Tinkering with ‘Wonderland’
Vortex’s ‘Alice’ in street clothes
Lewis Carroll’s “Alice in Wonderland” mixes fantasy with fear, spinning power with poetry.
Its stage adaptations have veered from academic adult interpretations to nonsensical childlike spectacle.
Director Lauren Dusek Albonico leapt down that rabbit hole, trying to steer a middle path in this coming-of-age story with her own adaptation, opening at the Vortex Theatre on Friday, Jan. 6.
Albonico spent the summer tinkering with the script, maintaining the fantastical aspects of the original while preserving its power. Her production stars 14 actors, all of them adults. They wear street clothes rather than the outlandish costumes of endless film versions of “Alice.” Albonico devised much of her vision while watching her own children.
“A lot of the props are imaginary or they’re household items used in the way children play,” she said, “like a lampshade on the head makes you the queen or an umbrella stands for a sword. I wanted to re-create that kind of playfulness.
“I did ‘Peter Pan’ a few years ago. I think I’m just drawn to these comingof-age stories and the power of myth. As children, we’re thrust into worlds where they are backwards and upside down and we have to decipher this timeless path into what is true.”
The author himself lands a role in this production, doubling as both the Cheshire Cat and the White Knight.
In myth, the hero or heroine needs a guide or sage, Albonico said. While the story may be nonsensical, it is Carroll who leads Alice through his topsyturvy
world, reappearing as different characters. It’s the White Knight who leads Alice through the maze of the Dark Woods and confronts the prideful Humpty Dumpty in “Through the Looking Glass.”
“The White Knight offers compassion and love,” Albonico said. “He’s a nurturing figure. He sings her this song at the end. It’s a sweet lullaby kind of moment.”
“Alice in Wonderland” stars Bridget Dunne, Matthew Van Wettering, Christy Lopez, Katie Farmin and Aaron Worley, with Angelina Ortiz as Alice.