REVIEW: The Skriker

The Skriker
Written by Caryl Churchill
Directed by Rebecca Zellar
Produced by Greyzelda Theatre Co.
Featuring Lisa Wilson, Kelly Yanoco, Kathryn Daniels & Ensemble Cast

Good theater is about communication - in the most obscure and dense pieces, without a sense that the piece is saying something worth hearing, all you have is the meandering "experience" of people moving around, making noise and creating atmosphere. I'm all for the highly experimental (I'm a NeoDadaist, after all) but communication of something is the key to success - even in our WNEP DADA Soirees, each poem, sound or movement is motivated by an attempt to communicate something specific to the audience. The one true strength of Off- and Off-Off Loop theater is the actor. If the actor can read the script and interpret the text effectively, everything else is just cool bells and whistles. If the actor cannot, you got problems.

The last Greyzelda production had no problem - the acting was excellent on all levels and the problems encountered were that the bells and whistles (the onstage video) just didn't work. Overall, it was one of the best productions of A View from the Bridge as you're likely to see. But Churchill and Miller are as different as you can be in terms of execution and Zellar has the opposite problem with The Skriker.

The Skriker of the title is a venomous and seductive creature capable of changing character and shape as she time-travels across the centuries seeking the essence of humanity to feed her. She is a timeless creature who craves the fertility of human women (babies being in pretty high regard in the Underworld of Churchill's design). She speaks - when not in disguise - in a sing-songy sprechsinge comprised of nonsense free associated from her actual communications and lords over of a host of fairies, beasties, and lunatics.

Churchill is one of my personal favorites and although I prefer both Cloud Nine and Top Girls to her later works, her use of surrealism and current politics is something I've always been inspired by. The Skriker is, by far, the furthest along those lines and is a frustratingly difficult piece to pull off as the demands she places upon both actors and audiences are particularly intense.

Zellar does a lot of things right in this low-budget Greyzelda production (I point out low-budget not as a criticism but to illustrate that in spite of the lack of money, the few bells and whistles they were able to invest in were top notch). The simple set designed by Heath Hays, moody lighting by Erin Lapham and beastie/monster masks created by Jeff Semmerling are all used to great effect. Zellar's staging is simple and clean, with the requisite contact improv movement and Twyla Tharpe-ish crawling around coached by Joseph Ravens. The original music and sound design by Robert Filippo is effective and Jana Liles (as both Dance Captain and in the all dancing, nonspeaking role of the Passerby who gets pulled up onstage and is trapped in constant dancing throughout the entire piece) is excellent.

In fact, Zellar's use of her backstage personnel is on par with some of the best work I've seen Greyzelda produce (aside from a few dimestore magic tricks, her stage pictures are pretty awesome). It is, unfortunately, in both the one-note direction of the actors and the utter lack of ability in the three leads that undoes the piece.

A malevolent Underworld, filled with scary creatures in bizarre masks should feel - well - malevolent and scary. As it stands, with the exceptions of Taylor Mauch and Jamie DesRocher, the ensemble of fairies are constantly shrieking and giggling and portraying less malignancy and more a third grader's view of what "mean fairies" act like. The overall effect is shrill and irritating rather than haunting and creepy and made the piece feel more like a bunch of pre-teens dressing up and rolling around on the floor than a surrealistic portrayal of Churchill's dreamworld.

Topping that off are the three ladies who carry the story. Kathryn Daniels (as Josie) spends much of her time onstage performing soap opera emotional responses and communicating none of the genuine gravitas necessary for a woman who has possibly killed a child and been put in an asylum. Daniels isn't bad, just a bit forgettable - I'm sure that will improve as the run continues - but she has enough natural "watchability" that I'm sure she'll pull it off with some practice. Kelly Yanoco, on the other hand, is like a void of charisma, deadpanning every line without the faintest hint that she is doing anything other than reciting words she memorized from a script and, when she does attempt to act out her emotions, it's like watching a high school kid awkwardly pretend to lie for the very first time.

Wilson, who plays the most demanding role in the play, fails to competently communicate through the bizarre language games Churchill has provided her character and gives every word and phrase, regardless of it's import in the underlying meaning, the same weight until her wonderfully written monologues become incomprehensible noise and her broad, almost "bad farce" characterizations of a Woman from Texas, a Lisping, Obnoxious Little Girl, and a Strange Stalker Guy aren't even interesting enough to compare to Brendan Frasier in the remake of Bedazzled let alone anything better.

Zellar's bells and whistles are really very good. Her actors are not. She's got problems here that a bit of table work might fix. Given that they're at the beginning of their run, there's no time like the present.