Saturday, June 21, 2003

I saw [sic] at the Sledgehammer Theatre tonight. It had its moments; a struggling composer detailing the thought process involved in creating the perfect music to accompany an amusement park ride is brilliant. But I couldn't really get into it. The acting was pretty weak, the set design and staging was too clever by a third, and the writing was guilty of the same unjustified self-confidence that plagues the characters. The constant opening and closing of doors to the three twenty-somthings' apartments, and the shuffling about from room to room, like something out of Scooby-Doo, no doubt seemed clever and high-spirited in rehersal, but I found it almost unbearably cloying. And lest we look down on the young people with their petty problems, we get to see, from an ankles-eyed view, the break-up of a more mature relationship as well. And apparently there's a dead old woman, who figures in somehow. Again, it had its moments, and however hollow the characters may come off, you have to have some sympathy for a man who will tie his future to a new career in auction barkering, in the age of E-bay. But overall, I'd recommend you pass on this one.

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