Theatre Gigante Brings Will Eno’s ‘Title and Deed’ to Kenilworth 508

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Photo courtesy Theatre Gigante

Michael Stebbins

Michael Stebbins

A performed monologue can be theater stripped down to basics—one person, on a minimal stage, talking, telling stories or making trenchant comments. Monologues have long been essential to Milwaukee’s Theatre Gigante. Co-Artistic Director Mark Anderson was already known for his monologues before joining the company, and Gigante has featured readings of Spalding Gray and David Sedaris in earlier seasons. Gigante’s second performance in their 35th season, Title and Deed, is a monologue by New York playwright Will Eno, best known for such Off Broadway hits as Thom Pain (based on nothing) and Middletown.

Eno’s 2011 monologue Title and Deed is a meditation on exile—its character seems adrift without address or a map but keeps moving on, seeking the right words for his narrative.

“I was immediately drawn to Title and Deed. The enigmatic, observational text, affirming existence, is really captivating,” says Gigante’s Co-Artistic Director Isabelle Kralj. “It struck me deeply, and I think it is quite brilliant in its ability to speak loads through modernistic and metaphoric simplicity. I thought that it was a perfect piece for our 35th anniversary season because it is a sublime trajectory of a lifetime. Now, apply the elements of that trajectory to a theater company—the ability and tenacity to keep going, to keep searching, to continue traveling, and continue exploring, making existence possible.”

Eno has drawn comparisons to Samuel Beckett. Kralj agrees. “Like Beckett’s work, it has an element of absurdity. It is bare, exposed and honest. Simultaneously bleak and hilarious, it manages to capture the quiet beauty and preciousness of life. In its destitution it is heroic,” she says.

Kralj will direct Title and Deed sparsely with attention directed to the sole actor, a familiar face for local theatergoers. Michael Stebbins has performed with Milwaukee Chamber Theatre, Optimist Theatre and Skylight Music Theatre as well as elsewhere in the U.S.—and often with Gigante.

“He has performed in Gigante’s Woyzeck, My Dear Othello, Quorum, Frank O’Hara’s one acts, Spalding Gray: Stories Left To Tell, I Am My Own Wife, and has read David Sedaris’ work for past Gigante presentations,” Kralj says. He is president of Gigante’s board of directors; Kralj choreographed for Door Shakespeare when he served as artistic director. “All three of us are great personal friends,” she says. “We cast him because he loves the monologue, which is important; we like working together and have a mutual understanding of our process—and I heard his voice every time I read the script. He’s good for the role.”

Theatre Gigante presents Title and Deed Nov. 18-Dec. 3 at Kenilworth 508 Theatre, 1925 E. Kenilworth Place. For tickets, visit gigantetitle.eventbrite.com.