Second Skin

Reviewed by Paul Birchall
Flagship Theatre Ensemble
Through May 15

RECOMMENDED

A ghost story around the campfire on the beach: It seems like such a natural fit, you almost wonder why you haven’t seen this sort of thing before. But director Kate Jopson’s compelling site specific production of Kristin Idaszak’s moody drama, set a few yards from the thundering surf at twilight on the beach in front of the Annenberg Beach House, is a spectacle that eerily and profoundly mixes the timelessness of a campfire story with the intimacy of therapy session. 

You arrive at the “theater” to discover the box office is a rickety table that has been set up on the beach, across from the path that runs from Venice to Malibu. Winds from the sea whip sand across the cash box and ruffle the hair of the box office fellow, who has to continually keep the programs from being blown into the ocean. You get your ticket, and he points to a set of chairs in a circle some 150 yards away, on a dune a few feet from the sea. 

After a trudge over the sand to the circle — you sense there would be a bonfire if such things were allowed on Santa Monica Beach — the show begins. The sun is setting over the ocean. On the night I attended a cutting wind blew from the north, requiring the audience to huddle under blankets the production provides. The performers utilize wireless microphones, with the lighting furnished first by the twilight and, after dark. from small plastic bulbs on the sand. The production at first seems deceptively small, but ultimately the playwright and director utilize the entire beach as their stage.   

Idaszak’s play is told by three female characters, each of whom reveals the story in separate 20 minute monologues. Quinn (Susannah Rea-Downing) has returned to her childhood home by the sea to tend to her dying mother, despite her resentment at their strained relationship, which deteriorated due to her mother’s self destructive behavior.  Meanwhile, Quinn’s mother (Claire Kaplan) is haunted by a long ago tragic incident from her childhood, one that resulted in the death of her younger sister. The final monologue is delivered by the younger sister (Sarah Halford) ‘s ghost, who has her own agenda in haunting the other two women. Intermingled with the plot is the myth of the selkie, the soul of a drowned woman, reborn as a seal, who sheds her skin to walk the earth as a human. 

Idaszak’s writing crafts an engaging mix of modern world relationship complexity and timeless myth. The strained mother-daughter relationship is functional enough – but we rather wish some of the soapy elements had been trimmed in favor of the supernatural stuff. 

As the frustrated daughter, Rea-Downing offers a nicely grounded turn that’s easy to identify with, presenting an interesting contrast to Kaplan’s brittle, haunted mother, and Halford’s luminous and rather terrifying younger sister. 

Ultimately, what accounts for about 90 percent of the show’s truly absorbing efficacy is the astutely created atmosphere director Jopson anchors.  It is an odd thing to perceive Santa Monica Beach at twilight as a character in a play, but so it is here.  As the lines are spoken, the sea roars — and each monologue transitions into the next, with a spookiness that is quite unerring. In one scene, a shadow lurking in the darkness behind the circle barely catches our attention, until it steps forward, rather creepily revealed as the ghostly character. 

Given that the temperature drops right after the sun goes down, you’d better bring a warm jacket, despite the blankets provided. As you’re on the beach long after dark, the emptiness of the space all around you adds to the overall sense of unease, in a startlingly beautifully done play that’s deceptively simple, subtle and dreamlike.

The Beach Outside the Annenberg Beach House, 415 Pacific Coast Highway, Santa Monica; Fri.-Sun., 7:30 pm; (dark April 29); through May 15. www.theflagshipensemble.com/tickets.  Running time: One hour and fifteen minutes.