Arts & Entertainment
Lives overlapping
U.S. premiere of German play gets tight Studio production
‘The Golden Dragon’
Through Dec. 11
Studio Theatre
1501 14th Street, NW
$35-$69
202-332-3300
studiotheatre.org
The cast of ‘The Golden Dragon.’ (Photo courtesy Studio)
When the rotten tooth of a newly arrived Asian immigrant employed at a Chinese restaurant in a European city can land in the steamy soup of a sleepy flight attendant who has stopped by for a late bite after completing an eighteen hour flight home from South America, there is little question that the world has become an increasingly interconnected place.
With “The Golden Dragon,” Germany’s most-produced playwright Roland Schimmelpfennig makes the concept of globalization relatable by overlapping the tough lives of economic refugees with those who live (sometimes literally) on top of them but never really see them. While a lot of what Schimmelpfennig portrays is very comic, he’s also not afraid to reveal the seamier side of a shrinking planet whose people meet on a less-than-even playing field.
At 80 minutes, this funny/disturbing work is centered on the lives of those who live and toil in one particular urban building. Through deftly drawn, quick paced, surprising scenes, various stories unfold. On the first floor there’s a Chinese/Thai/Vietnamese restaurant (the Golden Dragon). In its tiny kitchen five Asians busily turn out various dishes whose ingredients — ginger, chicken, button mushrooms, etc. — they mechanically pronounce aloud. Occasionally the youngest among them howls in pain from a horrendous toothache. Because he’s an undocumented worker with no money, a dentist is out of the question. Instead, the kitchen’s male elder addresses the problem with a pair of red-handled pliers.
In the apartments above the Golden Dragon other dramas play out: A straight couple’s marriage hits the rocks hard; an old man mourns the loss of his youth and virility; a young couple deals with an unwanted pregnancy; and a creepy shopkeeper tragically shares his Asian sex slave.
For this tight and well executed Studio Theatre production (the play’s U.S. premiere), gay director Serge Seiden brings together an especially diverse cast of three men and two women who cross age, race and gender to play 16 characters. Using a few props (including woks and spatulas) and minimal costumes (paper hats and hand bags), they adroitly move and switch roles through the play’s many brief-but-often-intense scenes. The phenomenal pacing and precise staging isn’t easy, but for press matinee the talented ensemble was definitely on point, working together as if the show were much further into its five-week run.
Local favorite Sarah Marshall (who’s gay) effectively plays a wide range of characters from maternal old cook to sleazy middle-aged man. Also featured are Amir Darvish (well known for playing the late gay rock star Freddie Mercury in an acclaimed off-Broadway one-man show), Joseph Anthony Foronda, KK Moggie and Chris Myers.
The design team is terrific too. Michael Giannitti’s lighting ingeniously alters Debra Booth’s gray blank slate set. At one point, he recreates that specific lighting found on a transatlantic flight when most passengers are still asleep and someone opens their window shade, allowing a stream of glaring morning sun to enter the cabin; and later he captures the nocturnal glow of the street lamp seen from a darkened apartment.
Though set in Europe, Schimmelpfennig’s play is, of course, entirely relevant here too. His writing and Seiden’s fine production are both thought provoking and not easily forgotten.
The 32nd annual Roanoke Pride Festival was held at Elmwood Park in Roanoke, Va. on Sunday, April 29.
(Washington Blade photos by Michael Key)
Eight contestants vied for Mr., Miss and Mx. Capital Pride 2024 at a pageant at Penn Social on Saturday. Xander Childs Valentino was crowned Mr. Capital Pride, Dylan B. Dickherson White was crowned Mx. Capital Pride and Sasha Adams Sanchez was crowned Miss Capital Pride.
(Washington Blade photos by Michael Key)
Theater
Round House explores serious issues related to privilege
‘A Jumping-Off Point’ is absorbing, timely, and funny
‘A Jumping-Off Point’
Through May 5
Round House Theatre
4545 East-West Highway, Bethesda, Md.
$46-$83
Roundhousetheatre.org
In Inda Craig-Galván’s new play “A Jumping-Off Point,” protagonist Leslie Wallace, a rising Black dramatist, believes strongly in writing about what you know. Clearly, Craig-Galván, a real-life successful Black playwright and television writer, adheres to the same maxim. Whether further details from the play are drawn from her life, is up for speculation.
Absorbing, timely, and often funny, the current Round House Theatre offering explores some serious issues surrounding privilege and who gets to write about what. Nimbly staged and acted by a pitch perfect cast, the play moves swiftly across what feels like familiar territory without being the least bit predictable.
After a tense wait, Leslie (Nikkole Salter) learns she’s been hired to be showrunner and head writer for a new HBO MAX prestige series. What ought to be a heady time for the ambitious young woman quickly goes sour when a white man bearing accusations shows up at her door.
The uninvited visitor is Andrew (Danny Gavigan), a fellow student from Leslie’s graduate playwriting program. The pair were never friends. In fact, he pressed all of her buttons without even trying. She views him as a lazy, advantaged guy destined to fail up, and finds his choosing to dramatize the African American Mississippi Delta experience especially annoying.
Since grad school, Leslie has had a play successfully produced in New York and now she’s on the cusp of making it big in Los Angeles while Andrew is bagging groceries at Ralph’s. (In fact, we’ll discover that he’s a held a series of wide-ranging temporary jobs, picking up a lot of information from each, a habit that will serve him later on, but I digress.)
Their conversation is awkward as Andrew’s demeanor shifts back and forth from stiltedly polite to borderline threatening. Eventually, he makes his point: Andrew claims that Leslie’s current success is entirely built on her having plagiarized his script.
This increasingly uncomfortable set-to is interrupted by Leslie’s wisecracking best friend and roommate Miriam who has a knack for making things worse before making them better. Deliciously played by Cristina Pitter (whose program bio describes them as “a queer multi-spirit Afro-indigenous artist, abolitionist, and alchemist”), Miriam is the perfect third character in Craig-Galván’s deftly balanced three-hander.
Cast members’ performances are layered. Salter’s Leslie is all charm, practicality, and controlled ambition, and Gavigan’s Andrew is an organic amalgam of vulnerable, goofy, and menacing. He’s terrific.
The 90-minute dramedy isn’t without some improbable narrative turns, but fortunately they lead to some interesting places where provoking questions are representation, entitlement, what constitutes plagiarism, etc. It’s all discussion-worthy topics, here pleasingly tempered with humor.
New York-based director Jade King Carroll skillfully helms the production. Scenes transition smoothly in large part due to a top-notch design team. Scenic designer Meghan Raham’s revolving set seamlessly goes from Leslie’s attractive apartment to smart cafes to an HBO writers’ room with the requisite long table and essential white board. Adding to the graceful storytelling are sound and lighting design by Michael Keck and Amith Chandrashaker, respectively.
The passage of time and circumstances are perceptively reflected in costume designer Moyenda Kulemeka’s sartorial choices: heels rise higher, baseball caps are doffed and jackets donned.
“A Jumping-Off Point” is the centerpiece of the third National Capital New Play Festival, an annual event celebrating new work by some of the country’s leading playwrights and newer voices.
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