Category: The Shaker

PITTSBURGH – A father and son acting duo will be taking center stage in the world premiere of Tim Ruppert’s The Consorts (June 2-12) to kick off The Summer Company’s 23rd season. 

It’s a frigid evening in England, 1556, and Archbishop Thomas Cranmer faces a fiery execution come morning. But when fate offers him an escape, Cranmer must choose between life and death—as well as between the ghosts of Queens Anne Boleyn and Katherine of Aragon, both of whom want Cranmer’s soul.  Directed by John E. Lane, Jr., The Consorts is a witty, time-shifting drama/comedy chronicling the last days of Archbishop Thomas Cranmer (John Yost), attended by Nicholas Woodson (Nathaniel Yost) and visited by the ghosts of Anne Boleyn (Coleen Garrison) and Katherine of Aragon (Jill Jeffrey).  

John Yost, the well-regarded film, TV, and voice-over artist, is a Duquesne University graduate returning to the stage after an 18-year hiatus in order to perform with his son Nathaniel, a junior theater arts major at the university. Garrison is a sophomore at Duquesne, Jeffrey is a theater arts instructor there, and playwright Rupert is also an alumni. Director Lane runs the theater arts program at the university.

All shows take place at Duquesne University’s new Genesius Theater. Tickets are $15, $10 for senior citizens, and $5 for students. Group rates are also available. Tickets and information at www.thesummercompany.com

By Michael “Buzz” Buzzelli, ‘Burgh Vivant

When droll British bachelor, Richard Hannay (Allan Synder) goes out for an entertaining evening of theater, he becomes embroiled in a web of espionage in “The 39 Steps,” a delightfully, funny play loosely (LOOSELY) based on the Alfred Hitchcock movie, which itself is based on John Buchan’s novel.

Hannay is bored with his life until he goes to the aforementioned show (a show within a play based on a movie based on a book…I can do this all day). A mnemonist aptly named Mr. Memory (one of Quinn Patrick Shannon’s crazy characters) stuns the audience with his eidetic memory tricks. A mysterious woman, Annabella Schmidt (Megan Pickrell), joins Hannay in the proscenium box. Annabella draws a gun and fires into the crowd. That’s when things get crazy. Actually, things start crazy and get crazier.

Annabella demands to go home with him, and he obliges eagerly. Once the blinds are drawn, she backs up a metaphorical truck and info dumps, revealing many plot points and tips that Hannay will need later, including a map to Alt Na Shellach, a resplendent home to Professor Jordan (one of Luke Halferty’s nutty characters).

When Annabella ends up dead in his apartment, the game is truly afoot. Hannay is on the run from the police (Quinn Patrick Shannon and Luke Halferty), villains (also Quinn Patrick Shannon and Luke Halferty), and various weirdos (once again, Quinn Patrick Shannon and Luke Halferty). If not for a crofter’s coat and the fortuitously well-placed hymn book, Hannay would be pushing up daisies. It’s a twisted plot, but the plot doesn’t really matter.

Everyone in the show is double, triple and quadruple cast except for Snyder who sticks to playing the lead. He does a superb job as the dashing hero, and he has terrific chemistry with Pickrell, who is enchanting (especially as Pamela). It’s Pickrell’s first foray onto the Pittsburgh stage, and here’s hoping we see a lot more of her.

This show isn’t really about the protagonist and his love interest(s).  Playwright Patrick Barlow, who adapted the story, flipped the script, not just with crazy antics and comedic misdirection. Its biggest performances come from the wacky extras. Constantin Stanislavski once said, “There are no small parts, only small actors.” Director Guy Stroman cast big actors to fill a bunch of small parts. Halferty and Shannon play myriad roles, zany underwear salesman on a train, police officers, paperboys, townspeople, old people, young people, men and women.  There’s a balletic synchronicity between the two  men, and it is uproariously funny. It’s the precision of their movements that cause the largest fits of laughter. We get to see their hijinks ensue on the Scottish highlands, on a  bumpy locomotive and in makeshift cars (plains, trains and automobiles?).

There are a lot of moving pieces in this play, and they are all executed flawlessly. Kudos to the entire crew. Even lighting designer Andrew David Ostroswki and sound designer Bob Bollman get into the act with a visual and auditory gag involving the title of the show.

It’s all quite silly when you get down to it, but it charms with an exceptional cast. Take as many steps as you need, run down and get tickets.

“The 39 Steps” runs all through summer (August 14, 2016) at the Cabaret at Theater Square, 655 Penn Avenue, Pittsburgh, PA 15222. For more information, click here.

Thursday, June 9  |  8PM

At the New Hazlett Theater

Tickets: $20 in advance, $25 at the door

“I am what I remember…what I remember, is what I am.”

More than simply a dance performance, memory 4 follows performers through a landscape of seemingly insurmountable tasks, spiraling to ascension as they merge sound and image, body and spirit. Throughout the ritual, memory decays and is redefined in each passing moment.  We begin to see memory as a place one can enter to re-experience and reflect, to move forward or retreat.

Under the direction of Taylor Knight and Anna Thompson, slowdanger works within multidisciplinary collaborations between dancers, musicians, and visual artists. slowdanger is inspired by and explores relationship, the way two or more things/people are connected. Taylor and Anna use performance as ritual practice to delve into patterns of the circular rhythm of life.

The New Hazlett Theater is located at 6 Allegheny Square East, Pittsburgh, PA 15212. For more information, click here.

By Michael “Buzz” Buzzelli, ‘Burgh Vivant

Songwriter and storyteller Benjamin Scheuer takes a powerful, personal journey of self-exploration in “The Lion” at the City Theatre.

Scheuer tells a story of his life. It’s not an easy tale to tell, and he’s not always the hero. With a guitar on his lap, and a song in his heart, Scheuer tells his story mostly in verse. His narrative goes from incredibly sweet to horrifyingly tragic, peppering the moments between songs with anecdotes of his life. It’s an evocative, truthful tale and it’s not always comfortable. But it’s exceptionally well done.

He begins with an endearing account of his early childhood. His father creates a cookie-tin banjo with a rubber band for a string and an old necktie for a strap. He paints a vivid picture of his early family life with his English mother, two brothers and a mathematician father. The relationship with his father is complex. He tells an unflinchingly truthful chronicle of their difficulties. You can hear the guilt, pain and remorse in his voice when his father passes away at a completely inconvenient moment; right after a family-fracturing argument.

He reports on his love life, his bout with a bone-eating cancer and additional family incidents. He covers an amazing about of territory in the brief seventy-minute show.

At the Saturday late afternoon show, he mastered two impromptu moments. Someone sneezed during a pause as he switched guitars, and he said, “Bless you.” The audience erupted in laughter and he said, “I know you guys are here,” which caused even more uproarious laughter. In a more awkward moment, a cell phone rang, and he politely paused the show until the ringing stopped. It was a gracious and endearing moment void of any ridicule or malice from the performer.

Most of the songs are folksy with an edge, but he rocks out on an electric guitar to a ballad about his dad in “Saint Rick.” Scheuer hits hard with some very emotional moments. It’s hard to keep your eyes dry during the show.

The entire evening is very minimalistic. It’s just Scheuer and his guitars (six in all).  Scenic Designer Neil Patel makes the space visually impactful with a shabby chic set, and there is moody lighting from Lighting Designer Ben Stanton.

Director Sean Daniels keeps the show a taut seventy minutes, but you’ll leave feeling intimately connected to Scheuer. We learn a lot about him in his short time on stage.

Bad and possibly overused pun alert:

“The Lion” is a roaring success!

“The Lion” plays through June 5 at The City Theatre, 1300 Bingham Street, Pittsburgh, PA 15203. For more information, click here.

– MB

By Mike “Buzz” Buzzelli, ‘Burgh Vivant

Stephen Sondheim has never been big on plot. His plotless musical “Company” is about a group of middle and upper class friends singing about their lives. “Assassins,” with a book by John Weidman, takes that idea one step further and has America’s most notorious killers sing about their lives and deaths. The show could easily be called, “Killer Company.”

“Assassins” starts out with eight infamous and some lesser-known assassins, Leon Czolgosz (Darrel Whitney), John Hinckley, Jr. (Corwin Stoddard), Charles Guiteau (Chad Elder), Giuseppe Zangara (Mark McConnell), Samuel Byck (Rob James), Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme (Kassie Doherty), Sara Jane Moore (Stephanie Ottey), and John Wilkes Booth (Stanley Graham). Let’s call them the Assassin Eight (say it out loud).  The Assassin Eight are joined by the Proprietor (Nathan Hough) and the Balladeer (Connor Bahr) and various townspeople (the ensemble). These madmen and women are later joined by Lee Harvey Oswald to become the Assassin Nine.

Speaking of asinine…each killer explains why they want to murder their respective president. Guiteau murdered James A. Garfield because the president didn’t hire him. Hinckley shot at Ronald Reagan in an attempt to win the love of Jodie Foster (ain’t gonna happen, buddy). Squeaky Fromme attempted to kill Gerald Ford to impress Charles Manson. There true life reasons are ludicrious.

Sondheim and Weidman throw the assassins into a blender and mix repeatedly. Characters from the Civil War chat to characters from the 60s, 70s and 80s. These lunatics co-mingle at a county fair. You’ll never find such a more wretched hive of scum and villainy as you will in “Assassins.”

The Proprietor and the Balladeer attempt to hold everything together. It doesn’t really gel until Oswald (Bahr) shows up, and we get the barest semblance of a plot. A murder plot. “Assassins” finally delivers an emotional punch with the song, “Something just broke,” set to a montage of actual newspaper headlines from the various assassinations and an extended clip of the Zapruder film. It’s a powerful, moving moment that brings the show to a close and wraps it up in a neat, little bow.

There are some killer performances in “Assassins.” Graham has a masterful command of the stage as John Wilkes Booth. Doherty is far from squeaky when she sings. She knocks them dead with her vocals. Elder chews the scenery with every step on stage. The actors even looked like their murderous counterparts. It’s an amazing feat for a group of community players marvelously cast by Director Nick Mitchell.

By the way, the show led to some serious disscussions and a desire to learn more about these ne’er-do-wells. It’s an interesting and entertaining way to get a history lesson. With shows like “Bloody, Bloody Andrew Jackson,” and “Hamilton” its all the rage. Don’t take the children, if you’re sensitive to foul language.

Speaking of foul language…there are humorous soliloquies by Rob James as Byck. He’s dressed in a dirty Santa suit and espouses some serious crazy. His monologues are some of the best moments of the show. They are also the easiest to understand because the orchestra wasn’t playing when he was talking.

Therein lies the rub. The orchestra overpowered the performers. Music Director Michael Meketa led a group consisting of two keyboardists (Meketa manned first keyboard), a guitar, bass, drums, reeds, trumpets and a trombone. They all played beautifully, but they played over the singing. Even though the performers were equipped with microphone headsets, they were rendered nearly inaudible by the big, boisterous sound of the band. Whenever a mic cut out, which, admittedly, did not happen very often, the show went all Marcel Marceau. It may be a hazard of the venue but it was very frustrating.

Mitchell would have a hit on his hands if he could tone down the sound on the band and pump up the volume on the actors. As we all know, every assassin needs a good hit.

(“Assassins” plays through May 22 at the Andrew Carnegie Free Library and Music Hall, 300 Beechwood Avenue, Carnegie, PA 15106, for more information, click here).