The Baltimore Waltz is a play about a brother and sister who decide to take a vacation in news of the sister having contracted a terminal illness. The sister essentially seeks companionship the entire vacation and the brother seeks help for her sister to cure the illness. The tone of the play is comic, although there are plenty of sad or serious moments making it tough to apply to one specific genre.
Adam McCall decides to go in an interesting direction with Carl. From my perspective, he's playing Carl as a gay character in that he has a very feminine voice, plays Carl with his head perpetually slightly tilted, and seems to have most of the mannerisms a typical gay character has in films or television. I'm assuming this was a directorial choice because of the scene in the play when the two men are stroking the rabbits pretty ferociously next to each other. I will say that McCall managed to infect some life and personality into this character as he really put all of his effort into this performance.
Elizabeth Braaten Palmieri plays Anna as a neurotic, fast-talking woman who never really knows when to slow down. Throughout the play she speaks with a fast pace which matches the dialogue where she seemingly says every thought that comes across her head. She also plays her worried as the more she starts talking, the faster she talks to emphasize that she's getting worried. Her body movement is quick and reactionary as if she's expecting somebody to jump and scare her all the time. Overall, she fits a very specific archetype and Palmieri definitely nails down that archetype.
Nick Tittone was very impressive as he needed to play about ten different characters. He managed to mostly successfully differentiate the characters enough for the audience to realize it. First, he plays the doctor who relays the news to Anna about her ATD. He seems to over-act a bit her, but not terribly and it's also easy to see why as he needs to differentiate this character. His voice is smug and slightly condescending and the tone indicates little empathy. His posture and delivery is confident and he seems vaguely aware of his patient. The other doctor he plays almost the complete opposite. He plays him with deep breathing, a nervous excitedness. He also plays a mad scientist in which he purposefully over-acts, but not to a fault. He widens his eyes, constantly puts his one hand towards the girl and then slapping it away with his other hand, and truly achieves that stereotypical image of a mad scientist. But in this case stereotypes aren't really bad, because he needs to find a way to separate his characters and there's just two minutes that each character goes on screen. There's not enough time to flesh out these characters. He plays a French waiter as a smug, confident person indicated by an upright posture and a confident delivery. He plays a Dutch person completely different by hunching over, constantly rubbing his nipples, and his voice indicates he's excited and fascinated by everything. Overall, I was impressed by Tittone's ability to play so many characters and put a different spin on all of them in a convincing way.
Review
In the Baltimore Waltz, Nick Tittone steals the show as he plays about ten different characters convincingly with about two minutes of stage time for each. He transitions between being a condescending, smug doctor and a nervous, excited one and between being a confident, suave French waiter to a overenthusiastic Dutch man. The other two actors, Adam McCall and Elizabeth Braaten Palmieri, pale in comparison, but both manage to play sympathetic, if somewhat broad characters.
Friday, October 25, 2013
Friday, October 18, 2013
Spring Awakening Assignment
The Spring Awakening creates an interesting world that the audience quickly learns about. It's evident that it's focused on teenagers within an oppressive school system that avoids talking about sex rather than educating about sex. It's also a musical so people express through feelings through song and hide them in regular dialogue.
The scenic design for The Spring Awakening brought to my mind the idea of fall rather than spring to me. The leaves missing from the tree, the reddish-yellow background, and the appearance - if on purpose or on accident - of leaves on the ground through the lights gave me this idea. The use of chairs on the stage was used for maximum effect as they were basically the only "design" on stage using them for a classroom, or to hide characters outside of a scene. The three "doors" in the back of the stage was used effectively to bring characters in and out. Also in one scene, they used the doors combined with the lighting to make the parents seem separated from the students.
The costumes made it clear that this was a world where creativity or individuality was shunned. All the girls and boys in the play had the same uniform on for most of the play. Girls wore spring dresses, only different in color from the rest of the girls. Boys wore "prep school" clothes indistinguishable from the rest of the boys. The clothes included high black socks, dress shoes, a button down shirt with a loose tie (unsure of what kind of tie), and a black coat.
The lighting design also contributed to the world of the play. For one, the lighting dictated where the audience was supposed to look. With many characters on screen and seemingly random times when the actors would start to sing, the lights gave the audience a clear idea of which part of the stage to pay attention to. The best example of this in the play is when one of the characters is writing a letter to another on one side of the stage, and on the other side of the stage is the person reading the letter. The lights alternate between both sides of the stage when one of the characters' mother interrupts her to talk to her while he's reading. In another scene the parents ask a character to go to bed and they stand right behind the visible doorways. The light intentionally hides the faces of the parents to show how distant they are from their kids. They are in shadow as if they don't really understand what is going on (and the play would support that they don't).
Review
With limited resources, scenic designer Jon Dritna does the best with what he's got. He surrounds the stage with a red and yellow background including trees without leaves. It seems like it's meant to convey the fall season. Costume designer James M. Miller creates preppy school uniforms for the students to show that this is a world focused on unity rather than individuality. The adults in the play wear professional clothes that help show they have long since resigned themselves to the "follow the rules" conformity of the world. Overall, the costumes and scenic design work together to provide a clear, dystopian world.
The scenic design for The Spring Awakening brought to my mind the idea of fall rather than spring to me. The leaves missing from the tree, the reddish-yellow background, and the appearance - if on purpose or on accident - of leaves on the ground through the lights gave me this idea. The use of chairs on the stage was used for maximum effect as they were basically the only "design" on stage using them for a classroom, or to hide characters outside of a scene. The three "doors" in the back of the stage was used effectively to bring characters in and out. Also in one scene, they used the doors combined with the lighting to make the parents seem separated from the students.
The costumes made it clear that this was a world where creativity or individuality was shunned. All the girls and boys in the play had the same uniform on for most of the play. Girls wore spring dresses, only different in color from the rest of the girls. Boys wore "prep school" clothes indistinguishable from the rest of the boys. The clothes included high black socks, dress shoes, a button down shirt with a loose tie (unsure of what kind of tie), and a black coat.
The lighting design also contributed to the world of the play. For one, the lighting dictated where the audience was supposed to look. With many characters on screen and seemingly random times when the actors would start to sing, the lights gave the audience a clear idea of which part of the stage to pay attention to. The best example of this in the play is when one of the characters is writing a letter to another on one side of the stage, and on the other side of the stage is the person reading the letter. The lights alternate between both sides of the stage when one of the characters' mother interrupts her to talk to her while he's reading. In another scene the parents ask a character to go to bed and they stand right behind the visible doorways. The light intentionally hides the faces of the parents to show how distant they are from their kids. They are in shadow as if they don't really understand what is going on (and the play would support that they don't).
Review
With limited resources, scenic designer Jon Dritna does the best with what he's got. He surrounds the stage with a red and yellow background including trees without leaves. It seems like it's meant to convey the fall season. Costume designer James M. Miller creates preppy school uniforms for the students to show that this is a world focused on unity rather than individuality. The adults in the play wear professional clothes that help show they have long since resigned themselves to the "follow the rules" conformity of the world. Overall, the costumes and scenic design work together to provide a clear, dystopian world.
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