Mitchell Oldham

Humankind has never lost the wish to understand and explore the unknown.  Seared into our genetic code, curiosity has been the motivating force that stimulated the birth of civilizations.

Strangely that curiosity does not always include a desire to understand and appreciate each other.  Here we continue to see differences in ourselves as threats and reasons to exclude. Those left on the outside or on the periphery can and do find themselves in either conscious or insidious peril because of who or what they are.

After Profiles Theater closed their doors last year, a group of theatrical artists recognized that a void needed to be filled where people who didn’t fit conventional norms of color or sexuality or size or physical completeness could express themselves.  They wanted to create a haven where those voices could be unleashed.  And they wanted to present those expressions in a space that would not only keep the story tellers free from harm, but would welcome their contributions to the artistic community.

The result is the Chicago Theater Marathon.  Ambitiously spanning 26.2 hours of new works that ran from a Friday night (July 21^st) to a Sunday afternoon (July 23^rd), this festival of creativity proved moving, hilarious, at times refreshingly bawdy, and fascinating.  What it did most well is display the astonishing level of inventive talent lurking in this colossus by the lake.

According to Artistic Director, Cassandra Rose, the collaborative telegraphed (via word of mouth and email) that they were looking for new works that coupled creativity to inclusion.  Working from a stance of self-empowerment, applicants were asked what makes them indomitable; the marathon’s theme. Some answers were direct and others much more oblique.  Virtually all of the applicants selected however were themselves or wrote stories about someone who has something about them that sets them apart.

One story might plunge into the emotional angst of being an immigrant; leaving the audience speechless from its intensity.  Another would mount a bizarre and wildly entertaining performance about long distance relationships and quirky YouTube obsessions.  You could be transported into fantasy through a story that takes place on a spaceship where all of the crew members are trans or gender non-conforming, doing shrooms and falling into “friendship”.  And then again, you might find out what happens to a famous black author who’s questioned by the FBI when his novel on terrorism becomes reality.

Netting over 100 applications, marathon organizers selected twenty-six to produce.  When it came to the work’s content, Rose and the rest of her curatorial crew remained as hands off as possible and simply focused on making sure the artists achieved their individual ideals for their work.

Set up so that the audience could easily flow from one show to another, often when one piece ended another began in either the main performance space, the Black Box, or in the lobby.  Logistically, it was all extremely relaxed and well-organized.

So fresh that much of the material remained unapologetically in its formative stage while being performed, a good deal of what the marathon mounted will hopefully see another life as a web series, a fully staged production or riding some other vehicle profiling a polished finished product.

Chicago would do well to look forward to their development.  No city can be considered vibrant without a thriving creative community and no artistic culture can thrive without a rich, complex tapestry of voices.

Chicago Theatre Marathon

July 21 – 23, 2017

1802 W. Berenice Ave.

www.chicagotheatremarathon.com

Flipping through the playbill and seeing that the subject matter dealt with refugees, my only hope was that Objects in the Mirror not be cheesy.  Immediately my heart lightened when I saw Allen Gilmore was in the cast.  I remember him most notably from his work with Congo Square and I miss seeing him as well as many other members of that outstanding ensemble as frequently as I once did.

Strikingly reminiscent of Dave Eggers arresting account of the “lost” boys from Sudan in his book, What is the What, Objects in the Mirror follows a loose band of Liberians in flight.  Forced to flee their country if they were to escape slaughter or, in the case of 15-year-old Shedrick Yarkpai’s (Daniel Kyri); kidnapping and conscription into a murderous guerrilla army.   An army where children’s emotions are desensitized with drugs before they’re taught to maim and kill with the cold efficiency of psychopaths.

Writing, directorial and acting excellence shoot to platinum level from the jump.   As ugly as this story of escape and renewal often is, playwright Charles Smith makes it brim to overflowing with love, honor, courage and, most emphatically, humor.  As trite as “we survive together or perish together” can sound, here you feel the gravity of those words because they are spoken as an emphatic imperative.  You’re not only shown what it means, you feel it.

None of this could succeed without a cast able to shoulder the weight of a story demanding so much intellectual grit.  This is what makes Objects in the Mirror so exceptional.  I can think of no other play, with the possible exception of August Wilson’s work, that so beautifully portrays intellectual heft in the form of a black man.  Usually it is the black woman who’s depicted with sinews of steel and phenomenal resilience.  Here it is the splendid Mr. Gilmore in the role of Shedrick’s Uncle John who acts as a modern-day Moses.  Equal parts shrewd tactician, adept negotiator and brilliant survivalist; he disguises his compassion in blunt speech and explicit demands.  It’s how the strong rise to survive wanton savagery.

Those same traits proved just as indispensable when the group was eventually accepted into Australia.  Their first asylum country, the United States, was closed to Liberians following 9/11.  A country with its own sordid history when it comes to race, redemption for these particular refugees came with a price in Adelaide, Australia’s coastal jewel.   Store managers followed them in grocery stores.  Bus drivers snarled racist epithets. But they had access to clean running water and were eating burgers with secret sauce rather than grass.  It’s not the first-time relative freedom came laced with daily indignities.

“You know those people had to step on somebody to get here” declared an observer of human events recently.  “Every refugee who makes it to a safe harbor country knows what it is to have blood on their hands”, he continued.  Perhaps.  Being a refugee is synonymous with desperation; often at its most rank.  A lot of unpretty things can happen to achieve the goal of escape.  You might even have to say you’re somebody you’re not.

For a 15-year-old, saying you’re someone else can weigh like an anchor and wreak havoc on your knowledge of self.  Naively confiding in a man whose interests in helping him right a wrong may be considered suspect; Shedrick threatens the safety of all of those who made it out of the Hell of Monrovia with him.

It’s once again Uncle John who rises to the occasion and confronts Shedrick on the danger of the confession.   He also has the temerity to defy the assumptive superiority of Shedrick’s confidante and challenges his impertinence and possible hypocrisy in persuading a vulnerable teenager to trust him.   There are those who live to experience the scene between Gilmore’s John Workolo and Rob Mosher (Ryan Kitley); the barrister in whom Shedrick placed his trust.  One black. One white. One an influential cog in the government wheel.  The other a displaced refugee.  But when it came to precision thinking and resolve, the battle was won by the one who isn’t supposed to win.

In the end, your imagination will determine the outcome.  Or you may leave always wondering what Shedrick decided to do.  Trust the infallible accuracy of his Uncle’s wisdom or place his fate in the hands of a stranger he hardly knows in the hope of restoring his true identity; his name.   What the audience is left to appreciate is the remarkable journey this story offers.  If insights are gained by placing oneself in another’s shoes, Objects in the Mirror holds treasure troves of revelations.

Endowed with the natural acting chops of a savant, Young Daniel Kyri as Shedrick Kennedy Yarpai drew you into his world and held you like a vise.  Lily Mojekwu as Luopu Workolo, John’s sister and Shedrick’s mother, was breathtaking in her role as a woman who will sacrifice having her son in her presence in order that he survive.  And Allen Gilmore out did himself in a role that allowed him to shine like gold.  “All good”.

Goodman Theater

April 29 – June 4

Telenovelas and soap operas come from the same place and in effect are the same thing.  Elaborate stories filled with unexpected twists, salacious secrets, ample doses of intrigue and even an occasional murder or two.  And don’t forget the sex.  Over a billion people around the world look at the Spanish version of these decorative deceits every day.

One thing that they are not is funny.  And that’s what makes Destiny of Desire so special and so wonderful.  Billed as a play within a play, it functioned more as a wonderful farce.  The trappings were all there for a traditional intricately tailored plot.  The baby switching at birth, the simultaneously running rich man poor man dramas, the secret love affairs and role reversals.  It’s all here and then some.  But let’s say with Destiny of Desire, it’s all wearing summer clothes.  Even though you can’t wait to find out what’s going to happen to poor Hortensia (Elisa Bocanegra) and hope like hell the conniving Fabiola (Ruth Livier) lands squarely on her own petard by the end, the play’s construction is so light that you’re laughing much more than you’re worrying.

Filled with music and crammed with sensational acting, the production exists as a spectacle of quality that leaves the audience to simply sit and marvel.

Top to bottom, the actors all deserve high praise for their splendid performances.  You might want to single out Ruth Livier’s singular take on Fabiola Castillo, the money hungry status obsessed trophy wife of a wealthy casino owner.  Equal parts superficial airhead and ruthless cobra, the combination makes her character hilarious as she flounces around the stage in couture hoochie.  The shtick greatly dilutes her venom while pumping up the comic appeal.

Eduardo Enrikez as the banished heir to his father’s casino fortune stole the show. He pulled off the tasty heart throb easily and balanced the comedic and the dramatic with astonishing skill.  But it was his singing prowess that took him over the top.  In one solo, the audience nearly went rock stadium wild after he slid from impeccable tenor to reach, hold and sustain a gorgeous high note.

To match the richness of the plot and the dazzle of the performances, the quality of the set design got stepped up a notch; even by the Goodman’s standards.  Never was sumptuousness more subtly implied with such dramatic effect.

Destiny of Desire

Goodman Theater

Mar 11 – Apr 16

Sometimes you wonder how an idea flowers into a premiere.  Victory Gardens production of Queen left a number of us in the audience pondering that question.  The play’s concept couldn’t be more noble.  Highlighting the global disappearance of bees, it followed the journey of two scientists whose groundbreaking work explaining that disappearance become suspect.  If they ignore the contradictory data to fit the model they’ve spent years cultivating, they’ll be rock stars.  Published, respected, and vindicated.

Parts of the play are highly technical which adds credence to the playwrights research and her commitment to scientific specificity and integrity.  Priya Monhanty as the quantitative wiz Sanam Shah nailed the cloistered nerd rabidly committed to her data and its integrity.  Darci Nalepa as Ariel Spiegel, the field expert who sacrificed the companionship of her baby’s daddy to prove a Monsanto pesticide was causing the decimation of a critical species delivered a solid performance as well.  A relief was needed from all of this gravity and it arrived in the form of Arvid Patel’ played by Adam Ross.  A quasi arranged love interest to Mohanty’s character, Sanam, he was cool, glib and often riotously funny as he did his woo thing.  A crazy mash up of Super Fly and a baby Warren Buffett made him wonderfully ingratiating.

If only the whole play could have maintained a bit more of that vitality. Queen was thought provoking.  The ultimate hope was that we would gain more insight into substantive causes for the alarming plunge in the bee population or glean a whiff of hope about their recovery.  Neither really manifested.  Instead the side stories prevailed.  One centered on the fallacy of scientific ethical integrity while the other dissected the decomposition of a friendship over those same ethical issues.  It worked well enough.  You left with a better understanding of the sacrifices people who dedicate their lives to research make to find answers to extraordinarily difficult questions.   That in itself could be reason enough to reserve a seat and watch this cautionary tale unfurl.

Victory Garden

Apr 14 – May 14

$20 – 60