A New Take on the Theatre of Revolt

Although playwright Josh Oppenheimer '96 informs us in the program that Armillaria Bulbosa and the Savannah Baboon "is about the packaging of a subconscious for public consumption," his package is definately hard to swallow.

Even before the lights dim, it is clear this production dares its audience to understand it. The play's title is in part an obscure reference to the giant fungus in Michigan, and it's hard to pronounce. The program contains a pretentious page-long explanation of the play's theoretical underpinnings, and the symmetrical set is stark save for two identical posters of a baboon. The production is consistent with these trappings, projecting a private sphere of highly abstracted jargon that probably only people involved in the production fully understand. But with a little effort, Oppenheimer's dense, seemingly disparate symbolism can slide into place for the audience.

Oppenheimer develops two plot levels that converge on the idea that we have been "robbed of our subconscious" and as a result our lives consist of "empty, vague, and performative" emotions. The immediate plot describes how the barbaric loner Frank (Robert Feldstein) forces himself on the civilized society of the idealic couple, Ernest (David Shafer) and Jane (Wynne D. Love). With incessant, nonsensical conversation on topics ranging from urban renewal projects to his illustrious career as a toll both operator, Frank intrudes upon Ernest and Jane's weekly picnic at the beach.

While Jane holds firm in her repulsion for Frank throughout the play, Ernest becomes increasingly attracted to Frank's id-dominated lifestyle. Ernest demands more and more personal information from Frank and adopts his raw speech patterns. Their identities merge to the point where Frank and Ernest literally switch places by the play's end.

This plot is secondary to a larger point about the falseness of theater. The play begins outside of the plot, with scripted shouts from ushers and an argument between the supposed director of the show and the actor playing Frank, who's reluctant to "do the show." At the end of the play, this actor finally revolts against the theater, striking the set, shouting at the audience to leave, and explaining "my moment of terror is my moment of theatrical orgasm is my anethesia" while the rest of the crew feigns horror and surprise. Of course, this revolt is scripted. Oppenheimer's paradoxical game is kind of cool, but overdone.

Even if you don't follow the production's deeper meaning, Ross Benjamin's excellent direction provides for laughter, tension and release at more immediate levels. Making "symbolic," often frustrating dialogue accessible to the audience, Benjamin includes many episodes of welltimed, appropriate slapstick that bring the audience to laughter in the midst of this grim play. When the main characters begin their picnic, Frank eats barbarically while Ernest carefully slices his hot dog; as time goes on, Ernest begins to spit out hot dog chunks just as disgustingly as Frank. Ernest's long hair gradually falls out of his ponytail throughout the play, and Frank only puts his long hair into a ponytail when he becomes Ernest at the end. Despite the conversational, place-bound constraints of the script, Benjamin's direction holds the audience on edge with lots of movement, gesticulation, and anger.

Robert Feldstein, projects the uncouth Frank with energy and enthusiasm--Feldstein's wholehearted abandon even becomes disturbing. His soliloquies of terror at the passage of time and his grandfather clock are particularly moving. But in his frenzy of action, Feldstein sometimes sacrifices his lines, and the significant climaxes of his dialogue are difficult to understand.

David Schafer has an especially tricky role as Ernest, who must balance the opposite demands of his wife and his attraction for Frank. Jane and Frank are strong and clearly defined characters, and Shafer manages to make the mutable Ernest match their one-track personalities effectively. Shafer also makes Ernest's radical transformation into Frank clear and convincing.

The audience looks to Jane as the only pillar of stability in the play, and Wynne D. Love lives up to this task. Her Jane opposes Frank's and Ernest's inane antics with formidible strength. Love's mature calm stands out admirably.

Jeff Meehan's lighting design provides a creepy complement to Benjamin's flamboyant direction. The set, with its twin baboons, makes a number of obvious symbolic links. The twin baboons connect Earnest and Frank and their removal from civilization. The symmetrically arranged circus rings emphasize the isolation of the characters. Frank and Earnest each live in the spotlight of a one-man circus, where they alone exist.

While most audience members understood the immediate plot, people seemed more bewildered with the play's violent end. When the "actor playing Frank" sprang out of the script and told the audience to leave, some actually got up and left. While Oppenheimer's script is really not subtle enough to break down completely the boundary between reality and artifice, the lively production nonetheless elicits a response from the audience as frank as, well, Frank.