WHAT: Is Edward Snowden Single?
WHERE: Players' Ring
BLURB: Thought Provoking
HIGH POINT: Powerful Script with Performances to Match
TL;DR: A superb, mindful, witty and intriguing script, with first class performances. Inaugural regional production.
When a reviewer arrives home from a play and immediately contacts poets, visual artists, actors, as well as family and friends, to recommend a play and its performances, that says it all.
Is Edward Snowden Single? is a quirky, and deeply emotional, character and psychological study. Funny, smart, uncomfortable, even disturbing, it's an incredible journey, and great fodder for the mind.
The two-character play - plus Snowden - depicts a longtime friendship. It starts out light, intimate and casual. The two performers earnestly appear as if they're friends chatting up the audience before they begin sharing their story.
The action quickly picks up pace, moves through lots of engaging concepts and characters, and begins to build - to what or where you're not sure - then moves in for a tense, provocative and powerful finish. Dang, this thing is good.
Its focus is integrity, betrayal, choices and consequences - as its press says, it's about pretty lies and ugly truths.
The contemporary script by Kate Cortesi is compelling, its structure (fourth wall down) intriguing, and the conversation realistically penned. It delivers a wallop.
Ditto the three impeccable performances. Pure Joy.
Kari Buckley as Mimi and Maria Jung as April give jaw-dropping performances. They serve up the multiple characters each play - and trade off - on a silver platter.
As their main characters who tell the story, both women create poignant portrayals.
The numerous characters they bring to life include the droll male hipster, a young child, an elderly woman, and more. With each switch Buckley and Jung morph everything about their physicality; it all changes - mannerisms, carriage, facial gestures, the full texture of being.
Jung disappears as the hipster Gavin, the elderly Nanna and others. And, quite incredibly, Buckley completely alters Mimi's facial appearance as different aspects of the character emerge. What these women accomplish - demonstrate - is the true magic of theater at work here.
Then there is Tim Hackney as Snowden - simply another flawless, thoroughly convincing performance. His assured, even portrayal, in what is a very tricky role, is mesmerizing. Makes for a trifecta.
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