Interludes

VIEWPOINTS – A pair of experimental Off-off-Broadway plays open: Agnes Borinsky’s A SONG OF SONGS and Talking Band’s LEMON GIRLS OR ART FOR THE ARTLESS

• By drediman
• March 15, 2022
• No Comments

In recent days, a pair of new experimental plays opened Off-off-Broadway courtesy of some of the city’s most pioneering theater presenters. As per usual, here are my thoughts.

A SONG OF SONGS
Bushwick Starr & Clubbed Thumb at El Puente
Through March 27

First up at El Puente in Williamsburg is Agnes Borinsky’s A Song of Songs (RECOMMENDED), which is being collaboratively presented by the Bushwick Starr, Clubbed Thumb, El Puente, and Slave Play playwright Jeremy O. Harris. The haunting and enigmatic play uses the Biblical poem “Song of Songs” as a springboard for its meditation on love (romantic, erotic, cosmic), grief, and community. The production is directed by Machel Ross, who understands the delicacy of Borinsky’s vision, which is in turn mundane, philosophical, and voluptuously poetic. Ross and his superb trio of actors – Borinsky, Sekai Abeni, and Ching Valdes-Aran (all give exquisitely wrought performances, bringing specificity and richer inner lives to Borinsky’s otherwise merely suggestive characters) – invite audiences with open arms to bring their own personal experiences to this unique opportunity for collective rumination. Running at only 75-minutes in length, the decidedly avant-garde play comes across as a fleeting dreamlike prayer, which is only heightened by the church-like environs (El Puente was once a Catholic Church, as well as an opera house), as well as the incorporation of generous helpings of ritual.

LEMON GIRLS OR ART FOR THE ARTLESS
Talking Band at La Mama
Through March 27

Then over at La Mama, we have Talking Band’s Lemon Girls or Art for the Artless (RECOMMENDED) written by playwright and composer Ellen Maddow. The devised work is an empowering vehicle for older actors (similar to Out of Time, which is currently running at the Public Theater), which is especially refreshing in an industry infatuated with youth and the next big thing. Talking Band’s latest tells the story of four lifelong friends who, in their advanced years, rediscover joy and purpose in their lives when they’re invited to create and perform a piece for a theatrical presentation at a local community center. There’s an innately good natured – if quirky – quality that permeates the entire endeavor that charms with minimum effort. Even its more bittersweet moments are rendered in a sweet, whimsical manner that indicates that the theater artists onstage are comfortably at peace in their own skin at this point in their lives and careers. Lemon Girls features the long-standing company’s signature blend of movement, music, and theater, which organically weave in and out of play’s narrative. In sum, the piece is an ode to the magic of performance and the process of creation – but from a wonderfully eccentric perspective that’s rarely available to audiences.