A wellness retreat doesn’t go so well in ‘Small Mouth Sounds.’
The silence seems to roar in “Small Mouth Sounds.”
In a world that constantly barrages us with everything from deafening booms to incessant beeps and pings, hearing nothing at all for long stretches of time feels quite radical. Bess Wohl’s off-Broadway play, a comedy of mindfulness exquisitely directed by Rachel Chavkin in a national tour stop at the Strand Theater in San Francisco, exploits the subversive power of stillness in our age of manic multitasking.
The thundering sounds of a torrential downpour open the show, which is framed by bright green projections of a gauzy wilderness. The people attending a weeklong meditative retreat in the woods are running from the chaos that engulfs us all. They yearn to learn at the feet of the master (Orville Mendoza) who is usually heard and not seen, an omniscient voice of God.
The ragtag band of acolytes includes the rubberlimbed yoga dude Rodney (Edward Chin-Lyn), who likes to hold court shirtless and cross-legged, contorting his lanky body into tortuous poses while emanating a smug sense of Zen. He’s also really into nudity in general and skinny-dipping in particular.
That habit irks the heck out of his assigned roommate Ned (Ben Beckley), who feels insecure enough already, having been dumped by wife shortly before having his house burn down. Oh yeah, and she
cheated on him with his brother while Ned was hospitalized after a rock climbing fall that shattered his skull. The scars are so nasty he has to perpetually cover his head with a skullcap.
The awkward and vulnerable Ned would love to seek comfort in the arms of the heartbroken Alicia (Brenna Palughi), who is rebounding from a bad breakup, madly texting her ex while inhaling potato chips under the covers to elude the no-cellphone rule.
As it happens everyone at this retreat has fresh scars that badly need healing, including the longtime couple
of Joan (Socorro Santiago) and Judy (Cherene Snow). One is a true believer while the other longs for her laptop. They have been together for so long that intimacy has bled into weariness over battling the struggles of life and loss. Discontent, yearning and regret simmer amid the smell of incense and tatami mats as the participants are thrust back into their own thoughts, left to ponder who they are and what manner of enlightenment they are seeking.
How to communicate with each other is complicated, of course, by the vow of silence. Unable to fill the quiet with small talk and the hours with digital diversions, the group stews in its own pool of silence. Most of the sounds we hear are sighs, cries and moans, but it’s surprising how quickly you fill in the narrative gaps on your own.
Body language tells the
story beautifully in this astutely directed staging, in which emotions feel rooted in truth. Chavkin, best known for the musical “Natasha, Pierre & the Great Comet of 1812,” manages to tease the subtleties out of the meditative state, its magic and its ambiguity. A multiplicity of meaning reverberates in the silence.
Despite Wohl’s wry eye for the wellness industry, the ways in which human frailties can be turned into profit centers, this theatrical encounter with quiet does seem to heal these characters and maybe in a small way, even the audience.
After a 100-minute detox from the din and clamor of reality, time often spent musing the absurdity of existence, we emerge back into the world, no longer all that anxious to power up our devices, feeling happily lost in our thoughts instead.