S-27

What I liked

There were some strong acting moments – 1) the mother with the baby was compelling to watch and she is clearly a seasoned stage actor, 2) the character of June was the most versatile in blocking and movement and had great stage presence.

Nice matching camo pants. And good beat-up make-up.

I also liked the heartbeat in between scene changes.

What I didn't like

I have a lot of thoughts about it, so take what’s helpful, ignore what’s not.

The story lacked substance and reason. It was clear from the get-go that the story was about how May would wind up on the other side of this situation, but to get there was a lot of vignettes with unrealistic monologues from various prisoners. I didn’t feel it BUILD to the moment. It was the same scene over and over.

While the girl with clay on her hands did a pretty exceptional performance overall, it was very distracting to see those gargantuan, manicured nails under the clay or mud and her painted toenails. I get that this is Fringe, but it really took me out of the scene and the moment to witness something so modern that juxtaposed the danger of the story or what the character was about to go through.

The blocking could be improved in these long self-proclaiming stories where May does NOT want to hear their story, whether she knows them or not, and does physical actions to stop them, like tying down a prisoners hands and legs, gagging them – which would be VERY on theme with the subject matter of torture with the prison S-21. But as it gets harder and harder to perform this job is where less and less of the force comes into play. The current blocking forces the actors to just recite their lines without putting ACTION behind what they’re saying. Lee doesn’t want to die? CLIMB UP ON MAY, find her knife, stab May in the leg, Lee runs to the door she came in to flee, June’s right there with the plastic bag. It doesn’t have to be THAT, but dynamic action would greatly improve the staging of this piece when it is SO dialogue heavy. Every prisoner seemed rather complicit with dying.

What was the “organization”? Who were they “against?” Like, why was Lee picking berries forbidden? Those divides between these two parties of thoughts weren’t very clear. And they always referred to “telling someone” or “getting someone” to make June do whatever May wanted her to do, but I never caught in the story who that “someone” really was or what threat they really posed.

It must have been gross for your barefoot actors to walk around on the smeared / steamed white rice.

I didn’t understand the lighting color changes in this room – they didn’t add to the story, and when Cole was rapey with May it was “green”? Just, strange choices.

My overall impression

This show was disappointing.