The Racquette

Issue date: 5/8/09 Section: A&E

SUNY Potsdam's Spring Play Festival occurred last week, featuring several student-performed shows. Despite some confusion regarding the name change (from the familiar "One Act Play Festival") the shows themselves were excellently produced.

The festival featured two events on alternating nights. The first, in the Black Box Theater, included Play, Samuel Beckett's absurdist post-mortem look at the participants of an affair, and Transfigured Night written by Potsdam's own Erin Harrington, part of an ongoing cycle of plays about the experiences of American lesbians. The other, in the College Theater, was Socrates on Trial, a three-act play written by Andrew Irvine, which takes a modernized look at the final days of the greek philosopher.

Play is, to put it mildly, a difficult piece to like. The characters are intended as remnants of themselves, something along the lines of trapped memories, ruminating about their failures in life. The characters' speech is cacophonous and choppy, punctuated by no motion other than the changing spotlight, and is not meant to be taken as a coherent narrative. This last point is punctuated by the play actually repeating after the first run-through, as though someone off-stage was calling for another rendition of "I'm Henery the Eighth, I Am."

For all that, the cast and crew did a remarkable job living up to Beckett's vision. The set and makeup were exceedingly well done, and the actors-Ashley Christensen, Molly Clancy, and David Spadaccini-displayed excellent control while performing the rapid, staccato tirades of their characters. Director Phylicia Gordon, in choosing the mood of the second run through, settled on a remarkable juxtaposition of increased tempo and muted emotion, for which there may be no better analogy than The Chipmunks on Prozac-a silly thought, perhaps, but well done nonetheless. Accolades are due also to Anthony Chanov, lighting designer, for precise utilization of the spotlight-the "fourth character" in the play, as Beckett has described it.

Transfigured Night publicly performed for the first time during this festival, is inspired by the poem "Verklarte Nacht" by Richard Dehmel, which tells the tale of a woman carrying a child that is not her lover's. The play details the love of two college roommates, and the difficulties they experience as one, unwilling to come out to her family or friends, remains in an abusive relationship with her boyfriend of several years. The dialogue is straightforward and realistic, drawing the audience in, while powerful symbolism and complex emotions are deftly handled.

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