By Paul Hagen

Stop Kiss

Diana Son's Stop Kiss is a beautiful piece of theater, and the recent Black Box production by Irina Grobman certainly did the script justice. The audience was greeted by a beautifully massive set designed by Joe Galan: a New York City apartment complete down to the change in the couch and 'that painting you just couldn't quite decide where to put on the wall so you left it on the floor.' Rich Ardito designed a soundtrack chock full of great female artists; clips from these rockin' tunes helped mask the show's biggest flaw, the unfortunately long and frequent scene changes. Between the scene changes, the already substantial length of the play and the ever-comfortable black-box folding chairs, the show left the rear-end a bit numb. Unfortunately Stop Kiss was performed without an intermission. With such a fantastic production, the audience certainly could have been allowed a break and still have been hungry to reimmerse themselves in the world of the show. The show had an immense impact nonetheless.

Tiffani Fest captured the quirky, insecure New York traffic reporter Callie with the same kind of energy that has made the girls of Sex and the City HBO standouts. In contrast, Sarah Bell played Sara, the newcomer-to-the-big-city with delicious individuality. No wide-eyed newcomer, Sarah's Sara radiated with confidence and beauty; her priceless smiles communicating as much as any line. Both actresses rose to the demand of the show's intricate structure, which intercuts both the story of Callie and Sara falling in love and the aftermath of an attack on them which takes place much later. Within moments, Fest turns from a sweet flirtation to being tearfully interrogated after the attack, and Bell effortlessly makes the change from ruddy confidence to wheel-chair ridden silent frustration. These transitions are doubtlessly aided by Maria Dziemian's costume design, which must be commended for its character consistency as well as the sheer number of costumes, and Miriam Crowe's lighting design, which did wonders to designate a space apart from the apartment, though the apartment set never leaves the stage.

The rest of the cast was also strong. Sean Magee as George, Callie's part-time lover, was charming and sexy without being lurid, at once self-centered and caring.

Joe Galan's understated performance as Peter, Sara's ex, created tension by representing Sara's conservative past without resorting to the clichÈ that conservative characters need to march around stage drenched in narrowmindedness.

Richard Prioleau, Jr. used text that could have easily indicated a bland and disinterested police officer to create a determined fact-finder. Maria McConville was fun and fresh as the eccentric Mrs. Winsely but far more touching and consistent as the Nurse who offers to teach Callie to care for the comatose Sara. McConville's light and natural performance in that scene helped make it one of the most effective in the show.

Irina Grobman is to be commended for choosing to direct a piece that not only addresses the tricky social issues of sexual orientation and homophobia but also is so theatrically tricky due to the dual timelines. The finished product not only addressed these challenges, but also was full of laughter and a true celebration of love.

The House of Blue Leaves

John Guare's The House of Blue Leaves is a huge piece, bristling with challenging language and complex situations. The Splinter Group's greatest success in its recent production of this work is the way it feels so utterly natural and effortless.

Joe Galan works his set design magic again, turning the black box into an utterly believable living space. Paul Mazza's lighting adds to this effect with its bold use of everyday light fixtures, which hang within the audience's view and manage to create the necessary lighting and also add atmosphere to the space a set pieces.

Director Aaron Rhyne's manipulation of the space is phenomenal. House of Blue Leaves reinvents the white box using everything from the vestibule which is transformed into a piano bar as the performance begins with the audience watching from the hallway to the closet which turns into a complete kitchen.

The actors fill the space with a performance which more than deserves its fantastic design. Patrick Dugan as Artie Shaughnessy is wonderfully downtrodden, allowing his character's frustration to bubble beneath the surface until it is released in the shocking final moments of the play.

Liz Santine as Bunny Flingus, Artie's lover, bursts into the space, painting it boldly like a streak of neon paint; she manages to make some of the plays most metaphorical language absolutely believable and completely understandable.

Liz Miller plays a carefully crafted Bananas Shaughnessy, Artie's wife. 'Crazy' characters are often so overplayed that they become nothing more than charicatures, but Miller's performance was deliciously textured. One could completely relate to her one moment, then pity her the next.

Donan Whelan is explosive as Ronnie Shaughnessy. Not only did he use the opportunity to interact with the audience with consistent boldness, but his monologue was a spectacular display of vocal and physical acrobatics; rage, frustration, embarrassment unapologetically presenting itself to the audience and never holding back.

Jill Creighton's was hilarious as deaf starlet as Corrinna Stroller; a sweet outsider being tossed (sometimes physically) around in a maelstrom of insanity.

Alexis Karol, Mollie Whitson and Kim Carpenter were delightful as a trio of nuns, physically daring and a fine comedic team. Kudos to Carpenter whose speech of gratitude toward the end of the show was particularly frenetic and fantastic.

Jon Crane appears late in the show as Billy Einhorn, the Hollywood director. He provided a cool stone pillar of the outside world, standing up straight in the middle of a house gone mad.

In his director's note, Rhyne states, "As we are entertained this evening in the Shaunessy home, our presence has created a uniqe experience for the family that has never occurred before." In response, I would thank Mr. Rhyne for creating that home so convincingly that I felt like I was sitting in a living room, getting to know a group of (particularly eccentric) strangers. This consistent intimacy made the show an even more exciting theatrical event. Rather than watch the tornado, the audience was sucked up inside, spinning with its power and laughing along its ridiculous, awesome and wonderful reality.