When The Illusion Drops
The morning shifts hazily into view beyond the precipice of dream and it’s already been a long week. There’s a strange alchemy to those moments when the illusion drops and dream fades out into the bizarre fugue of logic we call reality. Every stage production has those moments . . . when the programmed illusion fades out into the reality around it. In big budget professional productions the illusion usually fades out subtly and briefly, but I’ve seen it stop shows before.I remember a blistering hot day in the outdoor space of the American Players Theatre some time ago. It was a matinee--not cloud in the sky. The heat was accompanied by a humidity rarely experienced outside of a jungle. A surprising number of people in the audience WEREN’T leaving. I seem to recall Brian Robert Mani performing Shakespeare center stage amidst a fully stocked, fully outfitted APT production. The play was unfolding as well as could be expected under the circumstances. Gradually it became apparent that a smartly beheadsetted techie was walking straight down the center aisle onto the stage. For a single moment, one could clearly see the character filter out of Mani as the reality of the play shifted into the background. Reality slowly shifted gears. Apparently, someone in the audience had passed out of heat stroke. The show had continued some time later to complete the full performance, but it’s always a strange moment when a respectably expensive production of a Shakespeare play gets cut-off in mid-scene.
Some time later, there was another matinee of another work of Shakespeare’s. It wasn’t as hot, but it was just as impressive. Milwaukee Shakespeare’s production of 1 Henry IV was ending its first weekend. The show was well underway. All the elements of a really enthralling production of Shakespearian drama were just beginning to hit their stride as Jeffrey Withers carried his end of the play by performing a bit of dialogue in the role of Prince Hal when . . . suddenly and without warning (or even breaking momentum in speech) Withers related to everyone in the audience that he had thrown his back out in a previous scene and couldn’t focus on anything. The illusion dropped so suddenly that the rest of the cast seemed caught completely off guard by it. It was unreal--everything fell in a second. The whole reality of what as going on dissipated without warning. Moments like that in theatre make it feel all the more possible that moments like that could happen between the stages. You're walking down the treet and sudenly a techie turns to you to tell you the show needs to stop . . . and you realize this isn't your life at all.
Milwaukee Shakespeare elected to end the show there and make the proper adjustments for all in attendance. Putting another actor in the role was out of the question, as the fight scenes are so tightly choreographed for the tiny space of the Broadway Theatre Center’s Studio Theatre that it just wouldn’t’ve worked with anyone else in the role. They’ve canceled tonight’s Wednesday the 25th of April performance as well, allowing Withers one more night to recover from the moment when the illusion dropped.
Posted by rfindley on 04/24 at 09:32 PM