Here's my secret, Cap: I'm always hungry.
Hungry for new work. Hungry for lunch. Hungry for that which will crack the dreamshell of America open and reveal whatever the hell is really inside this weird egg.
This week I ate. You'll see that below, along with two other reviews out of LA and NYC.
–Noah J. Nelson, Publisher
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5 Lesbians Eating A Quiche (Glendale, CA)
EverFound Arts
$40; Nov. 13-16
It requires skill to take a fringe comedy hit built for five performers and open it up into a site-specific piece that seamlessly incorporates the audience into the proceedings, and skill is exactly what director Marissa Pattullo and her game cast bring in this production of Evan Linder and Andrew Hobgood’s 5 Lesbians Eating A Quiche.
The play itself offers a solid base as the “widows” of the Susan B. Anthony Society for the Sisters of Gertrude Stein gather for the 1956 annual quiche breakfast. Which lends itself to the immersive centerpiece of the night — a slice of quiche (vegan option was available) — that acted as a kind of intermission/social glue for the sizable audience.
What’s on either side of that slice, which was exceedingly excellent, is a hilarious production of a very funny script which Pattullo and company manage to blend seamlessly with the crowd work bits, pulling us into the heightened comic world where every “widow” has a secret (can you guess what it is?) and The Egg is the source of all that is good in the world.
As a dude, I wasn’t sure what they were going to do with the presence of guys at the show. After all, the Susan B. Anthony Society for the Sisters of Gertrude Stein’s motto is “No men. No meat. All manners.“ Luckily “Noah” was swapped out for “Noelle” at check in and I found myself letting my hair down (literally) for the night.
Things started off a little slow as the audience made their way into the church event space that served as the meeting room for Society, and on opening night a packed house meant it took a little time before the cast could circulate to all the tables as folks got settled in and grabbed a cocktail. Yet when they did come over the actors did a stellar job of drawing us into the world of the show, so that once the script started in earnest it was almost hard to tell where the crowd work ended and the play began.
That’s the gold standard when it comes to this kind of hybrid immersive work, especially with a shorter play like 5 Lesbians Eating A Quiche.
Director Pattullo and a number of her players — Emily Yetter and Noelle Urbano for sure — have more than one fully fledged immersive production under their belts as actors, and Pattullo parlays that and her love of the script here into a night that moves swiftly and keeps the whole of the crowd in the embrace of the show, even when thing start to really go off the rails. To be sure Nicole Ohara steps up to steal the show with comic panache in a script that gives every one of the “widows” a moment to shine.
The only real downside here is that this run is over, short as it was. Hopefully, whether in the form of a another slice of the Quiche or another script entirely, this won’t be the last we’ve seen of immersive work from EverFound Arts in LA.
– Noah J. Nelson, Publisher
Oratorio for Living Things (NYC)
By Heather Christian, directed by Lee Sunday Evans
$124-$197, Signature Theatre, Sep. 30 - Nov. 23
Oratorio for Living Things is a new work written by Heather Christian and directed by Lee Sunday Evans that muses on cosmic time and the meaning of life and memory. Despite ascribing to the traditional expectations of an oratorio — lacking set, costumes, intricate plot, etc — it does describe itself as theatre, which feels antithetical, and it shows. The piece is musically impressive and feels novel in the sense that something like this isn’t often presented in a theatrical setting, which is for good reason, as Oratorio for Living Things struggles to hold water past the initial spectacle of the piece.
To be perfectly clear in terms of immersivity, Oratorio barely skates by. It is essentially a choral performance during which the audience is seated and observing. There is a feeble attempt at participation at the end, which, despite being ever so brief, lacks purpose and intention. The musical performance takes a theatre in the surround approach, and I’ll give them the argument that the music surrounds and immerses the audience in a way that we don’t usually get to experience, but that is the extent of immersive practices included.
Immersivity aside, my larger concern with the piece is that it thinks it is doing something it isn’t. There is a sense that what you’re seeing is meant to be revelatory and sacred, but it largely feels unearned, as the level of audience care isn’t present to justify suspension of disbelief for the overly abstract content. Oratorio doesn’t have compassion for the audience and is more concerned with capital “p” Performing and aesthetic impact than relation or inclusion, which makes the message of the piece unable to inspire the wonder and awe that it aims to. That being said, I would be remiss to not reiterate how impressive the spectacle of the piece is. When the content is lucid, it’s great, it just spends much more time in the land of the abstract, which is unfortunate. The performers are incredibly talented, and the musical composition is ridiculously intricate and complex. While this missed the mark from an immersive and spectator care perspective, it’s worth seeing just for the pure extravagance of the performance.
— Allie Marotta, NYC Curator
Retreat! (Los Angeles)
Black Rabbit Theatre Co
$85 - 105; Nov. 14-16
The description for Retreat! makes it sound like a show about a wellness retreat. Despite that information being quite clear, I wasn’t sure what to expect walking into Black Rabbit Theatre Co.’s new piece. Would there be some kind of twist? Was it actually a cult? (The LA scene has really primed us to expect cult from all angles.) Would some kind of high drama play out?
The answer to all of these questions is, “No.”
In fact, it’s pretty much exactly what it says on the tin: a wellness retreat as immersive theatre.
Over the course of the show, guests go through an intake process for The Meadow, experience a few sessions with other “guests”, and then depart. The entirety of the experience is a series of one-on-one conversations, frequently, though not always, about communication.
This is where Retreat! shines. The actors lead their way through these wellness sessions and react to the information and cues you give them; I was shocked at how easy and natural the conversations felt, regardless of topic. There’s a level of polish to the whole experience, from the setting to the vibes to the fact that you never cross paths with another audience member. (Another small positive was that show times were offered all day, which can make attending quite convenient. I had a 10:40 am start time!)
If there’s a quibble with Retreat!, it’s that it feels more wellness retreat than immersive theatre. A theme around communication, and disconnecting from everyday life and your devices runs through the whole piece, but it never quite makes a point out of it. Some story threads show up while talking to folks, but never come to a resolution (and maybe I should have pried more). In that sense, it does feel true to life, there’s no guarantee of closure, but I found myself wanting for something to tie it all together.
That said, I find myself looking forward to whatever Black Rabbit Theatre Co. does next because they clearly have a lot of talent and different ideas about what immersive theatre can be.
–Kevin Gossett, LA Reviews Editor
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