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Open: 10/22/2010- Close: 11/12/2010
Woyzeck Reviewed for TheaterOnline.com By: Andi Stover
 As two wars grind on, without end or perceptible purpose, unemployment rises making now the perfect time to revive Woyzeck, George Büchner's unfinished classic about a soldier who desperately toils to support his family by acting as specimen for a medical experiment where he only eats peas. Director Jonathan Barsness adapts the 1836 German tragedy that innovated dramatic form with its spare, episodic structure by turning its main character into an unemployed couch surfer in a Midwestern town. With an ear for the way people speak, Barsness alters the poetic starkness of Bücher's fragment by making the scenes over in a realistic, casual manner. Although Barsness displays talent as a shaper of dialogue, his stylistic departure dulls the harshness central to the world of the play. Also, there are missed opportunities for exploring our current time by taking Woyzeck out of the cruel hierarchy of the military. The Toy Box Theatre Company efficiently employs limited resources to deliver an even production filled with nuanced moments of sensitivity. A minimal, but evocative, set by Kacie Hultgren turns the small, black box at 64 E. 4th Street into a dreary frozen landscape with simplicity and restraint. David Michael Holmes, as Woyzeck, convincingly portrays a lost soul unable to articulate his misery, but has difficulty creating mounting tension with his performance, mainly due to features of an adaptation that depicts Woyzeck as disturbed from the outset.  Updates to the story diminish the devastating metaphoric significance of the original. Barsness transforms Woyzeck from an overworked, exhausted soldier cracking under the extreme hardship imposed by class into a confused loafer who can't find work because he hasn't taken his meds. Instead of the dehumanizing effects of being poor inflicting madness on Woyzeck, as in Büchner's play, here his problems stem from his emotional instability. This change ultimately undermines the audience's ability to sympathize with Woyzeck as we watch the sordid events of the play enfold with measured inevitability. Late in the play, when Holmes screams at Marie, played with honesty by Clare Schmidt, there is no sense of great loss because we only have seen Woyzeck screaming with jealousy, never with the gentle compassion he is famous for. Despite these conceptual missteps, the cast and the musicians, the talented trio Colonna Sonora, bring a sincerity to their performances that elevate the production, conveying an honest portrayal of human frailty. We want so much more from our lives when mostly, there just isn't. The Toy Box Theatres' adaptation of Woyzeck succeeds in expressing the wintry despair of failure. I look forward to seeing what else writer/director Barsness conjures in the future. I hope to be in the audience when he shakes loose from aesthetic concerns not his own and realizes the depths of his own talents. Venue: Choicirciati Cultural Center : 64 E. 4th Street |
