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| Leon Russom as Dodge - Photos by: Nico Sabenorio |
Some people can live with the tragedies of their own making and hide them
until they die, others can’t. - Narrator
An ideal farmer’s day starts long before the sun rises. Feeding the livestock is generally the first
task. And then the farmer moves on to manage
the little things that are in disrepair. Tinkering until the dearly moments of
the evening, the farmer sidles to bed, lying down his tired soul, saying a
thankful prayer for all that he has been given, and then falls asleep.
Working a successful farm is the American dream personified.
As the family grows, the work intensifies.
Farm life is hard and rewarding work until something goes
horribly wrong. And something went wrong
here. A tragic event has forced the family
to live a conscience nightmare, suffering infinitely. And these exhausted souls
are now a confoundedly grotesque image of a farm family. Each in his or her despairing reflections, recognizing
the event that no one wants to talk about.
The event in question becomes a memory, an object relegated
to the darkest part of the home and the deepest part of the subconscious. And the
oldest, living with the dreadful curiosity, wonders each day how all this is going to end before eternal
perdition.
And you thought you were coming to see a comedy.
Whitefire Theatre presents A Scott Disharoon Production of the Pulitzer
Prize Winning play Sam Shepard’s Buried Child directed by Bryan Rasmussen.
Dodge (Leon Russom), in his seventies, sleeps on a warn leather
sofa, a blanket covering a chill so deep, and a hidden bottle of whiskey under
the cushion. The Folgers’s coffee can
for cigarette butts, and the folded poke, becomes a surrounding staple, along
with a trashcan, and the rejectamenta, the used tissues that never finds its rightful
place but on the floor.
Dodge is stifled by both a nasty cough and “a pact” made
years ago. His mournful self sits, watching
television, and hacking away. Next to
him are a number of prescription drugs to ease the cough. He waits for the time, hoping the grim reaper
will not get him before his work is finished.
Halie (Jacque Lynn Colton), Dodge’s slightly ditsy but hearty
wife, is concerned with his coughing as she listens from another room but not
so concerned as to come down and help him.
Her curiosity is satisfied with any reply or a grunt emanating from the soft
spot of the sofa.
“Every time you get like this, it’s the rain. No sooner does rain start than you start.” –
Halie
The rain has this family on the edge.
Halie orders Dodge to take a pill. Forget the love and healing old wounds. Her commands are about the only cure Dodge is
going to get now. Slightly lit, she applies makeup as she prepares herself for
a date. She’s got more living to do as she
remembers herself as a giggling teenager.
“I went once. With a man.
On New Year’s.” – Halie
“Oh, a ‘man’.” –
Dodge
Halie mentions that he was a breeder … of horses.
“I bet he taught you a thing or two, huh? Gave you a good turn around the old stable!”
– Dodge
Halie says that if Dodge isn’t going out today, Tilden
(David Fraioli), their simple-minded son, will be looking out for him. And Bradley
(Cris D’Annunzio), the indolent younger son, will be coming over today to give
Dodge a haircut. But one has to keep an eye on one-legged Bradley, a dangerous
man with cutting instruments (see amputated leg).
“I won’t be very late. No later
than four at the very latest.” – Halie
In the meantime, Dodge calls for Tilden but he is out in the
rain and nowhere to be found. This sends Halie mysteriously into a tizzy.
Tilden, rain soaked, suddenly appears with an armload of
corn, in the center of the living room, just, standing and looking around.
“There hasn’t been corn out there since about nineteen thirty-five! That’s the last time I planted corn out
there!” – Dodge
“It’s out there now.” – Tilden
So now we are getting the idea that not much is right with
this family. In fact things are starting to look a little creepy. And there is an air about them, an appearance,
of a hurt that involves a ghastly intimacy.
It’s no wonder. There’s
a child buried, somewhere, out there, on the farm.
Dodge tells Tilden to go put the corn back. And with a kind of animosity, Tilden pitches
the corn onto Dodge’s lap. This doesn’t sit too well with Dodge and he figures
Tilden is in trouble again.
“I know you had a little trouble back there in New Mexico. That’s why you came out here. Isn’t that the reason you came back?” – Dodge
“I never had any trouble.” – Tilden
The only thing left to do, Tilden starts shucking the corn, throwing
the shucks onto the middle of the floor, and the silk less stalks of corn into a
bucket.
From upstairs, Halie wants to know if Tilden is down there. Dodge
tells him not to say anything. And so Tilden shucks as Halie emasculates her
sons in detail: Tilden – handsome but a
jailbird, Bradley – smart enough to cut off his leg with a chainsaw, and Ansel –
who got himself killed on his wedding night, against her better wishes.
“It’s not fitting for a man like that to die in a motel room. A soldier.
He could’ve won a medal.” – Halie
Halie gossips about all the trouble Tilden has gotten
himself into, finding himself in New Mexico, and getting thrown out of that
state. She walks downstairs her rambling
continues past the picture frames of a forgotten past, she sees the cornhusks and
accuses Tilden of stealing the corn.
“I didn’t steal it. I don’t want
to get kicked out of Illinois. I was
kicked out of New Mexico and I don’t want to get kicked out of Illinois.”
–Tilden
Oh jeez. All this
fuss! No matter, Halie’s got a luncheon
date. She reminds Dodge that Bradley’s going
to give him a haircut. Dodge, clutching his hat on his head, says Bradley was
born in the hog wallow.
“You sit here day and night, festering away! Decomposing!
Smelling up the house with your putrid body…Thinking up mean, evil,
stupid things to say about your own flesh and blood!” – Halie
“He’s not my flesh and blood! My
flesh and blood’s out there in the backyard!” – Dodge.
Oh.
This hits Halie like a ton of bricks and is something no one
in the family wants to talk about. Still,
Halie prepares to leave. Says she going
to a meeting with Father Dewis (Grant Smith) to get a statue of Ansel or at
least plaque placed somewhere in town.
“Why’d you tell her it was your flesh and blood?” – Tilden
Letting some truth come out slowly.
Dodge is a little confused about Tilden’s return home, says
it’s unnatural, but is feeling like it’s the end of his life and doesn’t want
Tilden to leave. In fact, demands that
he does not leave the room. But, as soon as Dodge falls asleep, Tilden takes
the bottle of whiskey from under the cushion and leaves the house to find …
something.
And a short time later, the Scaramouch – Bradley – enters, negotiates
his fake leg, pulls out his shears, and starts cutting on Dodge’s calvous
cranium.
Later, Vince (Zachary Mooren), Tilden’s son, and his 19
year-old girlfriend, Shelly (Tonya Cornelisse), slip quietly into the house. To
Shelly, the house is like a Norman Rockwell painting and she has uncontrollable
giggles when Vince calls out “Grandma”.
Shelly is expecting apple pie with a nice respectable family
until she discovers the waxen and silent Dodge on the couch. She explains why
they are there but Dodge says nothing.
“Vince, will you come down here please?!” – Shelly
When Vince gets there Dodge doesn’t appear to recognize him.
In fact, no one recognizes Vince.
There is a child buried on the farm.
Christopher
Tulysewski’s stunning set, as we walked to our seats, is a visual feast. One can marvel at the use of space in this
wonderful place that is the Whitefire Theatre. It is a multi-level patchwork of a run down farmhouse in the countryside. Up stage left is a curious
object, a shovel.
Sam Shepard
rewrote the 1977 play Buried Child in 2005 and that is the version being
presented. The written play is filled
with an abundant symbolism, mixed up time frames, and people who do not exist.
Vince’s mother is one example of someone completely missing from the written
play. And that gives us reason to
believe that Vince is just a figment of everyone’s imagination, if only
briefly.
“All the boys were grown….Then Halie got pregnant.” – Dodge
That would make Tilden approximately 25 when he had sex with
his mother. This is probably why he
hightailed it to New Mexico, spent time there before coming back although it’s
not completely clear why he was there, what trouble he got into, and why he
came back.
(There were some very nice moments in the earlier version of
this play that I liked a lot. I will let that go for another time.)
Although this is a strong cast, there were a lot of opening
night jitters, moments not jelling, overlapping and missed dialogue and other miscues,
including one actor creating new dialogue. One doesn’t like to see this on opening night
but actors get in and out of trouble all the time, it happens.
Also, there is more creativity to be had here from all of
the characters. Sam Shepard's play is wrought with so much symbolism, the task for the actor becomes slightly complicated, that is to convey a truth while completing a physical objective on stage. And I realize this is
Sam Shepard but all actors must have strong objectives, even if misguided. I
want to see each actor taking the character to extremes, keeping what works and throwing out what doesn't. Still, there is a lot to like about this
production and by the time you read this, the actors will have settled into their
roles and grown more confident with more production nights under their belt.
There are spoilers in here so don’t read any further if you
want to see this play.
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Front: Leon Russom, David Fraioli, Cris D'Annunzio
Back: Jacque Lynn Colton, Zachary Mooren, Tonya Cornelisse
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Leon Russom was
impressive as Dodge. Although he is
slowly dying, there’s not much life in this humorless character that has humor
throughout. Also, Dodge has gone through a tremendous amount of pain and he has
committed a terrible crime. If it’s the one last thing he does there must be an
enormous emotional release when he confesses.
And no matter how close to death he is, the bigger the emotional release
the better, whether big or small, externally or internally, something has to
happen.
Jacque Lynn Colton
had her moments as Halie. My preference
is that she not be seen at all in the first act when she is up in her room. And
what I really don’t want to see is her making up herself, her hair, and
shuffling through papers (script notes?) ad nauseam on stage in the beginning
of the first act. There’s not a lot of room to do things up there and a black curtain
would highlight our imagination. Her actions don’t progress the scene. Also Colton has a very lovely voice and that
part of the performance rang true. The relationship with her sons needs work.
Also, there is something mentally wrong with Halie. She crossed a line most would consider taboo and
we should see that in her character.
David Fraioli
plays Tilden a man who is slightly touched.
It is probably the character with which Shepard had the most problems. A
former athlete, an All American halfback, probably high school All American
(there’s no mention of college for any of the boys). He is now timid, passive, and back on the
farm. Why? Only Tilden knows. Crazy character
traits are fine, but without an objective, the character goes nowhere and we
lack compassion for his route on stage. By my accounts Tilden had sex with his
mother at the age of 25, his mother got pregnant, farm life died and everything
stopped. Tilden, left, got another woman pregnant (didn’t get married) had a
son Vince, (who’s been living in New York for 6 years), got in trouble in New
Mexico and came back a shattered man of his former self. So why is he picking corn and carrots in the
rain? Because in the pliable rain soaked
ground, he is looking for his baby. (Seems
simple to me). So the crazy stuff with the corn, the diving on it, throwing it
on Dodge, must be in line with his objective and I didn’t see any of that. Also,
Tilden’s relationship with his mother must be a relationship that is unworldly
and I saw no relationship with her on stage at all. That’s not to discount all
the work going on, on stage. Fraioli has
a good look and had his moments.
Cris D’Annunzio, as
Bradley, has a very good look on stage and strangely enough he would be better
suited to play Tilden. Still he does a
fine job. A little more whimpering would
be nice especially after his leg has been taken. He is now the baby in the
family and must really play that role in order for the comedy to work.
Tonya Cornelisse did
a fine job as 19-year-old Shelly. She
is very thin with a strong sultry voice and the yoga scene in the third act was
fantastic. But, the second act, someone
needs to teach Shelly how to peel carrots that looks something closer to reality.
Take the leaves off, peel the carrots on
a newspaper (with a carrot peeler – every farm house has one), and work the
carrots like you really mean it! Shelly
has no qualms taking command of the carrots, taking command of the space would also be a good thing. Also, act two would be better played if the choices were one of
curiosity rather than disgust. Shelly
is there to uncover a family secret, to bring it out, to gather the information,
and to share it, no matter the cost.
Zachary Mooren
plays Vince. The violence did not ring true. Mooren’s objective is indefinable on stage and
this creates problems with his actions.
The bottle-throwing scene serves no purpose. The beating of his uncle takes him
nowhere. If his objective is to get the
farm then he should go after it.
Grant Smith has
his moments as Father Dewis. He comes in
as a savior, slightly lecherous, but by the time it’s all over, he is so far
out of his element that one thinks he might question his faith in the end. In the end, he is no savior but he must try mightily.
Lukas Behnken
plays Vince but did not perform the night I was there.
Not a lot went wrong on this night under Bryan Rasmussen’s direction and a lot
of things went right. You can read
Shepard’s play and find something new each time you read it. But what I really wanted to see was a
definitive stamp on this production, Rasmussen’s point of view. This is what
makes theatre so exciting, seeing another director’s work. Missing are the discomforting intimate moments
from Tilden and his mother Halie, their backstory, and how they are able to be
in the same room together. We never really get a sense for Dodge’s reason of being.
And even though he did not get up from the couch or the floor, his intention is
no less great, and he must really go for it.
Scott Disharoon
did a fine job producing this show.
Carole Ursetti
was the Production Stage Manager.
Ricki Maslar, CSA
was the Casting Director.
The Publicist was Nora
Feldman.
The Lighting Design was by Derrick McDaniel.
DJ Lesh provided
the Sound Design. The thunder with each character’s entrance was overpowering,
some rolling thunder in the distance would have been nice.
Laura Tiefer was
the Costume Designer.
Great photos were taken by Nico Sabenorio.
Run! Run! And take a
very old farmer with you.
Reservations:
818-990-2324
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