By Ernest Kearney – I want every show I see to leave me gaping in wide-mouth wonderment. I want to dash from the theater and run from stranger to stranger shaking them by the shoulders and begging them, “Please, please, see this show! It’ll fix your marriage, it’ll cure your ED. It’s that amazing!”
That doesn’t happen much. And it pains me that it doesn’t.
But nothing, and I do mean nothing, is more agonizing than when I am forced to compose a critical post mortem of a show that my heart was secretly rooting for.
I was rooting for The Border, described as “a Russian anti-war self-confession,” a “dramatic poem,” supported by the RimoVision Group and “Russian America for Democracy in Russia.”
To the annoyance of friends who are threatening to boot me out of the “Liberal Club” of America, I support the policies of the Biden Administration in the Ukraine. I’ve made a point of seeking out and reviewing plays concerned with Putin’s suppression of the Russian people and his war against the Ukrainians, and I’ve written about the Worldwide Ukrainian Play Reading Project[1]. I sought out The Border early in my Fringe, in order that I could begin spreading the word about what a wonderful show it was.
Except, it wasn’t.
In truth, The Border was as far from a ‘wonderful show” as can be imagined.
The Border had one director, one assistant director/stage manager, one translator, one producer, two production assistants, one designer, one costume designer, one set designer, one composer, one dialect coach, one SM manager, one actor, one playwright, two PR/public relations managers and from what I saw absolutely no one who knew what the hell they were doing.
An online bio about playwright Sergei Davydov describes him as an author of “over 30 plays presented on stages throughout the world,” whose poems and novels have been translated into “many languages” including Japanese.
There were no other online resumes available from anyone else involved in this production, which would explain the hour-long train wreck I was forced to endure.
[1] Hosted in Los Angeles by City Garage in Santa Monica
* ‘CADENZA‘
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Playing During the Hollywood Fringe Festival 2024
at
ACTORS COMPANY (LET LIVE THEATER)
916 N. Formosa Ave
DATES
Thursday June 13 2024, 7:00 PM | 1hr
Sunday June 30 2024, 7:30 PM | 1hr
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