The Pirates of Penzance Ride Off Into the Sunset This Time Thanks to The Gilbert & Sullivan Very Light Opera Co.

The Gilbert & Sullivan Very Light Opera Company (GSVLOC) could just as easily be named the Gilbert & Sullivan Very Silly Opera Company (GSVSOC), as G&S operas are awfully silly in the best possible way. Their latest production of The Pirates of Penzance is a departure from the version I reviewed in 2022. This new adaptation has been reconceived and revised by director Joe Andrews, with music direction by Dr. Randal Buikema. The subtitle is Love and Duty in the Old West, which is their way of saying they’ve converted it into a Western. The wonderful thing about the G&S oeuvre, much like the works of Shakespeare, is that they are now in the public domain, and as such, liberties like this can be taken with the productions. This allows for some wonderfully creative interpretations, like this one.

GSVLOC is an unusual company in that they perform only the works of Gilbert and Sullivan, and have been doing so in rotation since 1979. Sometimes what you need to do is find out what you’re good at and do that. GSVLOC is very good at staging the works of G&S. Unlike what we usually think of when we say “opera,” these productions don’t require captions so you can understand what everyone is singing. The lyrics are in English, and the singing isn’t so stylized as to be unintelligible. They’re easy to follow, well sung, and performed with a wonderful sense of humor. What’s so remarkable about these works is how modern the humor feels, despite being, in the case of The Pirates of Penzance, over 140 years old. It’s the sort of opera you can safely bring the whole family to, as the humor is universal.

The plot centers around Frederic, who was apprenticed to prairie pirates as a young boy due to his nursemaid Ruth mishearing his father’s instructions. As the opera opens, Frederic has turned 21, and the prairie pirates are throwing a party for him, as this marks the end of his indentured servitude. Frederic reveals to the Pirate King that he has stayed with them out of a sense of duty, even though he knew it was a mistake. But now that he is free, he feels his duty is to eradicate the prairie pirates. Parting from the pirates, Frederic comes across a party of young women, the daughters of General Stanley, who is, of course, the very model of a modern Mormon general. That’s right, they’re Mormons, and there are some little jokes peppered throughout the show about that. He falls in love with the one daughter who will have him despite his past association with prairie pirates. Her name is Mabel.

Just when all seems too good to be true, the pirates arrive and attempt to make off with the General’s daughters. Luckily, the General knows of these tenderhearted pirates and their weakness for orphans. He lies to the Pirate King, telling him that he is an orphan, and so the pirates leave empty-handed. In Act II, just before Frederic is about to lead the sheriff and his posse against the pirates, the Pirate King and Ruth pay him a visit and point out a paradox they thought he might find humorous. It seems Frederic was born on February 29, in a leap year, so technically he is only a little over five years old. Thanks to his overdeveloped sense of duty, Frederic returns to the ranks of the prairie pirates and plans to remain with them until 1940, when he will have had 21 birthdays. Mabel, as any young woman in love would, has agreed to wait for him. Silliness continues to ensue.

The Howard Conn Fine Arts Center is not a large theater or stage, but somehow it manages to hold a cast of 30 performers. True, about 20 of them are unnamed pirates, deputies, daughters, and their mothers, but the sound they make together is impressive. Graham Remple plays Frederic with an aw-shucks, do-the-right-thing amble that works well for a character who is both so good and so idiotic. The other standouts for me were Eric Sorum as the Pirate King and Tom Berg as General Stanley.

The production is under the musical direction of Randal A. Buikema, who, along with his orchestra, brings one of Sir Arthur Sullivan’s best-loved compositions to exquisite life. Michael Hoover’s set design does a nice job of representing the Old West, complete with actual tumbleweeds being pulled across the stage. The overture is used to present the audience with some context and history of America, and it is done with the company’s usual flair for humor.

GSVLOC’s production of The Pirates of Penzance, or Love & Duty in the Old West, is not as good as the more traditional staging I saw in 2022. But they do have fun with the setting change, and there are some new lyrics and lines that land perfectly with the audience. It may have been me, but I had a harder time than usual hearing some of the performers and making out the lyrics they were singing. Mary Kettlewell, who plays Mabel, was particularly difficult to hear.

The Pirates of Penzance, or Love & Duty in the Old West runs through November 22 at the Howard Conn Fine Arts Center. For more information and to purchase tickets, go to https://gsvloc.org/on-stage/

Don’t forget to keep an eye on the new website 79 Seconds on Stage a free and full guide to local theatre in the Twin Cities.

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Baby Brother Stage North’s World Premiere is an Actor’s Showcase in Subtlety With an Authentic MN Feel

Eric Lee and David Tufford. Photo by Peter Moore

Baby Brother is a new play written by Joe Keyes, currently of California but formerly a Minnesotan. He has not lost his ear for how we speak in the Midwest, and no, this is not the exaggerated regional accents of Fargo. This feels like you are a fly on the wall, listening in as two Minnesota bachelor farmer brothers try to have a conversation. They are in their 50s. I’ve been to enough rural church basements to know that the lack of emotional sharing on display, the reticence to discuss anything difficult openly, is not far from the mark.

Duane and Arvis are brothers living on and working the family farm. They have just returned from their mother’s funeral. They change out of their suits and into their jeans and flannel shirts, make a pot of coffee, and set to work on the jigsaw puzzle on the table. With Mom gone, they both seem to want to actually talk about their past, but even though they have lived together their whole lives, it doesn’t come easily. Which is precisely what feels so perfect about the script and performances. The way they start and stop, the way they cajole things out of each other, and the way one line of memories leads to a circling of the truth. There is humor in the play, but it is not a comedy, and the content advisory warning in the program should be taken note of. This show contains discussions of childhood physical and sexual abuse.

Baby Brother is an intimate play performed in a very intimate space at Open Book. The sure sign of good performances is when you are close enough to the actors that you could reach out and touch them, yet still completely believe they are the characters they are portraying, that they are completely oblivious to the audience’s existence. David Tufford plays the older brother, Duane. Like all older brothers, he’s the more confident and in charge of the two. Eric Lee plays Arvis, and we sense his timidity, suspecting at first that it is just his role in the family, having grown up as the youngest. But we come to understand that he is maybe a bit lost, that maybe something was taken from him when he was younger, and that has contributed to his disposition. Both performers are excellent at staying true to their characters. Even when dark revelations come out, there is no emotional breakdown. But there is a reserved and subtle moment of gentleness when Tufford makes slight physical contact in his effort to comfort his brother.

I’m really glad I made room in my schedule for this one. It’s only running for two weeks, so I recommend trying to book it right away. It’s such a simple show to produce, but the script is a gift to actors, allowing them to dive deep, internalize these roles, and give really subtle and effective performances. Director Peter Moore has wisely chosen to keep the set sparse and his actors reined in. It’s the lack of showiness that makes it so effective in the end.

Baby Brother runs through 11/22 at Open Book in Minneapolis. For more information and to purchase tickets go to https://stagenorthmpls.org/

Don’t forget to keep an eye on the new website 79 Seconds on Stage a free and full guide to local theatre in the Twin Cities.

Memento Vivere: Remember to Live a New Work From The Moving Company a Show I Will Never Forget, Funny, Thoughtful, Unique. Dead Brilliant!

Nathan Keepers, Kenzi Allen, and Steven Epp Photo by Dominique Serrand

Memento Vivere: Remember to Live finishes a very strong week of theatergoing for The Stages of MN. Conceived and written by the three Artistic Directors of The Moving Company, Dominique Serrand, Nathan Keepers, and Steven Epp, it is a unique work of art. My plus one for the show was Nala, a young coworker of mine who hadn’t seen live theater in a long time. Exactly the audience theaters would love to engage with. I always say the trick to creating new regular theatergoers is to take them to see a show they love, and they will want to repeat the experience. The Moving Company was a gamble in this respect. The company’s original works often challenge the audience to interpret what they are experiencing rather than simply spoon-feeding them a traditional plot. That is certainly the case with Memento Vivere: Remember to Live. Would this be inscrutable? Would this be the show that put Nala off theater for another few years? Happily, it was a perfect balance of ideas, humor, striking imagery and movement, captivating performances, and the kind of theater one wants to experience again. Nala and I both loved it, and I predict she will be a repeat plus oner, which will hopefully evolve into a lifelong regular theatergoer.

Opening with the sound and projections of rainfall, the show segues into beautiful music and the appearance of the cast, who enter the audience’s view like worms appearing after the heavens have drenched the earth, slithering and rolling along the stage floor. Then arms reach up like the dead returning from the grave. The cast gradually gains its feet, rummages through bags, and emerges clothed. They are proclaimed to be gravediggers and go through rituals of burying things they have found so they will remember them. The piece moves from nonverbal to halting, short bursts of dialogue to full-on storytelling of the classic Greek tragedy trilogy, the Oresteia plays.

The play is littered with Easter eggs designed to give the audience launching points from which to interpret the work. This is the very opposite of the Twin Cities Horror Festival show Evidence: Silence Experiments, that I was rather hard on last month. Where that was an untraditional piece that was aggressively inaccessible, here they are constantly feeding you ideas, movements, and quotes to draw you toward an understanding of their art. But there is also room for everyone to interpret things in their own way. The difference is that these artists know precisely what every line means to them, what every gesture and movement symbolizes. There is nothing that isn’t thought out and have a concrete meaning to the performers. we may not interpret it in the same way, but we can sense there is purpose in everything.

There is the imagery of the worms, the ideas of the gravediggers, and multiple quotes from Hamlet, including some of the jokes from the Gravedigger scene. This reminds us of Shakespeare’s idea of the worm being the great equalizer: upon death, it feeds on the King and the common man alike. There is a character who calls himself Pupa, and another who is a Phoenix. He is born, dies, and is reborn, his height is measured on a upturned coffin lid with lines marking dates in history from the present back to Jesus and even earlier to the times of Hobbits. At a point in the show that characters decide what story they will tell that night, implying that one is told every night.

For me, the show is about art: how it endures, how it is for everyone, how we reinterpret and rediscover it, and how important it is to remember it, to make it part of our lives. Art is a reflection of life, and the title of the show reminds us to remember to live. The conclusion echoes Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451, with each character proclaiming which piece of literature they are. The point of that story was that, in the face of a fascist society, humans keep art alive by each remembering a book. They become that book, and when the written word is burned, the art survives in the oral tradition.

How the company conveys these ideas and engages the audience so completely is due, in no small part, to the ensemble cast being extraordinarily in tune with each other and extremely disciplined in their attention to the precision of their movements. The Moving Company’s tagline is “theatre that moves.” Many of the cast have trained all over the world with some of the great clowning schools. Which brings us to the aspect of the show that I haven’t really touched on yet, which is the humor. In the opening five minutes of the 90-minute, no-intermission show (God, isn’t that a wonderful phrase?), my thoughts were: this is a striking production. But if they roll around on the ground and don’t speak for the entire show, no amount of sound and lighting design can make that interesting for an hour and a half. But it progresses from visual storytelling to dialogue, and as their voices come into the show more and more, the humor, both physical and verbal, blossoms as well.

I’ve written before of the question I always ask my plus ones after a show: Who was your favorite performer? Nala answered by going through the entire cast, not by name, as she didn’t reference the program, but in the end, she had acknowledged all of them. They are Kenzi Allen, Steven Epp, Nathan Keepers, Tracey Maloney, Anna Schloerb, and Luverne Seifert. I could not agree more; there is no way to choose. That is because every player is a vital part of what makes this show work. They are all in sync to a degree that is rare in theater. They are all pieces of a larger whole; without one of them, the thing would melt, thaw, and resolve itself into a dew, evaporating, unable to hold its form.

Memento Vivere: Remember to Live is a stunningly beautiful illustration of theater as art. Art that speaks to ideas while also entertaining, that realizes laughter, like your worm, is the great equalizer. The Moving Company uses every tool in the toolbox, not just movement and dialogue, to create a work that is utterly captivating. Sound and scenic design by Dominique Serrand and John Novak involves piles of dirt scattered around the stage, which become graves for things we must remember. Lighting design by Marcus Dilliard expertly helps to modulate the mood of the show. Costumes by Sonya Berlovitz and props by John Novak, Nathan Keepers, and Steven Epp create a sense of a patchwork world of animals and man, of the past and of the future.

Memento Vivere: Remember to Live runs through November 22nd at The Southern Theater in Minneapolis. For more information and to purchase tickets go to https://www.themovingco.org/

Don’t forget to keep an eye on the new website 79 Seconds on Stage a free and full guide to local theatre in the Twin Cities.

We Won’t Pay, We Won’t Pay! But We Will Laugh at Frank Theatre’s Side Splitting Production

The Cast of *We Won’t Pay, We Won’t Pay!* Photo by Tony Nelson

We Won’t Pay, We Won’t Pay! is an Italian play by Dario Fo. There is no translator credited in the program, but Wikipedia informs me that in 1984 an English translation was published by R. G. Davis. I have no idea if this is the same translation, though it feels decidedly more modern in some of the dialogue than the early ’80s. The question of credit only comes up in my mind because much of the dialogue, particularly by the characters of Antonia and her husband Giovanni, feels as if it is being made up on the spot by the actors portraying them, Kimberly Richardson and Randy Reyes. The script is a series of escalating lies that keep building on each other until they are stacked so high that no amount of gullibility can support them, and they all come tumbling down. What we are left with is a sobering truth, one moment of seriousness that hits home in these times of $4 gallons of gas and $5 gallons of milk.

Set in Italy in the 1970s, when and where it was written, it uses the Auto-reductionist movement as its jumping-off point. The play opens in the apartment of Antonia and Giovanni as Antonia and her friend Margherita arrive carrying bags of groceries. Antonia explains to Margherita how she went to the grocery store even though she had no money left to buy anything, as inflation has risen so high that even without paying rent, gas, or the electricity bill, she still cannot afford to feed herself and her husband. She describes, in animated style, the mass of women who, upon seeing that the prices of groceries had increased again, decided they would take what they needed and pay what they could, or not pay at all. This is based on actual occurrences at the time, and it is starting to feel like an idea ripe for reintroduction.

Richardson is one of the most hilariously gifted comedic talents in the Twin Cities. Her previous performances in shows like The Red Shoes at Open Eye Theater and A Midsummer Night’s Dream at the Guthrie are among my favorites of my blogging career. Both physically and verbally, she earns more laughs per minute of stage time than anyone else this year. Partnering her in leaps of outrageous logic is Reyes, who questions everything she says, leading her to make wilder and wilder claims. Then, rather than see through it, he internalizes and shares them as facts, embellishing them along the way. Not only are the explanations they come up with to explain things ludicrous, but the way in which the performers say them is priceless.

The play is performed in two acts with an intermission, with a run time of about two hours. The first act is the strongest. The second act is still very good, but it loses steam a little bit. I suspect what is really happening is that we are feeling laughter fatigue. We laugh so much and are so taken with the uproarious performances and script that by the time the second act gets about halfway done, we are ready to rest our facial muscles. Given the state of the world, the muscles used to smile and laugh are a little out of shape. That said, it was nice to exercise them so unreservedly again. If laughter is indeed the best medicine, I recommend everyone take two We Won’t Pays and call me in the morning.

Joining Richardson and Reyes are Maggie D’Ambrose as Margherita, Ben Qualley as various minor ensemble characters, Corey DiNardo as Luigi, Margherita’s husband, and Maria Asp as a Police Sergeant, Trooper, Undertaker, and Giovanni’s father. All are excellent, and there are some really fun moments of meta humor that seem to always revolve around Asp’s characters. As always, Wendy Knox’s direction is flawless. The pacing, the moments of physical clowning, everything is done with the absolute confidence that comes from a sure directorial hand and the trust of the cast.

We Won’t Pay, We Won’t Pay! runs through November 22nd at Mixed Blood in Minneapolis. For more information and to purchase tickets go to https://franktheatre.org/event/we-wont-pay/

Don’t forget to keep an eye on the new website 79 Seconds on Stage a free and full guide to local theatre in the Twin Cities.

Kung Fu Zombies Vs. Southeast Asian Girl Scouts, What More Do I Have to Say? Thank You Theater Mu

Hope Nordquist, as Do-Si-Do, mid-zombie fight. Zombie ensemble consists of Finn Buffington, Chandler Clement-Oja, Lance Krohn, Cody Manh Do, Sri Peck, and Logan Bret Sapp. Photo by Rich Ryan

Kung Fu Zombies Vs. Southeast Asian Girl Scouts is the third in the Kung Fu Zombie play cycle. I saw the previous play, Kung Fu Zombies Saga: Shaman Warrior & Cannibals, but not the first in the cycle, Kung Fu Zombies Vs. Cannibals. If this is your first, don’t worry about it; they are all self-contained, and the exposition is given quite effectively in the opening. There’s a line in that first scene, which I will probably get jumbled, but it sets the tone for what will follow. The main three characters are describing the zombies approaching them, and just as they are about to defend themselves, they say, “And for some reason, these Motherfuckers all know Kung Fu!” They then engage them in the first of many well-choreographed fights. Is it all zombies, Kung Fu, and Girl Scout cookies? No, it is about a settlement of survivors, a community, and how they persevere in the zombie apocalypse.

Playwright Saymoukda Duangphouxay Vongsay states in her note in the program that she had been working on the play for two years when Operation Metro Surge began. She threw out what she had already written and rewrote it to reflect what our communities were experiencing. I have to say that it shows. I had a blast with this play, and I highly recommend it, but it is not as polished as the previous play. What she did in less than a year is astonishing, though, and more than worthy of its place in the Kung Fu Zombie universe.

This edition centers around three young women who are the heartbeat of their stronghold. They are named after Girl Scout cookies. Samoa, played by Dexieng “Dae” Yang, is their leader; Do-Si-Do, played by Hope Nordquist, is their muscle; and Thin Mint, played by Mia Angelica Onia Guzman, is the brains. They are all supported and encouraged by the Den Mother, “Mama,” played by Lia Rivamonte, who organizes the supplies, cares for the sick, and loves her romance novels. The cookies are all fantastic. At some point in the show, I said, “That’s my favorite,” about all three, though of course, outside of the play, we all know Thin Mints are the best, right?

There is a character named Gary, played by Benjamin Dutcher, whose arrival shakes things up a bit, but the less said about that, the better. Dutcher does an excellent job in a rare non-musical role.

There are two other standouts in the production, and they are the Violence Director, Mason Tyer, and Scenic Designer, Mina Kinukawa. The previous play, to my memory, had at least two acts. In the first one, I recall the fights were in slow motion, and then later in the play, we were shocked when the Kung Fu was in real time. Tyer doesn’t go that route here. Everything is at speed or close to it, but there is a lot of it, and the final battle features some rhythm incorporated into the action that was very effective. Kinukawa’s set is constantly in motion, but the transitions are fluid and never stop the play’s forward motion. It’s a jumble of pallets and corrugated steel that brings the apocalypse to life.

There are strong echoes of our current climate, but as we were shown this last Tuesday, we must keep living, we must keep fighting. There is a future worth fighting for, and our communities are worth fighting for.

Kung Fu Zombies Vs. Southeast Asian Girl Scouts runs through November 15th at the Frey Theater on the St. Catherine University Campus. For more information and to purchase tickets go to https://www.theatermu.org/kfz-girl-scouts

Don’t forget to keep an eye on the new website 79 Seconds on Stage a free and full guide to local theatre in the Twin Cities.

One-Shot, There’s a Triple Meaning in That, Deals With a Lot of Themes in a Very Relatable Way at Six Points Theater

Carter Graham, Nico Sacco, and Warren C. Bowles Photo by Sarah Whiting

A one-shot (also called an oner or long take) is a continuous, unbroken camera shot in filmmaking that captures an entire scene or sequence in real time without visible cuts. The title of the show is a reference to the shot that the two young aspiring filmmakers and video store clerks are filming for the movie they are making in the store after hours. It also refers to the characters’ hopes of getting into NYU film school on scholarships. But even in that sense, there is a double meaning, because it means something different for each of the boys. For David, the white Jewish boy, it is the only school he applied to. For Martin, it is his one chance, as an undocumented person living in the U.S., to go to college. All of these meanings seem appropriate for a show that is about so many different things, set among characters for whom movies have become the way they communicate. Video store owner Charles describes the former manager, who has quit to work at Blockbuster, by referencing Gaslight (1944, dir. George Cukor).

One-Shot by Andrew Rosendorf is having its world premiere at Six Points Theater. In his show notes in the program, Rosendorf describes video stores and movie theaters as his sanctuary growing up as a closeted queer kid in the 1990s. We see that reflected in the characters as well. The video store is like their closet; inside it, they can be themselves. The problem with a retail store as a closet is that it has windows. The window of this video store, at the opening of the play, has been vandalized with the word “Fagot” (sic) and a swastika, and later, the word “Spic” will be added. David is Jewish, Martin is Latino, and Charles is Black. They are all gay.

The window acts as a constant reminder throughout the play of what awaits them outside of the video store. The world does not feel safe for these characters, and now their sanctuary, instead of providing comfort, is a reminder of that fact. There is a plotline regarding the scholarships. Both boys have applied and hope they will both get in so they can go to NY together, because they are a couple. But when one gets in and the other doesn’t, the play adds another layer of jealousy and privilege.

There are a lot of ideas and social issues being explored in the play, and somehow Rosendorf doesn’t make it feel overstuffed. Even the issue of immigration is explored, though the play is set in 1999. It makes the ending feel as though there is still graffiti on the windows.

The three cast members, Warren C. Bowles as Charles, Carter Graham as David, and Nico Sacco as Martin are well cast. Bowles brings a fatherly touch to the role of Charles, who tries to guide the boys. His best moments are when he is talking about his passion for movies or trying to get across to the boys the dangers he faced when he was younger. Graham’s best moment is when he has to admit to his betrayal of Martin. Sacco is excellent throughout, the standout in the show. When he confronts David, you can feel the anger and betrayal in every word and movement.

As a film lover and physical media collector, I absolutely loved the set design by Brady Whitcomb, which has an added surprise in store in the final epilogue scene. I scanned the video store shelves looking for movies that were released after 1999 and am happy to report I didn’t see any anachronistic titles. One thing I thought was strange, though, was that in a play featuring video store clerks who are shooting a movie in the video store after closing, there wasn’t one mention of Kevin Smith or even a Clerks poster among the video store decorations. Missed opportunity.

One-Shot is a real treat for any film lover and a great exploration of a lot of different ideas that are still very much on our minds 27 years after the play takes place. The show runs through November 8 at Six Points Theater in St. Paul. For more information and to purchase tickets, go to https://www.sixpointstheater.org/one-shot-tickets-available

Don’t forget to keep an eye on the new website 79 Seconds on Stage a free and full guide to local theatre in the Twin Cities.

Jellyfish Shines in U.S. Premiere From Unlabeled Theatre Company at the Gremlin Theater

Joey Deegan, Maeve Linkert, Mason Green, Shanan Custer Photo by Jordan Buckellew

I’ve written before about Unlabeled Theatre Company, which produces theater with casts that include people with disabilities. Their shows have, until now, been musicals that pair adults 18+ with cognitive or physical disabilities with professional actors as shadow partners, performing the roles in unison. I feel I can never fully express how important what Unlabeled Theatre Company does is. Theater should be for everyone. It should reflect the infinite variables of our reality, it should allow for the telling of everyone’s story, and there should be a place for everyone to tell their own stories. Unlabeled Theatre Company takes it a step further and says everyone should be present and afforded the opportunity to tell any story. Someone who is neurodivergent or in a wheelchair should be able to play SpongeBob SquarePants or Nigel Bottom.

Jellyfish by Ben Weatherill is not only their first play, but it is also the U.S. premiere of this play. Weatherill stipulates that anyone who wants to license the play for performance must cast an actor with Down syndrome in the role of Kelly, a 27-year-old woman with Down syndrome. It is a limiting requirement, but a refreshing one. In doing so, Weatherill is undoubtedly sacrificing income in order to ensure that Kelly’s story is told by the right person. Representation is important. We say that over and over because it is true, and yet we constantly see examples where casting sidesteps it. I’ve loved the musicals that Unlabeled has done, not simply because of their mission, but because they have been well done. That is true of Jellyfish as well. This is an excellent script, and the production succeeds without needing any kind of disclaimer or qualifier. You shouldn’t come to an Unlabeled show as a good deed. You should go to see a show, and you should expect it to be everything any other show from a small theater company is.

Jellyfish is about a 27-year-old woman named Kelly who lives with her mother, Agnes. Kelly falls in love with a 32-year-old man named Neil. Kelly and Neil are happy together. They genuinely seem to get on well together, and the love is mutual. When Agnes discovers their relationship, she is furious and assumes that it is an exploitative relationship. Kelly has Down syndrome; Neil does not.

The play explores difficult-to-answer questions, and it’s telling that Agnes, who has been an advocate and caregiver for Kelly her whole life, is dead set against the romance. But why? Doesn’t every parent want their child to find love and be happy? How does that change when your child has a condition that involves even mild cognitive and developmental delays? Why does Agnes try to set up a date for Kelly with another man, Dominic, who is on the autism spectrum? Why, in her mind, is that an appropriate pairing, but Neil isn’t? Do we, on some level, understand her concerns? As the audience, we are shown the beginning of Kelly and Neil’s romance. We see that she is the instigator, that he is cautious, but that he also really likes her. We are given glimpses that allow us to be more accepting of the couple. But without that, would we also jump to the conclusions that Agnes does?

These are not easy questions, and there are no definitive answers. My first child, Alex, was diagnosed with Asperger syndrome, the same thing the character of Dominic is said to have in the play. Asperger’s is no longer a diagnosis that is used; it has since been merged into autism spectrum disorder (ASD). When your child has something, anything really, that makes them different, your gut reaction as a parent is to try and protect them, to worry about how they might be treated differently, and to worry that their options will be different from those without whatever it is that makes them different. Earlier this year, Alex got married. He is in Italy right now with his wife on their honeymoon. Now, a mild case of ASD is not the same as having Down syndrome. But my experience as a father, and having those impulses, particularly when Alex was younger, to try and protect him, does help me relate to Agnes on some level. But my experience as Alex’s dad now also helps me understand that differences and diagnoses don’t preclude people from wanting what every person has the right to want. Love, marriage, independence, even parenthood.

Maeve Linkert, who plays Kelly, is assisted by a shadow partner, Lisa Hanson. Unlike the traditional shadow partner process, Hanson does not act out the role with Linkert but is seated at the back of the stage and reads the lines along with her. Kelly is a big role, and I never had the sense that Linkert didn’t know the next line. I think Hanson was there for clarity of the line readings. The script is also projected on the wall to the side of the stage. In this case, to be honest, the shadow partner made it more difficult to hear the dialogue. I think we would have attuned our ears to Linkert’s line readings more easily if we weren’t trying to filter out Hanson as well. But it’s possible Hanson was there as reassurance for Linkert, too. As I said, Kelly is a big part, and if that was an accommodation Linkert needed, I’m glad she had it. By 15 minutes in, my ears had attuned, and if I ever missed a line of dialogue, I just glanced at the script projection.

What really impressed me about Linkert was her ability to bring out the humor of the play so effectively. There are a lot of dramatic moments, but the play is also very funny. It is in the extremes that Linkert is best. Her arguments with Agnes and a fight with Neil are powerful, and the light moments of humor are perfectly placed.

Shana Custer is a Stages of MN favorite, and it was great to see her tackle such a meaty role in Agnes. She invests Agnes with so many conflicting elements that it’s like she is a real person. Agnes is patient, Agnes is a fierce mama bear, Agnes is weary, Agnes is judgmental, Agnes is flawed, Agnes is real. Custer, always an effective comedian, is great with moments of humor. It’s the moments of confrontation and frustration that were the most enjoyable to watch, because we don’t often get to see Custer given the chance to play such a complex role as Agnes. I had no doubt she could do a role like this. We just don’t get to experience it that often, and she was so good at playing all these aspects of Agnes. Sounds like a great name for a band: Aspects of Agnes.

Joey Deegan, as Neil, has the very difficult role of playing someone not labeled with a diagnosis, though there are definitely hints of ASD (he reminded me a lot of my son Alex), who falls in love with Kelly. Deegan makes it clear to us that Neil is really in love, with no creep factor, which is exactly where Agnes jumps to. He has to convince us of their mutual attraction and of his character’s innate goodness, more so than in a traditional play, because we have to be on their side for the rest of the play to work. We have to believe these things in order not to lean toward Agnes’ alarm bells. Deegan is very good at playing off both women, creating a connection and a palpable sense of caring with Linkert while holding his own against Agnes, who is constantly attacking and threatening him. He comes off as the guy you want your daughter to meet, whether she has Down syndrome or not. Deeply good-hearted is a hard thing to project, but Deegan does it beautifully.

And finally, in a small but very fun role, Mason Green plays Dominic. His humorous line readings as he sits in Agnes’s living room waiting for his date with Kelly, who doesn’t know she’s coming, are great. They are the sort of honest, no-filter things that Alex has been known to come out with. Green feels just perfect in the role and is also very effective as a sounding board and friend for both Kelly and Agnes in later scenes.

The show is directed by Jessica Froehlich. It runs about two and a half hours long but doesn’t feel it. Jellyfish is an extremely good play, and given the requirements to perform it, this may be one of your only chances to see it. It raises a lot of thought-provoking questions and will make you reflect on and question your own responses. It’s also very entertaining and features strong performances by the whole cast. I highly recommend checking this one out, but it runs just one more weekend, so hurry.

Jellyfish runs through November 8 at the Gremlin Theatre in St. Paul. For more information and to purchase tickets, go to https://unlabeledtheatre.org/

Don’t forget to keep an eye on the new website 79 Seconds on Stage a free and full guide to local theatre in the Twin Cities.