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Quirky 'Under 30' monologues are more akin to lectures
NOT THEATRICAL: Use of notes by actors was a bit too distracting.
Published: January 2nd, 2010 09:27 PM
Last Modified: January 2nd, 2010 09:28 PM
Last Modified: January 2nd, 2010 09:28 PM
The current round of "Under 30" continues Out North's 16-year tradition of quirky and personal performance pieces written and performed by local folks. While a few of these short works -- the title refers to the expectation that each "act" will run no more than half an hour -- have featured ensemble acting or choreography over the years, most have been soliloquies. In the case of the "Under 30" presentations that opened on New Year's night and continue through next weekend, all four are monologues.
These are not theatrical monologues, however. The word "lecture" is more accurate. There seemed to be a lot of reliance on notes, sometimes built into the script, sometimes to the point of distraction, and only the most rudimentary non-verbal elements.
Don Decker's "Fear No Fear" opened with the speaker at a lectern, talking about things people fear, like death and public speaking. Answering the question "Where do we draw the line?" was a video of Decker doodling silently on a dry-erase board, making lines, loops, squiggles, designs, employing time-lapse techniques to create animation effects. This was probably the most beautiful part of the night; I was reminded of Alexander Calder's "Circus."
This was followed by another video, in which Decker donned phoney googly eyes and gums, pretended he was a night club comic -- a profession with no obvious fear of public speaking -- and delivered a series of unspeakably lame jokes like: "I wanted to get my G.E.D., but I couldn't spell it." This segued into an imagined encounter with Jesus on an airplane and a series of questions: "Are there really harps in heaven? Or is that just string theory?"
In "Letters to Ho Chi Minh," Van Le expanded on the intensely personal memoir about her family's escape from South Vietnam, initially developed for "The Women of ..." at UAA last February. Details of indignities dealt to her mother and father by the conquering North Vietnamese, the horrors of escaping the country by smuggler boat, being looted by pirates, refugee camps, eventual asylum in snowy British Columbia and subsequent visits back to Vietnam were interspersed with (pretty) songs and Le's questions to the long-dead revolutionary leader.
Why did he wage a war that left the people he claimed to be helping poorer, less educated, sicker, displaced and dead, she asked. Who were these officials for whom bribery trumped ideology? Why was liberation followed by such repression and enslavement?
In the end she has exhausted herself, venting her anger to a "ghost," unable to continue struggling over historical events that she can barely remember. On the other hand, she notes that her mother still considers the war worth fighting.
Jonathan Lang's "Radio" also addressed his personal formation -- but instead of war and exile, his touchstone was the more pleasant device of Alaska broadcasting. He spoke of living in Valdez when Anchorage's KBYR was the only station received in that town. The peculiar messages of "Caribou Clatters" on Glennallen's KCAM. He recalled the excitement of KWHL signing on. Herb Shaindlin's "Desperate and Dateless" show on KFQD. The cautionary tale of KMXS disc jockey David Taylor, shot by listener Kathy Hodnefield whom, Lang reported, Taylor married before she had completed her prison term.
In a sense, the piece was a pretty plain love song to music radio in the pre-digital days, with a flurry of quick hits and three-minute segments, but no distinct point, a bit like the medium itself.
Mark Muro's "Apocalypse When I Get Around to It" or "Civil War III, Part 1," was simple storytelling. It began with a description of how economic signals can be read in toy airplanes and morphed into the comic report of a recent road trip on which Muro and his politically opposite brother attempted to reprogram one another.
Those attending this year's "Under 30" presentations who have seen previous shows may want to take a look at the exhibit of photos and memorabilia from former "Under 30s" on display in adjacent gallery space.
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