Saturday, December 28: 9 pm
And here we are, with the conclusion of
my very best night at The Drowned Man – a night, and show, where
everything went smoothly, not a moment was wasted, and I was treated
to an array of knockout performances. I started the night with
Miranda Mac Letten as Romola. Now, I know what you're thinking. I
finished out the previous show, just an hour before, with Sonya
Cullingford's Romola. And if you've been read all the way back to my
September shows, you may remember that I wound up pulling the same
stunt with the Grocer, and I wasn't really happy with the choice.
This is a different case, however, for two reasons: 1) This time I
was dealing with two different performers, whereas with the Grocer, I
was literally duplicating the material, and 2) It's Romola. If it were somehow possible, I would happily spend an entire show just cycling through the various
Romola performers.
Also, given that both Sonya and
Miranda's Romolas were high up on my must-see list, and these two
shows were the only times they respectively played the role during my
trip, I clearly made the right choice. Fate was looking out for me.
At any rate, the first step in following Romola was to find her, which proved more difficult than
expected. I bounded out of the lift and headed straight for the
woods – no sign of her. Trailer park – no sign of her. Saloon –
no sign of her (I felt a little bad rushing in and then right out
again – but I have to assume the barman is used to that). Figuring
she was already in the town, I cut through the Saddlery and checked
the Grocer's – no sign of her. Was I late? Did she already go the
studio? I rushed over to the secretary's office, but she wasn't
there either. Confused, I returned to the town, where I met up with
her just as she was walking into the Grocer's. She must have been
taking the normal path from the saloon into town, and came out behind me.
Let this be a lesson about shortcuts.
The grocery scene contains what is
probably my favorite bit of Miranda's Romola performance that is
entirely unique to her. When the Grocer (Julian Stolzenberg) gives
her an orange slice and comments that it's her favorite, the other
Romolas react with suspicion: “How do you know that's my favorite?”
Miranda's Romola, on the other hand, bit into the orange and practically squealed with surprise and delight, “This IS my
favorite!” then continued working the peel over well after she left
the store. Woman loves her oranges. It's a really endearing
moment, reminiscent of the episodes of brightness that I loved in
Sonya's portrayal.
Inside the secretary's office, the
scene played out very differently from Sonya's. As a side note, one
of the advantages of watching the same loop twice in a row, but at
two different shows, is that it's much easier to see the differences
between the two versions, so a lot of my impressions of this loop are
going to be framed that way. It's actually quite neat to have this
perspective, and I think that if/when I return, I will try to make a
point to do this for some other character on a double night. Anyway
– Miranda's version lacked the elation at finding a purpose, and
also the weird, compulsive typing. Instead, she seemed to combine
the two – she cleaned and straightened the office as if she was
feeling an unnatural compulsion to do so, maybe even against her
will. In a nice touch, she rebuilt the symmetry of the items on the
desk, then deliberately broke it. Romola the rebel.
The scene in the basement with Stanford
(Sam Booth) was essentially the same as what I had seen before, but
with an ever-so-slight shift in tone – oddly enough, not as a
result of how Miranda portayed Romola, but because of how Stanford
treated her. He was more gentle, even tender. In general, I stand
by the interpretation that Stanford loves Romola, but this is the
only incarnation that he seems to like.
Eventually we got to the point where
the Doctor (James Traherne, who has a wonderful kindly-yet-creepy Mr.
Rogers vibe about him) forced the pill down her throat (which was
much more of a struggle this time). This was the point where my loop
with Sonya had branched off for the finale, so I was back on less
familiar ground – I hadn't seen this portion of the loop since
September, with Katie McGuinness. I was very excited for the chance
to see it again, but given that the bulk of the next portion consists
of a 1:1, I was also worried that I, well, wouldn't. Fortunately, my
fears were unwarranted, and she took my hand and rushed me into the
motel for a 1:1 that was somewhat different from what I remembered,
and ended with a statement that left my eyes brimming with tears. As
we exited the motel, I was surprised to hear the reset music playing
– in September, that didn't happen until after she was dead. I
guess the timing must have been adjusted to allow for all of those
new interactions with the Doctor.
Romola's death in the car also happened
much quicker than it had in September. We climbed in, she reached
for the keys, then suddenly collapsed on to me. Quite the contrast
to the slow process of drifting off and snapping awake over and over
again that I had experienced with Katie's Romola, which had ended
with her collapsed on the steering wheel, holding my hand. As usual,
I refused to leave the car while she was dead, and while waiting, I
even took her hand and held it – it seemed unnatural not to be
holding her hand at that moment. When she finally awoke, it was so
startling and violent that it sent me scrambling backward out the
side of the car.
I watched from outside as she hid from
the guard and finally headed into the woods. Unlike when I saw Katie
do it, she did not find a bottle of booze in the car and start
drinking. The next bit was interesting because it actually changed
every time between the three times I had followed Romola. In the
first, back in September with Katie, she stumbled through the trailer
park, encountering a couple of townspeople (Harry and someone else,
can't remember who) before Miguel showed up and calmed her down by
pressing on her forehead. The second time, with Sonya, also in
September, the action was similar, but she never made it into the
trailer park until after she encountered Miguel in the woods, and he
seemed to deliberately pursue her. This time, the encounter with
Miguel came first, in the woods, and involved a definitely
choreographed pursuit, with both characters swinging in circles around
the trees. As with many such changes, I think the new version is a
clear improvement.
Shortly after, she pulled me into the
trailer for the other 1:1. It's funny, even though I know, from
experience, that it involves her mistaking me for a mysterious
“Bobby,” the first time she says the name - quietly, hunched on
the ground outside the trailer, it still sounds like “Mama.”
After that, I stuck with Romola through
her encounter with the newly arrived Mr. Tuttle (or should I say
Psycho Tuttle), played by Mateo Oxley. It's a surprisingly
unsettling moment, as he runs into her while playing with a tiny red
car, the significance of which is not lost on Romola. Since her next
stop was the Grocery, I said my goodbyes (silently, to myself) and
hitched my wagon to Tuttle.
I only wound up spending about half of
a loop with Tuttle, but he very quickly became one of my favorite
characters in the show, and utterly indispensable. The fact that he
didn't even exist the last time I was there seems completely insane.
By turns terrifyingly creepy and pathetically sympathetic, he was
utterly fascinating even when doing nothing at all. We got off to a
start on the“creepy” side of things when, after
(unintentionally?) tormenting Romola with the car, he headed into the
toy shop and drove it off the counter, simulating a crash.
He's also very much Phoebe's mirror,
which I was wondering about, given that their roles are so different. But
just like her, he spends a lot of time monitoring and guiding events,
recording encounters and times in a notebook and, on occasion, even
hurrying others along to meet their appointments. To Mateo's credit,
he kept this aspect of the performance going constantly, even before
we reached the point where it became clear exactly what he was doing
– I spent the first fifteen minutes or so trying to figure out just
why he kept checking his watch any time he saw another person. Also,
like Phoebe, he seems to have miniature representations of many of
the characters/locations in his store, including a “Mary” doll
and, of course, Romola's car.
After the second or third time that I
followed Tuttle out into the street for some brief interaction, I
started to notice that there was a girl there who was clearly angling
for a 1:1. How do I know her intentions? Simple – she wasn't
following Tuttle. She was following Tuttle's shop. She came in and
situated herself as far inside as she possibly could, refusing to
budge even if we left. Rather silly behavior.
Psycho Tuttle's most sympathetic
moments come when he encounters Faye, who he is entirely besotted with,
though she remains friendly but uninterested. At one point, when she
(Sonya Cullingford) and Miguel (Ygal Jerome Tsur) passed by, he did
this really creepy cool spider/crab crawl around the fountain to stay
out of their sight. After another encounter with her, he went inside
his shop and painted a heart. Then he added a couple of strange
symbols in the upper left and right – were they eyes? Was he
giving the heart a face? But why such strange, magical looking
symbols for the eyes? Then he added a nose, shaped like a cross.
Very bizarre. My best guess? A love spell. He continued down to
the mouth, but instead of an actual mouth, he drew two more symbols,
which looked almost like a J and a T – oh.
Right.
F.G. + J.T.
Faye Greener + Jasper Tuttle.
The only defense I can offer is that I
was looking at it upside down. And distracted by the fact that he
kept stopping to drink the paint.
Eventually, the hoedown rolled around
and Tuttle, angry at not being invited, rushed over to the wall near
the car to graffiti blood-red apocalyptic bible quotes, smearing the
paint by hand. The gatekeeper (Paul O'Shea) chased him back to the
shop, where he had a moment of failed flirtation with Drugstore Girl
(Sophie Bortolussi) and, I suppose, hid from Faye and Miguel
(logically, this must be where that spider-crawl happened, but that
doesn't feel right. My memory seems to be quite jumbled at this
point).
I'd like to point out that 1:1-hunting
girl remained in the shop this whole time. How do I know, if I
wasn't there to see her? Well, when we headed back to the door of
the shop, which turned out to be the 1:1 selection point, she finally
emerged, standing right in front of him, ready to be chosen.
Instead, he grabbed my hand and pulled
me inside, ignoring her entirely. As much as I hate to let meta
concerns like that influence my experience, I have to admit to
feeling a bit of unnecessary satisfaction at that moment. As for the
1:1 itself, I will only say this:
Ho. Lee. Shit.
People talk about how scary Studio 8
and the Dust Witch 1:1 are. And they are scary – in fact, I'm one
of those people. But for sheer, off-balance, what's going to happen
next, am I actually in danger dread, I don't think anything can beat
Psycho Tuttle.
I was ejected into the saloon a few
minutes later, his final words (“that doesn't look like running”)
ringing in my ears. I wanted to circle back around to the toy shop
to continue his loop, but it was getting close to reset time, and I
had already settled on a third loop plan earlier in the evening –
it was finally time to spend some time with Claude, played by the
soon-to-be-departing David Essing.
Unfortunately, as I reached the ground
floor, I was a little bit early. I knew I could pick him up right
before the reset as he emerged from the snow room to revive Andrea,
but I didn't know where he would be before that. In fact, I had no
idea how he even got inside the snow room – a secret passage of
some sort? It was a mystery I assumed I would never solve. I wound
up going with an interim plan: I knew where to find Andrea. I would
just follow her for a scene or two and let her take me where I wanted
to go.
I found her in the dressing room,
comforting Wendy (Anna Finkel). She was played by Kirsty Arnold
again, and I'm pretty sure I caught a couple of looks from her that
can only be interpreted as, “Seriously? This guy again?”
Especially after, while trying to get out of the way, I stood in
front of the cabinet where they store the drinks just as she was
about to open it. I believe I have done that three times now, but I
can still never remember not to stand there. At any rate, I was
left wishing there was a way to tell her I was merely hitching a ride
to Claude.
When she left the room, slowly
continuing her breakdown in the hall alongside Studio 2, I decided to
beat the crowd and cut through the Ornate Bedroom, arriving maybe a
minute before her. That was when, to my surprise, I learned the
answer to my earlier question: Claude gets into the snow room by
getting there first. Great way to start off a loop, feeling like an
idiot.
Fortunately I was soon distracted from
my embarrassment by the beauty of Andrea's snow dance and Claude's
revival/rest of her and by the sheer goofy fun of his casting dance
in the secretary's office with Alice (Jane Leaney). I have to admit
that I don't love Jane in the role – her interpretation feels
closer to the departed Emily Mytton's than Laura Harding does, and
suffers somewhat by comparison. This isn't a knock against Jane in general –
she is, of course, the definitive Dolores. It's just not a
character/performer combo that clicks for me as well as I might hope.
I was also lucky that Claude seemed to
take a shine to me early on. Almost immediately he wished me a happy
birthday (before turning away to reveal that he was actually talking
to Dolores) and from then on, it was as if we were linked – he
took every opportunity to pull me into the action, giving me his
jacket to carry back to the changing room post-initiation, warning me
off of Frankie (“He's mine!”), pulling me close to watch Frankie
in the infidelity ballet, giving me a tiny photo of Frankie and then
kissing my hand with the photo inside after his possessive solo dance
on the table, and finally, heartbreakingly, believing for a moment
that I was Frankie. After being rejected post-orgy, he retreated to
the photo office in the basement and turned to me, tears in his eyes:
“Frankie! You came back! Is it going to be you and me now,
Frankie? Like in the script?” When I didn't respond, his eyes
grew cold, and he pulled the 8x10 of Frankie's headshot off of the
clipboard, held it up right in front of my face, and tore it to bits,
showering me with the pieces. All in all, it felt almost like a
gigantic, extended 1:1.
If there's a visual motif for Claude's
loop, it would have to be shadows. In addition to his appearance in
the snow room, which I described in a previous write-up, he also
periodically uses shadows to “crush” the faces of photographs,
demonstrating his power over the people portrayed within. There was
only one instance where he failed to crush a photo – Frankie's, in
the photo office, right before he spoke to me. He started to do it,
but just couldn't bring himself to crush him. Poor guy. He's got
too much heart to be as evil as he should be – at least, David's
version does. I haven't spent much time with the other regular
Claude (River Carmault), but he seems much more overtly sinister –
I suspect his loop would feel very different.
I have to give David a lot of credit –
Claude is not a character that had really caught my interest much
throughout my earlier shows, but following him for a (nearly) full
loop was a tremendously satisfying experience, owing mainly to
David's sympathetic and nuanced performance. He's also a tremendous
dancer, often finding ways of moving that seemed to be not quite
possible – one that sticks in the mind was when he, kneeling on the ground just after Frankie
rejected him, seemed to. . . . I guess the best
way I can describe it is that he undulated to his feet, in a way that
scoffed at gravity.
Not long after the photo tearing
incident, he stopped for a brief, unmotivated dance in the hallway,
then took my hand. We all know what that means – finale time. He
rushed me upstairs, stopping just outside of Studio 2 to straighten
my collar and tidy up my hair, then took me to the base of the
woodchip mound. There, he did the same thing he did with me as
Badlands Jack, thrusting my hands into my gut with each stab of the
scissors – but this time he also whispered directions to Wendy -
“yes. . . . .do it. . . .. again. . . “ Then, a new touch
(unless I've just forgotten it from before) – as Wendy lifted
Marshall, dragging him to the hole, Claude began to squeeze,
compressing my diaphragm and lifting me upwards. I began to have
trouble breathing, and started to lose my balance. This was mildly
alarming. I thought I might have to actually say something about it,
although I hated to disrupt the moment. Just at the moment where I
could no longer breathe in at all, and I was about to topple over
from having my weight shifted around, Marshall disappeared into the
ground and I was released. The very last second before things went
too far – that's impressive. Claude proudly exclaimed to me, “I
discovered her!” and disappeared into the crowd. I headed over to
the stage area, where Conrad (Adam Burton) was directing traffic. He
pointed at me and said, “Hey – I know you.” I nodded and he
smiled. “Lookin' good.” I love the little touches like that.
Thus ended my very best show, back to
back with a strong contender for number two – at least, that's
almost the end. There was one more strange moment of note.
Post-finale, I made my usual stop at both of the pools – first
Wendy and Marshall's, then William and Mary's. While I was at the
W/M pool, someone walked by, tossed their mask into the water, and
said, “thanks for the cookies.”
I suspect I will go to my grave never
knowing what that meant.
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