SITE GUIDE
SEARCH
REVIEWS
REVIEW ARCHIVES
ADVERTISING AT CURTAINUP
FEATURES
NEWS
Etcetera and
Short Term Listings
LISTINGS
Broadway
Off-Broadway
NYC Restaurants
BOOKS and CDs
OTHER PLACES
Berkshires
London
California
New Jersey
Philadelphia
Elsewhere
QUOTES
TKTS
PLAYWRIGHTS' ALBUMS
LETTERS TO EDITOR
FILM
LINKS
MISCELLANEOUS
Free Updates
Masthead
A CurtainUp Los Angeles Review
Peace
|
I'm a pacifist at heart, but I do possess a yellow belt in jujitsu, and I really hate war. &mdash Chorus Leader .—
|
You would perhaps expect nothing less than a full scale adolescent &mdash if erudite &mdash gross-out when you go about sicing the comedy trio Culture Clash on Peace the hugely filthy play by Aristophanes. In fact, given the hay that the Troubadour Theater Company is concurrently making with Sophocles' Oedipus, the King Mama! over the hill in Burbank, clearly no wearer of a toga is safe.
Adapted by John Glore with Culture Clash's Richard Montoya, Ric Salinas and Herbert Siguenza, Peace may not be entirely an exercise in who can out smut whom (although it sometimes feels that way). There are some timely thoughts on war, violence and those who wage it peeking through the mire. And bless their mischievous souls, Culture Clash (Chavez Ravine, Zorro in Hellhas been pecking away at the funny bones of irreverence-seeking audiences for coming up on 20 years.
With Peace, the boys are jumping in and out of costumes and characters (ancient, contemporary and anything in between) as supporting players, leaving the play's actual quest to another wild card: John Fleck. Fleck's Trygaeus (known as Ty Dye and costumed to match) is a pot- growing, phallus-waving farmer who ascends skyward on a dung beetle looking to free the goddess Peace from imprisonment. Ares, the God of War, Peace's jailer, will naturally have something to say about that. And Ty Dy may need some help from a Malibu housewife (Amy Hill) plucked from the audience to be the Chorus Leader. The Mariachi trio, Las Colibri, led by Suzanne Garcia, helps ramp up the party atmosphere. and somehow manages to avoid getting scatalogically smacked.
Fleck has played much more demented than this, although given Ty Dye's encounters with a Michael Jackson wannabe son and the fey god Hermes ("all phalluses must go through me") Fleck is not exactly going subtle. His cast members certainly aren't. Montoya's demonic Ares, with oversized bloodied hands, a general's tunic and an ancient war helmet makes for a satiric villain (very imaginative costumes by Shgeru Yaji).
This marks the fourth annual outdoor staging of an adapted classic at the Getty Villa's , and the second comedy. Set designer Christopher Acebo, lighting designer Geoff Korf and puppet designer Lynn Jeffries make fine use of both the playing space and the back wall of the gallery itself. The players actually have to raid the museum &mdash strewing boulders in their wake &mdash to liberate Peace.
For Peace, Bill Rauch returns to L.A. to direct a freelance gig for the first time since taking over artistic directorship at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. This kind of broad and bawdy satire is very much in line (if somewhat more over-the-top) than what Rauch's productions for the Cornerstone Theater Company would do. That the director has brought longtime Cornerstoners Acebo, Yaji, Korf, Jeffries is hardly surprising, and the Clash will have a new play at OSF in 2010.
Underneath the mayhem, as I've said, is a rumination on war. It is driven home by an unlikely &mdash and, one hopes, a not easily traumatized &mdash source. So, as the song goes, give Peace a chance, but don't bring your own seat cushions. In the true spirit of farce, the Getty Villa staff will confiscate said cushions "for security reasons."
|
Subscribe to our FREE email updates with a note from editor Elyse Sommer about additions to the website -- with main page hot links to the latest features posted at our numerous locations. To subscribe,
E-mail: esommer@curtainup.comesommer@curtainup.com
put SUBSCRIBE CURTAINUP EMAIL UPDATE in the subject line and your full name and email address in the body of the message -- if you can spare a minute, tell us how you came to CurtainUp and from what part of the country. |
|
Peace By Arisophanes, adapted for the Getty Villa by John Glore, Richard Montoya, Ric Salinas and Herbert Siguenza Directed by Bill Rauch Cast: Richard Montoya (First Slave), Ric Salinas (Second Slave), Herbert Siguenza (Third Slave), John Fleck (Ty Dye), Amy Hill (Chorus Leader), Las Colibri (The Band) Stage Manager: Darlene Miyakawa Costume Design: Shigeru Yaji Lighting Design: Geoff Korf Assistant Director and Choreographer: Ken Roht Band Leader and Musical Director: Suzanne Garcia Puppet Designer: Lynn Jeffries Running Time: 1 hour 30 minutes with no intermission Barbara and Lawrence Fleischman Theater at the Getty Villa, 17985 Pacific Coast Highway, Pacific Palisades. (310)440-7300, www.getty.edu From Sept. 10 to Oct. 3 Thu.-Sat. @ 8pm Reviewed by Evan Henerson, based on Sept. 10 performance. |
|
REVIEW FEEDBACK Highlight one of the responses below and click "copy" or"CTRL+C"
Paste the highlighted text into the subject line (CTRL+ V): Feel free to add detailed comments in the body of the email. . .also the names and emails of any friends to whom you'd like us to forward a copy of this review. You can also contact us at Curtainup at Facebook or Curtainup at Twitter |
South Pacific
In the Heights
Playbill 2007-08 Yearbook
Leonard Maltin's 2008 Movie Guide
