What do a baton twirler, an ex-rodeo rider and an actress desperately trying to get a job have in common?
According to Gail Humphries Mardirosian, the director of AU production, “Talking With,” it’s an odd question that makes sense after seeing the play in the Katzen Studio Theatre.
“Talking With” is a monologue show written by author Jane Martin that features an all-female cast (with the exception of two male stage managers who made cameos) depicting the struggles of modern women.
Like any good monologue show, the characters span a wide range of circumstances and emotional peaks and valleys.
At the lowest valley there was sophomore Elizabeth Bartolotta portraying with deft subtlety a woman recounting the last days of her mother’s life; and at the highest peak there was sophomore Sarah King as the adorably deranged McDonald’s lady who would like nothing more than to share the gospel of plastic with the world.
Musical numbers peppered the monologues to provide a bit more variety.
The performances were uniformly spectacular, dredging both despair and delight and finding those elusive moments when glimpses of one invade the other.
There is an inherent danger in monologue shows becoming monotonous where the meaning gets lost in the words, and there is an inherent danger in shows with feminist themes becoming collections of clichés that have been addressed hundreds of times before.
“Talking With” fell into neither of these traps, and instead presented a collection of real women withAnd it was a good thing the audience did not appear bored, because the production took its title very seriously.
Intimacy was the goal from the start. The 10 principal women started the show perching on the railings behind and flanking the audience and delivered the first collective monologue over their heads.
They took any opportunity during the show to interact with the audience, posing questions, sitting among them and generally making them a part of the show as much as possible.
A particularly poignant example occurred when junior Emily Goodell, portraying the baton twirler from the director’s note, offered her baton to a man in the front row to hold as she explained its deep significance in her life. The moment took the monologue to a place it might not have reached otherwise as we peaked through the fourth wall for just a moment to get a better sense of a character.
The musical interludes between monologues were generally well placed and relevant. The numbers that opened the first and second acts deserve special note, as they were tightly choreographed and complemented the monologues they bordered well.
Performances of “Red Neck Woman” by John Rich and “Tell Them” by Corinne Aquilina however depicted nothing but stereotypes of Southern women and “housewives,” respectively, and nearly dispelled the charm of the realistic women presented until then.
It was frustrating to see a unique and thought-provoking portrayal of a female rodeo champion who laments the commercialization of her passion immediately be reduced to a “redneck woman” in the subsequent musical number.
Such moments were few and forgivable in the grander scheme of the show, but their presence represented a red mark of banality in an otherwise stimulating production.
Ignoring these blemishes, “Talking With” is a rare production that sets a clear goal and accomplishes it without the use of gimmicks or overdone spectacle.
It wanted to tell a set of stories about how women in the real world deal with their real problems, and it wanted to enhance that story by cracking and at certain points outright dissolving the fourth wall.
So just what do the baton twirler, the rodeo champion and the actress have in common? According to Professor Mardirosian, that is up to the audience to decide after talking with them.
