A TRIPNOTIC NIGHT
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The plays’ collective title, A Tripnotic Night, is one framing device. Another is the presence of an onstage character called “The Dreamer” (Randi Shepard), whose actions constitute a jumping-off point for each of the plays, which we are to assume are her dreams. Though her personality is left unspecific, her dress, props, and reading matter suggest that she recently arrived at college. Over the course of the evening, we see her wistfully hug a photograph of her parents, study from a volume of Freud, and listen to a violence-packed radio newscast. There is even an epilogue in which she is awakened by her friends, who turn out to be the real-life counterparts of those who populated her troubled fantasies.
This staging convention succeeds in linking the three plays while allowing each one the room to develop its own themes. Unfortunately, these themes are not particularly original or well-developed–at best these plays are typical of what one encounters in young writers’ groups. So Transient Theatre deserves credit for lending the diverse offerings not only a semblance of continuity but also new insights.
By contrast, Nevin’s Deer Man requires little salvaging, being a fairly straightforward variation on the comic-book epic. However, Deer Man is actually a woman–the philanthropic Dr. Margaret Faraday, who conquers crime through kindness and rehabilitation rather than superior force (which should relegate this script to children’s theaters). Cynthia Marie displays virgin-warrior nobility in the role of Faraday, and is ably supported by Koehlinger as Dawn, her saintly blind sister, and Tom Daniel, playing it straight for a change, as Dawn’s gentle husband. Providing adversity is Sokolowski as the evil social Darwinist Ronald Pierce, a man as evil as Deer Man is good. Daniel also contributes some lively comic-combat choreography, complete with chases around the auditorium and through the audience, and Sokolowski provides some on-the-mark atmospheric music, including the Kinks’ “Superman” and Cheap Trick’s “Dream Police.”
