The second of The Flea’s trio
of new plays is The Wundelsteipen,
by Nick Jones. The full title is actually The Wundelsteipen (and Other Difficult Roles For Young People)
and refers to setup for the show. The
piece is a number of short plays, as performed by young people at acting summer
camp. It is a device that allows any
number of inappropriate choices to be made, and they all seem to work. Having “young people” create these characters
brings them to life with less self-conciseness than an “adult” would
bring. An adult couldn’t very well come
into a story about why God would bring a baby to Heaven, and treat it as a
comedy. And, having The Bats (the Flea’s
resident players) play “children” allows the audience to laugh the actors in a
way that we could not, if they were actually youngsters.
.
The seven mini-plays range
from pitch perfect (and entirely inappropriate) to just okay, but the actors to
a great job with all of them.
 |
| Briana Pozner (the Wundelsteipen herself) and Alex Herrald |
My favorite of the various
plays, in both writing and acting, was Alex Herrald and Tommy Crawford in The Wundelsteipen. In this piece two brothers, hip deep in
puberty and internet porn, make a wish and are rewarded with a visit from the
sex fairy. But the sex-fairy has changed
a lot in an age where Playboy magazine is quaint and would hardly be rated
PG-13. Briana Pozner is a fairy, who’s
payment for wishes has changed with the times.
It is inappropriate on a million levels, and hilarious.
.
 |
| Tommy Crawford (standing) and Dominic Spillane (Caligula - in repose) |
Tommy Crawford played a slave
opposite Dominic Spillane as Caligula in Caligula
In The Morning. It was all about
the trials and tribulations of trying to wake up an Emperor that just doesn’t
want to get out of bed. It is an aspect
of Caligula that only a young person would be fascinated by. It was great.
.
The direction, by Tom Costello,
kept the cast and audience in the moment excellently. The show never grew past the idea of a bunch
of young people putting this together, and it wouldn’t have worked if it did.
.
All of the players
participated in the story Everybaby
– the story of a young baby summoned by God to Heaven to atone for his
sins. The child (played with wide eyed innocence
by Donaldo Prescod) doesn’t understand the idea of original sin, or why he can’t
get his playmates to go with him. Everybaby is a perfect example of
a story that reads differently when played by children, rather than adults - where someone might have really lost a child.
.
Not all the pieces worked for
me. College Romance and Salome both
seemed like SNL sketches that went on too long.
But the others were very good. The Wundelsteipen … was a very
funny time at the Flea.
The Wundelsteipen (and Other
Difficult Roles for Young People) @ The Flea Theater
Playwright: Nick Jones
Director: Tom Costello
Cast: Maren Langdon, Donaldo
Prescod, Dominic Spillane, Tommy Crawford, Hannah Corrigan, Eric Folks, Alex
Herrald, Briana Pozner
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