intermission.

Moose on the Loose

Reviewed by Julyza Commodore
Theatre West
Thru May 21

RECOMMENDED

Playwright Dina Morrone has crafted a show that is not only witty but also timely and touching. The collaboration between Morrone and director Peter Flood clearly blends well, resulting in a production that is detailed, nuanced and culturally relevant.

The year is 1999 in Ontario, Canada, inside a small suburban bungalow on a snowy day, where a family affair unfolds. Pina (Laura James) and Rodolfo Pupi (Richard D. Reich) are the matriarch and patriarch who’ve immigrated from Italy and are living with their daughter, Maria Tappino (Constance Mellors) and her husband, Giuseppe (Stuart W. Howard)— as well as their grandchildren, Joseph, the overachiever who wants to be a nurse; and Bruno Tappino, the underachiever who is glued to the couch and obsesses over watching the weather channel. (The grand kids are played respectively by  Nick McDow Musleh and Rick Simone-Friedland). However, the first entity we are introduced to is (this is hardly a spoiler, given the play’s title) a Moose on the loose. (James Lemire).

This is a family comedy, so we’re not done yet with the clan: Flying in from Rome with a huge secret in tow, Gina Tappino (Erica Piccininni); and bossy Carmela Tappino-Williamson (Deanna Gandy), accompanied by her somewhat spineless husband Darryl Williamson (Cecil Jennings) and their energetic young son, Timothy Williamson (Darby Winn). Also joining in when things go awry is Bruno’s kind, smart and indigenous girlfriend of 10 months, Honabigi (Meg Lin), whom no one has met until now.

Jeff G. Rack’s family home set (built by Tom Sanders) succeeds in creating a lived-in domicile. Despite having a moose as a central character, nothing here, from story to set, feels overly broad or contrived. Rather, the play provides an authentic peek into the life of a real family, hoisting its flag for what used to be called family values.

While thoroughly enjoyable, Moose on the Loose provides more than just laughs, but also comfort and a reminder of what is truly important.

Theatre West, 3333 Cahuenga Blvd West, LA; Fri.-Sat., 8 pm, Sun., 2 pm; thru May 21st. https://theatrewest.org/