CAN’T STAND UP FOR FALLING DOWN
For what seems an extraordinary length of time during the second half of Strawdog’s Can’t Stand Up for Falling Down, actress Mary Kanaley Nahser cries–not little trickles down the cheeks but a great flow of tears dropping off her chin onto the floor. Surprisingly, this does not impair her delivery in the least. One still wonders, however, what effect repeating this display three times a week for six weeks will have on her psychological state.
Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites »
At the start, Jodie is a child of ten, the only friend of a mentally retarded boy, Janney. Lynette is 14, a shy child sheltered by her parents and her religion whose only wish is for misfortune to pass her by. Ruby is 18 and the girlfriend of Royce, the leader of a pack of ruffians who make cruel sport of Janney. One day they chase him to the top of a quarry cliff, from which the frightened boy falls to his death, in full sight of his young companion.
Suspense is not the point of Cameron’s play, however. Can’t Stand Up is an exploration of the social processes that allow the abused to be abused. Though Lynette’s pentecostal religion would seem to implicate the church as one of these destructive influences, it’s not the only culprit. A culture that defines women’s courage in terms of endurance rather than action cannot help but elevate victimization and martyrdom. Cameron offers no answers to these insidious problems, save to urge the effectiveness of resistance. Common knowledge has it that bullies are usually cowards blustering out of fear; Royce mistreats his wife because he can do so with impunity. The intensity of Lynette’s resistance results from the delay in taking action.
Martha has inherited her father’s butcher shop and made quite a thriving enterprise of it, but worries she may have missed something by concentrating so hard on business. So she finds herself a pig of a boyfriend–Otto, an unlettered slob who gobbles, guzzles, and fornicates amorally, hates Martha’s dog as much as the beast hates him, belittles Martha for her success, reminds her repeatedly of her homeliness and her good fortune in having him around, and threatens to leave her if she protests. “There isn’t a feminine bone in your body!” he growls. “You spend your day surrounded by dead animals. All you think about are animals.” “But now I have you,” she answers serenely.
