|
In Search of Red River Dog |
||
| New Jersey stage: Tragedy, not trash, in trailer park 10/19/00 BY PETER FILICHIA In Search of Red River Dog Where: New Jersey Repertory Company, 179 Broadway, Long Branch When: Through Nov. 5. Thursdays-Saturdays at 8 p.m. and Sundays at 2 p.m. How much: $25 on Thursdays and Sundays, $27 on Friday and Saturdays. Call (732) 229-3166. Are people who live in trailers necessarily "trailer trash"? Playwright Sandra Perlman is out to refute the stereotype in "In Search of Red River Dog," now at New Jersey Repertory Company in Long Branch . Though Paulette and Denny live in a "sardine can," they're an eloquent and devoted couple, thanks to Perlman's fresh dialogue. Not that the young marrieds don't have problems. Denny's out of work, which doesn't help Paulette's dreams of going to college. Worse, their baby has died of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. Their prospects have tarnished in the few years since Denny nearly became the football team's MVP, and Paulette almost won the title of the town's Apple Butter Queen. Fifty minutes into the play, though, Paulette suddenly mentions that she believes their trailer is sitting in the midst of severe environmental problems. Plants won't grow, the water smells and their beloved dog, Red River , is ill. Though a crisis seems imminent, it won't be mentioned again. Perlman indicates that weighty issues occur to these people, but they lack the resources to deal with them. The playwright spends the second act replacing the couple's dreams of a better life with far less savory alternatives. She suggests that there's no escape from such a lower-middle-class life, and that poverty will eventually overwhelm even the brightest minds. What makes this a genuine tragedy is Perlman's ability to rouse sympathy for these two kids, who had the raw material to succeed. The sense of loss is made more acute because Dana Benningfield and Jeff Farkash have a wonderful chemistry as Paulette and Denny. In just a few, attention-getting minutes, they exchange faint smiles that bear an edge of desperation; their eyes show how much unhappiness pervades their lives. The couple's brave front makes them all the more heartbreaking. Benningfield gets the chance to be even more commendable in the way she displays great devotion to her father. He's at first played as a jolly drunk by Ross Haines, until he faces the harsh realities of unemployment. "This man don't bring home nothin', 'cuz this man don't work," Haines says, his voice full of defeat. As Paulette's mother -- who does her best not to be overwhelmed by her job of picking vegetables -- Betty Hudson is the salt of the earth. Director Rob Reese stages the play with the right pace and mood. Once again, the New Jersey Repertory Company proves itself to be a fledgling playwright's best friend, consistently giving new plays most remarkable productions. This is one of its better choices. |
||
Superb cast in drama that looks at life, lies Published in the Asbury Park Press 10/17/00 By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN, THEATER WRITER Men without jobs and the women who love them is at the heart of Sandra Perlman's new drama "In Search of Red River Dog," now playing at the New Jersey Repertory Theatre in Long Branch. Also at the heart of the matter are lies. The lies told by the steel mill owners to its laid off workers. Lies told by the garbage company that was illegally dumping chemicals years ago that now have poisoned the groundwater in Deerfield , Ohio , in 1978. And the lies told between a husband and wife that, when revealed, undermine the shaky foundation of their marriage.
Superbly acted by all four cast members and directed by Rob Reese, the play unfolds over 48 hours in the front yard of a run-down trailer. Sam Shepardesque in a stark, reality driven, highly emotional way, the plot centers on Paulette (Dana Benningfield) and Denny (Jeff Farkash), high school sweethearts who married after she became pregnant. Their young daughter has recently died and Paulette believes the cause was poisoned water from leaky chemical drums. Paulette's beloved dog Red also is sick, and she vows that if he dies (which he ultimately does), she'll have his remains analyzed to prove he was poisoned. Meanwhile, Paulette has some unusual habits which leads us to think she may be losing her grip on reality. She sings nursery rhymes. Hangs laundry at night to dry. And plants exotic spices she has no use for. She also is very bright - brightest kid in school - who married a football player who can barely put two words together. Benningfield turns in a finely wrought performance as the young wife who has to make some hard choices. Her mother Bertie (Betty Hudson), who lost two children to miscarriages before she got the family out of a beautiful but deadly coal mining valley in West Virginia , loves her daughter with a passion. But she does not want to move again, and believes if Paulette stirs up trouble with her theory about the poisoned water, they will never work again and be forced to leave the area. Hudson is excellent as the mother, particularly when she is horrified at the circumstances surrounding Red's death and what happened immediately afterward. Her husband John (Ross Haines) is drinking himself to death because he knows the steel mills will never reopen and he can't even land a clerk's job at the local convenience store because he can't work the computerized cash register. It is the women who have the survival instincts. John accepts this. Denny does not. Farkash's portrait of a Denny that is insecure and terrified his wife will leave him is nicely done. We want to feel sorry for his predicament and do, up to a point. As his fears overtake him, accusing his wife of infidelity and lack of respect, he becomes pathetic. As always, it comes down to sex and Denny resents not having any with Paulette, just because a doctor said to give her time to recover from their baby's death. He finally takes his frustration out on her and nobody's life will ever be the same. At the end of this two-hour drama we realize Paulette is the one who is facing reality and Denny is the one who lives in an imaginary world. Published on October 17, 2000 |
||