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offoff online review:
Curiouser and Curiouser
April 3, 2008
"Seizures suck," declares Molly, a young woman afflicted with them, to her doctor. "They show up like ghosts." That is why Molly would like to get rid of them, and the doctors can accomplish that, by removing part of her brain.
Unfortunately, more than Molly's epilepsy might be lost in that endeavor.
Molly's story is one of several intertwined tales of brain damage, disease, and transformation treated provocatively yet conscientiously by Rabbit Hole Ensemble in their haunting piece A Rope in the Abyss.
Earlier this theatrical season, a character in Tom Stoppard's Rock'n'Roll proposed that humans could build an artificial brain "out of beer cans" if we only knew how a real one works. The same frustration confronts Rabbit Hole's characters, but they explore the problem in greater detail than Stoppard's. Like the titular rope, each of Rabbit Hole's stories begins with familiar people, naturalistically (for the most part) portrayed, then plummets into mysterious places that science has not yet fully explained.
When a person loses their memory or changes personality, are they still "themselves?" Is the real self a "soul" that inhabits the brain? Can love survive in the absence of memory, self, and language? Is it better to fully comprehend one's grief or guilt, or is amnesia, in this context, a blessing? And can humans communicate in a vocabulary made out of different kinds of pickles?
A Rope in the Abyss asks all those questions, and then some, but modestly provides no declarative answers. Focused sharply yet broadly on its subject matter and tautly, unpretentiously, and empathetically constructed, each of the stories is a miniature drama, with lightly sketched characters filled in vividly by the passionate, technically precise acting of the four-actor ensemble.
In keeping with Rabbit Hole's signature aesthetic, there is nearly no set, absolutely basic costumes, no sound effects other than those created by the actors, and special effects consisting merely of the sharp, deliberate use of lighting to create striking chiaroscuro, shadows, and contours that help tell the story.
Playwright and director Edward Elefterion, who very deservedly won the 2007 Midtown International Theatre Festival's award for Outstanding Direction for Nosferatu: The Morning of My Death, works magic again with clear characterisation, painterly tableaux, and brisk pacing.
As Molly, Tatiana Gomberg (the ethereal Mina Harker of The Night of Nosferatu) conveys this bewildered young woman's desperate desire for a cure and subconscious fear of losing her self. Gomberg also shines as catankerous health nut Lorraine, who, after being "dead for two minutes" after a stroke, changes every aspect of her personality, horrifying her slacker son Harold (Dan Ajl Kitrosser). Both of Lorraine's personalities as acted by Gomberg are wholly convincing, and consequently compel the audience to share Harold's confusion.
As Harold and amnesiac murderer Russ, Kitrosser pulls off some tone-changing physical comedy, but also adequately conveys the horror that both characters ultimately experience. The tale of the murderer, narrated in pseudo-Seussian rhyming couplets, is the least successful of the many narratives. Its scientific context is explained less clearly and completely than the other stories.
This is unfortunate because its subject--repressed and recovered memory--is perhaps the most controversial within the medical establishment, with some medical scholars and practitioners declaring that repressed-memory-recovery is a myth and others insisting it is a common occurrence. The whimsical verse poetry perhaps illustrates the character's mind (Russ is an LSD addict, initially) but it is ultimately a case of style substituted for substance.
Overall, however, A Rope in the Abyss constantly intrigues and engages as it winds through many conflicts and lives. That is no easy rope trick.
Kitrosser's interpretation of a third role, haunted Iraq War veteran, is the least patronizing performance of that type that I have seen in a long time, and I have seen several.
The final two members of the ensemble, Nosferatu actors Danny Ashkenasi and Emily Hartford, spin a sad and beautiful love story about Hugh, an opera singer who loses most of his memories to an aneurism and Donna, Hugh's loving but overwhelmed, frustrated, and alienated wife. Yes, you do get to hear Ashkenasi sing opera, and it sounds convincingly operatic.
The moment in which the opera springs forth from the recesses of Hugh's damaged mind is the play's most surreal and mysterious moment. I can't tell you the details, but not because I don't remember them. I do. In fact, A Rope in the Abyss, will remain in my memory, I hope, for a good long time.
Daily News review:
Ensemble previews play far Off-Broadway
Tuesday, March 18th 2008, 4:00 AM
A brewery, a homeless shelter and a hospital may be off Broadway all right, but they don't exactly seem like places to premiere a play headed Off-Broadway.
Still, they are the sites Borough Park playwright Edward Elefterion chose to introduce "A Rope in the Abyss," a work about people with brain injuries, performed by the Rabbit Hole Ensemble, a Brooklyn-based professional theater group.
"We've always wanted to take the work we do to communities that don't have the opportunity or the means to go to the theater," said Elefterion, who also directs the play.
So before the three-year-old ensemble goes to an Off-Broadway theater in Manhattan, the group is doing free performances at the Kingsbrook Jewish Medical Center in East Flatbush, which has a unit where people with brain injuries are treated; at Brooklyn Community Housing and Services in Fort Greene; and at the Northeast Brooklyn Housing and Development Corp. in Bedford-Stuyvesant. Both groups serve individuals and families once homeless.
Earlier this month, the ensemble staged the play at the Brooklyn Brewery in Williamsburg.
"We used the Internet to see what sites and services there were for low-income people," Elefterion said. "We wrote about 20 places, heard back from 10 and then booked the performances."
Jeffrey Dunston, chief executive officer of Northeast Brooklyn Houses, said his group is excited about having the ensemble come to perform.
"We do have the Billie Holiday Theater, but our residents don't necessarily go there," Dunston said. "We see this as a good opportunity to bring something to the community and give our kids exposure to acting."
"A Rope in the Abyss" tells the stories of four people whose lives are dramatically altered by brain injuries. Elefterion, who teaches acting at Hofstra University, said he became fascinated with the topic while listening to Radio-lab, the WNYC-FM show that frequently does programming about neuroscience.
"I began to wonder, 'Where do I get the idea of me?'" he said. "The more I learned about the brain, the more I realized how in the blink of an eye personality can change."
"A Rope in the Abyss" is an imaginative, fast-paced presentation with four actors - Danny Ashkensai, Tatiana Gomberg, Emily Harford and Dan Kitrosser - playing multiple roles. Among them are Hugh, who develops amnesia just after his wife tells him she had an affair, and Lori, an athlete who faints while exercising. She suffers an aneurysm and wakes up a completely different person - one who loves tattoos, which she previously hated.
"It helps you understand brain injuries, and shows you how a gentle person can change," said Mary, who saw the performance in Fort Greene on a recent rainy Friday night. She declined to give her last name.
Jessica Baker, a visual artist from Clinton Hill, said she was glad she had braved the bad weather to see the play.
"People in this area don't get to see much theater," Baker said. "BAM is near, but who can afford it?"
TheaterOnline.com review:
A Rope in the Abyss
Oliver Sacks would appreciate “A Rope in the Abyss,” written and directed by Edward Elefterion, and presented by Rabbit Hole Ensemble. Four characters, three that intersect, have experienced some kind of brain trauma: Hugh suffers a brain embolism, which robs him both of his long-term and short-term memory; Mollie is an epileptic whose brain can be re-wired, not without consequences; Lori has an aneurysm and wakes from her coma an entirely different person; Russ murders his wife yet has no memory of the deed.
The frailty of human beings is on display here, as well as the changing relationships between those who have lost their memory (or their old selves) and those who still remember. Donna (Emily Hartford) tells her husband Hugh (the excellent Danny Ashkenasi) she has been cheating; when she leaves the room, Hugh has had a brain embolism and has changed irrevocably. Neither will ever be the same again. Hugh cannot remember who Donna is from one minute to another, nor can he recall the music he used to love singing, nor their favorite song (and the sad irony of Cole Porter’s “Night and Day,” sung by Donna and later reprised, is palpable). His condition remains basically the same, with little progress, for eight years. Hartford’s reactions to her husband’s inability to connect with her, her pain and her anguish, are heart-breaking. She is in an impossible position: how can she stay with Hugh, who is no longer the man she once knew, no longer shares the same memories that she has, but how can she leave him, the man that she married, when she still has all of those memories inside of her own head?
Lori (Tatiana Gomberg) is the fit, bossy, controlling mother of Harold (Dan Ajl Kitrosser) until she collapses with an aneurysm, and undergoes a radical personality change after four months in a coma. She gets a tattoo and craves junk food; she dons a Groucho mask. Lori embraces her transformation, but not so Harold, who has a tough time adjusting (especially when his mother calls him by the less-formal “Harry.”) The coma, it seems, has set Lori free, and at the same time, stopped Harold in his tracks. Gomberg plays Lori and also Mollie, a twenty-something epileptic; she is brilliant at both. Mollie can have a brain-altering operation to stop her horrendous seizures, but when she undergoes testing, she involuntarily says, “Leave my soul alone.” Mollie is also in an impossible situation: she can continue to have seizures and be herself, or have the operation that will alter her (and her soul.) How much can Mollie lose and still be herself?
Russ (also Dan Ajl Kitrosser) has murdered his wife, yet has no memory of committing the act. Russ’s story deviates from the naturalism of the others: his scenes are in verse, with the other cast members acting as a sort of Greek chorus of his mind. This is clever, but Russ’s story, despite the fine Kitrosser, feels the least realized. There’s not enough information about him, (nor stage time) to make his ordeal compelling, and as Ross is the one character that does not intersect with the others, the play would work equally well without his segments.
Playwright and director Edward Elefterion has the gift of dialogue at his agile fingertips. He has a knack for the rhythms of everyday conversation: the mundane spats between mother and son, the late-night confessions between husband and wife, the fragile doctor-patient relationship, the dry “doctor-speak” that brings no comfort to the patients nor their loved ones. He captures the incomprehension of not only those who have literally “lost their minds,” but also those that love and care for them. Each of these compelling stories could be a play in its own; to put the four together showcases the randomness of the universe, and how anyone’s life can change in a moment. Elefterion’s “A Rope in the Abyss” beautifully illustrates the lack of control we have over what we remember and what we want to forget. That is an achievement in itself.
Washington Square News review:
When amnesia takes the stage
Published: Friday, April 11, 2008
Updated: Saturday, August 16, 2008
"It's madness!" Russ (Dan Ajl Kitrosser) screams into the black nothingness. "It's memory!" retort the voices in his head, portrayed by the remaining three-quarters of the cast of Edward Elefterion's unforgettable new play "A Rope in the Abyss."
The play explores the genetic and psychological makeup of our identities. Tisch graduate Elefterion drew on textbook neuroscience to craft this haunting play, which tells the stories of four people who have had their identities erased or severely altered because of brain injuries.
The actors open each story by reciting together, "We'd like to introduce you to … ." While a little annoying, it is an effective device, as the storytellers really are introducing a new persona each time. Though it may sound like an examination of schizophrenia, "Ropes" is far from it because each persona replaces the former rather than existing at the same time.
The manner in which the four accounts weave together, jumping from subject to subject, not only keeps the audience invested but also provides an amusing "six degrees of separation" as characters stumble into each other's stories.
The one isolated character is Russ, in jail for a murder he can't remember committing. Kitrosser does an able job portraying the range of Russ' emotions, from stupidly high to suicidal, but his Greek chorus (made up of the other three actors) detracts from the story. Their rhyming style has its moments and differs from the other, more linear narratives, but more often than not, the relentless strings of verses are too reminiscent of Dr. Seuss.
Lorraine's (Tatiana Gomberg, another Tisch alum) story is the requisite tale of a person waking up after a coma with a complete personality re-haul. While it is amusing to see the health-nut old woman chow on Big Macs and get a tattoo, the anecdote doesn't upset and influence in the way that the remaining two do.
Danny Ashkenasi portrays Hugh, a singer whose story begins and ends the show. On the same day he discovers his wife is cheating on him, Hugh suffers severe amnesia that leaves him unable to remember anything, be it long-term or short-term. His brittle condition is wrenching, as he is reduced to a vocabulary of "pickle" and greets his wife Donna with a bright, child-like smile every five minutes.
It is here that Emily Hartford gives the most achingly emotional performance of the show. Although in her headshot she looks healthy and vibrant, as Donna she is exhausted and burnt out. Hugh's constantly renewed adoration is a punishment to her, and an awful trade-off for living with the shell of her husband. With each passing year, expressed simply but effectively through the script, Donna loses herself as well. The only negative to Hugh and Donna's story is that it lasts a tad too long.
Although their narrative styles differ, these three stories all express the pain and horror of losing someone in a split second and without warning. The characters don't even get a chance to say good-bye, and the audience aches for their bereavement.
The best story is the one that attacks the issue from a new side, this time regarding the control we hold over our brains. Mollie (Gomberg, double cast) is a young woman whose epilepsy has prevented her from being a student or really living out any facet of her adulthood. Whereas the other three stories deal with the aftermath of unforeseen tragedies, this vignette makes a compelling case against deliberate manipulation of the brain.
It is her story that carries the most haunting line, as doctors elicit myriad reactions while poking at certain lobes: "Leave my soul alone." Gomberg's Mollie chatters away merrily during this examination of her brain, only to flinch, coo or recite Latin when probed; even without the epilepsy, she can't have total control over her reflexes. None of us can. I don't want to reveal the tragic speech that she makes later in the play, but it hits hard.
The actors pop up in each other's tales as doctors, strangers and family, illustrating the fact that these mutations of identity affect everyone. Although it is never enunciated in the play, the "rope in the abyss" is the loved one holding on to you for dear life with the hope that you will find your way back.
As terrifying, bizarre and awful as our memories can be, they, more so than our genes or where and how we were reared, define us. Without them, we cannot perpetuate our former existence. Elefterion's play is a sometimes distressing but ultimately gorgeous study of human identity and the struggle to pull oneself out of the abyss.
