Photo Credit: Ross Zentner
Emily Bridges’ work as an engineer overseeing construction projects means she needs to be in control of moving parts, but when her senses leave her like leaves falling from a tree, she and her family must figure out how to deal with a world slowly turning upside down. In David Cecsarini’s production of Adam Bock’s A Small Fire at Next Act Theatre, Mary MacDonald Kerr’s Emily provides the unflinching question: What happens if the center cannot hold?
In the days leading up to her daughter Jenny’s wedding, Emily loses her hearing, then her sense of taste and sight. John, her supportive husband (Jonathan Smoots), is slow to be convinced of the gravity of his wife’s situation. Theirs is a relationship wherein Emily’s type-A personality holds sway. John’s denial of his wife’s predicament is not surprising. The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree as their daughter, Jenny (Emily Vitrano), has a chilled relationship with her mom, keeping John in the middle playing peacekeeper. Even when Jenny helps her mom get dressed for the wedding, they never fully connect. As Emily never cared for her daughter’s fiancé, the gulf of their relationship widens as the young couple moves out of state.
Aside from her daughter’s wedding day stress, Emily is also dealing with a situation at work.
When the drug-dealing son of one of her workers assaults his own mother, Mark Corkins (as the loud foreman, Billy Fontaine) portrays a thoughtful conduit for Emily’s uncharacteristically compassionate response. When Billy visits her at home, he places his work helmet on her lap, and Emily instantly knows it is him. Fontaine emerges as a layered character who says more about Emily than we might initially guess. His scene with John—awaiting the return of Billy’s racing pigeons at Emily’s urging—is a neat metaphor for knowing where home is.
Stay on top of the news of the day
Subscribe to our free, daily e-newsletter to get Milwaukee's latest local news, restaurants, music, arts and entertainment and events delivered right to your inbox every weekday, plus a bonus Week in Review email on Saturdays.
Voiceovers allow us into her head as Emily reels in frustration at losing control over her world. MacDonald Kerr’s transition, especially after Emily loses her sight, is stellar. At the wedding, voices that should be familiar come at her from all sides. When a sound collage of everyday hum falls silent, Emily and John devise a simple language—one squeeze of the hand means yes, two means no. In a tender moment of choreographed dance where the couple make love, we understand that, while Emily’s senses are being stripped, her core self remains intact.
Through Feb. 23 at Next Act Theatre, 255 S. Water St.
