Seen and Heard Around Town

The holiday season is upon us and for the next several weeks calendars must be consulted before any new plans can be accepted. Most evenings between now and the end of the year have already been scheduled, but I was excited to have a free night to attend J&J Productions staging of Love Drunk in the REP theatre space. This production is the southeastern premier of the play by Romulus Linney, which is loosely based on  Henrik Ibsen's "The Master Builder."  Ibsen is probably familiar to most high school graduates as the author of The Doll's House.

Not having read the source material, I am unable to comment on how closely this adaptation follows the original, but I am pretty confident in saying that there is absolutely no Victorian morality remaining in this script. However, like many of Ibsen's works, this script hammers at the audience's middle class, publicly embraced, morals and values while challenging the accepted norms of gender and sexual desire. Nothing is sacred in this script - abortion, incest, greed, fidelity, agism, lust, and honesty are all fair game in this battle of the sexy and sex starved.

The synopsis of the play states this is "the story of an older man who picks up a much younger woman in a cafe and takes her to his retreat, the tower room of an Appalachian Mountain log house.... What follows is a sexual tête-à-tête full of suspense, humor, fantasies, out-and-out lies, and a few moments of connection and peace." For me what followed was a lot of lies, arguing, sad attempts at seduction, yelling, cajoling, sarcasm, attacks, and mistrust. Both characters are suspicious of each other and are unreliable narrators when it comes to recounting the details of their lives and how they came to meet. Both are working an angle to get what they want or need. Neither is very likable.

There appeared to be a few lighting gaffs during the performance and the sound affects were a little choppy, but the acting was tight and well directed. Jess Jones and John Honeycutt were believable in their portrayals of the troubled 25 year old female and the 65 year old wealthy man.  Unfortunately, the subject matter of this play is not really indicative of your normal holiday fare. Upon the play's conclusion, I felt a bit like a guilty voyeur who wanted to be titillated by something new and sexy, only to be rewarded with a deep feeling of guilt for having watched two sad, lonely people fight so hard to convince themselves and each other to accept what they really wanted - a bit of companionship.

For those tired of the normal happy holiday fare, you have another week to catch this show (December 1-17). Tickets can be purchased online here: http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/210573

Based on Sunday night's attendance, you can probably purchase tickets at the door and save the online ticket service fee.