Unless I’m forgetting something (and please forgive me for missing you, Riddim), this will be my LAST “ARTS RUNOFF” POST EVER. I’ve had a really fun time doing these reviews, and I like to think they’ve served the purposes I hoped they would. I’ll do another post about it later to wrap up–maybe a review of my reviews! Meta!–but for now, check out this cool play in the Zoo this weekend:

Summary: A bundle of surreal(ist), hilarious(tastic) short skits culled from the classic Monty Python TV series, “Monty Python’s Flying Circus.” A totally extracurricular project dashed together over the last few weeks.

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Victory: Choices in Reaction. Great play, bad subtitle.

Summary: A play by Howard Barker loosely based on England in the 1660s–the monarchy was deposed, a commonwealth declared, then the monarchy came back. Runtime of almost 3 hours, lots of swearing. Intricate language. Severed heads.

Good: Like The Europeans (staged at Midd a couple years ago) but easier to follow and grab onto. // The Theater Dept. often aims really high with artsy, emotionally intense, challenging plays. Often, they don’t quite make it. But this time they actually got there. // Freshman Matt Ball really impresses as the reinstated king who can’t figure out what being king actually means. // Perfectly unified punky look, from light to sound to ultra-skinny pants.

Bad: Half of the time the long, stylized transitions between scenes were interesting. Half of the time they just felt like long transitions between scenes. // Lilli Stein rather typecast as a powerful but chipped  firebrand with a precise accent.

Broad: Howard Barker invented a philosophy called “theater of catastrophe.” (Of course he did–why does every playwright feel the need to invent a theater of something?) The idea is to traumatize the audience without any forgiveness or recompense, so as to motivate them toward making change in the real world. I think he’s full of shit on that point. Victory is entertaining, enticing, and full of beautiful language. It has moments that make you feel the characters are justified in at least some of their actions. Now, either Barker is just doing all that stuff as a ploy to draw us in, or he cares at least a bit about beauty, which means he’s a hypocrite. Just a thought.

Contextual rating: The run is already over, but I would’ve suggested that you…
-…do it, and see this show if you can.
-…put off that important thing you have to do and see Victory.
-…skip it. SEE THIS SHOW.

Summary: Two Hollywood producers, Bobby Gould (Willy McKay ’11) and Charlie Fox (Dustin Schwartz ’11) get a big chance to climb the ladder of success when a famous actor approaches Fox with a desire to do a movie with one of Fox’s scripts. The question of doing good instead of making money in this cynical world doesn’t even enter the picture until a second possible script, and Gould’s temporary secretary, Karen (Shannon Fiedler ’14), get involved. By David Mamet, known for witty, mean, rapid dialog.

McKay, Schwartz, Fiedler.  Just look at these beautiful people.

                                   Good: At first, I thought Willy McKay wasn’t right for the role of Gould. McKay just can’t be quite cruel, manly, or physically large enough to fill the image of the merciless, masculine producer. However, as the play went on, I realized the choice was perfect: Gould wants to be that guy, and his struggle is between becoming the good person he might naturally be and becoming the bad person he needs to be to get rich. His stature also allowed Schwartz, whose character is lower on the economic hierarchy, to bully him a little bit. // Going off of that, kickass power dynamics, brought out via great directing from Ben Orbison ’13. // The focus of this play is the acting. Every time I see Dustin Schwartz in a show, he gets better and more varied. Awesome range of emotion.

Bad: Although the set design was mostly fantastic, the white back wall broke the illusion a little by looking too rudimentary; a simple white panel and suspension of disbelief might have done the job better than the ambitious attempt at making it look like a real wall with a pattern.  Also, unfortunately, the used paint cans still smelled like paint. They made sense in the set, but I may have lost a few brain cells.

Broad: The title of the play comes from a 14th-century poem expressed as a prayer to God for a good harvest. The shed in the Organic Garden is adorned with a hand-painted sign that says “Slow-the-Plow.” Interesting connections.

Contextual rating: If you have something important to do this weekend,
-…do it, and see this show if you can.
-…put it off and see Speed-the-Plow.
-…skip it. SEE Speed-the-Plow! Had trouble choosing, but ended up giving into the fucking awesomeness of the show. And that’s the way to describe it: approachable, hilarious, dark, something you could talk to both profs and bros about without being embarrassed.

Speed-the-Plow in the Hepburn Zoo. 8:00 Saturday. $4, tickets at the door. It might be crowded.