‘Light Rail Plays’ celebrate local kids’ creativity
“Titus Andronicus” was once one of Shakespeare’s most popular plays, but this melodrama of revenge in ancient Rome fell out of favor for its over-the-top violence, which culminates in a dinner party straight out of “Sweeney Todd.” In a rare revival at Arizona State University, director Kristin Hunt treats the material like the cartoon that it is, setting the action in an industrial-looking slaughterhouse and mining the script for macabre humor, as when the villainous Goth princes plan their bloody exploits while working out like a couple of steroidal bros at LA Fitness.
The production has its flaws. Trimmed to 80 minutes, it moves so fast it’s sometimes hard to follow, and student actor Quinn Johnson doesn’t quite turn the dial of Titus’ insanity as high as it needs to go.
But the performance is never boring, and it succeeds at what seems to be its aim: to force theatergoers to squirm at their own laughter.
As an ironical add-on in a play that climaxes with cannibalism, the production also includes an element of “food design”: a selection of candies with ancient Roman flavor profiles, including an olive marshmallow, served to the front row during the performance and to the rest of the audience in a box before the show. Bottom line: It’s tragically delicious. Details: Reviewed Friday, Feb. 17. Continues through Sunday, Feb. 26. Lyceum Theatre, 901 S. Forest Mall, Tempe. $8-$16. 480-965-6447, filmdancetheatre.asu.edu/events.
Rising Youth Theatre thinks outside the box — or outside the proscenium, rather — in the fourth annual installment of “The Light Rail Plays.” A collaboration between local kids and professional performers, it’s a series of vignettes performed along the Valley Metro light rail route on Central Avenue, both on and off the train. In one, a pair of actors enact an uncomfortable exchange between strangers by holding thought bubbles over their heads. In another, a young woman playing on a giant faux smartphone is harassed by a pair of creepy puppet eyes admonishing her, “Come on, smile!” At the Camelback Road stop, a couple of skittish bunnies make friends with a dragon that turns out not to be as scary as it seems. The makeshift nature of the venues sometimes makes it hard to see and hear what’s going on, and, as in a lot of children’s theater, the tone might be a bit didactic for the adults who come along for the ride. But there’s so much joy and imagination on display that you’d
Now in its second season, the “accessibly cool” A/C Theatre Company specializes in edgy musicals getting their first production in Arizona. The latest example is a bit of a curveball: a 15-minute short that Broadway innovator LinManuel Miranda wrote in between his hip-hop hits “In the Heights” and “Hamilton.” He created it for public radio’s “This American Life,” based on the true story of a high-school kid with a crush on a girl who turns out to be an undercover police detective out to bust drug dealers. The actual story is kind of depressing, but the telling is fresh, fun and funny as the young cast sings wry rhymes such as “Everybody’s got a cousin / Who can hook him up with sumpin’.” To make an evening out of it, there’s more entertainment in the lobby between performances, including poetry readings and freestyle rap battles by cast members who, you should be warned, are brandnew to the art form. “8 Mile” it ain’t, but it’s all in good fun.
Bottom line: A 15-minute musical makes more sense on YouTube than as a night out, so this event feels more like a fund-raiser than a full production.
Details: Reviewed Saturday, Feb. 18. Continues through Sunday, Feb. 26. Phoenix Theatre, 100 E. McDowell Road. $21. 602-254-2151, actheatrecom pany.org.