Philadelphia Citypaper February 20-26, 2003
 
Three plays at Triangle Theater
by Toby Zinman

What a triumph for Jane Stojak's new Triangle Theater: three fine plays, all by famous playwrights. Each is interesting, clever and performed by mature actors who have complete command of their material.

The Marriage Play by Edward Albee stands about equidistant in time between his two splendid dramatic meditations on marriage, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? from the '60s and The Goat, last year's huge hit. In the same spirit, The Marriage Play pits two middle-aged, highly articulate married people against each other, and Michael Horowitz and Charlotte Patton are pitch perfect.

Elegant, intimate and immensely fed up with each other's predictable schtick, he waxes eloquent, she mocks. He cheats, she tolerates. She cheats, he is wounded. Their conversation depends on timing and style, and with the ease and venom of well-seasoned opponents, they have at each other ("Do you try to vex me?" "Only when you really want me to"). Their refrain runs something like, "What do you mean?" "What do you mean what do I mean?" It's both utterly realistic and bizarrely stylized.

Husband and wife each gets a long monologue: Hers is honeymoon reminiscence, perhaps nostalgic, perhaps not -- Patton's ambiguity of tone (heartbroken? ironic?) never tips. As she finishes, he slings out, "Stop vamping, you wanton bitch." His monologue is filled with longing for his youthful beauty and charm, and Horowitz subtly modulates this through every stage from earnest passion to self-bemusement. The two actors have the difficult task of a big physical brawl -- slapping, knocking each other down, rolling around on the floor -- in a tiny playing space very close to the audience, but the illusion is never broken.

The final silent tableau is a testimony to the excellence of Ed Chemaly's direction; the two sit side by side on a cream-colored love seat, each in a shade of white shirt and black slacks; they face away from each other.

Don't miss this one.

PHILADELPHIA WEEKLY, WEDNESDAY, FEB 26, 2003

STAGE : FOOTLIGHTS

Size Matters
In the past, Philadelphia's large and midsized theaters have ruled the roost. With a few exceptions (Pig Iron Theatre Company, New Paradise Laboratories, Brat Productions), most of the top productions have come from the area's established companies. But this season there are signs of all that changing. Now that the less-established venues have been vindicated by the year's best musical production and performance to date (David Colbert in Hedwig and the Angry Inch at the Painted Bride Art Center) and the season's most exciting play (Theater Catalyst's Nocturne), you can chalk another one up for small companies with Three Short Plays About Love and Romance at the Triangle Theater.

A triple bill covering two nights or one long Sunday afternoon, the production appears to mark a turning point in the fortunes of the fledgling Northern Liberties performance space. Now in its first full season, the theater's resident company, Random Acts of Theater, has had its growing pains, but with their current productions of Edward Albee's Marriage Play, A.R. Gurney's The Problem and Anton Chekhov's The Proposal, they have emerged seemingly overnight as an important player in Philadelphia theater.
 
Two Can Play
The bell rings and out they come, a pair of heavyweight fighters armed with insults, infidelities and epiphanies. For 70 minutes they battle toe-to-toe, two desperate but well-trained professionals locked in the ultimate cage match--a 30-year marriage. It's a bloody, messy affair, and in the impressive Random Acts of Theater production, Edward Albee's often-slighted Marriage Play gets the weight it deserves. Directed with visceral elegance by Ed Chemaly, the match begins with Husband (Michael Horowitz) arriving home from a "middling day" to announce he's leaving Wife (Charlotte Patton). He has, he tells us, become "aware." Aware of his animal instincts, aware of "the proper conclusions" and aware of the "future."

Wife, engrossed in a book she's written about their marriage in which 30 years of cohabitation has been reduced to "3,000 fucks," greets his news with mock indifference. But while her reaction to his announcement is initially satirical, the institution she treats so cavalierly at first is not easily dismissed. The couple's sexual fervor may have long since faded, but as Wife observes, the relationship's passion has only changed form. These alternative passions have occupied Albee throughout his career (having recently taken the form of bestiality in The Goat or Who Is Sylvia?), and as Husband and Wife circle each with varying degrees of separation, the play's central question emerges: Does marriage betray or support individual freedom?

For Husband the question is answered before the play begins, and while the Friday night performance initially showed the rust of a snow-induced two-week layoff, Horowitz communicates Husband's desperation and newfound awareness with the wide-eyed wonder of a man who has just discovered the meaning of life.

Patton's is an unnerving portrayal, and she plays off it beautifully, denying and denouncing him before finally reaching the disquieting conclusion that their marriage may indeed be over. Albee isn't about to provide us with any answers, but instead leaves us to ponder this institution of marriage as Husband and Wife sit on opposite ends of the couch, staring off into the unknown.