The Witness Theatre team's Spring Showcase was perhaps the most mature, well-rounded show they've put on in years.
The first one-act took a jab at the pretentiousness that tends to run rampant in college writing classes. Written by sophomore Douglas Ross, "Workshop" takes place in a seminar room during a fiction class not unlike many Writing Seminars courses. Ross's characters represent the gamut of strange folk often found in such classes well, from that kid who writes a novel when asked for a short story to the girl who uses every assignment as an excuse to lambast her ex-boyfriend ... who is also in the class.
The staging and direction by sophomores Jeremy Bremer and Tabitha Moses weren't quite innovative so much as practical and dynamic. The performances boasted strong comedic timing, particularly from sophomores Rebecca McGivney and Mac Schwerin.
"Cecilia at Safeway" written by junior Lisa Rosinsky and directed by junior Kempton Baldridge offered a good deal of wit and a fresh idea - a cashier who comes in after hours (sophomore Alina Pak) and meets a robber (freshman Adam Merrit). But the plot was difficult to follow, and the short-lived laughs weren't quite enough to make up for the lack of a discernible story.
Prolific playwright and junior Eric Levitz provided this showcase with a one-act much shorter than the others, running less than five minutes. The story involved a metaphorical discussion between a battered prostitute (sophomore Emma Brodie) and her dim-witted John (senior Mike Wills) about stars. Unfortunately, it was impossible to tell exactly what the ambiguous metaphor was supposed to mean. It seems like Levitz was banking on brevity and vague statements about life to be enough, but in this case, it just didn't work.
Like the first play, "From Personal Experience" by senior Audrey Murray, satirized the college-aged writer. The story is about a girl (sophomore Remy Patrizio) searching for inspiration for a story to win a writing contest, and she decides to get pregnant and have an abortion so she'll have something to write about.
The satire of the phoniness of some artists was well-developed and certainly valid, but the format of the play made it tough to follow. The one-act consisted of several scenes divided by brief blackouts, and a recorded voice-over by Patrizio's character was used as a transition to the last scene. Director sophomore Mike Alfieri did an admirable job trying to make this work, but the many cuts and asymmetrical style ended up being disorienting.
In "Surprise! We're in Love!" a potential couple (sophomore Pierce Delahunt and freshman Maxi Gumprecht) sit opposite one another at a table to negotiate the details of their pending relationship. It's a witty and honest portrayal of relationships by junior writer Talya Goldfinger, and the pair of actors worked well off of one another. However, there wasn't much to look at in this play. The direction by sophomore Kelly Chuang involved practically no movement: The actors simply sat at the table for the duration of the play.
The last play, "Josh Kicks Left in the Fourth Quarter" by sophomore writer/director Douglas Ross, was the strongest overall. As a married couple (sophomore Stephanie Delman and senior Raphael Krut-Landau) watch their young son's soccer game, they theorize about what his life will be like and how the decisions they made as parents will affect the boy as an adult.
The conversation is darkly comic and insightful, sometimes even disturbing. Though the actors simply sit on a bench for most of the play, Ross commanded the audience's attention with the occasional appearance of the adult version of Josh acting out his parents' predictions in the background. The play was the only one of the night with a clear beginning, middle and end, but it would have been stronger had some of the "middle" been trimmed. The action simply went on for too long, and despite convincing and understated performances by the actors, it was difficult to stay attentive the entire time.
The showcase was a vast improvement over showcases of the recent past. The writing was stronger overall, but the selection of plays could have been more varied. The redundancy wasn't a tragic downfall for the Witness team, but it did weaken the overall impact of the showcase.
