The American Conservatory Theater: You don't want an exit

Much less need one.

ACT's recent run of The Virtual Stage and the Electric Company Theater's production of No Exit was a brilliant re-imagining and carefully constructed performance that managed to turn existential into exciting.  While I am inclined to write a full and thoughtful review, the show has closed and the SF press has covered the technical and creative aspects of the show to some extent already.  And of course, they were all raves.  I learned that the Electric Company was also behind last year's tour de force which was the re-envisioning of Noel Coward's Brief Encounter.  Still, years later, I think about how great that show was.

Now I have never met her but I have a patron's love/hate relationship with ACT's Creative Director Carey Perloff.  I live in fear that the next show in my run of season tickets will be another completely inaccessible bore of a period piece with endless monologues and soporific scenes.  I adore the core company, and while Rene and Tony are so absurdly talented that they can assume any role as if it were written for them, others in the core seem to be cast in repetitive roles that I fear has less to do with the actor and more with the parts.    (Then again, Big Daddy always seems to be playing Big Daddy regardless of the show he finds himself in, including the spot he did on Law & Order I recently caught in a very old rerun.)

On the other hand, Carey Perfoff is responsible for bringing some of the best shows I have ever seen to the ACT stage.  During the receptions following the performances, audience members talk.  The general opinion is that ACT shows are hit or miss.  The misses are painful, cringe-inducing, and make some people outright angry at how not entertaining these things can be.  But the hits?  Out of the park.  I suppose that's fitting.  And luckily for all of us, the ACT stage of the past two years have seen a lot of great works.

No Exit was absolutely engaging and at times edge-of-your-seat, which is even more remarkable when you consider that it's a WWII-era existential French play about hell and almost all of the acting takes play off-stage. The expanded yet still existential role of the valet is genius, and played to perfection by Jonathan Young.  The intense feelings of being trapped, being watched, and unable to escape the constant companionship of people you don't like is played to its peak by use of cameras and video projections from inside the tiny room that is their eternal cell in the prison of Hotel Hell.

If you are unfamiliar, the point of the story, as oft quoted by my brother and shared by anyone who has ever been trapped in a crowded elevator, at the DMV, in the jury pool, or at the in-laws for Thanksgiving:  enfer, c'est les autres.  Hell is other people.

Heaven was this performance.

You may think that the three main characters were in cramped quarters with each other for their eternal torture and suffering, but the actual intense minuteness of the space was only revealed after the performance when audience members were invited on stage to look into their off-stage acting space of lighting and cameras.  There was barely room to move and I had a hard time imagining what I had just seen on screen being physically performed in such a tiny space.  Lucia Frangione, who plays Estelle, told us after the show that the actors are so close during their performance that they can feel each other's breath upon their faces.

Andy Thompson (Cradeau) and Laara Sadiq (Inez) give brilliant and forceful performances—all three actors are quite impressive and the necessities of the show require them to work exceptionally well together, both in line and blocking as well as emotion.  However I believe that Lucia has the biggest burden as her character seems to change the most during the play, and she also has some serious close-ups on those screens—down to the fine lines of her lipstick and the remarkable absence of lines from her skin.  Lucia has to be a peroxide blond for the all of the runs of this show as the camera is so tight that a wig is simply out of the question.  I'm amazed her follicles are still holding tight.

.

As we do with ACT, we take our performances on the Out with ACT nights, hosted by the superlative Randy Taradash, and we enjoy meeting and greeting the cast and learning more about their shows, performances, careers and the actors' impressions of the City.  And we get to hob and nob with our other theater gays with complimentary booze which is not only a treat but a performance in itself—so much it's almost like a double feature.  So a big thank you too to Absolut for being this season's beverage sponsor.

Special thanks to Lucia Frangione for being exceptionally charming after a clearly exhausting show.  And for always being ready for her close up.


Carey Perfloff has brought to ACT such astounding works as The Overcoat, November and Brief Encounter, and coordinated such remarkable collaborations such as Marcus and The Tosca Project. Next at bat, and sure to be a hit: Armistead Maupin's Tales of the City-A New Musical.

Kevin and I already have tickets to two performances—the opening night gala, and of course Out with ACT night. Out with Tales? Can't wait!

And "the merch," a rarity for ACT, is already in.


Hats off to ACT.