Review: “Americana Psychobabble”

Alexandra Tatarsky responds to the Trump presidency with absurd monologues, touching ballads, and laughter yoga in her bold solo show.

Do you feel angry, devastated, or scared after the 2016 presidential election? Maybe you should consider the Laughter-Tears-Vomit-Scream exercise brought to us by Laughter Yoga. This and other ways to cope with reality are demonstrated by Alexandra Tatarsky in her solo show Americana Psychobabble, which ran at The Brick as a part of This is Not Normal, an arts and activism festival.

 Alexandra Tatarsky in Americana Psychobabble. Photo by Lydia Kincaid.

When the political life of the country looks like an absurd circus, it is only appropriate for the clown to speak up. Tatarsky bravely assumes the responsibility for voicing global anxiety. From the very beginning she radiates a great amount of explosive energy, visible through the twists and twitches of her athletic body and rapidly changing raw emotions. Seductive, melodramatic, enraged, scared, and inspiring, Tatarsky switches emotional gears in a heartbeat.

When Tatarsky opens her mouth, words come out. But for the most part it’s just a stream of consciousness similar to Russian futurist “zaum” poetry. It sounds something like this: “Fuck the facts. We are so post-fact. De facto. That we are all fucked.” Talking in this manner, Tatarsky “reflects” on topical American issues: patriotism, money, guns, immigrants, and God. Think crazy preacher on the subway, or “village idiot” of the Lower East Side.

Strangely, this manner of speech feels suitable for modern day America. Words put together by the principle of audible similarity and infused by emotional delivery and expressive body language suddenly become a convincing monologue. When Tatarsky climbs up on an upside-down soybean oil container to deliver an inspiring patriotic speech, it is not merely a satire on Trump’s America. It is also a cry for help, a weep of a confused creature tangled in words and emotions.

Tatarsky's star-spangled outfit, red stilettos, ragged blond wig, and heavy, smeared makeup of “a patriotic lady coming home from Fourth of July festivities” are tossed away for the second part of the show. A brief interactive session of Laughter Yoga is followed by pouring ketchup on her finger and pretending it’s a hot dog. The Angel of Death—in platform sneakers, tangled black wig and a bundle of ferry wings dangling behind her back—takes the stage with a touching ballad accompanied on acoustic guitar.

Heartfelt songs with lines like “Daddy will make you feel great again” and “Music is made for being sad and making sadness loud,” feel very much on point. The more sentimental second part of the show abandons the “zaum” manner of speech and serves as a counterweight to the absurdist poetic beginning. To free herself from all the masks that a clown wears, Tatarsky performs a cleansing ritual of washing off ketchup from plastic bags and then bathing her face in the ketchup dyed water. And as Tatarsky strips out of her clothes when changing characters, she leaves the stuff on the floor like a snake discarding her skin.    

In Americana Psychobabble, Tatarsky is the jester, the villain, the imprisoned princess, and the knight on a rescue mission. Frightening and frightened, she somehow embodies both ends of the political spectrum making us understand a simple thing: there is no “us” and “them.”

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Americana Psychobabble played at The Brick, 579 Metropolitan Ave, Brooklyn, through June 29, 2017. The running time is 60 minutes with no intermission. Tickets were $20. For more information visit bricktheater.com. 

Americana Psychobabble is created and performed by Alexandra Tatarsky. It is co-directed by Meryl Sands. Lighting Design is by Sarah Murphy.

[This review was published on theasy.com on 7.10.17]

Review: “Chickens in the Yard”

In this emotionally subtle, surreal play, a gay couple searches for balance in their relationship, their families, and their fowl.

Roger Manix and Sangi Varsano in Chickens in the Yard. Photo by Mia Isabella.

Tom (Roger Manix) and John (Jeremiah Maestas) are a happy couple, living together with John's mother Joyce (Maggie Low) in Pittsburgh, PA. Tom certainly tries to stay positive, despite the fact that his career as a sculptor never took off and he now works at a coffee shop. Despite his own insecurities, Tom tries to brighten up the lives of his loved ones. Evenings go by in a pleasant routine: take out food, wine from red solo cups, and red cigarettes while seated on red garden furniture. But peace and understanding, shown through the excellent color coordination of Jeff Hinchee's scenic and costume design, is suddenly stirred by the appearance of Tom’s sister Abby (Sangi Varsano), who he hasn’t seen since she was four. Now seventeen, Abby has come to scout local colleges, or at least this is what she says.

There's also the family's chicken farm, initially meant to fulfill Joyce's longing for her dead husband. In everyday life, chickens are many things to their humans: a source of produce, pets, a reason to communicate, and something to care about. But most importantly, in Chickens in the Yard the chickens—Bruce Lee, Lucille Two, Eleanor Roosevelt, and Anne Hutchinson—provide a way to escape the complications of the human world through surreal transformation. Every time anybody chickens out they literally become a chicken.

In their attempts to define the meaning of family, marriage, love, and personal happiness, the characters confront the ghosts from their past, including Tom's homophobic mother. But for the most part it’s the god-like voice of Mr. Park, Joyce’s husband and John’s father, who dominates these flashbacks. The accompanying lighting change immerses the stage in darkness and reveals the relief of the tinfoil-covered walls. This DIY, space-age silver coating adds a surreal visual effect, giving the feeling that we are inside a chicken coop.

The four actors are excellent as both humans and birds. Their shifts between species happen right in the middle of a scene, allowing for seamless transitions. Although there are certain parallels between the worlds of humans and fowl, Kruse thankfully never reduces the relationship between them to a simple moralistic metaphor. Yet one can't help but ask: are people supposed to be happy by design, just like chickens are created to lay eggs? Or is it more the case that, just as chickens don’t lay eggs on cue, people can’t be happy on command?

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Chickens in the Yard plays at Jack, 505 1/2 Waverly Avenue, Brooklyn, through July 16, 2017. The running time is 75 minutes with no intermission. Performances are Thursday through Sunday at 8 with added performance on Monday, July 10 at 8. Tickets are $25. For tickets and more information, call Brown Paper Tickets at 800-838-3006 or visit adjustedrealists.com.

Chickens in the Yard is by Paul William Kruse. Directed by Will Taylor. Produced by Adjusted Realists. Scenic and Costume design is by Jeff Hinchee. Lighting design is by Aaron Porter. Sound design is by Adrian Bridges.

The cast is Maggie Low, Jeremiah Maestas, Roger Manix and Sangi Varsano.

[This review was published on theasy.com on 6.30.17]