Shakespeare Meets A Nightmare Before Christmas
Last month, I
happened to watch Salamander Stew, a play by Michael Fixel performed as part of
the New York Fringe Theatre Festival. A cross between Shakespeare and The Nightmare Before Christmas, Salamander Stew is a verse Romeo-and-Juliet
musical with a twist. Powered by love and a mighty joint, it takes you into a
phantasmagorical world of slithering creatures, hungry spirits, and deceptive
rather than deciduous trees. Everything we always read about the deep dark
woods but were afraid to experience unfolds before our eyes in its native
wickedness. If you are a Harry Potter fan, a Tolkien geek, or if Beetle Juice is
one of your favorite movies, you will crave Salamander Stew.
‘Tis the premise
– classically simple: Young, naïve, and lovesick Steven stumbles upon beautiful
woodlands. It’s hard to tell whether the spell descends on him from the evil
powers of the trees or the sinful potency of the grass he smokes, but once he
takes a respite in the welcoming shade, the thicket takes him. His inflamed
mind takes him on a psychedelic trip: he meets his love, he loses her, he wakes
up in the lizards’ lair exhausted and hungry, but all he is offered to eat is
a nauseating salamander stew.
A sprig of spinach
A slice of radish
Whiff of ginger
Paw of rabbit
Orange claw
Forest thatch
Lizard’s lungs
Down the hatch
There aren’t
many props on the stage: a leaf-covered layer and a couple of beautifully
authentic stumps adorned with fuzzy yarns is all the magic. The treacherous
forest as well as the evil inhabitants it harbors, are acted by the energetic
cast of seventeen. They spend hours on their make-up, transforming themselves
from human into sprawling plants, slithering serpents and ghastly gnomes. On
the way to the theater, they practice jungle sounds, chirping like birds and
rustling like leaves. Their efforts pay off: the moment we set foot in the door,
we feel that instead of a theater, we have wandered into the endless woods.
A lot happens
in this one-act musical: dancing, drumming, singing -- all in a quick
aggressive pace that never slows down, moves the story forward and keeps our
attention. So do the lighting effects, transporting us from the pitch
black to the vampirish white to the soft shade of the love scenes. The cast
works well together, especially when performing the Red-Eye dance in complete
darkness, creating a believable illusion of dozens of hungry red eyes glowing
in the infinite wilderness. A charmingly poetic old English script, executed in
the best traditions of Stomp, has a lot to offer, but there is only one thing
it doesn’t do.
It never
explains what Salamander Stew really is.
When it
doubt, Google it. According to Urban Dictionary, Salamander Stew is a
code name for sex. Maybe it was a coincidence, maybe not. What do you
think?
No comments:
Post a Comment