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Mud - Photo by Bryan Feir
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Estragon: Yes, let’s go.
They do not move.
Curtain.
1953 was a watershed year in the history of theatre. Samuel Beckett premiered En Attendant Godot at the Theatre de Babylone on Paris’ Left Bank, which crystallized existential struggle in a new poetic form. The young Cuban playwright Maria Irene Fornes was in the audience during that first season and the tragicomic dilemma of Godot profoundly colored her body of work.
Mud, Fornes’ 1983 play, is a clothesline of dirty laundry strung between Vladimir and Estragon’s ending to Godot. An unapologetic and unflinching look at the desperation of rural poverty, director Samantha Johns frames the play with American blues and a simple interior set of a home, which immediately conveys age and abuse. The cast is small, three characters that expertly wring the comic moments from looming tragedy.
The protagonist, in that she is the most sympathetic character, is Mae, played by Alisa Mattson. The home is her birthplace, where she has grown up with Lloyd, played by Steve Horstmann. Mae and Lloyd’s relationship is confused to say the least. As Mae explains to Henry (Jason Ballweber), they are “like animals who grew up together and mate.” The delineation between animals and humans is a crux of Mud; the title itself refers to the living conditions of pigs. The scars of emotional and sexual abuse are evident throughout the play, which each character manifests in different evocative ways, such as Mae’s numb demeanor as abuse is heaped upon her, the diseased rage and insecurity of Lloyd and the manipulative lust of Henry.
The tragic aspects of the characters are in counterpoint to Mae’s desire to be different and better. Mattson brings up choked tears as she describes the struggle between her “baseness” and her “hungry soul.” There is pathos in her reading aloud about starfish, struggling through each word, which is critical to the play’s deceptive simplicity. The animal tension between Lloyd and Henry as they compete for the care and affection of Mae brings about some of the most comic moments. Horstmann’s gaunt physique and sudden gestures play to great effect against Ballweber’s porcine, condescending sneer.
Mud is a tour-de-force effort of acting and blunt direction. The provocative, delicate work circumscribes difficult questions of the survival of the psyche and the depths of human need. It is a brave play indeed—and a brave production.
Location Info:
Bedlam Theatre
Artist Info: Bedlam Theatre
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