Tree
Julie
Hebert
Walking
into the auditorium, all eyes immediately notice the scores of multi-sized, tied
cardboard boxes that litter the entire two-level, modest home before us. We then notice a front porch with a
rowboat docked in what appears to be the dry road in front. Mystery? Secrets?
Revelations? What else could
be in store for us, given these visual cues?
The
family tree of this play is one whose roots and limbs are not as obvious as
they first appear. A knock on the
door soon brings two adult siblings – one black and one white -- face-to-face
for the first time. The ensuing
uneasiness and confrontations initially lead us as audience to think we are
seeing a play that explores racial stereotypes and relations in America.
However, a few taut, precisely directed scenes later, we realize that this play
goes much deeper, taking us past alleys and byways of lives that are
intertwined in ways that only those stacks of boxes know. Memory becomes a core issue of the play;
deciding what memories of family and self to reveal and what ones to leave
stored in some anonymous box becomes crucial for each of the people we meet.
Susi
Damilano and Carl Limbly bring tremendous emotional depth and character
credibility to the half-siblings Didi and Carl. With a delicious Louisiana drawl, Didi persists like a
bulldog as she literally invades this Chicago household of Carl and his mostly
locked-away, upstairs mother in order to discover more about her recently
deceased father’s life. Carl, on
the other hand, is very reluctant to engage too deeply with this pushy, white
woman and seemingly only wants to protect and care for his Alzheimer-suffering
mother. (Or is he trying to
protect himself for some reason?). As the aging mother Mrs. Price, Cathleen
Riddley hauntingly presents us with a ghost of a woman tormented with twisted memories. In her sometimes delirious, sometimes
sane state, we become transfixed with her rants, songs, and pleas to an unknown
‘Ray.’ We as audience begin to see
pieces of a puzzle that only come together fully with the help of Carl’s
20-something daughter, JJ, played assertively and lovingly by Tristan
Cunningham. Who is family and who
is not? Who knows and who hides? Are memories blocked and gone forever,
or are they just waiting to be relived?
We as audience and they as actors ride a roller coaster of emotions
through more and more discoveries toward a moving, even surprising resolution.
What was
striking in leaving the auditorium is that a large portion of the audience did
not choose immediately to head out the door. Yes, there was a happy hour at the beautiful lobby bar; but
clearly people also just needed to talk, to hug actors, and to say ‘thank
you.’ Something happens during
this play at a visceral level as we each think about what does family mean for
us. We each begin to wonder what do we really know and what do we try too hard
to ignore or even forget. It is
difficult to sit through such a play as Tree without beginning to open some of
our own boxes that have stayed stacked and sealed way too long in some corner
of our past. Tree truly digs its roots into our own minds and lives.
Rating: 5 E's
No comments:
Post a Comment