Top nine theater moments of 2019
But what I will do is tell you what I think were the best moments. Things that really grabbed me and stuck with me. It comes out to an even nine. In chronological order, here they are.
Red Planet Blue, Edmonds Driftwood Players
Driftwood cast Justin Tinsley in this outer space adventure by local playwright James Lyle. Tinsley played the commander of a mission to terraform a distant planet. He had acted in many shows at Driftwood and everyone in the community knew him well. It was known that he was fighting cancer and this might be his final stage performance. As Tinsley became more ill (as I understand the timeline) it became clear he would not be able to take the strain of doing the show. It was decided his part would be recorded. This was perfect because the commander only ever appears on the video screen of the space ship. By the time the show opened, Justin had passed away. Yet there he was, acting.
Nudeprov at the Pocket Theater
It was what it sounds like, nude improv. Actors? Nude. Audience? Nude. I had agita, from the moment I purchased the ticket right up until I was standing in the lobby before the show. Yet I filed in with everyone else. Then came the moment we were instructed to disrobe. It was a big nothing, even less of an issue than being naked in the locker room at the gym. I chatted with the stranger next to me, like I would at any other show. Everyone seemed at ease. The effect was to unite everyone, which is a good thing for any theatrical performance.
Shakespeare Dice: As You Like It, Dacha Theatre
Once a season, Dacha “dices” a show. Each actor learns all the parts and at the top of the show, an audience member rolls a die and thereby casts the show. No one knows who they are playing until that moment. It’s nuts. It's a treasure. This production was set in a karaoke bar and at various points, one or another character would sing a song. In one of the performances (I saw several), the actor playing Jaques chose to sing Joni Mitchell’s Both Sides, Now. You know, “I’ve looked at clouds/love/life from both sides now …” I died. It was so perfect!
Pass Over, ACT
Two of the characters have a typical day hanging out on a street corner, desperate, but hopeful. Dreaming but going nowhere. The day ends. A new day starts. It’s the same day all over again. Same conversation. Same jokes. Same routine. But now with the sense that there is no hope and the dreams are a joke. I wondered if this was really happening, if I was really going to see this scene over again, if I could take it. It would be so boring. Bingo! That’s the point! I had entered into the lives of Moses and Kitch. It was a bold risk to take and it paid off so well.
Bulrusher, Intiman Theatre
Logger is one of a few African Americans in a small northern California town. He’s middle-aged. Vera, a sort of long-lost relative appears and Logger takes her in. She’s a teenager running from something. At one point, Logger asks, demands, really, to fix her appearance and she eventually agrees. Through the rest of the scene, Logger plaits Vera’s hair. It’s a power move and a loving, fatherly moment at the same time. I loved it for being a simple, intimate, human interaction of a kind you rarely see on stage.
Waiting for the Paint to Dry, Macha Theatre Works
Colby has been left alone to care for her special-needs half-sister, Edith. Colby has quit her job and put her life plans on hold. Both struggle to cope. Edith paints pictures directly on the wall in the living room. Colby drinks. As in Pass Over, there is a moment when you discover that everything is going to start all over again, the way it has a thousand times before. After an exceedingly difficult day, Colby whitewashes the wall and Edith starts painting the exact same scene as before. It’s heartbreaking. All too real.
M _ _ _ ER, On the Boards
This is a one person show. The actor makes her way to the stage, which is in the round and so close to the audience that my knees (I like the front row) literally touched the stage if I slouched. The actor adopts the persona of everyone’s mother and accuses us of having forgotten her birthday. She calls on people, by names that she selects (I became Tedmothy) and conversation ensues. Soon she has asked two audience members to pull out chests from under the stage. There is ice cream and spoons inside! Now, in addition to calling on people and discussing why they would forget mom’s birthday, or whether they are twin brothers, or whatever else comes up, she is literally spoon-feeding us ice cream. That was the part!
Assassins, Second Story Repertory
I was in the front row again. Near the top of the show, there is a part where the Proprietor brings out a big chest, like a steamer trunk and opens it on its side, so it’s standing like a sort of podium. With a quick motion, all at once, he reaches inside and slams down a big, ugly revolver on top of the chest and it’s pointing right at me. Frightening. Effective.
Slick Tarp: No Guts No, Gory, Sam & Jeff (at Copious)
In one of this series of skits and sketches, an actor prepares to shower, eventually going behind a translucent curtain while lights and sound give the full effect. Soon you notice that another actor has entered the space through the actual door from the hall and into the theater. She’s crawling on all fours. She goes, slowly, stealthily past the bar. Past the little seating area and around the steel pillar (if you can visualize the Copious space.) She continues in front of the lounge area, turns the corner and nears the shower but instead of throwing back the curtain and doing the deed (murder, one presumes) right then, she continues crawling to the far side of the shower curtain while the other actor blissfully showers behind, in silhouette as the water sound effect drones on. The crawler arises. Just then, the showerer, still not noticing anything, dies of a heart attack or whatever. The intruder drops down and crawls back out of the space by the same route she entered and at the same slow pace. It’s so suspenseful and comical in the first half and then purely hilarious in the second half, like one of the skits on the Carol Burnett show where Tim Conway played an old man who could move only an inch forward at a time with shuffling steps. I think the whole skit counts as one moment, it’s so compact and complete.
That's it. Those are the nine.
Pictured: a personal favorite moment of mine from five years ago when I played Dr. McCoy in Hello Earth's Outdoor Trek: Amok Time and got to say the line, "In a pig's eye," to Spock. Photo by Libby DeLyria.
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