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About Just out. (Portland, OR) 1983-2013 | View Entire Issue (Jan. 17, 2003)
January 17.2003 * Jaat a a t j^ THEATER ............... '▼ ................ Albee all over Two theater companies celebrate the m aster of American drama by C h r is t o p h e r M c Q u a in ortlanders have numerous opportunities during the next several months to partici pate in the bona fide case of Edward Albee fever sweeping the Rose C ity (as well as the rest of the country). Portland C enter Stage is producing the gay playwright’s W ho’s Afraid o f Virginia W oolf? through Feh. 9 at Newmark Theatre. O n e of A lbee’s best-known works, this complex, fasci nating (three-hour!) drama reveals an evening in the life of married couple George and Martha drunkenly playing host to a younger couple in their home following a faculty party. Meanwhile, on the other side of the river, Profile Theatre Project presents Seascape through Feb. 16 at Theater! Theatre! as part of its all-Albee season. (See review.) Those who attend Profile’s Jan. 19 matinee can stay after the show for a “mat chat,” which, according to marketing and development direc tor George Taylor, is “a great chance for the audience to talk with the director and actors about the production they have just seen.” O n Feb. 8, the man him self will be at Port land State U niversity’s Lincoln Hall for a free Seascape-oriented Q & A . “T h e seeds for arranging this visit were planted hack in June when I attended a playwrights confer e n c e ... with which Edward A lbee’s been involved for the past 10 years,” says Jane Unger, Profile’s artistic director. “He was eatingout eatingout Pizza, Salad, Sandwiches, and Oregon Microbrews sold here Free Delivery (óO th-Rivcr, GlisarrlVoodstock) extremely pleased that Profile was doing a season o f his work.” Financially, though, get ting Edward Albee to your “new and small theater com pany,” she continues, is daunting. “We could have Nancy and Charlie brought him to visit through Project’s Seascape his lecture agent.... Howev er, it was too large a financial undertaking.... Instead we’re working with him directly. He’s been extremely generous in agreeing to speak to Profile’s audience and will be donating his fee back to his Playwright’s Foundation.” Adds Mead Hunter, literary director at Portland C enter Stage: “Edward Albee is a national treasure. T h e resurgence of interest in [his] work these days proves that people have caught on to that— again.... It was easy for Americans to forget about him during the years when he wasn’t creating large-scale ‘hits.’ But as recent years have proven, he is a major artist working at the top of his creative powers.” j o l Tickets to W ho ’ s A fraid of V irginia W oolf ? at Newmark Theatre, 1111 S.W. Broadway, are $12-$47 from the box office or 503-274-6588. Tickets to SEASCAPE at Theater! Theatre!, 3430 S .E . Belmont St., are $!2-$25 from 503-242-0080. eatingout eatingout '^ u cim ^ n " jis tr o netgnbor’kood b a r I 3 1 9 1 TO Tried it yet? Now there's breakfast have quite a day at the beach in Profile’s Theatre R E V 1 EIIU I espite the expansive implications o f the play’s title, Profile Theatre Project’s new production of Edward Albee’s Seascape is perfectly suited for the company’s inti m ate venue at Theater! Theatre! The tw o-act comedic drama, which won the Pulitzer Prize in 1975, benefits greatly from a sense of isolation for its surprising surrealism to work. Thanks to the closeness of the space and Curt Enderle’s unassuming minia ture-seashore set, the play’s action really does feel cut off, far away from the everyday— perfect for the work’s expressly reflective, metaphorical tone. Seascape presents the audience with an upper-middle-class retired couple, Nancy (JoAnn Johnson) and Charlie (Tobias Ander son), who find themselves in the midst of an ennui-infused marital crisis during a day at the eatingout eatingout beach— and their encounter with creatures of the sea, specifically what appear to be two giant, I talking lizards named Sarah (Kimberly Howard) and Leslie (Tony St. C lair). It’s Nancy who carries the burden of the play’s overarching evolutionary metaphor con cerning the opposing modes of stasis and mobili ty, complacency and engagement, life and death. “Grow or die,” Albee tells us through her. It’s hardly a new or radical idea about aging and vitality— a theme just as effectively dealt with on The Golden Girls— but Albee’s ability Co pin point very specific pockets of human pain ami emotional urgency effectively brings it home. W ith N ancy’s incessant pleading with her husband— a man content to lie in the sun and wait to die— to turn their golden years into an adventure, she’s a sort of bearer o f existential life force, refusing to make things comfortable for Charlie— in fact making things uncomfort able in order to keep him moving. Albee’s plays have been said to contain in their heterosexual relationships veiled, symbolic depictions of gay male couples. It’s an interest ing and plausible way to interpret Seascape, but, in the end, it seems beside the point, as does N ancy and Charlie’s very apparent material security. Their leisure-class existence deserves a theme play o f its own, but it’s a context that allows a deeper humanistic exploration of uni versai emotional and spiritual worries. There are noticeable flaws— the playwright coasts a little on the lizards, who are obvious constructions in aid of his them atic scheme, which itself comes to seem a tad self- impressed— but Profile’s staging o f the piece, the performances (especially Anderson’s) and some sharp life-and-death insights should make atten dance a priority for Portland theatergoers. JH eatingout eatingout W illiam 's en 12 "v^ French Cuieine 3oth Open 7 Daye a week 2 0 7 5E 12th (5 0 3 ) 9 6 3 - 9 2 2 6 3701 SE Havrtliome 503-231-0901 Why not C T 2^ L - 2 8 “ casual mediterranean café & wine bar ~ Casual Dining ~ Lounge ~ Game Room Open 4:00 Daily 120 NW Third Avenue, Portland, OR 97209 • (503) 224-3285 Parking Validated Smart Park Davis & Front www hobos.citysearch.com ~ ~ ~ ~ Try o u r sp e cia ls *2°° Tuesdays Wine Down W ednesdays LVmc m tifiti M>fv lii'tiwM m \ p 'in uuMir/i ‘Free 12 22 . 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