Show and Tell Post #1

About a week ago, I read Qui Nguyen’s She Kills Monsters, written in 2011 and first performed Off Off Broadway by the Flea Theatre on November 4, 2011.  Interestingly enough, the play opened yesterday at the renowned Steppenwolf Theatre as a part of its “Garage Rep Season.”  Qui Nguyen himself is a Vietnamese-American playwright perhaps most famous for his early collaboration, Vampire Cowboy Trilogy, with Robert Ross Parker, with whom he founded the Vampire Cowboy Theatre Company.   One can buy She Kills Monsters from amazon.com or from samuelfrench.com. 

She Kills Monsters is the story of Agnes Evans, a twenty-something-year-old teacher who wants to learn more about her deceased teenage sister, Tilly, who died in a horrific car crash along with the rest of Agnes’ family.  Agnes finds Tilly’s Dungeons and Dragons adventure module and looks to play with Tilly’s former dungeon master.  The scenes alternate between the highly fantastical world of Tilly’s adventure, which include DnD-ized versions of Tilly’s friends, and the real world, where Agnes actually meets these people.  In the DnD world, Agnes and the party must team up to defeat three evil bosses and the dragon, Tiamat; the three bosses are comprised of the villains of Tilly’s life, such as the bully cheerleaders and Agnes’ boyfriend.  Through the game, Agnes learns that Tilly was a lesbian who had a crush on the real-life basis for one of the party members, Lilly, who did not know how to accept Tilly’s affections.  Eventually, Agnes slays the Tiamat, and the play ends with the narration that Agnes, her boyfriend, and Tilly’s old DnD friends would continue to have adventures every week, but they would never forget Tilly. 

My favorite dramaturgical choice for this script is that Tilly’s sexual orientation is not referenced until page 36 of the 70-page script.  It may come across as a sort of “suddenly, here’s the moral!” addition, but the script is built this way for a reason.  It lulls the reader into thinking that the play is just a silly comedic fantasy, but halfway through the play, two evil succubi (cheerleaders) call Agnes’ dead sister a dyke, which is obviously quite shocking to her.  This structure actually mimics the experience of DnD nerds; the fun, awesome fantasy world is an escape from a cold, mean reality that does not understand.  She Kills Monsters is not aiming to be just Lord of the Rings-style DnD-session escapism; it treads the line between reality and fantasy to show both.  This structure of harsh bits of reality covered by a blanket of silliness is actually used early on in the play, as well, which opens with a Cate Blanchett-esque narrator making nerd jokes who cursorily adds “And so the Gods answered her wish by smiting down every single one of her loved ones in a single car crash.  But this isn’t the story of that tragedy.”

In that same vein, I like that Qui Nguyen did not write this story about the car crash or Tilly’s death.  In the play, there is not even a mention of Tilly’s and Agnes’ parents or whoever else would be one of her loved ones in the car crash.  Despite this, the play is very much about the Evans sisters and their relationship before Tilly’s death, so the action of the play is not just an isolated incident of unrelated fantasy.  I think the play does itself a favor by not bogging itself down in the details of the tragedy, though.

Prompt 5--Hornby

In Maria Irene Fornes’ The Conduct of Life, the progression of the rape scenes is pretty important.  Scenes three, five, and seven are all scenes in the warehouse with Orlando and poor Nena, but rape does not happen in every scene.  First, to start the progression, Orlando brutally rapes Nena in scene three, waking the audience up to that terrible atrocity.  It is terrifying, and many audience members would probably walk out or sit through it in hopes that it would be the last of such scenes.  Then, the tension comes back in scene five, but Orlando does not rape Nena; instead, nothing really happens, and the audience is probably pretty confused.  Many audience members would take it as a sign that Orlando is getting better and just does not want to rape her.  However, in scene seven, Orlando rapes Nena again, and the audience has to sit through another terrible rape scene, just after getting their hopes up that Orlando would stop.  It puts the audience in the mindset of Nena because, though they do not know what will happen any time Orlando enters the warehouse, they should prepare for the absolute worst. 

In the Lab Theatre’s production of Dutchman last semester, Lula’s apple was a recurring motif.  Obviously, the image of a woman eating an apple is a clear biblical allusion by itself in symbolist literature, showing Lula as a trouble-making, seductive creature, but its use in the play added other elements to it, as well.  For instance, in the beginning of the play, Lula is eating an apple and offers it to Clay, which he graciously accepts, foreshadowing his seduction and downfall.  When Clay has eaten the apple, he places the core on his book on the ground, showing that this seduction is hindering his ability to think.  At the beginning of scene two, Lula feeds Clay slices of an apple by cutting them off with her knife, showing Clay’s naïveté and full acceptance of what Lula feeds him, as well as foreshadowing Lula’s future use of the knife—stabbing Clay to his death.  In the script, this was not very specific—Lula enters with the apples, and they eat them together, which is a strong gesture in itself; however, I do not think that reading a motif has the same effect as seeing it produced onstage.  I think the visualization of the motif is substantially more important than seeing a word repeated many times in a paper script.

Prompt 4--How I Learned to Drive

           The Greek chorus produces an effect of isolationism on the two main characters.  Essentially, we are looking at a world that is inhabited by only two “vivid” characters—Li’l Bit and Uncle Peck—and the ensemble of family members and various extras that live in their world.  This forces us to think about the entire play in regards to Li’l Bit’s and Peck’s relationship, as opposed to the other characters, who are only tangentially relevant.  This story could be retold with Aunt Mary as a major character, and it is almost offensive that her story is only told in one monologue.  It is interesting that the three chorus members play highly individualized roles, however; if this play were produced in Athens 2500 years ago, the many bodies of the chorus would represent the masses in general, and we would probably only see the one public opinion from it—“Eww.  Gross. Stop it.” 

            I don’t really understand why the whole show is presented as a driver’s ed course.  Yes, the play is tangentially about how Li’l Bit learned how to drive, and the play is titled How I Learned to Drive, but that does not seem like enough to warrant that specific presentational choice.  I think it takes away from the seriousness of the situation, which I suppose may be the point.   Really, though, which is more offensive—portraying child rape as a horrid, graphic, despicably violent act, or to downplay it and make it palatable to the audience? Obviously, I would much rather see How I Learned to Drive staged than The Conduct of Life because I would love to live in a world where child rape isn’t horribly violent and terrifying or, preferably, just doesn’t exist.  Still, doesn’t it seem immoral to portray Uncle Peck as a good man and Li’l Bit’s childhood as a gimmicky “well, this is what my childhood was like, just like everyone else”?  I think so.  I think it is immoral to portray violence in any way that isn’t horrifying (except for comedic purposes, of course; don’t you dare tell me that this play is treating child rape comically).

Prompt 3--The Conduct of Life

The dramaturgical choices in The Conduct of Life that stand out to me tend to be the ones in the stage directions.  Fornes describes the rape scenes using the phrase “pushes his pelvis against her” many times, which has an unsettling effect on me, personally.  It makes the reader consider the biology of the situation, which makes it much more difficult to avoid the horrifying aspect of it all.   It makes me wonder if Fornes found the phrase “he rapes her” to be too unbearable, or perhaps too crass, but if this is the case, then it is at odds with the fact that she is writing a play where rape happens twice onstage.  In fact, this topic is actually a bit too disgusting for me to consider at the moment, so I am going to change the subject.

At the beginning of Scene 1, Orlando is doing jumping-jacks; Fornes describes it as “he continues doing jumping-jacks as long as the actor can endure it.”   From a production standpoint, this sounds terribly boring for anyone watching or working on the play—after all, how many jumping-jacks can a healthy man perform before he can no longer “endure it”? It does create an interesting effect on the character (actor, really) and the audience’s perception of him, though.  After all, the play is largely about Orlando’s physicality and aggression, and Fornes decides that the first thing the audience will see onstage is Orlando extensively working out.  From the actor’s perspective, he is guaranteed to be exhausted when his first monologue comes up, which accentuates the weariness and resolve in his words.  Orlando is so tired that he cannot bear it, but he still has the strong resolve of wanting to succeed, receive his promotion, and not be addicted to sex.  For that one scene, we might just believe him.