BWW Reviews: Arouet Gets Bleak with NINE and THE LONG ROAD

Arouet is currently presenting two very dark and bleak one act plays with "Nine" and "The Long Road". Now don't get me wrong. Bleak and dark can work as long as they engage and don't preach. Unfortunately only one of these plays somewhat manages that. But we'll get to that in a minute.

In the first act we had "Nine" where we see two women (Colleen Carey and Cynthia Geary) who are being held captive by an unknown entity. As the two wait to see which one will be taken next to be tortured they attempt to form a trust in each other by trading in the only commodity they have, information. And then in "The Long Road" a family deals with the senseless murder of their younger son each in their own ways. The victim's Father, John (John Murray) alternates between running and drinking. Their other son, Joe (Jared Holloway-Thomas) does anything to get out of the house. And the Mother, Mary (Eleanor Moseley) attempts to contact the perpetrator of this crime, Emma (Abigail Grimstad) through a social worker, Elizabeth (Kate Witt) who has been trying to help the girl.

See, not the cheeriest of subjects. But as I said, dark and edgy can be entertaining and engaging if it has something to say. And while "Nine" by Jane Shepard may not really go very far or have a grand conclusion, it at least kept my attention with interesting dialogue. Unfortunately Shelagh Stephenson's "The Long Road" really just came across as one of my least favorite things in the theater, someone else's therapy on stage. The entirety of the play is just the characters telling how they feel on what has happened either to each other or, many times, directly to the audience in monologue form. This is the definition of therapy, telling someone how you feel in order to make yourself feel better. And if that weren't bad enough the plot points and dialog come off as so very cliché. And then the cherry on top of this misery sundae, Stephenson chose to jam in a contrived and overused plot device into the mix which took the piece beyond simply Lifetime Original Movie and into the realm of Afterschool Special.

The performances in the two pieces were fine enough. In fact Carey and Geary in the first piece had me riveted with the commitment to their characters. And the folks in "The Long Road" come across as realistic enough, although I could have used some more levels from Grimstad as she seemed to have one note, that of angry young girl. Although that could be the due to the cliché simplicity of the script.

Ultimately both shows amounted to an effort in discovery but I never quite got what they were trying to discover. And with such cliché and hackneyed therapy on stage as was in the second one, I found it very difficult to care. With my three letter rating system I give "Nine" a MEH+ but for "The Long Road" which just felt long I give it a NAH. Note to authors, if you're going to exorcise your demons in your scripts, then have something interesting and new to say. Otherwise, keep it to yourself.

"Nine" and "The Long Road" from Arouet perform at Eclectic Theatre through March 14th. For tickets or information visit them online at www.arouet.us.

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