Don’t Forget Tickets to “Memoirs of a Forgotten Man!”

Patrick Harvey, Jon Lutyens, Sunam Ellis in Memoirs of a Forgotten Man (Annabel Clark)

Memoirs Of A Forgotten Man
Thalia’s Umbrella
At 12th Avenue Arts

Through March 9, 2024
 
A fascinating and brilliantly written production, Memoirs of a Forgotten Man, is now onstage at 12^th Avenue Arts, by Thalia’s Umbrella. It feels like a decades-past Russian-written critique of their government, but was written by an American, D. W. Gregory, and only in 2018.
 
We meet Dr. Berezina (Sunam Ellis) who is trying to get her doctorate thesis approved for publication and has been called in to meet Comrade Kreplev (Jon Lutyens), but it’s on a Sunday morning – a very odd time to be meeting about this effort. Immediately, we are on edge because she is on edge. A feeling of menace and discomfort infuse every moment. What is she doing there? What is he doing there?
 
Kreplev practically dismisses all of her scientific effort. He demands to know information that is not present in her writings. Her focus is regarding memory and how it works. She has written about a subject of hers whom she both studied and counseled 20 years earlier. But the man has disappeared. Kreplev is most interested in him and where he has disappeared to. She is completely baffled by this.

Time Travel Matters in Seattle Public Theater's "Once More, Just For You"

 

Once More, Just For You (Joe Iano)

Once More, Just For You
SeattlePublic Theater and
Macha Theatre Works
Through February 25, 2024
 
A world premiere from Seattle’s preeminent sci-fi fantasy playwright, Maggie Lee, is now on stage at Seattle Public Theater (co-produced with Macha Theatre Works). The premise of Once More, Just For You is that a woman (scientist) has a time machine in her basement and is intent to do something very specific with it. What she wants and why are the two questions that fill the mystery of the play.
 
Scientist Rae (Ina Chang) has a mission to go back in time and change one very tiny, very unimportant - to the whole universe - event. She doesn’t want to change world history because that’s a step too far. She doesn’t believe that changing this one tiny event will affect much of anything else, though of course she’d never know if it did later.

"Blood Countess" Horrifies (In A Good Way)

Brandon Ryan as Fitzco and Zenaida Rose Smith as Elizabeth Bathory (Truman Buffett)

Blood Countess
MAP Theatre (at 18^th and Union)
Through February 24, 2024
 
Ten years ago (ok, 9 ½), Annex Theatre produced a world premiere by local “goth” playwright Kelleen Conway Blanchard called Blood Countess. The subject is a poetic and evocative telling of a real-life noblewoman, Elizabeth Bathory, whose life spawned many folktales after her life and death in the 1500s, including that she maimed, tortured, and killed hundreds of young women. There were claims of vampirism!
 
Blanchard has a very unique writing voice and often blends macabre humor and sexuality into her work. Laughter is inextricably mixed with dark subjects. Here, Blanchard had a wide-open field to imagine the life of Bathory. And imagine she does. The play begins with Bathory’s childhood, then marriage to a fellow sadist, up to her final captivity and end.

Experienced Talent Brimming in "The Book of Will" at Taproot Theatre

Nolan Palmer and Melanie Godsey in The Book of Will (John Ulman)

The Book of Will
Taproot Theatre
Through February 24, 2024
 
This production of prolific playwright Lauren Gunderson is rambunctiously performed by a mostly-veteran ensemble of wonderful actors. It’s such a joy to see/hear them chew into the script, especially Nolan Palmer, as he skillfully overacts, as Richard Burbage, Shakespeare’s soliloquys while wanting to murder the young, ridiculous thespians who mangle and change Shakespeare’s words – because Shakespeare’s plays have not yet been codified in print.
 
The play surmises that after Shakespeare’s death, no one has thought to collect all of his plays and make sure they are properly saved for future audiences. In 1619, a few years after Shakespeare’s death, dumbed-down versions of his plays are proliferating, with actors guessing at what the script would be! Determined to fix this are the fabled actor Richard Burbage (Nolan Palmer), who played dozens of the great roles, John Heminges (Eric Jensen),the business manager of Shakespeare’s acting company, The King’s Men, Henry Condell (Reginald André Jackson), an actor and co-owner of the Globe. They are aided by wives and daughter (Llysa Holland, Nikki Visel, and Melanie Godsey).
 
Palmer doubles as William Jaggard, a swindler in the publishing game who has often been accused of plagiarism, and somehow has spawned a son, Isaac (Christopher Clark), who swears he will help bring authenticity and trust to publishing the Folio. The rest of the wonderful ensemble include Ben Johnson (Nik Doner), the other great playwright of the era, and Ralph Crane (Andrew Litzky), a meticulous scribe of the “acting” scripts of Shakespeare who wrote down and kept many crucial scripts for himself (thankfully), and William Eames, who plays several small but important roles.

Special Opportunity to Hear Musical “Sunset Boulevard”

Billie Wildrick and Matthew Kacergis in Sunset Boulevard (Chris Bennion)

Sunset Boulevard
Showtunes Theatre Company
(at Cornish Playhouse)
Through February 11, 2024
 
Below, you’ll see that I was intrigued enough about the musical that I did some Wikipedia-ing about both the movie, Sunset Boulevard, and the musical’s history. But I first want to encourage you to hurry and get tickets for the last two performances of this concert before you lose this unique opportunity!
 
Showtunes Theatre Company, if you have not had the immense pleasure of attending their concerts, yet, allows us to see top-level local musical theater performers tackle musicals that may well never have “full” productions in Seattle. They perform “concerts” where there is no set, not much significant costuming or lights, and the performers generally use scripts-in-hand, so the audience has to bring a lot of imagination along.
 
However, in recent years, the concerts have gotten more and more complex, with choreography, a few key costumes, and fewer music stands between the audience and performers. This concert is more technically sophisticated than most concerts I’ve seen! There are absolutely gorgeous costumes for Norma’s glamourous lifestyle (by Chelsea Cook), and some crucial projections (by Jake Burleigh) that provide the old-timey feel of vintage motion pictures.
 
Then there is a 20-person on-stage orchestra led by artistic director Nathan Young! That means that the musician-ship, the lush sound of the score, couldn’t be better at a large theater with a full production! The atmosphere and quality of the production is top-notch!
 
The ensemble of performers is superb! Glorious Billie Wildrick plays Norma Desmond and trembles with silent-screen-star emotions. She nails every big number, expressing (sometimes crazy) feelings with conviction and passion. Matthew Kacergis, as Joe Gillis, has great vocal range and power and whose down-at-heart screenwriter is by turns driven and defeated. Jeff Church, as Max the taciturn butler, has a beautiful bass voice. Karin Terry, as Betty Schaefer, the 22 year old (!) literary assistant determined to write a movie, enchants. The rest of the cast is full of huge talents, as well.

A New “Quixote” Enlivens Both The Classic and Border Issues

Sancho Panza and Don Quixote (Nate Watters)

Quixote Nuevo

Seattle Rep
Through February 11, 2024
 
Octavio Solis’ play, Quixote Nuevo, is a treat for both Spanish and English speakers when you can pick out the interplay of puns and alliteration and literary references. In Quixote Nuevo, he mirrors the well-known tale of Don Quixote, who loved Dulcinea and tried to fight the powers-that-be.
 
He chooses a professor, Jose Quijano (played with elegance and verve by Herbert Siguenza), of the author Cervantes, who wrote Don Quixote. The professor is accelerating in his decline toward dementia and his family feels he’d be safer in an assisted living facility. Jose becomes a “new” Quixote, escapes his concerned family and townsfolk, and begins a search for Dulcinea. But escaping also presents great danger, as his inability to see where reality ends and fantasy starts could cause him to forget to eat or drink out in the bleak desert on the border of Texas.
 
The tone of the play is often joyful, yet mixed with pain. Large puppets are used to menace and to entrance. Tejano music is used masterfully to demonstrate parts of the story and underscore moments of emotional outbursts.