‘Revolt’ a well-performed piece of avant-garde feminist angst

In the 1990s, British playwright Sarah Kane blasted into the theater world with her explosive plays. She committed suicide in 1999 and left a gaping void, now being filled by another British playwright, Alice Birch, whose dramas are a strange amalgam of lyricism and TNT.

Perhaps only the Tricklock Company could do complete justice to Birch’s latest play, “Revolt. She Said. Revolt Again,” a nihilistic theatrical hand grenade excoriating the injustices women experience in the workplace, in the bedroom, within the family and pretty much everywhere else.

The play unfolds as a series of theatrical manifestoes, with titles projected against the back wall during each scene: “Revolutionize the Language (Invert It)”; “Revolutionize the World (Do Not Marry)”; “Revolutionize the World (Don’t Reproduce)”; “Revolutionize the Body (Start to Shut It Down; Stop Eating).”

In the first scene, we see woman as a thing existing solely for man’s pleasure. He wants to make love to her, not with her. When she turns the tables and uses the same objectifying language to him, his dalliance peters out in impotent frustration. Domination seems to be the source of this man’s erotic desire.

Performers Drew Morrison and Katy Houska animate the scene with great energy, finesse and comic timing. Actors not performing a specific scene are visible behind transparent scrims and occasionally strike poses or perform an action that accentuates the theme of the scene they are watching.

The play continues in this manner, as a series of manifesto-like vignettes, increasingly nihilistic. While the first two scenes take aim at the institutions of mating and marriage, soon the strike is against the very means of life itself — reproduction and eating — which, of course, if followed literally would terminate the human race — as would one of the last diktat’s we hear: “Eradicate all the men.”

The play finally descends into total apocalyptic madness, with all the actors on stage rushing frantically about and speaking simultaneously. The stage and the attractive costumes are now littered with simulated blood and vomit as well as a deluge of water, intimating the destruction of humanity.

During the entirety of the production, a trio of talented musicians — directed by Kyle Wayne Ruggles — remain visible stage left, just barely off-stage. The actors occasionally interact with the band; I particularly noted the hilarious expression of Drew Morrison when the band started playing a few chords from John Lennon’s “Imagine” while Diana Delgado’s character imagined a world quite different from the one we live in now. Because Morrison turned to look at the musicians with a facial expression that seemed to say, “Seriously?” my hunch is that the musicians are improvising, in part, with the actors occasionally responding in kind.

Tricklock is an experimental theater company, and it brings physical dexterity, sensitivity and keen improvisational skill to everything they do, including a scripted piece of avantgarde feminist angst like this one.

Hannah Kauffmann’s direction is perfect, and her five actors engage the text with the sort of passion and precision we find only in the most skilled and fearless of actors. If you have the stomach for it, you should not miss this show.

“Revolt. She Said. Revolt Again” plays through Dec. 2 at Tricklock, 110 Gold, Albuquerque. Go to tricklock.com or call 414-3738 for reservations.