Stage Kiss Through March 15; Thursday-Saturday, 8 p.m.; Sunday, 2 p.m., $16-$20. Art Square Theatre, 702-818-3422.
Sarah Ruhl creates idiosyncratic plays that chart deep, unruly emotions with intelligence, humor and a grand sense of the theatrical. Here are three moments that capture Cockroach Theatre’s take on Ruhl’s Stage Kiss.
1. “She” makes a sound like a laughing owl in an echo chamber. The play’s conceit is that a company is reviving an overwrought 1930s melodrama, and “She” (Amy Solomon) has been hired as the lead—a dying woman whose only wish is to spend her last days with a long-lost lover. The only problem is that the actor playing her long-lost lover “He” (Scott McAdam) really is her long-lost lover. The play-within-the-play affords opportunities to lampoon the worst parts of being an actor, like the nervous tics to save face when engaging in ridiculous acts of fake normalcy—cue She making a game attempt at laughing mordantly, much to the disquiet of the whole cast. The first act rides a wave of this comedy, resulting in shrieks of laughter and openings for improv. Brenna Folger and Ross Horvitz are particularly piquant, pairing well-timed bon mots with comedic physicality.
2. The entire cast sings “Some Enchanted Evening.” Ruhl’s work calls for stage magic, and this production answers. While Tim Burris’ set was clunky in transitions, it worked wonderfully for this moment. After She and He have reignited their love and returned to his squalid flat, She’s real-life husband and daughter track them down. The chaos of their affair erupts, and the damage it has done comes to the fore. But McAdam turns on the charm as He, the back of Burris’ set opens, and a grand piano appears. Magic takes over, and even though lives are in ruins, for one moment, the majesty and power of all-consuming romantic love prevails. The cast dances and sings in harmony, and the worst decision ever seems right—until it doesn’t.
3. A ghost story. When She has a breakdown onstage (for a new play, in a different town), she has to confront the wreckage of her life, and why she may not have made the right choice. She shares a Japanese tale about embracing the ghost of your unlived life. It’s twisty, emotional logic, and poignant, but the real, fragile life of She doesn’t feel as harrowing as it should. The cartoons still have sway, so the oversized emotions, which should now be real, still slightly read as artifice, depriving this beautifully delivered play of some of its punch.
