Numero Festival: Lisbon, Portugal 2005

The Sixth International Lisboa Multimedia, Film and Music Festival took place in Portugal in November 2005. The theme was "Neurological Games," encompassing the varied multimedia productions, dealing with sound, cinema, visual arts and other types of live performance for the 21st century. I caught two performances, one was the bizarre and esoteric "So Happy Together" by Vitor Rua and Vera Mantero.

New York International Fringe Festival: NYC 2005

As published in OffOffOnline on August 13, 2005:


Some critics do everything in their power to craft a review from which no one can pull a quote for marketing purposes. Others, though they may not admit it, yearn to see their name emblazoned under an exclamatory phrase on a city bus or in a theater company's season brochure.

I have been neither of these thus far in my reviewing career, but be forewarned. The following review of Soir�e DADA: Neue Weltaffen contains scores of yankable words and phrases. To boot: Run, don't walk, to see Soir�e DADA at P.S. 122 before these beautiful lunatics escape from New York.

An extraordinary piece of avant-garde theater is occupying the second-floor space of P.S. 122 through this Saturday. The quartet from Chicago's WNEP Theater (that's What No One Else Will Produce Theater) has crafted a daring piece of art�and a hysterically funny one at that�to the disturbance and delight of its audiences. This is the third in a nine-year run of various DADA soir�es, but Soir�e DADA: Neue Weltaffen is the one that made it to the New York International Fringe Festival, and that's lucky for us.

Four actors, greased up in white faces and dark formalwear, are charged with shaking up the audience with their schizophrenic and searing wit, in-your-face acting, and surprising relevance. This ensemble has steeped its sensibilities in the post-World War I movement of Dadaism�a backlash against the absurdity of the war. The company has mastered what Dada founders Hugo Ball, Tristan Tzara, Richard Hulsenbeck, and others began in 1916. "Dada" literally means "hobbyhorse" in French, but figuratively lacks any meaning whatsoever. (One of the most recognizable expressions of Dada in the United States is Marcel Duchamp's iconic urinal titled "Fountain.")

WNEP Executive Director Don Hill and Artistic Associate Steve Lund helmed this whirlwind production, which features Emily Dugan, Jen Ellison, Bob Wilson, and Steve Zimmers. A naked plastic doll with moving eyes is introduced early on as an honorary cast member. When DADA Dabo (Ellison) first presents her from a suitcase, DADA Dondi (Wilson) grabs the blond toy, stares at it intensely, and says in an aroused tone, "She's got a lazy eye." Creepily hilarious.

Each Dada takes turns telling an absurd monologue or climbing onto a chair to chat with, harangue, needle, or caress an audience member�appropriate for a show whose moniker loosely means "new world monkeys." They scream audibly, they scream silently. At times their words are delicate and beautiful, and at other times they are utter nonsense.

In German (Swiss?) accents, they spit out machine-gun proclamations: "Dada is anti-action! Dada is anti-complacency! Dada comes to you at night and infects your nightmares with the scent of rotten halibut and causes your medulla oblongata to vomit the poison into your everyday monotony." The pacing is tight, and the precision with which they perform is startling.

The piece's frenetic energy may sound nerve-fraying, but the company knows when to alienate the audience and when to simply hit 'em with a good joke�as if Bertolt Brecht were directing The Daily Show. That is evident in lines like "Dada sees your full potential and rejects you anyway." With its humor, WNEP presents Dada Lite, eliciting less rage and more laughter than the original Dadaists, who incorporated few jokes.

These Dadas attack contemporary ills, from prosaic complaints like gas-guzzling SUVs to grander-scale frustrations like the standardization of Western culture. As the 60 minutes zoom by, the Dadas begin endearing themselves to the audience. They're strange and frightening and boy can they scream, but through their formidable intelligence it seems that they've figured it all out.

A hefty amount of audience interaction is interjected with bizarre monologues. Bob Wilson as DADA Dondi turns in an astonishing performance. He has amped the weird factor up and performs with dedication and commitment. Both women are remarkable as well. DADA Dabo (Ellison) delivers a powerful speech that simply multiplies the numbers of "you." "There is one of you. There are two of you. There are three of you," etc. The monologue continues into the billions, and as the number increases, the fever pitch of the delivery follows. Indeed, there is only one of her.

Ellison and Wilson are the strongest in the foursome, and Emily Dugan turns in a solidly strange performance as DADA Gift. Her black wig (stolen from Uma Thurman's Pulp Fiction wardrobe?) frames her white face and her Cleopatra eye makeup. DADA Wainscotting is outfitted in a bowler, vest, tie, jacket, and goggles.

The action is underscored by a thumping soundtrack of songs in various languages, and, while the lighting is simple, it is effective in its splashes of red, green, or blue when appropriate. Or inappropriate. Or DADApropriate.

Göteborg Dance & Theatre Festival: Sweden, 2004

I had no idea what I was getting myself into. I had e-mailed a woman in Scandinavia a few times and the next thing I knew, I was on a plane to Göteborg, Sweden.

The impetus for my sojourn was the International Association of Theatre Critics’ Young Critics Seminar, arranged in conjunction with the Göteborg Dance and theater Festival. So, I left Newark airport, which operates next to a gargantuan IKEA store, for Stockholm, the IKEA world headquarters. How different could it be? For starters, unlike the rough-edged cities and fashions Americans live in, everything about Sweden was streamlined: from sleek the airplane flatware to the tidy film “Anja efter Viktor.” (Even if it is a Danish movie—you get the idea). I love to travel and have had the good fortune to do so with motley groups in the U.S., Mexico and Scotland, among others. But this experience in Göteborg (a.k.a. Gothenburg) made the deepest impact on my career as a critic, theatre artist and American journalist.

My 11 colleagues came to this remarkable Nordic city from South Korea, Portugal, Romania, France, Canada, Moldavia, Russia, Denmark and, of course, Sweden. Each morning in the stylized café of our humble Hotel Flora, complete with black wallpaper patterned with giant daisy photos, we would grab some breakfast of salami, sliced red peppers, pate, thick yogurt and a cup of coffee or tea before walking up the main avenue to Artisten, Gothenburg’s art school. We held our morning seminars, usually lasting 2-3 hours, in English, although I was the only native English speaker in the group. For the first few days, the seminar’s director, Margareta Sörenson, and the two monitors, Wibeke Waern from Copenhagen and Lis Hellström Svenningson from Gothenburg corralled our confused dozen, of whom only three understood Swedish. As each day passed, our befuddlement dissolved into sizzling intellectual conversation, European history lessons, awkward, on-the-spot translations and heartfelt companionship. We discussed the pandemic of shrinking real estate for theatre reviews in papers, as well as the lure and danger of freelance life. But we were there for the theater, right?

Living in New York, I left in the midst of the International Fringe Festival, whose roster only included a paltry six companies from outside of the United States. (Worse still, the festival hosted more that 200 companies in all.) The much smaller Göteborg Dance and Theatre Festival offered only 18 companies from which to choose, but only two were Swedish-based. My mind was virtually shattered the first night out during “Foi” by the Belgian company Les Ballets C de la B; I was filled with pride for the solo performer, Nana Janelidze, and her Georgian story of war-torn Eastern Europe; and I was shocked by Lina Saneh’s “Biokraphia” from Lebanon.

As the only American, it was quite a precarious time to represent the nation in the international community, and the trip certainly re-awakened me to the insularity of America and the need for a east- (and south- and west- and north-) looking vantage away from our own borders. Not only in the political arena do we need to fling wide our arms, but in our own art: in traditional theatre form and interpretation. Most of the performances at the Goteborg festival were not text- or reality-based. The heavy London/New York premium on 19th century, Western models of theatre seemed passé at best. The art form has long outgrown slice-of-life naturalism, yet our American universities teach Meisner like he’s Moses on the Mount and our award systems hold up “Proof” and “Take Me Out” as theatrically paradigm. Ah, but that’s the old “chicken-or-the-egg.” Which came first? The gesture or the word? In any event, this Scandinavian theatre festival reminded me that I much prefer the Artaudian to the Ibsenian view of what is stageworthy.

As we all—from lumbering nations to nimble individuals—try to discover meanings or lack thereof, theatre offers a solitary and unique form of artistic expression.

Just in case you don’t know what you’re getting yourself into.

Cos Festival: Reus, Spain 2005

Reus is a surprising Spanish town. Though partly overshadowed by booming Barcelona a mere 70 miles to the north, the hometown of architect Antoni Gaudí is no sleepy Mediterranean village. I arrived there in late October for Cos, the Eighth Annual International Theatre Festival of Mime and Gesture (or however that best translates from Catalan). Artistic director of Lluís Graells assembled 20 companies and performers from various regions in Spain as well as France, Israel, Belgium, Peru, Poland, Cameroon, England and Italy.

For a city of only 100,000, Reus boasts glorious venues. Theatre Bartrina was built in 1905 and seats an intimate 550. The larger, grander Theatre Fortuny is named in honor of the Reus-born painter Mariano José María Bernardo Fortuny y Carbó. Smaller spaces are plentiful in the cozy Catalonian town.

The proud and unique city of Reus awakened with a lively festival attitude for the week. In addition to the performances, courses were offered in puppetry and improvisation, restaurants were abuzz with late-night theatergoers, and the various plazas glowed with excitement as people dashed from venue to venue.

I was able to see 11 productions in my five brief days in Reus. They ran the gamut from amateurish fare best suited to children (or frat boys) to visually-arresting works for the most sophisticated theatergoer.

The piece that still shines in my mind weeks after my return to New York is “Duel” by the Clipa Theater of Israel. A melancholy clash between a pair of ill-fated lovers is underscored by the “Peer Gynt Suite” by Greig and “The Swan” by Saint-Saens. Idit Herman and Dmitry Tyulpanov appear on the ostentatious Fortuny stage like porcelain dolls. That short piece is performed before “Rite of Spring,” the main choreographic event. In that, Herman and Tyulpanov are joined by six other dancer-actors to enact a large-scale frenzy in beige. In primal, brutal tones, the company dances to Stravinsky’s infamous piece as if they were in the opening scene of the film Planet of the Apes.

Over at the Teatre de l’Orfeó Reusenc was the delightful work of Peruvian mime Hugo Suárez in the piece “Hugo and Ines” (named after his Bosnian partner Ines Pasic). He amazed a full house of children and adults by using his body parts—hands, fingers, knees, navel—to create figures and faces. Suárez brings vignettes of sadness, joy and frivolity to life in the most simple manner. Fingers become angry teeth; knees transform into bald heads. The poignancy of a love lost is as present in the work as the silliness of using a navel as a mouth.

Breaking from the majority of sullen work performed at Cos was the humorous “M.A.M.—Modern Art Modern,” presented by Ciatre Copi Rait of Catalonia. Unabashedly lampooning the New York modern art movement and its main characters, the three-person cast of Lourdes Domènech, Gerard Domènech and David Ferrer brought levity into the packed Theatre Bravium. In the piece, New York innovator and multidisciplinary artist “John Phillip Etty” presents an array of his groundbreaking works, from theatre to painting to dance, with hilarious irreverence. The more seriously Etty takes himself, the harder the audience laughs. All the while, his conservative interpreter and presenter (Ms. Domènech) plays the perfect straight man.

Other Cos performances worth mentioning are the excellent “L’Abric” by Taller Itt and “Nouvelles Folies” by Cie Fiat Lux, both from France; the bawdy commedia dell’arte show “Tacata i fuga” performed outdoors with the enchanting 16^th century Priory Church of Saint Peter as the backdrop; and the ambitious puppet piece “La sonrisa de Federico García Lorca” by Bambalina Titelles of Valencia.

The Ninth Annual International Theatre Festival of Mime and Gesture will take place in fall 2006. For a quiet alternative—or supplement—to the giant festivals in Edinburgh or Avignon, look to this tiny Spanish gem.

Edinburgh Festival Fringe: Scotland, 1998

I probably saw 40 shows in my three weeks in Scotland in August 1998. Eight years later, one of the shows that still sticks with me is "Honestly" by the British company, Hoipolloi.


I was there performing at the Hill Street Theatre. We had 21 midnight performances and we sold out nearly every night. Walking to the theatre from our rented flats along Princes Street was a daily dream. Our theatre group spent hours busking along the Royal Mile to sell the show. From Arthur's Seat to the Edinburgh Palace to a hit show, that month in Scotland was one of the best times of my life.

European Theatre Prize: Torino, Italy 2006

I have just returned from Turin, where I spent a few days roaming the streets of one of Italy's less-touted towns. I was there as part of the American Theatre Critics Associations's World Congress where we were to wintess Harold Pinter receive the X Prix Europe pour le Theatre.

Among the productions I saw, the first was Luca Ronconi's behemoth "Troilus and Cressida." A five-hour interpretation of Shakespeare's rant on the Trojan War. (Photo left by Marcello Norberth.)