Dispatches From the Edge

Photo By Bret Brookshire

The Conduct of Life

Running Time: 1 hr, 5 min

Sometimes reviewing plays is unpleasant. After a recent performance, an old friend of mine and often-times actor in town advised me that I should be "kind" when writing reviews. I found the advice to be incongruous. I'm all for artistic freedom, but when I come across a script like this, I get the idea it might be better to scrap it all.

That said, if you enjoy somewhat graphic pedophilia and emotional and psychological abuse of females -- and unfortunately I know you're out there -- this is the production for you. The "life" in this Maria Irene Fornes effort is conducted thusly: A military officer marries a woman for her ability to keep his house and watch his finances. He keeps another female -- little more than a child -- imprisoned somewhere for the sole purpose of having sex with her. While he does nothing but verbally assault his wife, he tells the girl he sexually assaults her out of love. There's some business about a war or a revolution, but it's purely in the background.

I sincerely wish I could say that there is some redeeming quality here. As expected from FronteraFest, production values are bare bones. The set is rehearsal furniture, and the costumes are simple and sketchy. The actors as a group are more than adequate in presenting the material, but the characters are almost totally unsympathetic and the actors can't do much to overcome that. The staging tends toward the static, and the pacing is slow, neither of which helps, but the real problem is that the material doesn't give anyone a chance. I am familiar with some of Fornes' scripts. I like one of them tremendously. I had not been exposed to this one. I don't want to be again.

I certainly could be wrong. Something of value might be here, but I didn't see it. Presented by a new Austin company, Nushank Theater Collective aspires to "nurture new writers with the focus on developing a new, progressive aesthetic in Chicano theatre." An admirable goal, and FronteraFest is a wonderful enterprise. Both the Short and Long Fringes offer opportunities that theatre practitioners otherwise would not have. I get the feeling that Nushank wants to give this script a fuller production. My unsolicited advice: Don't. At the curtain call, the actors looked shell-shocked. I just wanted to wash up. (Saturday, Feb. 3, 2pm)