The Princeton Seventh (The SOB Review) - Partizan Theater, Minnesota Fringe Festival, U of M Thrust Stage, Minneapolis, Minnesota
***1/2 out of ****It's one thing to write what you know. But embellishing it? Well, that just might be a whole lot more fun.
In playwright/director
James Vculek's brilliantly funny, metaphysical comedy
The Princeton Seventh,
writers of all stripes grasp that it's never easy putting pen to paper when writing that truly novel novel. It takes inspiration. And license.
Fortunately, Vculek is inspired. And his license kills.
Intelligently and incisively crafted with witty repartee among its four principals,
The Princeton Seventh centers on a nearly empty hotel bar in Toledo where one undistinguished man (
Ari Hoptman, right) chats up the only other patron, famous author Jack Cutler (
Alex Cole, left), who's in town to salute literary giant Max Lonoff (
Richard Ooms).
Still drafting his speech over drinks, Cutler is annoyed that the other man is continually plying him with one too many questions. But after being plied with a couple cocktails, Cutler becomes intrigued when he learns that the man he dismissively referred to as a mere "shoe salesman from Cleveland" turns out to know Lonoff quite well. Turns out this mousy man was one of six -- or was it seven? -- students famously mentored by Lonoff during his only year teaching at Princeton.
The pompous, yet suave Lonoff enters the bar with his trophy wife (
Alayne Hopkins) and it soon becomes apparent just who the mystery man is. Or does it?
Although it's a scant 55 minutes in duration, there are more twists and turns in
The Princeton Seventh than most plays twice as long. And just when you think you have this play figured out, a new act unfolds before your eyes as if from some parallel universe. Playing like the best of
Charlie Kaufman's
works, Vculek's surreal play turns things inside out, making you wish you could push the replay button and watch it unfold again to catch what you may have missed.
The magnificent Hoptman shines as the chameleon who simply can't be penned down. The terrific Cole is reliably cock-sure as the jerk novelist who thinks he's seen it all. As one of Minneapolis' acting treasures, Ooms delivers a solid one-two punch with dual portrayals of the great Lonoff, and the radiant Hopkins goes the distance alongside him with a knock-out Waverly and a Mindel from the opposite end of the spectrum.
Cleverly written and directed,
The Princeton Seventh may very well be the most cerebral comedy you're likely to see at the
Minnesota Fringe Festival (two performances
remain). Entertaining, sharp and winning, Vculek's work deserves a larger audience far beyond the fringe.
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
In keeping with the new Federal Trade Commission (FTC) regulations that unfairly discriminate against bloggers, who are now required by law to disclose when they have received anything of value they might write about, please note that I have received nothing of value in exchange for this post.Labels: Alayne Hopkins, Alex Cole, Ari Hoptman, Fringe Festival, James Vculek, Minnesota Fringe Festival, Partizan Theater, Play, Richard Ooms, The Princeton Seventh, The SOB Review
Something Witchy (The SOB Review) - Partizan Theater, Minnesota Fringe Festival, U of M Rarig Center Thrust, Minneapolis, Minnesota***1/2 (out of ****)Someplace far beyond where the improbable seems to run forever parallel to the possible -- with no apparent chance for ever intersecting -- the former veers directly into the latter.
Such was the case forty years ago this summer when
Charles Manson and his "Family" of followers shocked the world with their
heinous crimes against the bold and the beautiful in Los Angeles. Their brand of drug-induced, racially-tinged,
Beatles-inspired "
Helter Skelter" over the course of two nights left seven brutally murdered, including actress
Sharon Tate and grocer
Leno LaBianca.
The
Tate-LaBianca Murders, of course, would become the stuff of never-ending notoriety. There would be countless
books,
movies and even an "official"
blog. So large is the continued fascination that the thirst for new angles on this 40-year old story never seem to be fully quenched.
It's against this backdrop that
Partizan Theater's
Something Witchy manages to find that obscure place where the improbable gives way to the possible yet again. Set in 1986,
Something Witchy conjures up the insatiable thirst of one man (
Chris Carlson) for his own angle, resulting in a search for a long-since missing 16 year old Family Member. That search ends in the Midwestern suburban home of Rachel (
Catherine Johnson Justice), who has quietly assumed a new identity and life as a wife and mother of her own 16 year old daughter Cody (
Lindsey Alexandra Hartley).
Instead of merely turning in
another ripped-from-the-headlines story -- ten years ago,
Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA) member Kathleen Ann Soliah was found to have quietly taken root as Midwest wife and mom
Sara Jane Olson -- playwright and director
James Vculek brilliantly turns that twist on its head with a far creepier, crawlier take on the inherent perils of stalking itself.
Clocking in at just an hour,
Something Witchy is a spine-tingling, taut thriller anchored by three riveting performances. Hartley projects the requisite frustration of a teen who can't quite figure out her mysterious mother (even if her voice doesn't always project nearly enough). Carlson lends a truly creepy air to his man on a mission, making us wonder what his true motives in tracking Rachel really are -- is it his own fame and fortune or some twisted lust?
Justice is simply off-the-charts as the cornered Rachel, whose face can't belie the facts when confronted. But is she relieved to finally share her dark secret or is there a dormant Family aspect that's been bubbling under the surface all these years?
For a work set amid the fringes of society,
Something Witchy is far from average
Minnesota Fringe Festival fare. Far from improbable, it succeeds in standing on its own weight here, and its possibilities point to a meatier stand-alone play that will hopefully cast its spell in other theatres to come.
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Labels: Catherine Johnson Justice, Chris Carlson, James Vculek, Lindsey Alexandra Hartley, Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota Fringe Festival, Partizan Theater, Play, Something Witchy, The SOB Review
For Your Viewing Pleasure: Two HarborsUnless there's a connection to live stage productions, I don't typically write about film or television as a rule. But since rules are made to be broken, I'm making an exception.
If you live in the New York City area and don't want to brave the
freezing temperatures outside over the weekend, may I kindly suggest for your viewing pleasure watching
Thirteen/WNET-TV at 11:30 p.m. Saturday night for a quirky little award-winning gem of an indie flick called, "
Two Harbors"?
Written and directed by a very unassuming, and downright polite, auteur named
James Vculek -- who, by the way, in his spare time
does run a fledgling little theatre company in Minneapolis called
Partizan Theatre -- this 2005 black and white film is "based on a true story" of "an obsessed sci-fi collecter uses an impressionable young woman in an attempt to lure aliens to earth, with tragic results."
Using the tagline, "Sometimes love can be an alien concept," "Two Harbors" boasts two of the Twin Cities' finest stage actors --
Richard Ooms and
Claudia Wilkens -- as well as
Catherine E. Johnson,
Alex Cole and
Ari Hoptman.
An audience favorite at over two dozen different film festivals from coast-to-coast, as well as Down Under and our neighbor to the north,
Two Harbors' many honors include:
- 2005 Minneapolis-St. Paul International Film Festival (Best Feature)
- 2005 Milwaukee International Film Festival (Best Feature)
- 2006 Eugene International Film Festival (Best Feature)
- 2006 Victoria (Australia) Festival of Motion Image (Best Feature)
- 2006 Cedar Rapids Independent Film Festival (Silver Eddy Award)
- 2006 Winnipeg International Film Festival (Best Actor - Alex Cole)
- 2005 Austin Film Festival (Honorable Mention)
- 2006 Rural Route Film Festival (NYC) (Honorable Mention)
- 2006 SoCal Film Festival (Huntington Beach CA) (Honorable Mention)
If you need a little more prodding, here's the promotion on Thirteen/WNET:
Here's the original trailer for the film:
I had the good fortune to be on-hand for the very first screening of this film and have since made a trip to Milwaukee to see it at the city's iconic new
art museum when "Two Harbors" won "Best Feature" at the Milwaukee Film Festival.
Watch it and let me know what you think!
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Related Stories:Angelina Jolie Is A Zionist Whore! Or, Plan 9 From Baghdad (The SOB Review) (November 20, 2006)
Labels: Claudia Wilkens, Film, James Vculek, Minneapolis/St. Paul, Partizan Theater, Richard Ooms, Television, Two Harbors, WNET
