James Wilson takes a look at Isabel from the National Asian American Theatre Company:
Mark Twain's preface to "Huckleberry Finn" famously states, "Persons attempting to find a motive in this narrative will be prosecuted; persons attempting to find a moral in it will be banished; persons attempting to find a plot in it will be shot." A similar warning might accompany Isabel, reid tang's new play produced by the National Asian American Theatre Company (NAATCO) and co-commissioned by Long Wharf Theatre. Variously set in a ghost-inhabited house, a dense forest with carpeted staircases rising from the ground, and a childhood home in which the mother roars with a voice of a mountain lion, tang's play teems with absurdism and irreverence. Unfortunately, the elements ultimately don't cohere, and although Isabel putatively addresses issues surrounding gender identity, it is frustratingly and self-consciously obtuse. |
