"It's just too difficult to be alive, isn't it, and to try to function?"
Uttered at the show's opening, this line perfectly summed up the tone of "Laughing Wild," the truncated play by award-winning playw right Christopher Durang performed last Friday and Saturday in the Production Workshop's upstairs space. Directed by Karin Freed '09, this well-executed abbreviation coaxed new life into the often-tired themes of modern-day discontent and the difficulty of human connection.
Unfolding in three parts, "Laughing Wild" consisted of two monologues and a closing dream sequence. Cut down from its original running time of two hours, this 45-minute version managed to capture accurately the psychological complexities of its two main characters without sacrificing Durang's humor.
The first monologue, delivered by a woman dressed in black (Ana Carolina Varela '09), portrays an absurdly unbalanced, self-indulgent individual. Once settled into her role, Varela kept the audience's attention by injecting manic outbursts into otherwise calm descriptions of her neurotic episodes. These include assaulting a man over a can of tuna, engaging in a vicious fight with a taxi driver and joining Alcoholics Anonymous solely for acceptance. It is a credit to Varela's pacing and comedic timing that material begging to be rushed through was not and that the audience came to empathize and laugh along with a potentially irritating and dismissible character.
For the second monologue, Davis Jung '09 played a man somewhat meeker than the woman but equally as unable to extract happiness from life. Having attended a series of "personality workshops," the man has learned several positive thinking exercises, which he shares with the audience. Unfortunately, even as he performs the exercises during his monologue, they begin to fail him. This is especially true as he recounts how an irrational woman struck him for refusing to give her access to the tuna fish section at the supermarket. His negative descent continues as he describes the shock he experienced upon learning of the 1986 Bowers v. Hardwick Supreme Court ruling, which allowed states to ban homosexual sex acts (during the play's inception, this ruling was overturned in 2003 in Lawrence v. Texas). Though Jung's delivery was hesitant at times, the second monologue proved to be a poignant piece that complimented the show's first half.
In the play's concluding scene, which included a memorable appearance by Oksana Babchenko '09 as a traumatized child, the man and woman act out variations of their encounter during the tuna fish incident, all of which end badly. It isn't until the scene transitions to a dream state that they are able to interact harmoniously with one another and show compassion for each other's point of view. "Just breathe" is the take-away lesson here, and the show ends with the characters slowly inhaling and exhaling.
With its sparse structure and plot, excess scenery was not essential to "Laughing Wild," making it a perfect fit for the upstairs space. Although it did not enjoy a particularly long run, this play carried a powerful punch and served as a thoughtful addition to the spring theater season.
