A Very Deadly Constructivists Holiday banner
The sentiment of the holiday season is cleverly satirized on a small stage this month as The Constructivists host a program of interconnected shorts that pay tribute to the seven deadly sins. Conceived by Jaimelyn Gray, the show features William Molitor is a visitor in the night who serves as the host of a series of spoofs of popular bits of holiday fare.
Haley Ebinal is charming as “Carlie Beige” (a Charlie Brown analog) who learns a valuable lesson about the full gravity of hubris as she performs a stunt designed to make her the most popular kid on social media. Also featured on the program are spoofs of Hallmark Holiday movies, “I Love Lucy” and more. Anya Palmer delivers quite a bit of complexity to her role as the female lead in the Lucy spoof. Joe Lino is staggeringly charismatic in a spot-on impression of Desi Arnaz.
Perhaps the only short on the program that isn’t a direct spoof of something else is the monologue about Wrath. Nate Press reaches for deliciously dark fun in a monologue about the last day on the job for a shopping mall Santa. Press has impressive presence in his delivery of the story of stress and anger in a world of tense commerce.
Director Andrew Hobgood has found a brisk rhythm for the show that allows the overall momentum of once scene to blend quite efficiently into the next. There’s enough variation in and around the scenes to keep the show from dragging through a very brisk and highly enjoyable intermission less time onstage. It’s a cozy, little bit of holiday fun featuring quite a bit more death than one might normally come to expect from a Christmas show.
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A Very Deadly Constructivists Holiday runs through December 14 at the Broadway Theatre Center’s Studio Theater, 158 N. Broadway. For more information, visit theconstructivists.org.
Due to illness in the cast, the opening weekend of the show was done as a series of staged readings. This review is based on one of those staged readings.
