Fifth of July': a critical view

A critical review of a complex show can, in this context, convey but bits and pieces. So, as many of Fifth's other varying elements have been remarkably covered by Kate Drizos and Sarah Butrymowicz in the show's respective preview and review, I will take to the juicy guts of its performance: the actors.

As critical carrion crow out to rollick and roil around fresh carcasses, I pick and peck at the eight-person pool of talented Tufts performers. And though you shoo me away, I'll be sure to snatch enough freshly-dead flesh of performance to tide me over till the next department show...

In the way of individual presentations, then - always a touchy subject - suffice it to say, first and foremost, that no player plays through a drama department major without working extremely hard and sacrificing egregious amounts of valuable time and energy for the love of performance alone.

That said, let me take my critical license, it being free in the first place and subject itself to criticisms, and pick a little at outstanding elements of the show's acting. Let me note that what I leave out isn't "for the birds," but for another voraciously vociferous bird to critique as s/he sees fit. I am limited to 1000 words, mind you.

I'll begin by briefly addressing Jeff Beers, the play's lead performer. Where his embodiment of a body without organic legs couldn't have been bettered by a professional, his exploration of Ken Talley's despair left some of its painful depth unplumbed, thereby diminishing the otherwise perfectly played touch of his eventual hope. Beers' build could have stood more vigor in order to make Talley's concluding resolve that much the sweeter in all his enveloping sadness. But Beers, a freshman, has but begun his acting career at Tufts, making him a hell of a prospect for future Tufts productions.

The other newbie on Tufts' stage is obviously no newbie to the stage. Callie Oppedisano seized powerfully her opportunity to awe us with wowing consistency of character. Her continuous, fluttering chuckles and repeated return to that semi-sophisticated-Southern tone of voice constituted a reliable set of symptoms around which she was able to work believable variations of "being." She rocked the stage like an old-fashioned rocking chair, producing a dependable sway sufficient for success both in portraying an old auntie and grounding the cast dynamic.

In the middle of an impressive inscription in Tufts theatre history is Brendan Shea, whose droll depiction of dead-headed hippie-rocker Weston Hurley provided relieving hilarity amidst a tempest of tense situations, lightening the density of the harsh themes that undergird the play's movement. But his clownish capacities proved a double-edged sword, for where we might've glimpsed the tragically stupid side of the drugged-out rocker, we were left too totally with his huggable teddy-bear innocence.

The clown catered too much to the audience's sympathy - however vital much of that sympathy was to the show - leaving untapped the downfall of his out-of-tune tale-telling. We smiled along with a cute voice when we might've moved further with that voice into its nonsensical discord with reality. If he found everything so far out, man, we might have been able to find him farther out. Not that the seeds for such finding weren't in the portrayal's soil, as it were; but for the sake of thicker dramatic irony, they might've sprouted into clearer view.

Also tallying another noteworthy stage-taking to a superb series of them was Kasey Collins, whose characterization of Gwen Landis landed solidly on stage in service of the most moving performance the play offered. Her cool confidence fluidized the action as it danced courageously into its own darkness. In the midst of her character's quick shifts, I dare say we quavered with her as fragile bodies, and, through the build of a tremulously vulnerable voice, followed her to flushes of that raw feminine fullness she isn't afraid to release.

We witnessed an instability of beauty that did something more than embody the capricious country singer Gwen Landis, though it did that so well. It signaled the gift with which the receiver is helpless, the swell of performative drive that is the material of the actor's art, the repetitive thing around which one builds varied techniques.

Having touched Kasey's superlative expressions, we connect automatically to the fortified frame in which they were delivered: Aristotle Kousakis' representation of John Landis. Aristotle's high-strung Hollywood suave functioned both to fire Kasey's histrionics and to suture them to the reality of each scene in which they were freed.

The taut, cocaine-eyed side of his character no doubt held the energetically wired rhythm that helped thrust Kasey into her intensity, whilst the suavely assertive (if sly) businessman that grounded his stage-persona acted as a leash that let Kasey go without letting her go too far. Aristotle and Kasey exemplified the strong coupling that often feeds fine artistry.

And fine artistry "Fifth of July" was. Not since Sheriden Thomas two years ago put up Lauro's "A Piece of my Heart" has the Tufts' stage seen such socially significant drama so stirringly presented. A review of the elements of this particular production indeed stands irrelevant next to the imperative questions the production raises - questions of consciousness, conscience, history, war, sexuality, friendship, to name but a few.

In closing, let me direct my critical eye at me. Of course this review lets down a little - it's not about scandal. It's on the play after, about the day after - the fifth of July - the spectacular fireworks having screeched, exploded and stunned.

And we're left, like the characters in "Fifth," to the dirty aftermath of that inspirited critic's dream, that inspired culture's imagination, where everything is less perfect than we'd hoped, everyone less free than we wanted to believe, reality so much more real, but not without traces of something like hope in the face of our impossible responbility: to move on.