 |
|
At least one thing is inarguable: Erica (Rebecca Henderson) and Vicky (Rachael Holmes) experience a lot in the 40-odd years they're together, and we see all of it from the first date to their wedding and children, the painful breakup, and their final, haunting meeting before parting permanently. And as they deal with uncertainty, prejudice (Vicky is black, Erica white), and their own little quirks (Erica is uptight-neurotic to the extreme, Vicky has never been able to fully root her free-thinking ideals in her clamped-down background), their life takes on a rich, glowing patina that reinforces the notion of their tale as one worth telling. In telling it, Barfield leaps back and forth across days, months, and decades, using the tiny words and instances that trigger memory to launch each new scene. As this happens, and we "meet" the duo's daughters, witness their burgeoning romance and eventual disintegration from the inside out, and dissect the everyday building blocks that made them who they are, we get a much broader view of recent personal and societal history than we could get in any other way. And because it's filtered a single, fixed vantage point, the focus is, bracingly, usually on the effect rather than the cause. (The legalization of same-sex marriage in Massachusetts plays a crucial role, for example, but that happens in the background.) Director Leigh Silverman's rendition of this is technically exacting, and she's crafted the 65-minute evening with such pinpoint precision that you can't get lost even as you stumble about in time. Jennifer Schriever's lights and Bart Fasbender's sound help establish each new period and locale, but Barfield's script sometimes moves so quickly that they don't have time to activate. But Silverman and the actors always do, and are in absolute command of the dozens of scenes that depict every imaginable occurrence in a serious long-term relationship. Henderson's severe take on Erica provides a stark, stirring contrast to Holmes's more reluctant, go-with-the-flow Vicky, and both performers make the most of the opportunities they have to show as each of the hundred facets of both women. Though their most intricate and absorbing work occurs in the quietest scenes, when the excitement of events such as childbirth or skydiving isn't around to distract—a scene in which Vicky attempts to pursue a romantic interlude in a stalled Ferris wheel while Erica has a monumental freak-out is masterful in its emotional misdirection—Henderson and Holmes are totally convincing playing any age and any situation, all without the aid of props or costume changes (Emily Rebholz designed the straightforward, character-rich clothing). What's not quite clear, however, is why specifically why any of this matters. Barfield has no difficulty setting up and seeing through connections both simple and complex, but falls short of showing why this scattered treatment is more insightful than a linear take on the same treatment would be. One suspects it has to do with the idea that our recollections of events typically assign them a weight and an importance beyond what they had in the moment, and that's certainly reflected in the writing, as—despite Erica and Vicky's individuality—nothing groundbreaking happens to either one in all the time we spend with them, though there's a light epic quality to their pairing nonetheless. You sense, then, that giving depth to the shallow isn't the side-effect, but rather the intent, and as the play spirals open, nothing disabuses you of the notion. In tripping through the present, past, and future, Bright Half Life recalls the current Broadway play Constellations, which has a similarly repetitive, unpredictable temporal structure. But that show's underlying stylistic concept (how multiple universes and reveal far more about people than we'd be capable of learning otherwise) is completely intertwined with its content, an extra, crucial step Barfield has not taken. Here, you're reliant entirely on one concrete set of events that, for its virtues, is not vivid or original enough to generate much of its own steam. That steam might provide danger or heat, two qualities that this play is noticeably lacking. But there's no shortage of intelligence or beauty to be found here, and Silverman, Henderson, and Holmes do much to compensate for what's missing dramatically. They do enough, in fact, to make Bright Half Life worth watching, even if it usually feels like you're sitting through someone else's narration of their family photo album with all the pages out of order.
Bright Half Life
|
