Feeding the Moonfish (Repeats July 22, 31 and Aug 1, 7)

There are a number of plays, usually taking place in the American South and usually involving a small body of water, in which a lonely man and a lonelier woman discover each other through semi-poetic conversation about each other’s pasts. Talley’s Folly and The Trestle at Pope Lick Creek are superior examples of this strain of drama. Barbara Wiechmann’s Feeding the Moonfish is far less gripping.

In WingSpan’s production of the play, Josh Glover plays Martin, a burger joint cook who goes to the swamps every night to talk to the moonfish surrounding the dock. They talk back. Barrett Nash plays Eden, who hides away in the back of his truck and discovers his strange tradition. Both are deeply troubled by something in their pasts, and the play’s highlight is a competition they have to see who has had the more anguished life. Susan Sargeant’s direction and Lowell Sargeant’s sound and set design made WingSpan’s entry into the Festival of Independent Theaters a worthy effort. Set in a Florida swamp, where a creaky old dock sits over the water, the atmosphere was instantly affecting. You can see how someone might get desperate here.

On the whole, though, the play took itself too seriously. When Nash entered, her voice registered in that high-stakes epiphany tone usually reserved for a play’s climax, and it never relented. In fact, the play stayed at a consistently serious level, even in moments which seemed to call for levity. Contrasting Nash’s energy, Glover was perfect as a baffled but forceful Southern boy, who longs desperately to escape his lot. Both Glover and Nash had impressive moments, but by the time Glover delivered the play’s climactic monologue, there was nowhere left to go. The two of them had been so soul-baring already.

Then there’s the issue of the talking moonfish. The layered recording of several women’s voices sounded too robotic. It is unclear whether these unseen fish, which form a “silver river” around the dock, are real or in Martin’s imagination. Either way, they were neither ethereal nor emotive enough. Their bizarre presence caused a few too many snickers in an otherwise hushed audience. Perhaps, when a play deals with the somber unraveling of two souls, it’s hard to make talking fish fit.

Alice in Wonderland (Repeats July 24, 20 and Aug 1, 7)

White Rock Pollution’s Alice in Wonderland is based on Andre Gregory’s Alice, a 1970 Manhattan Project ensemble creation, created before Gregory decided he hated American theater and fled to Poland to find himself in forest spiritual communities. As such, the play is rather un-Aristotelian in its form, just as Lewis Carroll’s original text is hopelessly anecdotal. Director Tom Parr IV’s adaptation engages the audience in a joyous chaos, full of makeshift theater tricks that brought a good portion of Saturday’s audience to its feet at curtain call.

Despite its chaotic nature, Parr’s Alice is actually far more literal an interpretation of the story than it might seem, although it chooses to focus on lesser known moments and characters. It also forgoes powerful characters like the Mock Turtle and Bill the Lizard, and includes two characters from Through the Looking Glass, Humpty Dumpty and the White Knight.

Danielle Pickard plays Alice and a gifted ensemble surrounds her, huddled in a New York street alley under trash. Using the junk as props, they whip her through Wonderland, playing all the parts and constructing all of the visual effects on the spot. Guiding her through the charming and fast-paced play, the ensemble is flawless.  And there are many thrilling moments—Alice becoming huge and tiny, for example, or the way Ben Bryant becomes the Caterpillar, with colorful umbrellas as his mushroom, and using a truly wonderful trick (which I won’t spoil) to make his sluggy torso.

The play begins to lose momentum, though, in its mad dash to the end of the story, and it never finds an ending. The same might be said of Carroll’s original story, but it is the duty of any theatrical interpretation to find moments that create an arc. Even though Randy Pearlman is hilarious as Humpty Dumpty, and Brian Witkowicz is heartbreaking as the White Knight, it is random and unsatisfying that their two scenes serve as the play’s climax .

Throughout all of her many iterations in all media, Alice has remained a stagnant character, which is disappointing, since Carroll’s portrait of her is fascinating and dark. Oh, for an Alice who actually makes decisions, who makes things happen rather than letting everything happen to her! Until then, it is always a joy to see talented performers embody the wide cast of wacky characters, and White Rock Pollution’s version is as good as any, if not better.

Main image: The cast of White Rock Pollution’s Alice in Wonderland (Courtesy Photo)