Review: FOOL FOR LOVE Intensely Rivets After Bewildering Start

FOOL FOR LOVE/by Sam Shepard/directed by Will Bradley & Cecilia Fairchild/The Los Angeles LGBT Center's Davidson/Valenti Theatre/thru July 10, 2016

A mesmerizing second half more than compensates for a curious first in Sam Shepard's FOOL FOR LOVE, the Los Angeles LGBT Center's entry into the 2016 Hollywood Fringe Festival. With the four characters' relationships peeling open like layers of an onion, the last half explodes with the actors' intensity and their quite evident acting talents. Will Bradley & Cecilia Fairchild directs their cast at a dutifully, fast clip.

Bradley Fisher as the Old Man simply commands the stage, initially with his plaintive guitar strumming accompanying his dulcet vocals, then with his intriguing interpretation of his past later on in the play.

Both Burt Grinstead and Charlotte Gulezian seamlessly inhabit their roles as the past lovers Eddie and May possibly reuniting. After a long period of time away, Eddie tracks May down in her rundown motel room. (Kudos to Grinstead for his detailed low-rent motel room set.) As skilled as Grinstead and Gulezian are, the hard to pull off spit-second change of minds ("Just leave! Don't leave." "I'm leaving. I'm staying.") does not illicit any sympathies for either parties. In the midst of this seesawing of leaving, not leaving, May lets slip that she's expecting a man to drop by. Bringing into the room a rifle and later, a lasso rope from his truck assuredly brings up fears and suspicions of what Eddie will do to this man. Grinstead's fun lassoing bit's quite entertaining even while effectively ominous.

Roland Ruiz as Martin "The Man" makes the perfect third wheel, completely intimated by the much taller, strapping Eddie. Ruiz convinces with Martin's ill-at-ease attempts to agree with Eddie's commands and everything he says. So totally pathetically sad.

Grinstead and Gulezian each take centerstage as their characters tell their elaborate quite different versions of their past to Martin.

All questions solved, but a happy ending? Does Sam Shepard ever do happy endings?

www.hollywoodfringe.org/projects/3751