Ishmael: The greatest fishing tale of them all

Nate Sipe, Jim Parker, Kevin Kniebel (musicians); Jack Weston

(Photo by Dan Norman)

Sometimes dragging yourself out of the house during the Minnesota winter seems like a terrible burden. It’s warm at home. There’s no terrible road conditions, low visibility, lower temperatures, or awful parking to deal with when you choose not to go out.

Still, there are rewards for the brave, such as the Jungle Theater’s new production, Ishmael.As you might guess from the title, this is a version of Moby-Dick. It’s been trimmed down to a slim 90 minutes, but does so by honing in on the core of the tale: the madness of Captain Ahab, the wanderlust of Ishmael, and the scary life that awaits anyone foolish enough to sail the seas.

All of this is told through the capable hands of Jack Weston, who presents us with a campfire tale to end all campfire tales. Adapter Leo Geter uses only words from Melville’s original novel. That means it retains the original tone even if the events have been scaled back.

The story does take its time getting started, but the lengthy prologue helps to set Ishmael’s character and allows the audience to sink deeper and deeper into the story, until we – like our narrator – are almost drowning under Ahab’s mad passion.

Weston isn’t alone on stage. A trio of musicians – two drawn from neo-bluegrass outfit Pert Near Sandstone – offer support, as they sing traditional tunes or provide the occasional “crowd” when needed. The focus, however, remains on Weston, whose dazzling performance makes it feel like we are right there on the Peqoud with the doomed crew.

Find out more here.

Addendum (or a scary look into the way my mind works)

Moby-Dick has made an impact on lots of culture, including rock and pop music. Led Zeppelin called its extended drum solo/chance for the rest of the band to score some drugs, “Moby Dick.” The doom-laden metal band Ahab took cues from the story, as did the heavier-than-thou Mastodon on “Leviathan.”

Then there’s Moby, who apparently is a distant relation of Melville, and took his name from the famous white whale. However, there is nothing heavy or mysterious about Moby or his music.

Fool for Love drags into horrors of the American Dream

Photo by Rich Ryan

Sam Shepard compressed several plays worth of insight into the American psyche and what it means to be a “man” in his early 1980s masterpiece, Fool for Love. Over the course of an hour, we get an intense window into the lives of four disparate characters all trying to find a piece of the “American Dream.”

Dark & Stormy, never shy about intense character studies or difficult tales, dives head first into Shepard’s twisting tales with largely positive results.

This is the third production of the show I’ve seen over the years, with the previous two both being at the Jungle Theater. In fact, it was the very first show I saw at the venerable theater, back in the 1990s when it was in a little shoebox of a theater on Lake Street.

Dark and Stormy’s flexible space brings the action right into the audience’s laps, even more so than that production from two decades ago. Now, the hot and cold relationship between Eddie and May plays out just a few feet away, and the Old Man rocks silently on his chair just as close to the action.

I’m getting ahead of myself a bit. Eddie and May are longtime lovers whose relationship has flamed out. May lives in a nothing town somewhere in the American southwest, and cowboy Eddie has traveled hundreds of miles out of his way to try and win her back.

This isn’t some rom-com though. The pair have… issues that run deeply throughout their relationship. A lot of those are down to the Old Man, who haunts their memories. In fact, it is never quite clear if this is something the Old Man is imagining, or that his presence in their lives is so strong that they can’t shake his influence when they are together.

Another man enters into this three-way dance. He is Martin, a young and somewhat gentle soul who is romancing May. The hard-nosed and jealous Eddie enters into a bit of a “man-off” with Martin, and May finds herself torn between the fury of her previous love and the safer harbors of Martin’s.

Sara Marsh and James Rodriguez bring an appropriate amount of heat as May and Eddie, but it is the two other actors that really make this an intriguing production. Patrick Coyle’s steely intensity, present even when he is just watching the proceedings and drinking from a Styrofoam cup, is arresting and his presence looms (as it should) over the whole show.

Antonio Duke brings a fresh look to Martin, who often comes off as just a wallflower; one of the mythical “snowflakes” folks complain about. Duke, however, offers up some inner strength that Martin usually doesn’t have. There are signs that a tough life has given him some additional steel behind the polite façade.

Mel Day does a solid job in directing, though the opening scene – when Eddie spends all of his energy to convince May to come back – needed some additional space and time to really sink in. The play rushes by quickly, and a few extra moments to ground us to the main characters would help the rest of the action hit harder.

For information and tickets, visit online.

The Red Shoes joyfully tramples all under foot

Photo by Ron Ravensborg.

Joel Sass has found kindred spirits at Open Eye Figure Theatre.

The two seem like naturals. Sass' inventive stagings and oft off-kilter work matches perfectly with Open Eye's sense of outlandish adventure, often in tiny sizes. Those shared interests certainly come to a head in The Red Shoes, Sass' masterful deconstruction of a Hans Christian Andersen tale.

There's no fairy kingdom here. Instead, we get a gritty, film-noir-like take on the tale, as a single woman holes up in a grungy-beyond-grunge apartment.

There, hemmed in by a nosy landlady, an eager-beaver delivery boy, and a mysterious woman in a trenchcoat, she endlessly recounts a murder that may have taken place in the same apartment, with occasional breaks to put on her red shoes and, as David Bowie tells us, dances the blues.

That all of these characters are brought to life by Kimberly Richardson (with the aid of several puppeteers and body doubles) just adds an extra layer of theatrical spice. Her nimble physicality and ability to shift from broad humor to tense drama to outright terror in a matter of moments is put through the full test here.

Now tack on Sass' own sense of invention and play. His set is full of clever nooks and crannies that both aid Richardson's quick changes, but deepen the word. Of course the landlady speaks through a pipe with a flapping valve for a mouth. Of course the tiny diorama that Richardson uses to reenact the mysterious crime is the apartment writ small. Of course the various clues and newspaper articles on the wall move and change as the play unfolds, serving as title cards for each scene in the play.

It's a delirious, giddy, enthralling, terrific piece of theater that isn't going to make complete sense without some thought after. Even then, the exact meaning is somewhat obscured. So be it. Life in the big city doesn't always make sense, even when you are dressed to kill with your best red shoes on.

The Red Shoes runs through March 25. Visit online for more information.

"There may have been a bit of necromancy"

Image by Whittney A. Streeter

I was able to kick off Halloween -- truly the greatest time of the year -- with Black Death: The Musical, which merged real-life terrors (the plague that nearly destroyed Europe in the 14th century) and some drawn from the imagination of show creator Susan Woehrle (an army of undead raised by an alchemist's spell).

The songs are pretty cool, too.

Set in France during the first outbreak of the plague in the 1340s, Black Death: The Musical offers a kaleidoscope of horrors as bodies pile up in the countryside. Doctor Guy de Chauliac knows that there are some simple solutions (like regular bathing), but needs the assistance of Pope Clement VI to convince the masses.

On the road he meets up with Sister Julianna, who also knows that the piles of dead bodies aren't good. As most of the priests have also died from the plague, she has a solution: let the nuns perform last rites so the bodies can be buried at last.

Those plot strands are based in history. The third has more than a bit of Mary Shelley in it. The alchemist Nicodemus watches his son Morvyd succumb. Nicodemus has access to an ancient spell that can bring the dead back to life, but what comes back isn't exactly the same as before.

Woehrle's script is grotesque and darkly funny, and the company relishes heading into those dark places. Rodolfo Nieto, in particular, relishes every moment in his dual role as the libertine Pope and the studious alchemist.

Musically, Scott Keever merges ancient styles with a contemporary twang that adds to the show's unsettled vibe.

Black Death: The Musical only runs over the weekend, at 7:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday and 3 p.m. Sunday at Sabes Jewish Community Center, 4330 Cedar Lake Road, Minneapolis. Visit online for more information.

If you are looking for additional horrors this weekend, the fifth Twin Cities Horror Festival kicks off tonight at the Southern. A diverse cast of creators, from the over-the-top terrors of Dangerous Productions to off-kilter creations of Four Humors, provides a mini-Fringe Festival of more than a dozen productions. Visit online for more information.

Photo by Hilary Roberts

This final show isn't scary, though maybe the trip to Bloomington may give city dwellers hives. The little-seen musical The Baker's Wife is running at Artistry. The plot is fairly simple: a new baker comes to an isolated, tiny French village. The older man has a young wife, who catches the eye of one of the young lads.

When those two run off, the baker descends into despair and stops making bread. The desperate villagers put aside their differences to get the couple back together.

Even though it features songs by Godspell/Wicked composer Stephen Schwartz, The Baker's Wife has never really caught any traction. Joseph Stein's book, which spins its wheels around the same never-evolving conflicts, may have something to do with that.

Once you get past that, the musical has some wonderful romantic (and not so romantic) songs. There are terrific performances from the cast, led by the always wonderful Bradley Greenwald as the loser-at-love baker.

The Baker's Wife runs through Nov. 12. More information here.

Ragtime: As current as today's headlines

Photo by Dan Norman

A year ago, I considered topping off my review of Theatre Latte Da's fall show with a headline like, "Holy fuck, go see 'Sweeney Todd.'"

I can pretty much say the same thing about Latte Da's autumn show for this year, "Ragtime."

Strong performances from top to bottom anchor Peter Rothstein's deep and thoughtful production. That the play -- based on a novel from 4 years ago about events more than a century in the past -- is utterly  current only adds to its impact.

Set in and around New York City at the turn of the 20th century, "Ragtime" tries to compress the American experience into a two-and-a-half hour package. That comes through in three interlocking stories. There is an upper-class family, an immigrant father and daughter right off the boat, and a black musician and his lover.

The link comes from the son of Coalhouse Walker, Jr. and Sarah. The out-of-wedlock child is abandoned by Sarah and is found by Mother (the wealthy family is not identified by names). Instead of passing the child and mother off to the authorities, she instead takes them into their home.

Coalhouse tries to woo his lost lover to marriage, and does it in a decidedly American way: buying a flash Model T. A black man in a nice car doesn't sit well with those in New Rochelle. That is especially true of some racist volunteer firemen.

Coalhouse's hope is dashed when his car is trashed. In an effort to get justice, Sarah is killed by the police when they think she is going to attack a politician. That drives Coalhouse to acts of revenge, as he begins to burn down firehouses around New York.

Meanwhile, recent immigrant Tateh and his daughter struggle to make their way in their new world. Rising from intense poverty, Tateh finds the kind of success that America promises, but can never shake the feeling that his real background marks him as an outsider.

That's already a lot, but the musical also tosses in plenty of historical figures, from Henry Ford to Harry Houdini to Booker T. Washington.

If you are familiar with Latte Da's work, you know "Ragtime" features tight, expertly sung and well-rounded performances. The stark staging focuses our attention on these characters rather than the set dressing. (Coalhouse's Model T, for example, is a baby grand piano.)

The only weakness is out of the creative team's control. The musical itself struggles to find its footing in the second act, as we move away for long stretches from Coalhouse's story to other less compelling parts of the story, such as a baseball game that Father and Little Boy take in at the old Polo Grounds in New York.

That doesn't undercut what works here, such as the act one closer, as we don't just watch and hear, but absolutely feel the grief that Coalhouse (and the family) feel after Sarah's death. Director Rothstein intensifies this in an incredibly simple way. After the finale is over, there isn't a blackout. Instead, the actors hold their positions on stage, waiting for the loud applause to finally die out, and then silently march off stage. For a show where the lively, no life-affirming music of the early 20th century is so present, this silence says as much as a million words about the state of America.

"Ragtime" runs through Oct. 23 at the Ritz Theater in Minneapolis. Visit online for tickets and more information.

Four Humors makes the unreal real in Don Quixote

Photo by Dan Norman

Considering I picked up about 20 feet of Star Trek books last week, it was fitting that I would take in a show about the power of stories and the desire to have beloved characters live beyond the confines of their original tale.

In Four Humors' The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha, Cervantes' tale goes through the wringer, with modern nods and a fluid interpretation of the original material.

After all, as noted near the end of the production, few have read the original work. (I haven't, though I'm pretty sure a copy has been on my bookshelf for a couple of decades.) We know the story from the endless remakes and riffs; from Man of La Mancha to the documentary about Terry Gilliam's failed attempt to film the story.

The company, who has tackled the likes of Candide and Lolita in the past, in absolutely in their element here. Don Quixote's fantastical adventures are brought to life through simple puppetry, video projections and lots of guts and guile by the actors.

Don Quixote (Ryan Lear) is a bookish middle-aged man who is drunk on tales of knights and chivalry. The fictional adventures have poisoned his brains and he decides to engage in some 17th-century cosplay, as he roams the Spanish countryside in search of castles, giants and battles.

Instead, he finds grungy inns, the famous windmills and flocks of sheep. No matter, Don Quixote, along with his faithful servant Sancho (Brant Miller),  sees what he wants to see and is ready to defend the honor of his beloved by doing grand deeds.

All the while, the man's nephew (and his trusty companion, Scott) attempt to bring don Quixote home,  but it seems that Sampson is falling to his own kind of obsession and madness as he takes on the role of our hero's tormentor.

There are plenty of delights here, from Lear and Miller's terrific double act to the clever way puppets and the projection screens are used. A few cotton balls on sticks turn into massive flocks of sheep, while a puppet lion represents a massive, caged beast.

Despite the humor, we don't lose sight of the characters or the idea that stories can be bigger than any one person to contain or control. But never mind that, I've got some Star Trek books to read.

The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha runs through May 22 at the Guthrie Theater.

Table 12: A funny existential crisis

Photo by Scott Pakudatis

In No Exit, Jean-Pau Sartre posited that Hell is being forced to spend time with other people. Freshwater Theatre's Table 12 ramps that idea up a notch, by pushing the mismatched souls together at that most fiendish of modern-day gatherings: the wedding.

Freshwater mades its debut at the Minnesota Fringe Festival and is revisiting the show as part of its 5th anniversary. It's a glorious, funny, and strangely life-affirming piece.

Table 12 is where the misfits at this particular wedding have been stashed away. Here we find the freaky next-door neighbors, the newly made husband's boss, the sort-of family member (he divorced the bride's sister), the embarrassing friend, and Charlie.

Charlie's a very special case. He's family (a cousin of the groom) and he dated the bride for a couple of weeks in the past. He's also crashed the rehearsal dinner by singing a full set of altered love songs to express his life to a woman who had chosen another man.

Cute in a romantic comedy. Stalker-ish in real life. Family connections kept Charlie at the wedding, but there are some rules, which are closely enforced by the table's waiter.

That's the set up. What happens is what you would expect from a gathering of mismatched souls lubricated by alcohol and either angry at their place at the wedding, or resigned to the fact that they are at the losers' table.

It's howlingly funny, too. Like a lot of comedies, there are people here you probably wouldn't want to spend much time with in real life, but are a lot of fun to watch. It's not just a zoo exhibit. Eventually, you begin to side with them -- even sad-sack Charlie and drunk Amy, who invited a blind date to the wedding; a date that didn't show.

Table 12 comes with a prologue as well: two pieces from another Fringe show, An Adult Evening with Shel Silverstein. The pieces are equally absurd slices of life. In one, the worst father in the world gives his daughter her 13th birthday gift (it doesn't go well). In the second, a husband confronts his wife about her habit of raiding garbage cans (it goes worse).

The shows are presented in rep with We Just Clicked: A Festival of Short Plays about Online Dating at the Phoenix Theatre. Find the details online.

Photo by Heidi Bohnenkamp

A couple of notes about other recent shows seen:

Ed confession time. I don't get Disney musicals. I mean, I know why they are popular and understand at an intellectual level what the appeal of them is for audiences. Yet, since I grew up during the dark times for the company, so unless they produce musicals based on The Rescuers or The Black Hole, I'm not going to have any nostalgic connections to the material.

That doesn't mean I can't have fun at the shows, it's just that certain bits expected by the rest of the audience leave me cold. This brings me to Beauty and the Beast, now at the Chanhassen Dinner Theatres.

It's a handsome, well-directed and performed production that still  had me looking at my watch more than once. Much of that was during the scenes involving Gaston, the vain real villain of the piece. The show spends so much time with him -- and away from building the relationship between Belle and the Beast -- that I started to wonder who the stars of the show were supposed to be.

That slows the show down, but there is eventually enough good will to win you over, especially with the winning performances by Ruthanne Heyward and Robert O. Berdahl in the title roles; Mark King as Lumire; and Scott Balckburn as Cogsworth. Also, special note to Rich Hamson's terrific costumes, which bring all of the cursed souls of the castle to life in a much more limited budget than your Broadway, or even touring, production. The show runs through Sept. 24 at Chanhassen Dinner Theatres.

Finally, you only have a week left to do this, but if you haven't made it over to the Jungle for Two Gentlemen of Verona, you definitely should. Sarah Rasmussen's all-women production is a pure delight.

We could talk about the politics behind putting women into these highly "masculine" roles, but really what we have here is a chance for a terrific ensemble of actors to work together. And really, the chance to see the likes of Sha Cage, Christiana Clark, Mo Perry, Wendy Lehr, and a host of others work together should be enough to get you to Lynn-Lake.

And if that's enough? Well, there is Bear the dog playing Crab the dog -- complete with a Elizabethan ruff. Two Gentleman of Verona runs through March 27 at the Jungle Theater.