Interludes

VIEWPOINTS – Theater in transition or part of the new normal?: THE WATERING HOLE & SEVEN DEADLY SINS

• By drediman
• July 13, 2021
• No Comments

One of the fascinating things about the return of in-person theater has been the hybrid forms in which it’s come back. Although productions like Blindness at the Daryl Roth Theatre and En Garde Arts’ A Dozen Dreams at Brookfield Place – essentially visual art and sound installations – were originally conceived in a sense as placeholders until the return of actor-driven theater, they also simultaneously challenged the notion of what constitutes theater in the first place. Last week, I encountered two more of these hybrid shows that perhaps suggest that these non-traditional forms of theatrical expression aren’t merely transitional projects, but are instead being folded into the new normal of theatergoing.

THE WATERING HOLE
Signature Theatre Company
Through August 8

Washing over Signature Theatre Company’s spacious home base on 42nd Street like a cleansing tide is The Watering Hole (RECOMMENDED), an interactive, actor-less production conceived by Lynn Nottage and Miranda Haymon. The unique piece is comprised of a progression of short “plays”, which are activated as you wander through Signature’s maze of auditoriums, dressing rooms, rehearsal studios, lobby, etc. These pre-recorded works – most of which deal with society’s wholesale reckoning with the status quo at large – are accompanied by wildly diverse art installations, which act as visual jumping points for the playwrights’ poetic musings on the state of things. Even if the episodes tend to be more on the opaque side – which may or may not be everyone’s cup of tea (I particularly took to Ryan J. Haddad’s aching autobiographical chronicle) – the overall experience allows for a safe haven to contemplate and recalibrate as we thoughtfully move forward, particularly for the theater community (including theater artists and audiences, alike).

SEVEN DEADLY SINS
Tectonic Theater Project / Madison Wells Live
Through July 25

Then we have Seven Deadly Sins, (RECOMMENDED) an outdoor production which utilizes the Meatpacking District’s unused commercial storefronts as mini-stages from which to depict pride, greed, lust, gluttony, envy, anger, and sloth. Like The Watering Hole, the show is made up of a series of short plays written by talents likes of Bess Wohl, Moisés Kaufman, Thomas Bradshaw, Ming Pieffer, among others. These punchy, incisively acted works – which put the seven sins within the context of contemporary life – are tangy bite-sized nuggets that often conclude with unexpected twists. Logistically, the audience is synchronized to move from storefront to storefront and experiences these micro-plays with the aid of silent disco headphones (to funnel in the plays’ dialogue). Although this may sound overly fussy, it’s all orchestrated seamlessly, resulting in a fascinating, immersive experience akin to watching museum dioramas come to life. Overall, Seven Deadly Sins is a seductive, sexy success, which is in no small part also due to to the production’s bold, vividly-realized design elements.