David MacDowell Blue

Two character plays with multiple scenes have a problem maintaining momentum. Sex With Strangers by Laura Eason has a potential solution to this--simply, the costume and set changes are minimal, and initially non-existent. More, the characters as written leave us not only interested in what happens next, our interest grows. More than our interest, our investment because this play is no polemic but rather an exploration of an intense relationship--its birth and perhaps its end. Certainly it co... full review

I've been telling friends that The Same Room is "No Exit but with a happy ending." This usually inspires a laugh and the question "So heaven is other people?" Well, yes. So is hell. Plus the full range of everything in between. Two young women literally end up thrown (by who? or what?) into a room. We and they pretty soon realize they are dead, outside of time and space as we understand it. Nobody knows what happens next, but they must somehow handle it. In this work, the two are anything... full review

Seems like this year's Fringe had a huge number of one person shows. Probably no more than usual but I seem to have seen more of them this year, with Nephew of the Universe one of the last. It had nearly all the ingredients of a good such--humor, a sense of a personal arc and lessons learned, an interesting backstory. But I did not feel sucked into this story, and maybe the reason was one of scale. This story tells of a kid brought into a "religious group" (some say cult) and his eventual lea... full review

Every notice how humor so often feels uncomfortable? The reason is simple enough--even when we laugh with someone, rather than at them, laughter tends to feel cruel. Whether a pie in the face or an unbelievably uncomfortable job interview, our reaction is to people's suffering. But the best laughter includes laughing at ourselves, not out of denial but recognition of our own faults, our own need to deal with pain by making it into something else. Squirrel!!! pretty much does that with the sto... full review

It bears says--I have had a very nice Fringe this year. Wrote only one pan, with two mild disappointments, but the rest of the shows I've seen veered between just plain good to soul-shakingly excellent. Most, though, have also proven...well, heavy. No complaints! Still, no use pretending this delightful variety show didn't act as a breath of fresh air! So much fun! So many laughs! Such a delightful array of different talents on display! My personal faves were the skits, partially because ... full review

We all have our journeys, our own terrors and regrets, victories and failures, accomplishments and lessons learned. Nine times out of ten this makes up the substance of nearly any one person show, so the question comes up--how akin to our own lives does this person's story feel? Sink or Swim accomplishes this very well in the most straightforward way--by sharing what happened, how he felt, and in an engaging manner let us in on his life. His methods proved clever, even interactive (btw the man... full review

I can but applaud a resurgence of interest in the classics, especially those we don't see that often, as in this case Seneca's Hercules Insane. This production does something even more startling that the revival of an Ancient Roman tragedy (we more often see people do the Greeks--possibly in hopes of seeing ourselves as in a Golden Age) in a pretty close approximation of how it was originally staged! Actors wore masks, spoke in meter, permeated stylized movements in every moment, and never shie... full review

My favorite acting teacher once gave me words to live by. "Theatre" he said "is revolutionary in nature. It changes you. You are no longer the same person you were before seeing a play." I am of course paraphrasing since he said this in the 1980s. But this play makes a fine example of exactly his point. Just in terms of a weird, dreamlike situation--three strangers meeting for reasons never made totally clear in a graveyard--we the audience listen in on a fascinating, perplexing and unresol... full review

A woman. A grand piano (or any piano really, this one happened to be grand). Some songs. Such a simple, yet challenging premise. One Laura Jo Trexler meets with talent, passion and panache! In this case the conceit lies in the pov from each original song she performs. Each one has a female character from the works of Shakespeare, from Gertrude (in Hamlet) to the Dark Lady of the Sonnets and beyond. Along the way, we experience enough passion, humor, tragedy, silliness and the like for a fu... full review

Lights Out at the Hermit's Cave comes from a place of pure fun. An ensemble of very good performers demonstrate over-the-top means "good" if done well and in the right context. This company, The Hermit's Cave, stages in a dark room horror radio plays from the 1940s. Not as radio plays, but rather acted out all around you the audience, albeit with a foley artist and live musician to add ambiance. It works! It works delightfully, even in a simple meeting room with most of the lights turned off.... full review