Stephen Karam’s drama “The Humans”, 2016 recipient of The
Tony Award for Best Play is currently showing at The San Diego Repertory
Theatre downtown on the Lyceum Stage through Feb 2nd.
I’ve said it in jest and in truth that I wouldn’t mind
being a fly on the wall just to see what goes on behind closed doors in X Y or
Z’s house.
Clockwise: Brian Mackey, Kate Rose Reynolds, Jeffrey Meek, Rosina Reynolds and Elizabeth Dennhey |
Just recently I had that opportunity to look in on the Blake
Family on this one Thanksgiving Day. The Blake’s, Erik (Jeffrey Meek is most
convincing) Aimee (Amanda Sitton), Brigid (Kate Rose Reynolds), Deirdre
(Elizabeth Dennehy) and Fiona or Momo (Rosina Reynolds) are congregating in
Richard (Brian Mackey) and Brigid’s new street level flat located in a not so
pretty, almost eerie section of New York’s Chinatown. “But”, she prides, “we even
have a window looking out on to the street…well alley.”
The two story flat (the playwright refers to it as a ‘shabby
apartment’) designed by Giulo Perrone makes room for easy flow of traffic if
you don’t count climbing up a steel winding staircase that opens to the larger
of the two rooms. But there are bumps and bangs (Melanie Chen Cole) that can be
heard and felt from the upstairs apartment that are blown off by Brigid and
Richard as belonging to their ‘Chinese’ neighbor above them. They come from out
of the blue and nearly scared the bejeasus out of me when I first heard one.
Kate Rose Reynolds, Elizabeth Dennehy, Amanda Sitton and Jeffery Meek with Rosina Reynolds. |
The one bathroom and other bedroom are located upstairs as
well with a recliner and boxed “stuff” waiting to be put away. The kitchen and
eating area are down stairs with Richard as the designated cook. He and Brigid
make a good couple, but Deidre would rather see them married rather than just
living together.
It’s often been said that when we ask about this one or that
one, we usually end up with TMI. But in the scheme of things less is not better
in “The Humans” because this family, like so many others whom some might call
Upper middle-Middle class living out the American Dream, has a lot to say.
The Blake's lives are so intertwined and even though Erik and
Deidre are empty nesters, the family picks up where they last left off: talking
over one another oft times even dismissing another’s thoughts or putting
someone down, having a family moment, looking after a beloved elderly and distant grandmother, even ganging up on one or another, or trying to be heard and understood
is part of the family dynamic.
Kate Rose Reynolds and Brian Mackey |
Any one of us in this complicated tribe we call the human
race can relate. They do it without
skipping a beat. It is truly an ensemble piece where everyone takes part and
every family member is important.
Proud and loving remembrances laced with family humor and
real life situations push this dramedy, beautifully and sensitively directed by
associate artistic director Todd Salovey, in a 90 minute oft time sit -com, oft
time edging on the tragic, will have you chuckling and teary eyed at the same
time. Most however will confess these holiday gatherings cause more stress
among family members that at any other time.
The Blake family hails from Scranton, Pa. They would now fit
into the middle or lower class, (used to be solid middle class) surviving from
paycheck to paycheck category.
Erik who has been a high school maintenance man for
twenty-eight years, alludes to the fact that he and Deirdre are planning to fix
up a second summer house and reminds Brigid that, but for the fact that she
chose not to go to a state school she wouldn’t be in debt and bartending
nights. Brigid’s (the younger Ms. Reynolds is a natural) constant kvetching
about having to work bartending is also a topic she and Erik banter over during
the course of the visit.
Amanda Sitton and Kate Rose Reynolds |
Deirdre is an office manager making less than the two new
hires, in their twenties, who are making five times her salary. She too has had
the same job for forty years. Daughter Aimee has a law degree and is on the
verge of not becoming a partner in the firm that spells ‘time to move on’. Both
complain of being discriminated. Both may be right.
Aimee is also suffering from colitis and just broke up with
her long time girlfriend. Still haunting Dad Erik is the fact that she just
escaped, by minutes, being in the Twin Towers in the wake of the 911tragedy.
His dreams of losing his daughter trouble him causing him to have haunting
dreams at night. She has what my tribe would call tsuris.
And wheelchair bound Momo; well she’s there somewhere. She
does have her lucid moments and on one occasion even remembered the words to a
favorite tune this proud Irish family always sang at past Thanksgiving
gatherings.
It isn’t often that an actor is on stage for an entire production, stares out at the audience and once in a while utters indistinguishable gibberish, and yet is so felt as part of this family dynamic. Ms. Reynolds is one of San Diego’s premiere actors. Her showing up as the wheelchair bound former matriarch, (a lost to the world Momo) while continuing to give a stellar performance, is a credit to her professionalism.
While it was difficult watching her in that role, the
humanity, pampering, inclusion and attention she receives from her family in
this production of “The Humans” proves that all is not lost in this current
reign of total disrespect for humanity
(and other humans) from those who should know better
Karam’s “The Humans” paints a pretty accurate picture of
everyday folks who would love to live the dream, but don’t have the means, lost
their way or blew their chances to do so.
It’s so human it hurts. It pulses with off the wall humor
from ‘cockroaches to kale’, so much so that if you are not used to the rhythms
of these family subtleties, you will miss them. I especially understood
Deirdre’s frustrations to her Points on Weight Watchers if she had chips and
dip appetizers.
I couldn’t help myself
from almost hearing my own cries about WW points. And in my first apartment in
the outskirts of Boston, we, my husband and I, also had cockroaches that my
super called beetle bugs. So much for those comparisons!
Conversations run back and fourth in layered and painful
admissions that up until now have put the family on a superficial plateau and
are blurted out over the course of the afternoon/evening visit.
Confessions, losses, new -found awakenings and truths now
become out loud facts as when a hurt and wounded Aimee confesses that she and
her long time girlfriend split and her disease is getting to the point that
surgery is needed and she has no insurance. Amanda Sitton, a local favorite, as
most of the ensemble is, is so credible that yours truly felt her hurt and
loss.
Kate Rose Reynolds and Jeffrey Meek |
Jeffrey Meek’s Erik and Elizabeth Dennehy’s Deidre are the
yin to the other’s yang. Together they make a whole; supporting, lifting up,
dreaming the same dreams, hurting the same hurts, bringing their all that feels
right and that that doesn’t, into focus knowing that some in the audience might
have walked in their shoes.
Erik finally shows up and has the guts to tell his family
that they lost their lake house, his job and pension (among other things) and
would have to downsize the family home as well. He has nightmares (he calls
them dreams) going back to the 9/11 incident that haunt him and he can’t seem
to dodge them. Perhaps by sharing them with Richard, who also has weird dreams,
his might be eased.
The most eerie of scenes as the play ends has Erik standing
at the doorway in a haze of mist (small glitch in the lighting caught everyone
off guard, Chris Rynne), and after he has a few mishaps gathering up the
family’s last belongings and everyone heads for the car, we don’t know exactly
what he is thinking or will do.
“Lights”!
Jeffrey Meek |
The ending is bit ambiguous leaving us virtually in the dark,
as is Erik. What happens next in his life is up for conversation. But fear not
we, as humans are resilient and survival is our highest virtue.
See you at the theatre.
Dates: Through Feb.2nd
Organization: San Diego Repertory Theatre
Phone: 619-544-1000
Production Type: Comedy/Drama
Where: 79 Horton Plaza, Downtown San Diego
Ticket Prices: Start at $25.00
Web: sdrep.org
Venue: Lyceum Space
Photo Credit: Jim Carmody
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