Last Friday night I was banned from the Guild’s front row if I wear red and come to a comedy. I couldn’t control myself. The play is way too funny for me, and so I was laughing–and I plead my case to Artsnet. Sometimes, laughing is uncontrollable. What is controllable, I’ll admit, is the color I’m wearing and where I sit. But I was running late, and the front row has fantastic leg room. I had no idea that I might be distracting to the actresses pulling off this coup of a play. I certainly couldn’t tell; they were very professional at hiding their laughter.
Friday evening, through with a long string of shows at YAC, I got to go on a mini-vacation. I went to Boston Marriage at the Guild. You’d think you’d be “show”ed out, with all the cool things happening in Whitehorse, but Boston Marriage doesn’t feel as if you’ve gone to a show. It feels like someone snuck you into someone else’s living room to watch. And it’s refreshing and touching and funny.
The Guild, after a few plays where characters yell at each other, comes up with a love story, where the leads may bicker at each other a bit, but who resoundly care for each other at their heart–and their sniping isn’t just regular sniping. It’s David Mamet sniping. That’s like the Caviar of sniping. Okay, for comparison, Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf was hot salsa sniping. Sharp, angled, hook-like and a bit cruel. Mamet’s language is so rich and perfect–it tastes way too expensive for your mouth (which is why hearing it from Katherine McCallum and Moira Sauer makes it even funnier–they know how to wrap their tongues around every word-morsel).
So I laughed, and laughed and laughed…(cringing) and couldn’t stop. I was surprised that they didn’t stop the play to let me finish. But they couldn’t–and when they went on, well, it compounded the laughter–and now I was laughing at new stuff, on top of the previous funny lines, and my laughter got worse. I was very lucky I didn’t pass out, though I think Moira and Katherine both probably would have liked it if I lost just a teensy bit of oxgyen along the way. Not that I ever covered up a line. Not that I ever was so loud others couldn’t hear the jokes. In fact, in FACT, others were laughing just as much as I was. (But, they weren’t wearing red and they were sitting farther away–hence a more acceptable laughter.) The whole room shook like puppies in Christmas box.
Bear Witness 