OFF-BROADWAY PRODUCERS ALERT!!!
(Bruce Weber's Words, not mine!!!)
Most of the Fringe will stay on the Fringe, but one entry that deserves a serious production is ACTS OF CONTRITION.
(Again, Bruce Weber's Words, not mine)
OK, y'all... time to get on the schtick... thanks to the great folks at
FringeNYC, our show from last year's Fringe Festival,
Acts of Contrition, was performed for a select audience of NY Theater backers and the phone haven't stopped ringing! Maybe you might want to find out what all the hubub is about. You can call the aforementioned Mr. Weber if you need to:
August 18, 2003, Monday
THE ARTS/CULTURAL DESK
CRITIC'S NOTEBOOK; Faith, Hope and Guilt On Fringe of the Fringe
By BRUCE WEBER (NYT) 1668 wordsApproaching the New York City International Fringe Festival is like getting on line for an exotic but low-budget all-you-can-eat buffet. Surprises are possible; danger lurks. Who knows what you'll be sampling? The Fringe, which continues through Sunday, is now in its seventh year of sprawling across the extremities of Lower Manhattan. It has had its reputation sprinkled with glitter the last couple of years by the Broadway musical ''Urinetown,'' which was presented in
nascent form at the 2000 Fringe.
As it happened, my scheduled four days' and 12 shows' worth of Fringing was cut short by the power blackout, which caused the cancellation of shows on Thursday evening and all day Friday. But I did get to probably the most anomalous of the festival's presentations: ''Discordant Duets,'' a play with an evangelical Christian bent about two young couples that begin in the same unholy place and proceed in different directions. It's a professional production with a cast of obvious training, directed earnestly by Mark Todd Bruner and written with sincere, or at least fervent, purpose by Mr. Bruner and his wife, Michelle. It is, however, quite a terrible play for a very simple reason: it presumes that life's problems have one unambiguous solution. This may be the secret of effective preaching (though I doubt it), and perhaps this kind of storytelling is useful as a recruitment tool for the born-again crowd. But it makes for simple-minded drama, and unless you are already converted or wish to be, you might run out of patience, as I did; I left midway through the second act, after a couple of suggestions that offended me, namely that if you are not willing to accept Jesus as your savior, you are bound to become a belligerent drunk.
The program claims that ''Discordant Duets'' -- which can be seen at Teatro La Tea (107 Suffolk Street, Lower East Side) on Wednesday night at 9:30 -- is the ''only play in the festival that explores Christian themes,'' but that isn't so. A much better, much more realistic play is ''Acts of Contrition,'' a drama by
Timothy Nolan that doesn't flinch as it addresses the sexual abuse scandal in
the Roman Catholic Church.
To those who object to my favoring the astringent view of the church over the saccharine, please hold the indignant e-mail messages and letters. I simply prefer theater that probes the complexities of conflict to theater that pretends they don't exist. In any case Mr. Nolan's play is not only respectful of Catholicism and Catholics, it is also a distinctly sorrowful work, as opposed to an outraged one.
Its characters include a cardinal (
Gene Fanning) and three young priests who are good friends, one of whom, Stephen (
Shiek Mahmud-Bey), is on his way to becoming a bishop. The moral issues that arise when Stephen is accused of sexual impropriety spray off in myriad directions.
And though in the end the play feels a little programmatic, covering all the bases -- from celibacy to homosexuality to the craven hypocrisy of church leaders -- that have been debated endlessly in the newspapers, Mr. Nolan writes thoughtfully and carefully about the human cost of a problem that is, after all, a function of human frailty. And at the center is a vivid performance by Mr. Mahmud-Bey, who makes Stephen's faith profound and his gift for the priesthood as evident as the tragic weakness that makes him
unfit for it. His confession, which is heard by both his friends (James M. Armstrong and Mark Gorman), is as wrenching a scene as I've seen in quite a while.
The play -- which can be seen at the Play Room (440 Lafayette Street, third floor, East Village) on Tuesday at 5:30 p.m. and Friday at 7:30) -- is uncertainly directed by Vincent Marano. Not only would it benefit from a crisper staging and some money for a set, it also deserves both. (Off Broadway producers alert.)
