‘In a Word,’ a fearless masterpiece

The premise is simple in Lauren Yee’s superb drama, “In a Word,” which opened last week at The Bard’s Town Theatre in a production directed by Amos Dreisbach and assistant director Lauren Bidwell. Two years have passed since Tristan, the adopted child of Fiona (Tamara Dearing) and Guy (Neil Mulac), disappeared from Fiona’s car after she left him alone for a moment to go into a gas station.

It’s a nightmare scenario. And two years later, the nightmare hasn’t abated. But the detective on the case (played by Ben Park — who plays eight finely differentiated roles, including that of Tristan himself) is closing the case.

It’s a familiar premise, but one never handled with such brilliance and grace as it is here. Yee’s script is a fearless masterpiece that pulls us into the center of this horror, not by depicting grief, but by laying bare the psychological processes triggered by such a shock — especially the experience of time. Disasters of all kinds distort our sense of time, both in the critical moment and long afterwards.

Yee is a virtuoso in the manipulation of time. At the technical level, She uses verbal repetition, intricate and sonic linguistic themes and variations, and stuttering cadences that give the effect of aural strobe lights to express the fracturing of time. At the narrative level, she adroitly captures the sense of a distorted past (one that can’t be recovered by looking at photos, or by listening to a recording left on an answering machine), and a future lost. It’s a remarkable feat, accomplished with an economical precision that reminds me of the work of the great short story master, Lorrie Moore.

Likewise, Dreisbach and his cast do a remarkable job of bringing the script to life. The performances are disciplined and granular. Fiona, by profession a schoolteacher, bears much of the play’s dramatic load. And even as the play’s narrative shifts back and forth through points in time (the adoption, the day of the abduction and the present), she builds a fully-integrated character whose shattered self feels like a prism on the past. If Guy, the husband and father, is a balancing force for Fiona, Mulack nevertheless reveals his own simmering, bitter pain. And in his many multiple roles — the shambling detective, the put-upon principal at Fiona’s school, Guy’s macho dart-throwing friend, a chilling kidnapper and the lost child Tristan — Ben Park strolls on and off the stage with complete shape-shifting mastery. •

‘In a Word’ Through May 22
The Bard’s Town Theatre
1801 Bardstown Road, 749-5275
thebardstowntheatre.org

‘Psycho Beach Party,’ a way-gnarly production

If, like me, you have long been curious about the connection between Schopenhauer, Nietsche, Jean-Paul Sartre and the beach movies of 1960, you may find it enlightening to hang 10 over to the Henry Clay Theatre for Pandora Productions’ revival of Charles Busch’s 1987 play “Psycho Beach Party.” It opened last weekend in a way-gnarly production that would certainly blow the mind of Annette Funicello.

Busch’s play is a droll mash-up that somehow manages to bundle surfing tropes, philosophy and some creepily-funny allusions to Hitchcock’s “Psycho” into a couple of hours of spirited, sexually-transgressive fun. At the center of the story is Chicklet (Gerry Robertson), whose attributes are seldom seen in beach movies: She’s a quiet, reserved, flat-chested lass who is determined to learn how to surf (and she just happens to suffer from a multiple-personality disorder that expresses itself in the form of a dominating type out to rule the world). Chicklet’s best friend, Berdine, (Kelsey Thompson) is the very embodiment of existential angst, and her mom (played with glorious, over-the-top energy by Jason Cooper) is pretty much the distilled essence of every twisted horror-movie mom ever conceived.

The plot — such as it is — is driven by Chicklet’s desire to become a great surfer, despite the rampant sexism of the boys on the beach — especially the Grand Kahuna of this set, Kanaka (Remy Sisk), whose entourage includes a couple of handsome young men, Yo-Yo (Charlie Meredith), and Provoloney (Eric Sharp), whose schemes to seduce the gals on the beach suddenly find expression in a different sort of romance. There are bright performances from April Singer as the beach’s blonde bombshell, Marvel Ann, and Leah Roberts, as movie star Bettina Barnes. And there is the handsome idealist, Star Cat (Michael Lee Stein), who has given up his dream of becoming a psychiatrist to emulate his hero Kanaka — but whose three semesters of psychology come in handy in this plot (the cast also features nice cameos from Sabrina Spalding and Michael Detmer).

This may not be the beach you visited with the family as a kid, but it’s a whole lot of fun. Some wonderful slow-motion fight choreography, the bouncy, childlike energy of this cast, their bright, zany costumes and the beachfront set will put you in a weird sort of summer place.

Technical credits go to Jesse Alford (lighting), Alfred Jones, Jr. (choreography), Karl Anderson (sets), Lindsay Chamberlin (costumes), Matthew Allison (makeup) and Laura Ellis (sound). •

‘Psycho Beach Party’ Through May 22
Henry Clay Theater
604 S. Third St., 216-5502
pandoraprods.org

This article appears in May 18, 2016.