So, yes, the Knightsbridge Theatre is the company that I am a member of. But that doesn’t mean I can’t review their shows too. It just means I’ll probably be a little nicer than usual, especially if I know and like the majority of the people involved.
“One Night To Die For” (no longer running, as I didn’t see it until closing weekend) was an evening to two one-acts – “Audience” by Michael Frayn (the author of “Noises Off”) and “The Real Inspector Hound” by Tom Stoppard (Academy Award and Tony Award winner). “Audience” was a quick-paced comedy with mostly short and vague dialogue or inner monologues occurring between audience members watching a bad play, a dead-pan usherette, and the playwright agonizing over lack of audience reaction, coughing fits, a ringing phone, etc. etc. etc. Then in “The Real Inspector Hound,” two theatre critics are literally sucked into the murder mystery they are reviewing. It was my understanding and interpretation that director, Scott Dittman, subtly hinted that “The Real Inspector Hound” was supposed to be the play that the characters in “Audience” were watching, even though the two plays have nothing to do with one another.
“Audience” took place in the house of the theatre. The real audience (paying ticket holders of the Knightsbridge) were all crammed into house left, while the fake audience of “Audience” was scattered throughout house right. What was funny is that several of the people in the play were company members, but before the show, they were mingling out in the lobby and buying concessions as if they were real audience members. So they were pretending that they didn’t know us. This was a great little pre-show show for the real audience members who didn’t really know anyone in the show. And it was a fun little game for the rest of us. There were definitely at least two people who were faking it out in the lobby that I really thought were just there to see the show like me. The not so-funny thing was the cramp I got in my neck from having to watch the show sideways, and the fact that there was a beautiful, bright, empty set on stage, and I kept expecting at least ONE thing to happen on the actual stage, but nothing ever did. I thought the play itself was a lot of fun though. The people I went with didn’t really like or get it. Yes, it was a little sloppy, and I think that was mostly in the writing. It jumps around from being actual dialogue to being just thoughts running through the characters heads, and there’s no way to distinguish which is which. So throughout the play, I never really knew what was being said out loud and what was being said in the characters’ heads. Except for the playwright character – obviously the things he was saying were just in his head. And then there are these random dramatic sub-plots, like about a woman realizing her husband must be cheating on her, that seemed totally unnecessary and melodramatic. So, basically, what happens in the show, is the audience absolutely hates the play they’re watching, but through a series of interruptions and annoyances, they basically subconsciously convince each other that they love the play. And the playwright triumphs in this success, despite the fact that the audience decides his play is a comedy, though it is not. I think my two favorite moments in this show were 1) Elizabeth Yocam’s hilarious dead pan curtain speech (which was not actually part of the play, it was just her character from the play making the actual curtain speech for the Knightsbridge Theatre), and 2) Elizabeth Yocam’s hilarious dead pan improv out in the lobby while selling concessions (which was also not actually part of the play, it was just her character from the play actually selling concessions). My least favorite aspect was that one of the performers in this show is someone I do not know personally but I have seen in a Knightsbridge production before. And as much as I’m sure the person is fabulous in many ways, he/she is just absolutely unrealistic and stale as an actor. This person performs as if he/she just memorizes the lines and then recites them out loud without any subtext or emotion, and I think the play would have been completely different and far easier to follow if a stronger actor had played that role. And I know I’m being mean, but other people have stated they feel the same way. It just baffles me, and all I can think is that no one else auditioned for the role or that he/she is a personal friend of the director’s. There, I said it. Now I’m going to have some bad karma or something, but I had to let that out!
Now, “The Real Inspector Hound,” in my opinion, is a stronger written piece to begin with. The two theatre critics (Dan Cole and Brad Upton) open the show, again, sitting house right. Then the faux play within the play took place on the actual stage. The play within the play is a murder mystery and is really, really bad. And that’s what made it so funny. It’s filled with intentional exposition. Vicki Conrad’s maid character (sorry, I don’t remember the character names and they’re not listed in the program) went so far as to recite stage direction like, “One hour later. The same.” Hi-larious. The two female leads in the faux play (Marti Hale and Karyn O’Bryant) were entertainingly over-the-top. And the fast-paced banter between Cole and Upton (primarily about Cole’s character falling in lust with the actresses on stage and not having an affair, and Upton’s character wanting to kill his missing critic partner) was pretty damn tight and if there were any slip-ups, they went unnoticed. Eventually, the two theatre critics are literally pulled into the play within the play, and following some farcical randomness, end up dead. Performances in “Inspector Hound” were more balanced, as in, no one was noticeably stronger or weaker than the rest, which made it a smoother viewing experience. My biggest criticism for this play was that it’s a British play, so it was performed with British accents, but not all the actors could actually do the accent, and it was quite noticeable when people struggled with it. Which brought up the discussion (following the show), when are accents really necessary? I mean, couldn’t they have just done the show in American accents and, therefore, been able to maybe focus more on things like timing. But because of the language used in the play, it may have sounded stupid in American accents. Like, if you say “Bloody hell!” in an American accent, it just sounds stupid, right?
I’ve always been conflicted about the accent-thing. Like, what if it were a play being performed in English but set in Germany. Should all the actors then speak in a German accent? Or do we just assume they’re in Germany, so in real life they’d be speaking in German and not in English with German accents, so there’s no need to do the accent at all? Like, remember the film adaptation of “Memoirs of a Geisha?” The book is set in Japan but was written in English. So the film was in English. But they all spoke with accents. And it was especially odd because Zhang Ziyi (or Ziyi Zhang), is a Chinese actress who didn’t speak a lot of English at the time, so her accent was some mesh of all sorts of randomness. And, yet, I could understand her fine. And then Nicole Kidman was nominated for an Oscar for “Rabbit Hole,” in which she constantly slipped in and out of her Australian accent. So, it’s like, why bother?
End tangent.
Anyway, kudos to Scott Dittman for a fun night of one-acts. Nothing mind-blowing or thought-provoking, just a good time. But the run is over, so I can’t really say, “Hey, you should go check it out.” So, don’t go check it out. It’s too late. You snooze, you lose.
