review by Acorn Jones
Ordinary Theater Company is anything but ordinary. I recently saw their production of The Joys of Fantasy at Twelve21’s 8,000 square foot venue. Joys is a remix of a remix. The company presented Our Town Revisited back in April, but had to change the title for their New York run, especially as there is a production of Wilder’s Our Town currently playing off Broadway.
Ordinary Theaters’ Artistic Director, and director/writer of Joys, Mitchell Polin had an interesting concept to work with in revamping Our Town, but ultimately had a little too much going on. The original play itself is very minimalist, performed without sets, but set on a bare stage, with environments suggested to us by a Stage Manager / Narrator / God figure. It is a subdued and guided exploration of the value of life, and how we spend the time we have within that life.
Joys on the other hand introduces a rock band, and loses all form of text and the dual stage manager character seems to have no control over the story. With the original play set in a small town, Grover’s Corners, the play now takes place in New York City.
My main problem with the show was that throughout the first act the actors were whispering their lines to each other to a point where I couldn’t understand what they were saying. Part of this is due to them being drowned out by the band, but I honestly don’t think the band could play any softer. I understand the need for intimate moments, but if we can’t hear you, we can’t hear the play, so what’s the point of being here?
There were some wonderful moments too. During the second act, Caroline Gart and Teri Incampo share a few scenes together, and the actresses work well off of each other. These scenes were spontaneous, fresh, and the subtlety of performance was remarkable considering how much distraction they were set amongst.
Susannah Berard also has some nice moments in the performance and she does well holding her own on stage. I didn’t really understand the reasoning for the past and future version of her character, her other half played by Claire Kavanah. They both played their parts well, but I missed the reasoning for the device.
Over all is an interesting play, but I think would be better off as a music video/film. Tungsten 74 wrote some great music for the piece, and I think what the production is trying to attempt would work much better on screen and the explosive rock and roll nature can be better harnessed and used for their benefit. I think the play has potential, and just needs a little more tweaking. In the mean time, it’s a good experiment and a great concept.
The Joys of Fantasy runs July 8th-25th, Wednesday-Saturday at 8 PM. Twelve21 is located at 12 West 21st St, between 5th and 6th Ave. Tickets are $20 and available at 212.409.8662 or http://www.ordinarytheater.com/
