Review: Nellie and the Women of Blackwell

A powerful “dark ride” into the history of mental health treatment

Wildrence, one of New York City’s staple immersive theatre studios & venues, opens its blue door again to teach us a lesson in local history and compassion. Its newest offering, Nellie and the Women of Blackwell, co-produced with Infinite Variety Productions, is a non-fiction immersive show based on the 1887 expose by Nellie Bly, “Ten Days in the Mad-house.” In it, a brave reporter recounts her experience as an undercover patient of Blackwell Asylum on Governors Island, publicizing all the horrors and atrocities she witnessed during her 10-day stay. The theatrical version of Bly’s adventures, written by Ashley Adelman and directed by Jessica Schechter, is a striking immersive experience that left me trembling for days after I saw it. Meticulously designed and beautifully performed by the cast of four actresses, this production is undoubtedly the strongest piece yet that I’ve seen coming out of Wildrence’s multiple partnerships with theatre companies.

Nicole Orabona and Kate Szekely in Nellie and the Women of Blackwell. Photo courtesy of Wildrence

After descending a staircase leading to the cellar in one of Chinatown’s buzzing streets, 16 audience members find themselves in a cramped editor’s office of the World newspaper. Nellie Bly (Kate Szekely), a lively young woman in a period blue skirt, enters nervously clutching her matching hat. I’m immediately immersed in the end of the 19th century and not just by Bree O’Connor’s costumes. The appearance of an arrogant and patronizing editor (Nicole Orabona) reminds me that I am in a world ruled by unabashed misogyny. The editor makes sexist remarks and grabs Nellie by the slide of the chin. Nellie seems to let it slide right beside her. Bly is on a mission to uncover the truth and will let nothing get in her way. Her effervescent enthusiasm is contagious, so I don’t hesitate when we are invited to check ourselves into the madhouse alongside Nellie.

All attendees are assigned an undercover female patient name as part of the mission, then documentary photographs of women (the real-life asylum patients) are passed around. Nellie encourages us to study and recreate their facial expressions in order for us to “blend in.” As a part of our “mental patient bootcamp,” Nelly unscrolls a long list of reasons why someone might be admitted into a mental institution from 1864–1889; she asks us to read the ones that catch our eye. “Immoral life,” “medicine to prevent conception,” “over-study of religion,” and “asthma” are but some of the reasons found among many signs of insanity. A chill goes through my spine. What started as an exciting journalistic mission soon turns dangerous and dark.

By way of performing signs of depression and mania in a women’s shelter later and a police court, Nellie and her 16 audience sidekicks are admitted to Blackwell Asylum. Here we meet one of the patients, gentle Tillie (Ashley Adelman), and an iron-hearted head nurse Mrs. Grupe (Janessa Floyd). There is only one other nurse and one other patient in the show, both performed by Nicole Orabona, but the clever use of the audience helps us to imagine the overpopulated mental institution even with these modest casting means. The well-fitted cast of four actresses bravely ventures into performing the most unflattering sides of the human psyche: sadism, abuse of power, horror, and despair. In such an intimate setting, Mrs. Grupe’s anger is genuinely scary (the staff always finds reasons to yell at the patients regardless of patient behavior) and Nellies’ crushed spirit is easy to sympathize with as we witness the abuse of patients in the asylum.

Nellie and the Women of Blackwell does a remarkable job making the audience a part of Nellie’s word in a gentle, non-intrusive way. This is especially valuable since the content is so harsh and might even be triggering for some people. The care for the audience starts with arming us with a safe word and ensuring audience members are never left alone with a character in the position of power. I realize that I am always with a friend, either Nellie or Tille. The experience is structured as a dark ride, with the 16 audience members often separated and reshuffled and guided to different scenes that are running in parallel. At various points of the journey, I am pushed onto a scale by the nurse or left to shiver on a staircase collecting leaves and munch on a stale piece of bread.

There are just enough theatrical moments in Nellie and the Women of Blackwell to punctuate the kafkaesque horror and absurdity of life in a mental health facility. But surprisingly enough, the truth reveals itself as stranger than fiction. In the days after seeing the show, I began questioning what in this production was historically accurate and what was merely artistic liberty. For example, I was sure that the cramped rows of narrow tables in the dining room where patients were allowed only sit on one side was an invention of the design team. This unwelcoming set stirred huge discomfort in me and reminded me of a proscenium theatre at once. How surprised I was to discover a historical photograph of the asylum’s dining room on the show’s webpage! Here they are, patients stuffed behind the narrow tables, all facing in one direction.

Aside from the excruciating thought that what I’m witnessing is based on real events, the acting is stellar and the narrative utterly compelling. Furthermore, I am stunned by the thorough production design. I swear I smelled ancient damp rags, unwashed bodies, and bitter medicines during my stay at the Blackwell, so vivid is the world created by the production. The sound design by Andrew Dunn mostly consists of environmental noise that barely attracts any attention but affects the subconscious. When we are in the examination room, I hear the sound of a draft whizzing quietly by and immediately have goosebumps, even before Tillie shivers and Nellie complains about the cold. The sickly-greenish hue of the hospital’s windowless rooms contributes to the atmosphere of a depressing, concentration-camp-like facility.

The set design by Andrew Dunn in collaboration with Wildrence also transforms the compact venue into a variety of rooms, ones that are re-dressed with impressive speed. Nearly every nook and cranny of Wildrence is utilized efficiently, including the staircase and the hallway. In fact, one of my favorite scenes — the medical exam required upon admission — happens in a hallway, divided into small sections by white curtains. Each section holds two people and has a mirror on the wall. Obedient to the institution of the unseen doctor, I stick out my tongue and show my wrists, feeling much like I am in an interrogation room and am about to be sent to prison. There is no way to argue or communicate with the doctor, so I feel doomed. I am soon to discover that all communications with medical professionals here are one-sided, since the head doctor is a dummy, controlled by Mrs. Grupe.

After spending ten days in the asylum on Roosevelt Island, Nellie was released. Her eye-witness testimony exposed the mistreatment of the patients and caused a wave of reforms in mental health institutions. In particular, as is stated by Nellie herself, “New York City has appropriated $1,000,000 more per annum than ever before for the care of the insane,” meaning that her work caused the city to spend additional funding (approximately 26.15 million dollars at today’s rate) to improve patient conditions that year. Nellie and the Women of Blackwell continues the mission of the title heroine, as the creators of the show have partnered with Lenox Hill Neighboring House to raise awareness of women’s homelessness and mental health.

The changes in treating women’s mental health since 1887 are drastic, yet there is still much work to be done. More people struggle with mental health issues then you might think. Each year, 1 in 5 women in the United States has a mental health problem such as depression, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), or an eating disorder. A lot of the work to be done is around finding ways to de-stigmatize the treatment of women’s mental health in the United States. And speaking up on behalf of those who, for one reason or another, have lost their voice and their agency, is the work that every one of us can and should do.

(This review was published on NoProscenium.com on February 25)

Review: Assemble

A walk through a retail store becomes a meditation on life

(Note: Assemble is an unauthorized immersive performance; we were asked to not reveal the secret location before the last week of the New York City run. If you don’t want any spoilers, do refrain from reading the second half of this review).  

Photo courtesy Assemble

Are you truly happy with your life? Do you look back with no regret at all about the choices you’ve made? Do you feel certain about the direction in which your life is headed? 

If you had to pause even for a moment to think about these questions, chances are you will enjoy Assemble, a guerilla site-specific audio performance, currently running in Brooklyn as a part of the Exponential Festival. If you found yourself slowly spiraling into an existential crisis by answering those questions, you are already halfway to getting into the mindset of Jane, the character through whose eyes Assemble is experienced. 

Jane is a New Yorker turning forty and, as many of us do around milestone anniversaries, she is assessing her life. The way that she does it is rather unconventional. With the help of an AI assistant, she navigates a famous big box store, revisiting her memories and dreams. The audience members are invited to tag along, to reflect on their own life and to walk in Jane’s shoes for a part of the way. What does it mean to be a woman in a megapolis approaching forty? What are the choices laid out in front of her? And when she makes a choice, is it a manifestation of her true self or a mixture of cultural expectations and the influence of brand marketing? In a way, we all ask ourselves these questions at some point, which is why it’s so easy to relate to Jane.               

The Assemble experience is provided via a smartphone app (developed by David Blackman) downloaded onto one’s phone. A series of short audio tracks take the listener through various locations in the store, occasionally throwing in narrative “forks”: by clicking on a picture of an object on your screen, you can choose your own adventure. You might be asked to record a voice memo, write something down, take a photo, or draw a picture. There are some tasks involving interacting with the store environment and manipulating objects on display. I felt somewhat uneasy performing the latter. Although the tasks weren’t asking for anything that might be too embarrassing, as soon as they went outside the lines of normal behavior expected from customers, I found myself hesitating if there was a staff member visible.                

Prior to entering the store, I listen to the audio waiver, informing me that Assemble wasn’t exactly  authorized by the store, but it wasn’t exactly  forbidden, either. I am warned that if at any point in my experience, I am approached by a staff member and they ask what I am doing, it’s best to say I am conducting research. 

Feeling a little bit like a spy trespassing on enemy territory, I feel especially wary of my appearance and my behavior.  My brain is in full “panopticon” mode when it is time to perform a “strange” action. But this mode I’m in only makes the moments of quiet listening that much sweeter because I know The Big Brother is unable to hear what's in my headphones, unable to enter Jane’s thoughts, and, therefore, unable share our experience.  

Besides her name and her age, I don’t get many facts about Jane. There is enough here to get an idea of what she is like. But at the same time, writers Talya Chalef and Jess Kauffman leave enough gaps so that I can  fill in the blank parts with my own thoughts and experiences, making Jane feel very relatable. When the app prompts me to reflect on something, I sometimes hear Jane’s thoughts in my headphones, but sometimes space is left for my own reflections. Other people and noises enter the mosaic soundscape during Assemble, the density of which varies greatly. There are times when our AI guide is practically attacking me with questions and tasks, while  there are also quiet, meditative moments.     

(Spoilers regarding the exact location of the experience follow.)         

                      

The AI guide in the app who directs me through the experience is named Sigrid. Using  her cheery voice with a Scandinavian accent, she takes me through the IKEA showroom in Red Hook. Somewhere in between a shopping assistant and a life coach, Sigrid is here to entertain, educate, and sell various scenarios of a perfect life (which, of course, can be obtained through buying goods from IKEA). 

My journey goes through fully assembled and decorated rooms with names like “The home is where the heart is” and “A passion for things.”  As I lie on the beds, pull out drawers, and sit at tables, I imagine myself living in similar life-sized doll houses, the kind which are neatly designed for small city apartments. Audio scenes bring the mock apartments alive, but, at the same time, these scenes make them feel sad and hollow, like the artificial plants used for decorating these rooms. I stand in the middle of a housewarming party where the host, Pete, brags about his kitchen appliances. In another scene, I hear a confused dad reading instructions aloud on how to insert a tampon. I lay down on a bed and, as I start giving into the calming music, I hear the snoring of an invisible person next to me. The same way as I “try on” a STJÄRNTULPAN duvet cover or try sitting in a ÖRFJÄLL chair, I try on roles of a bohemian New Yorker, a parent, and a spouse.                   

An IKEA store organically lends itself to an “dark ride”-like narrative with a predetermined route charted through various “sets.” It already feels like a life-sized version of The Game of Life with arrows on the floor pointing towards your next destination: workspace; kitchen; nursery. It is a brilliant idea to build Assemble on top of existing infrastructure, by re-thinking and re-appropriating the context of a store like IKEA. The fact that the immersive production is operating in complete secrecy from the venue underlines its political agenda to criticise consumerism and patriarchy. Assemble also tackles another interesting topic, namely how the arts serve commerce. In a way it is an “immersive brand de-activation” despite having no direct attacks on IKEA in its content.

Assemble is a playful, tasteful, and profound invitation to take a look behind the cardboard facade of the catalog-ready dreams imposed on us by brands.    It is a straightforward and unapologetic criticism of the modern, super-achiever culture that demands “high performance” in everything: career, marriage, raising offspring, and decorating your apartment. But this criticism is brought to the participant’s ears as a “contraband” — a lot of these insights only hit me later on. Assemble is never aggressive or accusatory; somehow, the show manages to be fun and relaxing but also raise some serious questions at the same time.

(This review was published on NoProscenium.com on January 26)

Review: In Many Hands

Kate McIntosh reminds us of the value of caring for one another

(This review contains moderate spoilers for the experience.)

BAM’s Next Wave Festival in 2019, under its new artistic director David Binder, was arguably the most successful one in recent years, in no small measure thanks to a number of shows in experimental and immersive formats such as User Not Found. Another piece in the Next Wave festival, In Many Hands, had a way-too-brief run but demonstrated to me the value of play and curiosity; it is an intimate communal theatrical experience focusing on how we interact with objects and each other. Merging performance, interactivity and art installation, the creator of the piece, Kate McIntosh, a New Zealand-born, Brussels-based artist works in the areas of physical engagement of the audience using objects and creating social spaces for exploring one’s agency and engaging in experimentation collectively.

In Many Hands. Photo by Ed Lefkowicz.

The artist herself, with a serene and quiet demeanor, greets the audience of 51 people gathered in the lower lobby of BAM’s Fisher building. Prior to the beginning of the show, we are asked to remove all the objects and jewelry from our hands. Divided into three groups, we are led to one of three tin basins located throughout the theater filled with warm soapy water to wash our hands. The instructions (roll up your sleeves, refrain from speaking during the show, try to sit next to somebody you don’t know) are delivered by one of the facilitators in the same friendly, placative manner. A tin basin with a black towel tied to it is a mundane domestic object, but a spotlight above it and the anticipation of the unknown elevate the experience of simply washing my hands. This meditative, nearly ritualistic onboarding sets the mood of the experience. After the “ceremony of purification” backstage, I enter the theater and it feels like a temple.

The seats and the stage normally found here are gone. Instead, there are three long tables set in a triangle shape, covered in stark white cloth, in the middle of the darkened black box theater. There is a line of stools facing outwards. I take my seat towards one of the ends of the table, between two strangers. Mimicking the action of others, I put my elbows and arms on the white cloth lit with a spotlight. Soon, I notice that there is a long paper ribbon traveling towards me, passing through all the hands of the people at the table, kind of like a comically-long telegram strip. When it comes to me, it reads something like “Notice the hands of the person next to you. Are they trembling, are they calm? Are they hot or cold”?

I look around and then something else starts traveling down the line of hands, a series of gestures. Imagine the game “telephone” but instead of whispering a phrase down the line of players, the facilitator does something with the hand of a person next to them and the action cascades down to the end of the table. It is intimidating at first to hold or to tickle the hand of a stranger, but a certain level of anonymity during In Many Hands helps. We end up forming an unbroken chain, where my right hand is resting face up in the left hand of the person to the right of me, and my left hand is holding the right hand of a person on my left. My right palm can’t lie flat because of a previously existing injury and my neighbor’s hand is trembling, so it takes a moment to adjust to each other’s physicality and overcome the initial awkwardness. But by the end of act one, I feel a strong personal connection to my two neighbors without sharing a single word and very few gazes. (But I am getting ahead of myself.)

Once all the hands are linked, objects are passed down from the beginning of the line by the facilitator (and a second facilitator is discarding the objects by putting them into a box at the end). First, there is a parade of rocks passing through our hands, all without a single instruction. Rocks of different shapes and sizes, I feel each of them with my right hand and study closely the most interesting ones, handing them to my neighbor on the left afterward. At some point, the facilitator at the end stops discarding rocks, leaving each person holding one. Somebody gets to hold a miniature nugget the size of a baby’s pinky nail, somebody else gets a broad and flat rock, a pumice stone, or a nearly perfectly spherical pebble.

When a massive cobblestone travels my way, I hold my breath knowing that that one is going to end in my not-so-functional hand. My right-hand neighbor catches me looking and silently offers to switch my load with his, but I smile and shake my head no. Before putting the beast onto my fragile palm, he flexes his palm underneath mine, and, after waiting for my nod, slowly releases it, while continuing to provide steady support. It feels like somebody is willing to take on some of the weight I carry, metaphorically speaking, because physically, of course, the cobblestone wasn’t that big of a challenge. And after this simple act of consideration and care from a stranger, I am already sold on In Many Hands.

In a nutshell, this is the performance: objects are being passed down by the strangers in silence. After we complete the rocks, various botanical, zoological, anatomical specimens and various tools and substances of different natures travel down the chain of hands. But don’t let the simplicity of the structure deter you. Puzzling at first, In Many Hands’ unexpectedly turns rewarding in a lot of ways.

As In Many Hands progresses, the mood gets increasingly playful and giddy. Bursts of laughter and gasps of surprise are heard throughout the room. Participants invent new, creative ways of handing the objects over, experimenting with presentation and facilitating the experience for each other. Although you see the object that you are about to receive, once you touch it, it often feels like handling something for the first time. Suddenly, its weight, its temperature, and its smell reveal themselves with an unexpected newness.

When a handful of large cold seaweed leaves plops down on my hand, much like a dead fish, I giggle in surprise. Thinking that it might be fun to provide my neighbor on the left with a more relaxing, spa-like experience, I pick up each cold seaweed leaf individually from my hand and carefully assemble them on his hand and his arm. He chuckles at first and after the leaves are in place, sits still for a while, taking it all in. During the onboarding, we were told that it will take different people different amounts of time to complete the tasks. Some of the experiences, the seaweed in particular, call for relishing and I am glad we are given time not to rush.

In Many Hands proves an opportunity to meditatively study various objects with multiple senses (except for taste). The objects are the same for everybody for the most part, except for some finer substances that transform as they travel down the line of many hands. When a scoop of soap-like liquid appears in my palm, I am not quite sure what to make of it: much of it was spilled in transition, and the color is mudded with other solids and liquids that everybody held prior to this. A magnifying glass appears in my hand and I study the hand of a person next to me: covered in brown goo, smelling of soap and coffee. My hands smell the same even after I wash them. For part two, I am instructed to take a seat at a different table, facing inwards this time.

Part two starts in a similar manner, but soon the lights dim down and the objects travel through the hands of the audience in complete darkness. Through my hands pass various objects of peculiar texture, some produce sounds (such as when we rustle and tear out pages from a telephone book). Suddenly, the crescendo of the show begins. As much as I would like to share it, I don’t want to spoil the surprise. The joyful chaos of play takes over, with laughter and screams of surprise filling the room. It gets loud and we momentarily become one with the environment and with each other. And then it suddenly stops. The monumental yet quite finale keeps us in our seats, absolutely mesmerized for several minutes. There is no curtain call. People look at each other from across the room, smiling. Nobody wants to leave just yet, but one of the stagehands opening the door and thanking everybody for coming is a clear sign that we need to vacate the room. I feel a childish disappointment that our “playtime” is over.

In Many Hands made me think about how the participants can “serve” each other during an immersive experience. This intimate, interactive show requires the audience members to pay constant attention to their partners, to be able to read them without speaking or seeing them, a skill that is certainly much needed today if we want to maintain our humanity and survive as a species in the long run. In Many Hands explicitly doesn’t reveal an overarching theme nor does it make any moralistic conclusions. But, to me, it is a history of our planet and human civilization told through objects, closed on a haunting and poetic note. We are all responsible for our collective future; it is, after all, in many hands.

(This review was published on noproscenium.com on January 10)

Review: A Christmas Carol

An annual No.11 Productions’ Christmas immersive party finds new ways to reconnect modern audiences with Dickens’ classic.

For the fourth consecutive year No.11 Productions took the good old Dickens’ classic, A Christmas Carol, out of the trunk of seasonal necessities and, after dusting and tweaking it a bit, performed it for one night only at the Irondale Center in Brooklyn. This was my first time attending, and I felt the atmosphere of joyful unity right upon entering the grand space of the former Sunday School. Friends saying hello to each other, children running around, and a few volunteer audience members trying on costumes off to the side; everything is reminiscent of a big family gathering. 

Steven Conroy, and Forest Vandyke in A Christmas Carol. Photo by Nate Bertone.

For about forty minutes of pre-show, audience members are ushered to the gallery upstairs where plentiful pastries and tangerines are arranged on little tables, and a bar serves two kinds of punch. The play itself begins after director Ryan Emmons makes his welcoming speech, a transition that might be required but actually works for the “family party” format.

No. 11 Productions’ A Christmas Carol is in a sense a promenade piece. Each scene takes place in a different part of the room, sometimes erupting right in the middle of the crowd. Trying to guess in which corner the next dialogue will occur—and then making it there in time—becomes a fun game. Besides not knowing where the actors will appear next, the rare but joyful moments of interaction with the cast keep the audience on its toes. After being startled by Marley’s chains rattling and then invited for a Victorian line dance, I had no idea what to expect; to my pleasure, A Christmas Carol kept surprising again and again.

The wonderful cast performed with such contagious sincerity that I soon found myself seated cross-legged on the floor with all the kids, latching onto every single line with the excitement of somebody who is hearing this story for the first time. Forest VanDyke as Ebenezer Scrooge, a grumpy penny-pincher who changes his ways overnight, is especially good at taking us on this journey of spiritual rebirth and transformation. Another unforgettable performance is by Sequoia, a magnificent Ghost of Christmas Present in drag. She transforms the venue into a dance floor for the duration of her number, leading the crowd into a dance accompanied by live music by the Nat Osborn Band (who gives a concert as an after-party).

The volunteer audience members who play some of the smaller roles add a lot of flavor to this production. Others in the audience root for the shy performers who can barely make it through their two lines like proud parents at an elementary school performance. The audience roars with laughter and applause for the beloved recurring characters, like Tiny Tim, performed by a 6-foot guy leaning on a crutch that barely comes up to his knee.

No.11 Productions' A Christmas Carol is a wonderful holiday tradition that will cheer up anybody’s spirits. The company manages to combine superb professional performances with an endearing amateur theatre vibe. So make sure to have your dancing shoes ready for next year!

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A Christmas Carol plays at Irondale Center, 85 South Oxford Street, Brooklyn, on December 16, 2019. The running time was 90 minutes with no intermission. Tickets were $30. For more information visit no11productions.com.

A Christmas Carol is by Charles Dickens, adapted and produced by No.11 Productions. Directed by Ryan Emmons. Associate Director is Ryan Buchanan. Original Music and Sound Design by Enrico de Trizio. Additional Music by Nat Osborn. Set and Lighting Design by Ryan Hauenstein. Puppetry and Prop Design by Jen Neads and Danny Tieger. Costume Design by Kathleen Blanchard and Julie Congress. 

The cast is Forest Vandyke, Steven Conroy, Julie Congress, Alison, Novelli, and Giselle Chatelain.

(This review was published on theasy.com on 12.27.19)

Review: Judgment Day

A German play about pack mentality written in the 1930s strikes with its relevance in this grandiose production.

The Park Avenue Armory is one of my favorite theatre venues in New York for its iconic yet flexible Wade Thompson Drill Hall and edgy programming. Judgment Day, an adaptation of a 1937 play by Ödön von Horvath, is a perfect example of both. Director Richard Jones returns after the critically acclaimed The Hairy Ape, which played the Armory in 2017, this time with an even more spectacular production.

The cast of Judgment Day. Photo by Stephanie Berger

The events take place in 1933, in a small unnamed town in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Express trains pass the little town without even slowing down, comically pushing the citizens against the tall blank wall of the railway station. The loud rumbling (sound design by Drew Levy) and bright silhouettes of the windows swooshing by (lighting design by Mimi Jordan Sherin) make the figures look two-dimensional. The same can be said about the majority of the citizens, restlessly gossiping and vigorously bullying any “black sheep.”

The stationmaster, Thomas Hudetz (Luke Kirby), finds himself first the local hero, and then a victim of the community judgment, after a fatal accident that killed eighteen people. The train derailing caused by an untimely signaling unfolds right in front of our eyes. The stationmaster’s reputation of “a diligent official” (as he calls himself on multiple occasions) was nearly his only pride, and is now at risk. Both witnesses, the innkeeper’s daughter Anna (Susannah Perkins) and the stationmaster’s wife Frau Hudetz (Alyssa Bresnahan), become equally unhappy for covering up and revealing the truth, respectively. The decisions that the main characters have to make take them out of the two-dimensional realm and put them on a wild rollercoaster ride that becomes progressively surreal.

Although coming to terms with one’s guilt is at the core of Judgment Day, it seems like Jones is equally preoccupied with the conflict between the individual and the mob. (Mirroring the fate of the stationmaster, Frau Hudetz and her brother, druggist Alfons (Henry Stram), also fall in and out of favor with the townsfolk.) The director masterfully depicts the nuances of confrontational relationships, not only through the mise-en-scène, but also the transitions, when the group of citizens, under Anjali Mehra's movement direction, silently walks across the stage, evoking a pack of wild animals thirsty for blood.

These elaborately staged transitions also allow the repositioning of the two monumental plywood pieces of scenery, reminiscent of children’s building blocks (set design by Paul Steinberg). The choreography of these blocks (there isn’t a better word to characterize these mesmerizing movements) and the de-individualized, nearly de-humanized mob rushing across the stage, create a beautiful dance that evokes the scale of an individual in comparison to history. Reminded of another monumental piece seen in the Park Avenue Armory, Everything That Happened and Would Happen, I was hypnotized by the majestic grandeur of the scenery brought to life with bold and vigorous lighting design and the abundance of haze. But at the same time, I was taken aback by the fear of the gathering crowds, rising to power and crushing anybody who doesn’t comply with their standards, no matter how outrageous.

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Judgment Day plays at the Park Avenue Armory, 643 Park Avenue, through January 11, 2020. The running time is 1 hour 30 minutes with no intermission. Performances are Mondays through Thursdays at 7:30; Fridays at 8; and Saturdays at 2 and 8. Tickets are $55, $95, $145, and $195, and are available at armoryonpark.org or by calling 212-933-5812.

Judgment Day is by Ödön von Horváth. Adapted by Christopher Shinn. Directed by Richard Jones. Movement Direction by Anjali Mehra. Set Design by Paul Steinberg. Lighting Design by Mimi Jordan Sherin. Music and Sound Design by Daniel Kluger. Sound Design by Drew Levy. Costume Design by Antony McDonald. Stage Manager is Janet Takami.

The cast is Luke Kirby, Susannah Perkins, Alyssa Bresnahan, Henry Stram, Alex Breaux, Charles Brice, Cricket Brown, Gina Daniels, Harriet Harris, Maurice Jones, Maurice Jones, Tom McGowan, George Merrick, Jason O’Connell, Joe Wegner, and Jeena Yi.

(This review was published on theasy.com on 12/20/19)

Review: Traumnovelle

The intimate site-specific piece has superb choreography but struggles to fully use the space.

I enter the code to the front door of the apartment building on St. Marks Place in Manhattan and take the elevator up. There is a bike mounted on the wall next to apartment 5F and a potted plant tucked into the corner next to the staircase. I could be going to a yoga studio or visiting somebody in this average-looking East Village apartment building. But I am here for an immersive show.

What I am about to see is Traumnovelle, a site-specific dance collaboration between Adam Barruch and Chelsea Bonosky, the duo performing under the name Anatomiae Occultii. Besides her many other accomplishments in the world of dance, Bonosky brings to the table her extensive experience performing in Sleep No More while Baruch has choreographed an immersive show for Celebrity Cruises. But this dark piece is the duet’s first stab at immersive production. Traumnovelle, demonstrates a familiarity with the form but ends up somewhat timid when it comes to working with both the site and the audience.

photo by Alice Chacon

Traumnovelle invites an intimate audience of 13 to enter a private apartment. Inside, there is a red loveseat with an unnamed couple sitting on it (Barruch and Bonosky). The shirtless man wears black pants, while she wears a copper slip dress and smokes a cigarette with a green filter. Only her knee pads indicate the theatrical nature of the scene, otherwise their appearance is domestic, yet elegant. As smoke from her cigarette fills the room, the audience members scatter, trying out the available viewing angles. Before entering, we were instructed to “explore the space without touching any props or actors,” but the appartment only consists of one room with a bathroom adjacent to it, so the “exploring” is over before it can really begin. This reminds me of how important every single aspect of the immersive experience is and how crucial the wording of the onboarding might be.

The man heads into the bathroom, turns on the water, and undresses, before the door is shut and we are left alone with the woman. She takes a seat at a table covered in a thick layer of rose petals. There is a small vase holding a few red roses in the middle. The woman beheads each flower with scissors and then pours two glasses of wine at the bar, putting a rose petal in one of them. Time seems to slow down, guided by the somber ambient music. The man returns. The dance of their relationship intensifies.

Although it is not immediately clear what is going on between the two characters, watching Barruch and Bonosky dance is mesmerizing. Their connection is remarkable, which is not so surprising for two collaborators who have been working together for 10 years. Their technique is impeccable and it’s breathtaking to peer at them from such a close distance that you can even hear them breathe. Their deliberate movements start to break away from the efficient practicality of everyday gestures (smoking, taking a shower, picking up glasses from the shelf) little by little; the mundane soon transforms into the poetic.

It is a bit like listening to people speaking a language which I don’t understand but still enjoy being around it. As I ease in, I start imagining that I do understand a “word” or two using whatever context I have available. I make the analogy to listening to a foreign language deliberately, as there are two spoken monologues in Traumnovelle which are heard as voiceovers through the sound system. The dancers “translate” them using the duet’s signature “kinetic gestural language.” I don’t understand ASL but some of the gestures, based upon what I observe, look like they might have been taken from the vocabulary of sign language, due to the pacing and the parts of the body that are used and pointed at by the performers. So, when used, the spoken word catches me by surprise; it takes me a moment to finally tune into it. While I understand the words separately, I don’t understand them taken as a whole. It’s not easy to grasp the meaning of the abstract text in the piece, and, to my surprise, I find body language more helpful in this regard. After the spoken monologues finish, I can’t help but suspect the entire dance stands in for a concrete text; I do my best to try to decode the movements I observed. Needless to say, as much fun as this game is, it is a fruitless effort. I am back on the seesaw of ambivalent meanings trapped between the choreography and my imagination.

Traumnovelle plays on the duality of the familiar and unfamiliar, immersing the audience in the atmosphere of a lucid dream. “Traumnovelle” means “dream story” and is also the name of the 1926 novella by Austrian writer Arthur Schnitzler that partly inspired the dance piece. In that story, two married young partners each go through their own journeys of reawakened sexuality, bittered by the guilt of desiring somebody other than their spouse. In Anatomiae Occultii’s Traumnovelle, the story is much vaguer but it seems to be revolving around similar topics of desire and infidelity. This production frees the audience from the domestic drama of social norms and moral choices found in the original piece, and instead offers a journey into the deeper grounds of the subconscious, the place where images rule over words. Some of those images from Traumnovelle are stuck in my head days after seeing the show, such as the moment when the woman scoops all the rose petals from the table and drops them slowly, leaving a “blood” trail on the wooden floor.

The venue itself, Arts on Site, contributes to the haunting atmosphere of the piece but also competes for status as the star of the show. This apartment looks more like a film set than a real habitat, thanks to its exposed brick walls and tall windows with back-lit greenery, and a monumental wooden bar counter, all enhanced by dramatic dim lighting. The setting looks like an eccentric man-cave with a 70’s vibe, which doesn’t entirely feel like it “belongs” to our characters. The duo floats in and out of the space, figuratively speaking. About half the time, their dance has a clear orientation towards one side of the room, making the experience very proscenium-like. These moments where the site isn’t engaged make me think of the venue as being arbitrarily chosen. On the contrary, some of the most beautiful choreography bits are the ones that actually use the features of the space, like a sequence that happens on the bar itself. The massive wooden bar counter becomes a “stage.” The lighting fixtures hanging above it frame the action and create an eerie lighting effect when brought into motion. The interior and the choreography finally become one. Unfortunately only about half of the scenes incorporate the environment in a meaningful or aesthetically interesting way.

The scenes that were oriented toward the “fourth wall” also made me aware of the awkwardness of my position as a voyeur. While nervously shifting a few feet left and right along the perimeter of the room, I am worried that I might obstruct the view of other audience members or be in the way of the performers. In immersive theatre, I enjoy both being confined to one perspective as well as the “dance” of moving around performers and other audience members. But, in Traumnovelle, this “dance” was neither here nor there. Interestingly, the narrative itself has the potential to accommodate the role of the audience, but does not utilize it. Both spoken monologues discuss the “presence” of other people when we are alone or have sex with our partner. Their “ghosts” might be there in the form of a body mark, a smell, or a stray thought. I only made this connection post-factum, but what a potent thread it could have been in the show. With all the beautifully ambiguous poetry that Traumnovelle contains, it lacks structuring when it comes to working with the audience, at least for now.I sincerely hope Anatomiae Occultii will continue their exploration of site-specific choreography and weaving the audience into their stories. It is a great pleasure to watch such superb dancers perform, no matter the format. But like with anything beautiful, I would love to be able to get closer, to bond outside the traditional model of actor and observer.

(This review was published on NoProscenium.com on 12/5) 

Review: The Catastrophe Club

This site-specific, post-apocalyptic play is a secret gathering at a bar in an attempt to figure out where humanity went wrong.

The exact address of the undisclosed location is sent to the attendees of The Catastrophe Club on the day of the event. See, it's the year 2520, and public gatherings are outlawed, hence the secrecy. We are seated around the room in an underground bar and our host, scientist/programmer Ruth (Rachel Towne), invites us to travel back in time to approximately 2015-2025 with the help of four Sims. Ruth created Zizzie (Cassandra Nwokah), Teres (Sue Kim), Anders (Stewart Walker) and Emime (Dan Kublick) from a time capsule, made by these four friends and climate scientists while hanging out in a bar one evening trying to figure out how to save the world and comfort each other. They sarcastically called it “The Catastrophe Club” while a glimmer of hope still remained.

Clockwise from left: Cassandra Nwokah, Sue Kim, Stewart Walker, and Dan Kublick in The Catastrophe Club. Photo by Jeremy Varne.

Spoiler alert, they didn’t quite succeed in saving civilization. The Great Flood and Freeze that happened somewhere between 2015 and 2025 Common Era destroyed the majority of the Earth's population. Relying on her modern technology and objects from the time capsule, Ruth tries to understand what it meant to be a human in “Year One to Year Ten,” and perhaps get closer to understanding her own heritage. In between stopping and resuming the reconstructed scene, the head of our little gathering shares information about her current world of strict order and total surveillance; in 2520, it looks like a catastrophe of a different sort might be on its way. So how do we preserve our emotion-rich, communal, conflicting “human nature” and save the planet from fatal climate change? This is the main question that author Devin Burnam poses.    

The Catastrophe Club feels a little lingering towards the end but overall it is quite enjoyable, mostly for the charismatic characters of “the past” performed with vigor by four wonderful actors. As Emime, the comic-relief, Kublick is especially memorable in his stand-up comedy routines, clarinet playing, and acrobatics on the bar floor. In this intimate, site-specific setting, every tiny movement and intonation are on display and it’s really difficult to hide a lie or get away with overly theatrical gestures. The cast, directed by Shaun Bennet Fauntleroy, still seem to be perfecting this delicate balance, but ultimately they are on the right path.

The Catastrophe Club is site-specific, but only to a point. True, the action happens throughout the bar, and is sometimes obstructed by the architecture of the space, or else by the gaps in Ruth’s data about the evening. And via its emails, The Catastrophe Club succeeds in creating an atmosphere of adventure and conspiracy even before the audience enters the theater. But I wish this atmosphere had stretched beyond knocking three times on an unmarked door. Inside the bar two themed cocktails—“Near Death Experiences” and “Devastating Newses”—are available, but nothing else reminds us where we are and why we are here. There are many missed opportunities to make the whole experience even more immersive, from check-in to the pre-show. In its current run, The Catastrophe Club is a play performed in a bar, but it has the potential to be much more. If only the creators could borrow some of the courage, inventiveness, and genuine care for fellow humans from their characters.

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The Catastrophe Club played at a secret location near Bleecker Street and Lafayette Street, through November 22, 2019. The running time was 90 minutes with no intermission. Performances were Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays at 7. Tickets were $30. For more information visit thecatastropheclub.com.

The Catastrophe Club is by Devin Burnam. Directed by Shaun Bennet Fauntleroy. Produced by Sea Dog Theater, Janelle Garcia Domig and Christopher Domig. Sound Design by Tye Hunt Fitzgerald. Original Music by Devin Burnam and Christopher Domig. Stage Manager is Whitney Bahr.

The cast is Cassandra Nwokah, Sue Kim, Stewart Walker, Dan Kublick, and Rachel Towne. 

(This review was published on theasy.com on 11.21)