An Unflinching Look At The Dark Edge of Storytelling

The World's Stage Theatre continues its exploration of the works of UK playwright Martin McDonagh  as it delves in The Pillowman. The dystopian interrogation drama stars David Bohn as an author of fictions who is brought in for questioning regarding a series of murders based on his stories. 

David Franz and Audwin Short play sometimes compassionate/sometimes sadistic inquisitors looking to get information out of the author, occasionally threatening to harm the author's brother in the next room (Joe Foti IV.) 

The three-hour show is presented with two intermissions and supported by a couple of video shorts that add background to what is going on onstage. Onstage there are two rooms: the interrogation room in question and a squalid room with a dirty mattress in which the brothers have an extended conversation. The cast works together in a way that is cohesive enough to keep things rolling quite well. This is three hours that feels like it's only 90 minutes and a good portion of why that works probably has a great deal to do with the direction of Paul Matthew Madden doing an excellent job of working with all of the kinds of constraints one might expect out of a production that's only going to run for a few performances.  

The script is, in places, annihilating-ly good. McDonagh is exploring the art and the nature of storytelling in a way that is both brutal and beautiful. The stories told (and there are many of them) manage a balance between stomach churning psychological horror and something totally sublime and utterly beautiful. And it all plays out in the context of an investigation into multiple juvenile homicide, so don't expect some happy, cheery life-affirming exploration into the nature of storytelling. If you want that you can go read or watch Life of Pi. This is something altogether deliciously more sinister that explores the darker side of storytelling on many, many levels. 

David Bohn is a flawed hero here. He's admirably resilient in the face of almost certain doom. Bohn shows real leading man charisma in the role of a deeply intellectual variety that is really reassuring. If his performance seems to occasionally lack depth, its lacking that depth in the service of a production which looks to draw a fantastic theatrical experience out of the shadowy muck of human endeavor. The character is tired and desperate and his reactions don't always come to the surface--even when things are said that would make any actor want to deliver something more charismatically dramatic. Bohn is letting the production go where the production needs and it shows a considerable amount of clever restraint. 

David Franz is sadistically fun in the role of "Good Cop" interrogator Tupolski. He's got a clever ear for the kind of dark comedy that McDonagh is going for here. He's got the humor down perfectly, but if there's a problem with his performance it may lie in the fact that the characters humorous side is overpowering his seriously threatening side. The charter seems to be written to be the type of person who can be empathizing and laughing along with you one moment and then punching you in the face the next moment while shouting something terrifying. It's a difficult dichotomy to bring to the stage. Franz only manages that dichotomy in fleeting moments. That aside, its a great performance and it's not like he doesn't come across as being threatening when he needs to be. 

Audwin Short's performance as "bad cop" Ariel might be a bit stiff in places, but he's got great potential as an actor that really comes into sharp relief here. The character is very, very aggressive and very, very driven. there's a dark edge in him that is looking to punish anyone who would hurt kids. There's a heroism in that even if it's sullied by a sadistic streak that seems to take pleasure in harming others. Short may not have the darker edge of the character down . . . his performance doesn't seem as aggressive as it should be, but Short's got the heroic end of the character down really, really well. The script plays him up as the antagonist in the first half with our author hero as the good guy . . . which is pretty much the way things are for most of the run of the show. When we see the heroic end of the "bad cop," at the end of the play, Short turns around that villainous end of the character with grace and poise. He's a natural as a stage hero and that works to the benefit of the production.

As good as the rest of the ensemble was, the one performance in the cast that's likely to stick with me into the future is that of Joe Foti IV as the developmentally challenged adult brother of the author. He's an adult child in many respects without much of a grasp on basic social conventions. In many respects, the character represents the darkest possible side of childhood innocence. And Foti IV is playing that with a staggeringly clever obliviousness. He's completely blind to what's going on around him and totally out of touch with the fact that he may soon be put to death. That Foti IV is also physically a large cherubic figure performing with the mannerisms of a child plays into what might be one of the most vivid portrayals I will have seen all year. The character is written to be brilliantly disjointed psychologically and Joe Foti IV takes that disjointedness and runs with it in a very interesting direction. 

The World's Stage's Production of The Pillowman has two more performances: One on Sunday starting at 6pm and one on Saturday starting at 7:30pm. The 3 hour show (which includes two intermissions) is staged at the Underground Collaborative on 161 West Wisconsin Avenue. For ticket reservations, visit Brown Paper Tickets.