Spoiler Paragraph for Fun Harmless Warmachine

The last scene of the play was a very heavy scene and had a lot of elements and steps to it. It was a scene between Tom and Melissa a little while after he had given the Order the order to leak her information and an sexually explicit video of her. They were both sitting in a coffee shop. He says he is sorry and is looking for Melissa to tell him that everything is alright. But Melissa sees right through him and asks him why right now he wants to make things better. Why is it that just right after things went badly for him, he actually starts to apologize to other people. It seems like he is not really motivated by empathy but by a desire to feel better about himself. I loved the moment where Melissa tells Tom that he didn't ruin her life like he said; her life is much more than he can ruin. I think it was very powerful that she didn't accept the apology but showed him every aspect of what he did wrong and still said her life is bigger than his longing for recognition and revenge. I liked how the show was not a case of a straight white guy making a mistake and being forgiven. It is a story of him learning something and paying some consequences for it, but he doesn't get forgiven because he paid the consequences. Someone who did that to someone else shouldn't be easily forgiven, no matter how penitent he is. He won't get the gratification of forgiveness, so he has to live with what he has done. Return to the review.

Spoiler Paragraph for Guards at the Taj at Steppenwolf Theatre Company

The guards are tasked with a very hard task of cutting off 20,000 pairs of hands to make sure that nothing as beautiful as the Taj Mahal will ever be built again. This really messes them both up, but especially Babur. There is one scene where he is wearing bloody clothes and Humayun bathes him and helps him get dressed while Babur is just staring off into the distance, just blank. It is so moving to see these two guards who are supposed to be stoic and menacing acting so vulnerable with each other and them being completely wrecked. It shows there is damage to everyone involved. And that is what makes it so hard to figure out if they are actually bad because they did what they were ordered to do. You already love them which means you want to basically let them off the hook, and in scene two, that is basically possible because you don't see the actual action, you just see the aftermath. That is still pretty distressing, but not as bad as seeing someone's hands cut off. There is no screaming or pleading or any actual people you have to see. But then in scene four you actually see Humayun cut off Babur's hands and Babur is pleading to him and telling him that he has an escape plan. In the middle of Babur's sentence Humayun chops of his hands, and sears them, and Babur is rolling on the floor in agony and it is so horrible to watch. But you realize that there were 20,000 people who had just had that done to them a few days earlier. It shows that watching one person get their hands cut off feels more horrible than hearing about 20,000. It's like that thought experiment that asks if you would push one person in front of a train to save 20 people down the track. Mathematically in makes sense to save 20 people by killing one, but emotionally it is harder to push the person to save the 20. I think this play wants us to think about why it is so different seeing one person get their hands cut off compared to seeing a basket full of bloody hands and how we can ignore large-scale tragedies but not smaller personal ones. Return to review.

Spoiler Paragraph for Death & Pretzels' The Book of Maggie

In this show Peter guards the gate to heaven, just like in Christian tradition. He also has a phone he can talk to Jesus on, which really cracked me up because it was so absurd and not part of the original tradition. But then it turns out there is nothing behind the door he's been guarding. There is some really cool symbolism in Peter guarding nothing. I think that there are a lot of really interesting and good things about Christian belief, but sometimes people use it as an excuse to discriminate against people. When people do that, they are guarding something that doesn't need to be guarded. Access to fulfillment is free and doesn't have a single entrance. This show also suggests that there is no difference between heaven and hell because both of them are eternal, and that is what Judas says is so terrible about hell, the eternity. Return to review.

Spoiler Paragraph for Interrobang Theatre Project's Grace

Karl talks about how during World War II his family helped hide Jewish people and how he had his first kiss with one of them, but the Germans found them and he was forced to rape her. It was heartbreaking. He shares that story with Sara and Steve when they are asking him about his faith in God. And he says he doesn't believe in God, because something like that could happen to someone. Near the end of the play, he talks about his wife's funeral and how afterwards he ran into the girl his family had hidden and they went to a Starbucks and she forgave him for what he had done. He still might not believe in God, but he does now believe in hope and the possibility of forgiveness. Return to the Review.

Spoiler Paragraph for To Catch a Fish at TimeLine Theatre Company

At the end of act one, Terry hits his girlfriend Rochelle, when she is asking him not to go to the store anymore because she thinks it is dangerous. It is a very hard scene to decide how you feel about it because Terry has brain damage and doesn't seem to understand what he has done and how much it hurt Rochelle and their relationship. You can say, Terry doesn't deserve her because he hit her, or you could say that Terry didn't know what he was doing and Rochelle should give him a second chance. Or you could say that they both messed up because she was being physically forceful with him and he was just trying to get away. It is hard for me to decide what I think about it. I don't think people should be forgiven for abusing someone if they meant to abuse them, but it is really hard with Terry because he didn't understand what he was doing and he was being pressured. This situation is even more complicated than a normal someone hits someone and they get in trouble. I thought this scene was really well acted because I couldn't decide how I felt about it. Both of the characters are desperate in that moment and you want them to be together because that seems to make them happy. But then this happens and you worry that Terry doesn't understand what he has done, so if they get back together he might think it is fine to do it again. Return to the review.

Spoiler Paragraph for Birds of a Feather at Greenhouse Theater Center

I think the ending of the play is really bittersweet. Silo and Roy's relationship has ended but a new relationship breaking penguin norms (between Tango [Kirby, in this scene], who is Silo and Roy's daughter, and another female penguin) is just beginning. Silo and Roy were saying goodbye to each other, and Silo tells Roy about his new partner, Scrappy, and Roy assumes he is talking about another male penguin, but Silo reveals to him that Scrappy is a female penguin. And the exact same thing happens when Roy is talking to his daughter Tango. He presumes Tango's new partner is a male, but it turns out to be a female. It is really touching to see this coming-out moment meeting acceptance in this play that has been mostly about the struggle of being gay. In this moment you get to see the beauty of acceptance and love no matter what your sexuality is. And I'm sure it is really hard for Roy to hear the same words having different impacts on him from two penguins he loved. Roy and Silo's breakup breaks my heart. You have grown to love this relationship. You have seen it grow from the beginning to the end. You can't help but feel like Silo's reasoning might not be because of his own wants but because of what Pale Male has told him is masculine and right. And that makes me really angry to think that someone could be in a happy relationship if it wasn't for outside influences. Return to the review.

Spoiler Paragraph for Teatro Vista's The Madres

The last scene of the play was, in my opinion, the most powerful. It was really hard to see Carolina and Belén getting torn apart from each other. Carolina's reaction to figuring out that her plan to get her daughter back was not as foolproof as she thought it was, and just watching her break down, was so powerful. The actor did a great job at really showing how she was feeling at that exact moment; there was this moment where I saw her switch from being so happy to see her daughter to realizing it would be over in a few minutes. You see how desperate she is in that moment. And Josefina isn't sobbing, but you can still see how scared she is and how she feels like she has to be strong for her daughter. You see her make the decision to join with her daughter in dangerous protest because she sees the true evil of those holding her granddaughter captive. Those people have turned the neighbor boy Diego into a monster. It is scary how powerless everyone is over this one man, Diego, just because he feels entitled to control over these people's lives because he works for the government. There are all these very strong people in the room during this scene, but Diego has the most power because of the terrible people who have his back. Everyone else in the room wants to use their power for good and not just for power. I feel like this is insanely relevant now because many countries are run by people who don't think of their citizens' needs but instead of how they can have more power for themselves and be feared. Return to the review.