5.29.11
This is an Archival Site
There is now a new Rogovoy Report home
5.18.11
Weekend Preview May 19-24
Bob Dylan tributes, Deborah Voigt, Tom Paxton, Bill Kirchen, John Kirk and Trish Miller
5.18.11
Celebrating Bob Dylan's 70th Birthday in Style
Paying tribute to the greatest rock songwriter ever
5.17.11
FILM REVIEW: In a Better World and Of Gods and Men
Review by Seth Rogovoy
5.17.11
'LIKE' The Rogovoy Report on Facebook
Click 'LIKE' to Receive Facebook feeds from The Rogovoy Report
5.12.11
Deborah Voigt Headlines Mahaiwe Gala
Opera star to sing arias, show tunes on Saturday, May 21
5.15.11
Famed Spiritual Teacher to Speak on Nonviolence
Mother Maya in free talk at Sruti Yoga in Great Barrington, Mass., on Friday May 20 at 7pm
5.12.11
Special Effects Wizard to Be Honored by Film Festival
Doug Trumbull to be Feted by BIFF
5.11.11
Weekend Preview May 12-16
Cultural Highlights of the Berkshire Weekend
6.4.09
Talk about a small world
Elaine and I grew up together, but only just recently met....
5.8.11
Berkshire Living to Cease Publication
A Farewell from Publisher Michael Zivyak
5.8.11
twiGs Branches Out
Lenox boutique launches new e-tail site
5.8.11
[MUSIC REVIEW] Avalon Quartet in Close Encounters at Mahaiwe
Review by Seth Rogovoy
5.8.11
[MUSIC REVIEW] Avalon Quartet in Close Encounters at Mahaiwe
Review by Seth Rogovoy
5.7.11
[FILM REVIEW] Bill Cunningham New York
Review by Seth Rogovoy
5.7.11
[FILM REVIEW] Bill Cunningham New York
Review by Seth Rogovoy
|
[THEATER REVIEW] BLUE/ORANGE at SHAKESPEARE & CO
7.18.07
SHAKESPEARE & COMPANY
Blue/Orange
by Joe Penhall
Directed by Timothy Douglas
Players: Jason Asprey, Malcolm Ingram, LeRoy McClain
review by SETH ROGOVOY, editor-in-chief and critic-at-large, BERKSHIRE LIVING Magazine
(LENOX, Mass., July 15, 2007) -- The question of who is sane and who is mad has been a favorite of dramatists going back at least as far as Shakespeare, and perhaps even back to the Bible. It still is a standby -- note how this week not one but two shows in the Berkshires directly address this issue: One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest at Berkshire Theatre Festival in Stockbridge, and Blue/Orange, a three-man play being given a magnificent production through September 2 in the Founders' Theatre at Shakespeare & Company.
This is a playwright and actor's show, consisting of very little action or stagecraft. The burden of the writer's script falls on the actors, and Jason Asprey, Malcolm Ingram, and newcomer LeRoy McClain are more than fully up to the task.
Asprey and Ingram, who are also playing together in Rough Crossing on this same stage this summer, are psychiatrists in an English clinic. They struggle over the ultimate diagnosis of and disposition of Christopher, played with dynamic energy by McClain. In fact, if Asprey and Ingram weren't so in command of their scenes, which tend to be more talk-oriented, almost mini-debates, than the ones with McClain, one might say that McClain steals the show.
But this is truly a small ensemble effort, and everyone plays his role to a 't.' At its worst, Penhall's writing and staging can be somewhat pedantic, with his characters just mouthing viewpoints rather than speaking from their hearts and souls. But at its best, Penhall's quick, sharp, witty dialogue recalls Harold Pinter, and Asprey and Ingram keep it moving fast, not allowing it to bog down into the sort of docudrama it could be.
The play takes on a lot of heavy themes: immigrant social policy, racism, and the politics of psychology (nothing new to anyone who's read R.D. Laing or Michel Foucault). But Penhall has drawn his characters vividly enough to have them embody ambivalent positions and ethical quandaries which make this as much about applied psychology as anything else, which in a sense, is what every play is about.
For a minimalist production playing in a large theater, Blue/Orange has maximal impact.
|
...sites that work