I saw something, and I'm saying something: Kentucky Confusion

The Kentucky Cycle: Part 1
by Robert Shenkkan
directed by David J Miller
asst. directed by Julie Levine
presented by the Zeitgeist Stage Company and the Way Theatre Artists

The facts:
1) On October 6th, at 2PM, I saw "The Kentucky Cycle: Part 1" at the BCA Plaza Black Box.
2) This was the first public performance of the show and, technically, a preview.
3) I really wanted to like the Kentucky Cycle.

I really did. Which made it all the more difficult when I realized , halfway through the third one-act of the show, that the production just wasn't cutting it for me. I left, disappointed, but understanding. This was two small (and feisty, as their press release would have us believe) companies, and one Big Play. Maybe it was just too much of a stretch.

And then the reviews started coming out. First the Globe, then the Phoenix, then countless bloggers, all piping in glowing praises of the solid accomplishment of fitting such a sweeping parade of connected stories into the tiny BCA Black Box. Although I was happy for the companies involved (who would certainly need some good press to sustain an audience for their 7-week run), I was also slightly bewildered. Why couldn't I join the crowd in lifting Zeitgeist and Way Artist's production up as exemplary? Had I gone crazy and mistaken a brilliant show for an uneven one?

I, unfortunately, don't think so. Although there certainly were striking moments and performances, for every one there were one or two puzzling ones, or just a simple lack of direction.

The production started off on a strong note, with a simple pre-show concert (the live music continued to be a highlight) and procession of the cast into the theater, ending with a tableaux that lead us into the first play, entitled "Masters of the Trade". Michael Steven Costello was sharp as the greedy and conniving Michael Rowan (a role he would play for the next three sections before meeting a perhaps timely end, considering), digging his teeth into a thinly disguised villain role. In the second play (Ironically titled "The Courtship of Morning Star"), he was matched by the striking and fiery Mia Van de Water as his Native American concubine. It was in the third section, entitled "The Homecoming", in which the thus far solid production was shaken. Here Mia Van de Water was asked to age her character 16 years, from a resistant shrew to a woman smoldering with resent. Her capable grip on her younger character slipped, as she seemed unsure as to what these years meant to Morning Star. This was one of the fundamental issues I had with the production. Even if an actor showed chops as one persona, soon the play had them switching hats and jackets for another, which was, in many cases, played less convincingly. Certainly not all of the mostly-competent cast suffered from this phenomena. Cheryl Singleton exuded promising energy as Sureta Biggs, Michael Rowan's homecoming surprise, in a scene where a bath-tub stabbing was her competition, and she stood up to the challenge. More impotently, after returning from the intermission, she followed through with a wearily grief-stricken and 27-years-older Sureta. But this became an uncommon occurrence as actors reappeared in new clothing, but with somewhat less intuition and spark then previously displayed.

The direction succeeded in what would be the most obvious challenge of the cycle; pace. With the first part alone containing 5 separate one-acts and spanning 80-something years, the decades sped by assuringly. Although I think some credit is due to Schenkkan's script, which doesn't stick around any tragic scene for long, Miller's production did move. But in the larger department of staging, I found his vision to be somewhat bland in what would appear to be an opportune project to flex his directorial muscles. I suppose there is something to be said for solid, subtle direction, but some sections of this show seemed to scream for some attention. Our first (and maybe only) taste of what the production could have been came in Morning Star's birthing scene, as she stood facing the audience, delivering one of the text's more glorious speeches (propelled forward by persistent live drumming), and another actress, doubling for Morning Star, mimed birth with her back turned. The image of the two women, screaming in unison as Van de Water breathlessly cried to her people's gods while her double shuddered in delivery, was exhilarating, and punctuated the moment with intensity. Too often the subsequent scenes were played with thudding naturalism, which I found ill-fit to the big, mythic intentions of Schenkkan's play. This style may have been more convincing if the physical production stepped up to the challenge.

The close proximity of the audience to the action provided the quieter, softer moments of the play with an intimacy, but this same proximity robbed many of the stage combat routines and on-stage murders of their potential impact. I felt that if proper blood effects couldn't be attempted, then some sort of stylization should have been employed, which may have given more power to the violent acts of the story. David R Gammon's boys-club production of "Titus Andronicus" last spring utilized an innovative substitution of water for fake blood, which produced a manageable effect ( equal parts Guignol and Taymor) that gave the violence both a visceral and cognitive reaction. In a show that also seemed to be going for grit, the physical production was off-puttingly spotless. Killers rarely were marked by their crimes with blood on their hands, and in the midst of the countless monologues about land, I thought the scenic design greatly lacked any element of dirt or stone. I wonder how the show would have played in Riccardo Hernandez's gravel-strewn wasteland that was the setting for the A.R.T's 2005 "Desire Under the Elms", which shares the Kentucky Cycle's Greek tragedy transposed to the amber waves and purple mountains of America.

But in the end, pros and cons aside, I did admire these two companies for attempting what is, by any sensible theater-goers book, a very Big Play, and more importantly, a very bold move. It makes me wonder why these massive undertakings (thinking ahead to Boston Theatre Work's future mounting of both parts of Kushner's epic "Angels In America") are being mounted by the smallest companies in Boston, while the ART fills its season with not one, but two one-person shows and prepares for the second annual head-scratching movie adaptation/desperate ploy for youth (following in the great footsteps of "Wings of Desire" and "The Onion Cellar", to be discussed later), and the Huntington has just babysat a somewhat amusing import that outlived its stay (but will surely not on Broadway). I like the companies involved in The Kentucky Cycle for taking, what i consider to be, a Big Fucking Risk. Do I consider it a complete success? No, but I certainly am glad that it is getting positive press. I just hope that in its future endeavors, I can be in on the game.