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Time Stands Still
Reviewed by Neal Weaver
Secret Rose Theatre
Through Feb. 8
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Photo-journalist Sarah (Prescilliana Esparolini) and foreign correspondent James (Aidan Bristow) are a cracker-jack team, who have travelled the world, covering its wars and hot-spots, and they are also lovers, who have been together for eight years. But a tour of duty in Afghanistan has shattered their world. James witnessed a brutal massacre of young girls, which has shaken him intensely, and brought on a kind of nervous breakdown, sending him back to the States and leaving Sarah on her own. And she has also been traumatized. When her vehicle was blown up, she was severely injured, and Fareed, her translator and “fixer” was killed.
Now Sarah has come home, on crutches, with a scarred face, a badly injured arm, and a broken leg, and James has escorted her back to her Brooklyn loft. He has assumed the role of protector, but she’s doesn’t want to be protected. She wants to get back into the fray as soon as possible, while he insists that she mustn’t rush things and over-tax herself. That’s not so easy, since she’s a self-professed adrenaline addict who misses the excitement and stimulation of covering dangerous situations.
Their editor and friend Richard (Troy Ruptash) is eager for them to get back to work. He wants to put together a book of her brilliant Afghan photos, with a text by James. Sarah is eager, but James is reluctant. Meanwhile, Richard has acquired a new girl-friend, young Mandy (Nik Isbelle), who is a party-planner, with a genius for saying the wrong thing at the wrong time. Sarah and James find her way too young and naïve for him, and refer to her as his mid-life crisis. Beneath her frivolous prattle, however, Mandy has strong and shrewd instincts. She challenges the ethics of photographers who are content to stand by and record horrors and tragedies, while making no effort to ameliorate them. And she questions the value of exposing the horrors of war to a public that lacks the resources to do anything about them.
Finally battle lines are drawn between James’ longing for a life of conventional comforts, and Sarah’s inability to give up the excitement of looking through her lens, when time stands still, and nothing exists for her but the picture she’s striving to make.
Donald Margulies’ script is both a series of deft character sketches and a play of ideas, contrasting the ways in which we deal with the madness of modern life. And he defies predictability by having the flibbertigibbet Mandy serve as the conscience of the play. Director Vicky Jenson serves the play faithfully, foregoing the big effects to anatomize the nature of her characters and their choices. And her four actors match her handily in their ability to focus sharply on the issues without losing track of the moment-to-moment realities.
Esparolina’s Sarah is a woman who knows her own mind, and doesn’t suffer fools gladly. She loves James enough to marry him but not enough to give up her independence. Bristow captures the dilemma of a man who loves a woman, but not enough to live life on her terms. Ruptash’s Richard is a well-intentioned authority figure, who is all too often caught as a buffer between opposing approaches to life. And Isbelle neatly captures the duality of a young woman whose deeper instincts counterbalance her naiveté.
Aquila Morong Studio at The Secret Rose Theatre, 11246 Magnolia Blvd., N. Hlywd.; Fri.-Sat., 8 p.m.; Sun., 2 & 7 p.m.; through Feb. 8. https://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/969532
