Open Wardrobes

On Saturday night Kelly and I caught the final performance of Robots vs. Fake Robots, the latest offering from Walking Shadow Theatre Company. (I know, I know, if I'm going to review a play I should do so while there's still a chance to go see it!) The play is science-fiction, set in the year 6000 where robots rule the world and organic life is all but extinct, save a handful of humans (who are clearly subservient to the robots). For about the first 5 minutes or so my main thought was, "This is just odd," but I have to admit, the play soon started to grow on me. It's an interesting theatrical challenge - how to have characters on stage (played by humans) feel like robots? Playwright David Largman Murray tackles this issue first by giving the robots a distinct, and certainly mechanical, pattern of speech, whereas the two human (or "peetle") characters speak in a natural style. Andrea Gross' wonderful costumes also heighten the sense of the robot characters as, while "perfect" (in their own minds, at least), artificial. The strong acting all around finished the job by creating the individual robot personalities that definitely do not feel human. And this sense also comes from the overall theme of the play - that while humans may not share the robots' "perfection," we do possess the emotion and thus compassion that they lack. The robots (with wonderfully salvaged names such as Nintendo 64 or Morse Code) for all their robot lovemaking are incredibly cold, killing the "peetles" who get in their way with barely a thought, leaving the humans to eke out a miserable existence in the shadows, trying to stay out of the way of the robots and their Underground Patrol.

The conflict of the play arises when Joe (played by John Catron), fascinated by the robots and their lifestyle, sets out to become one of them, aided by robot Kneepad (Nathan Surprenant) who can remove a human's most distinguishing feature: their scent. Joe does indeed pass himself off as a robot, but he is pursued by his girlfriend Sammie (Lindsay Marcy) who seeks to show him how cold and fake the world of the robots really is. The title itself suggests the robots' point of view, but Sammie alone understands that it is really the robots who are the fake humans and ultimately lack all that makes human life worth living.

All in all Kelly and I both really enjoyed the play. It is always a pleasure to see a piece that is strong all around, from the script to the acting to the technical elements, and here Walking Shadow certainly did not disappoint. I personally feel it is the strongest of the scripts they have presented this year and hope to see scripts of a similar caliber in their roster next season (not yet announced).

And while it's too late to catch this show, Walking Shadow will be making an appearance at this summer's Fringe Festival with SQUAWK, written by company member John Heimbuch. I am a little sad that their originally planned show (Scrimshaw: the Unauthorized Biography) won't be happening, but the tagline of their new show reads, "An elite military intelligence training program. Two officers. One penguin. Who will make it out?" And really, can you ever go wrong with penguins?