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THEATER REVIEW: ‘Clean House’ can be a tad cluttered
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
THEATER REVIEW. Grade: B
Two sisters and a maid. A woman who laughs herself to death. And a doctor who storms Alaska in pursuit of a cancer-curing tree.
Like hybrid creations from the case studies of Oliver Sacks and the fictions of Jorge Luis Borges, such characters dance through the magical world of Sarah Ruhl’s “The Clean House” — a sweet, lovely surprise of a play at Horizon Theatre that meditates on the fickle chemistry of happiness and housekeeping, dust and desire, laughter and forgiveness.
Ruhl, lest you haven’t heard, is a MacArthur Foundation “genius” grant winner, Pulitzer Prize finalist and all-around golden girl of contemporary drama. Starting out as a poet, she was coaxed from the garret by Brown University professor/playwright Paul Vogel, who insisted that the prodigious writer try her hand at drama. Vogel (“How I Learned to Drive”) claims the results— including the brand-new “Dead Man’s Cell Phone” and “Eurydice,” recently seen in an elegant Alliance Theatre production — are her greatest contribution to American theater.
When overworked medical doctor Lane (Carolyn Cook) hires the dreamy Brazilian joke writer Matilde (Suehyla El-Attar) to keep her house, she discovers that her tolerance for dust is about as short as her capacity for forgiveness.
Fortunately for Matilde, Lane’s sister Virginia (Jill Jane Clements) likes to clean, an obsession that seems to be a device for sublimating her desires and disappointments. Unfortunately for Lane, her surgeon-husband Charles (James Donadio) falls under the spell of one of his mastectomy patients, a free-spirited Argentinian woman named Ana (Mary Lynn Owen). (The scene involving their operatic, operating-table love-making is a stitch.)
As it turns out, Ana reminds Matilde of her mother, whose death by laughter was a giddy tribute to the joke-telling skills of Ana’s father. When we first spy Matilde, she is telling us a joke — in Portuguese.
Ruhl’s intricately laced ironies and touches of magic realism call for a delicate, almost languid approach. Though director Lisa Adler and company deliver a production that’s handsomely designed and performed, some subtleties of Ruhl’s dreamy, absurdist philosophy get lost in the broadly comic, overly choreographed staging.
As polar opposites on the behavioral spectrum, Cook’s uptight Lane and Owen’s delightfully quirky Ana are the heart and soul of this rich stew. Stuck in an atrocious long gray wig, Owen nonetheless manages to convey how Ana’s beauty comes from within. (Notice how this woman relishes a good apple, and a good joke.)
Donadio’s understated style is a nice foil to the gayety, but it would be interesting to see how another actor might exploit his character’s inventive nature. Clements manages to add yet more wrinkles to her endless supply of facial tics. But you wish that dialect coach Cynthia Barrett could evince a more authentic sounding accent from El-Attar, who has become a favorite go-to actress for playing big-hearted ethnic types.
Sound designer Chris Bartelski’s choice of Brazilian singers Joao Gilberto and Virginia Rodriques enhance the play’s notes of saudade, and Tamara McElhannon’s all-white interior is smartly realized and visually handsome.
This production may be a tad disappointing at times — the tone sometimes uses vacuum-cleaner aggressiveness where feather-duster gentleness might have sufficed — but it’s certainly not a mess. Let love and laughter into your soul, the playwright seems to be saying, and don’t worry so much about the dust and drek of outward appearances. Probably no one cares what’s under your rug — but you.
The 411: 8 p.m. Wednesdays-Fridays. 8:30 p.m. Saturdays. 5 p.m. Wednesdays. Through June 29. Horizon Theatre, 1083 Austin Ave., Little Five Points. 404-584-7450, horizontheatre.com
Bottom line: A nice glimpse into the mind of a celebrated young playwright.
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Comments
By frank velazquez
June 6, 2008 11:49 AM | Link to this
As a Spanish speaking American I was very interested in attending The Clean House. I’m very well acquainted with the Atlanta theatre scene and it never ceases to disappoint me when they try to pass a non Spanish/Portuguese speaker for one.
No doubt these ladies are talented and in physical appearance could pass for the ethnic background they portray, but really! Not only was El Attar’s Portuguese-English dialect terrible, making it very difficult to accept that she was actually a newly arrived Brazilian but Owen’s Spanish was AWFUL not to mention it wasn’t even remotely Argentinian! At least El Attar was able to do the Portuguese relatively well.
Why are the same people used for “ethnic” roles that they clearly cannot pass off believably? Are there no Spanish speaking actors in all of Atlanta? If so, why are they not being used for such roles?
Do the directors not anticipate there will be audience members who can actually tell the difference?
I had such high hopes for this production. Given that is was a professional show and Lisa Adler directing I had expected a little more attention that important detail.
By Maclare
June 7, 2008 6:13 PM | Link to this
It’s not Paul, but PAULA Vogel.
Just sayin’.