Llewellyn J. Rhoe founder of Arts Equity: Reviews

To learn more about Arts Equity as we make this transition from our former space at The Main Street Theatre to a new theatre venue. You can always reach us at the same number 360-695-3770

Sweet Equity, Arts Equity's Return to Vancouver

Last spring, The Vancouver Voice ran a feature on the closing of the Main Street Theatre, the performance house for the Arts Equity theater group. Assigned to the story, I contacted and met Llewellyn Rhoe, co-founder of Arts Equity. He spoke in the wryly passive manner of someone who was getting adjusted to defeating news and who was harboring battered hope for what had been his contribution to Vancouver culture.

Now, on a sunny winter Saturday morning, the renewed energy in Rhoe is unmistakable. His soft-spoken demeanor contains his beaming excitement, cautious optimism and the welcome stress of a busy schedule. When we stopped in to Mint Tea on Main St. to chat, the employees welcomed him and expressed their excitement at the good news: Arts Equity is returning to Vancouver.

“There’s an awful lot I think that’s happening here,” said Rhoe. “There are a lot of people in the art community doing work and we just want to get back to our share of it. And … to be honest, we need to go back to work.”

Arts Equity will have their work cut out for them in the coming months. Their lease agreement includes months of free rent in exchange for the renovation of the building. For this, they’re rallying for financial and labor backing from donators and from volunteers.

They’ve set a $30,000 goal for renovation, including updated wiring for stage lights, plumbing and changes to satisfy handicap requirements.

“We’ve been raising money, just small donations, over the past year,” said Rhoe, “because without a box office, without our bar concessions, the cash flow... a lot of us have been working for free.” Their website, artsequity.org, is taking donations via Paypal.

Arts Equity will run on a production/construction parallel schedule, which will allow them to produce plays while making renovations when financially feasible. They hope to have the first production underway by April or May.

“Where we’re at right now, what we’ve been able to negotiate, we can move forward in doing this,” said Rhoe. “There’s a lot of sweat equity.”

Following the closure of the Main Street Theatre, Arts Equity followed through on a plan to perform at various rented locations in Portland. They performed one show before calling it a day.

“The performance that we did of 21A with Joey LeBard was really solid for a one-person show,” said Rhoe. “Our audiences were small. Our Vancouver audience definitely didn’t cross the river, and that surprised us.” Rhoe said Arts Equity also suffered from local competition and lack of press.

Gearing up for the return to Vancouver, Arts Equity is taking the lessons it learned in Portland into consideration and is looking at methods of survival and adaptation. This will include lowered ticket prices and Saturday shows aimed at children, a first for Arts Equity.

Rhoe said Arts Equity’s return will be a community effort: they’ve already assembled some volunteers for the physical work needed for the clean-up and renovation, and are seeking donations of useful parts and supplies. Once running, the theater plans to be an outlet for artistic collaborators needed for theater, such as visual artists and musicians.

Last year, as the Main Street Theatre was closing, Rhoe had said, “It’s hard to think about being creative when you’re looking for an artistic home.”

“Nothing has changed from that,” he said when we met recently. “More people who are looking for an artistic home and have something they want to do. And things are coming together, and we’re happy about that.”

Adam Stewart is a contributor to The Voice.

Arts Equity vs. the Mainstream

The Main Street Theatre closes its doors

By Adam Stewart

People visiting the south end of Main Street in downtown Vancouver anytime soon are likely to stumble across a ghostly presence. The Main Street Theatre's signage of boldly offset gold lettering against red background is still intact, but in fact it is little more than the skeletal remains of the once vibrant theatrical venue.

Next to "For Lease" signs on the dark windows, empty squares of tape remain like chalk outlines surrounding a body where theatrical posters and positive reviews were once prominently displayed.

This past February saw the closing of the Main Street Theatre, and the dislocation of the theatre's resident company, Arts Equity. The final (and aptly named) production at the space, Eugene Ionesco's "Exit the King", ran through February 16.

On March 7 an informal wake was held at the Tiger's Garden bar to celebrate Arts Equity's 467 performances at the theatre. Notable members of the company, fans, supporters and friends gathered to mark the occasion.

"It was a really interesting way to spend the last four years," said Llewellyn Rhoe, founder of the company.

The theatre, he said, was born out of necessity. While recovering from an accident some years back, Rhoe turned to producing as a form of therapy. "I really didn't have a choice. It [was] either attempt this project or be depressed."

Arts Equity has filled an important role in Vancouver's theatre scene: it was the first theatre in Clark County to operate out of its own venue, and it produced plays that were often edgier than those produced by its Vancouver contemporaries. Yet its unique status couldn't keep the operation afloat.

Vancouver Voice theatre critic Steven Walling - who cut his teeth on Arts Equity's production of "Road Rage" for the now defunct newspaper the Vanguard and has also contributed reviews to Willamette Week - covered the company in considerable depth since its inception.

"The theatre scene in Vancouver is certainly grim without Arts Equity around," said Walling. "There are already several strong family-focused or children's companies in the area, and I think without Arts Equity there is a hole in the type of fare being provided."

"I think [the state of theatre in Vancouver] is very healthy," said Val Ogden, chair of the Southwest Washington Center for the Arts (SWCA).

The SWCA has been spearheading efforts to develop a planned performing arts center with condominiums attached - the proposed site for which has been granted a moratorium by the city while the group attempts to raise funds.

According to Rhoe, Ogden never attended an Arts Equity production at the theatre.

"It's a joke," explained Jack Booch, contributor to The Vancouver Voice. "By the time that performing arts center is built, the local theatre groups who want to use it will not be able to afford to pay the rent."

Booch, former director of the Portland Civic Theatre and Executive Producer for The Theater Guild, Inc. in Manhattan, doesn't believe that Vancouver has a strong enough interest in the theatre to support the center without assistance.

"The formula is this - one in ten people will see one play a year on average," he said. "Now you take the total population of Vancouver and do the division and you'll see that we don't have enough people, enough bodies...forget cultural awareness."

"I would like very much to be a resident company at the new center," said Jaynie Roberts, the Artistic Director at Magenta Theater, "but am not prepared to drive myself into the ground in order to make that a reality if the money is too much."

Some area residents question the efficacy of pouring money into a new center when local companies are in need of subsidized assistance already.

"I guess if a theatre company could sell that many seats to afford to rent the space, it's fabulous," said Bethany Corson of the Christian Youth Theater (CYT). "I don't see that we have a lot of theatre companies doing that in Vancouver."

For the time being, these and other Vancouver theatres have survived as touring acts. CYT has enjoyed measured success since its beginnings in Fall 2002. Its production of "High School Musical" attracted over 5,000 viewers over two weekends. CYT performs in various school auditoriums, and is branching out of Vancouver to perform in Gresham and possibly Beaverton.

"Our ticket sales have been phenomenal since our beginning," said Carson. "We're really happy with our success in Vancouver, so we're moving beyond Vancouver now."

Roberts said Magenta's biggest audience comprised 1,139 members who came to see last year's production of "The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe".

"I am happy with our level of success," she said. "Yes, we are growing, but wisely."

Rhoe said he doesn't believe Arts Equity's disappointing ticket sales are an indicator of the general health of the theatre scene in Vancouver.

"I don't think we should be the barometer for whether or not [the performing arts center] should be built," he said. "I hope it gets built. The latest estimates are that it will take four years. A lot can happen in four years. I know from experience, a four-year cycle is a good cycle. It's going to go by in a blink."

Rhoe suggested his theatre's closure was due to several factors, including its location in the "bar district." Others have suggested that the venue's repertory, which sometimes presented edgier material, may have contributed to its demise.

But such criticism doesn't faze Rhoe.

"I didn't want to do [...] what other people were doing because I thought it was already adequately represented," said Rhoe, "and I didn't think it would be very neighborly, frankly, to do a lot of that material."

Rhoe's aim was to challenge his audience.

"[Audiences] left the theatre saying, 'I can't believe I saw that in Vancouver,'" said Rhoe. "And that was really one of our goals, to create that kind of experience for the theatre."

Rhoe said Arts Equity tried to present quality writing, selecting plays written by winners of the Nobel and Pulitzer prizes.

While CYT was producing family-friendly entertainment like "Robin Hood" and "Annie", Arts Equity was staging shows for mature audiences, such as Eugene O'Neil's "The Long Voyage Home" and Steve Martin's "Picasso at the Lapin Agile". Arts Equity also produced original plays, such as Rhoe's own "Road Rage".

Most infamous was Rhoe's production of Paula Vogel's racy drama, "Hot 'n' Throbbing", which featured simulated sex and frontal male nudity, and treats subjects such as pornography and domestic violence from a feminist perspective.

"I would say [the people of Vancouver] are much more responsive to mainstream, run-of-the mill musical theater," said Steve Coker, an area playwright and producer. "That's your bread and butter in the theatre community. That's how everybody makes money."

Financial considerations aside, surprisingly little regard for artistic credibility seemed to be on the minds of those polled, with some exceptions.

Walling pointed out that the confrontational nature of Arts Equity's productions has been largely over-stated.

"I doubt the majority of the work produced at The Main Street Theatre was out of step with Vancouver patrons," said Walling. "Albee, O'Neill and Steve Martin are hardly offbeat."

Coker suggested the theatre's demise might also have had to do with a lack of consistent press coverage, which, he said, contributed to the end of another strong theatrical period in Vancouver in the late 1980s.

"It's not that the community at large was unsupportive," he said. "It's the people who could have made an impact on it who turned their backs on it."

Meanwhile, the loss of Rhoe's venue is keenly felt.

"It's really too bad," Booch said. "The Main Street Theatre was a real asset for this community. It will be missed."

"Our space on Main was both our biggest asset and our biggest liability," said Rhoe. "We didn't have to move out, didn't have to be a road show company, which is what we are about to become for a short period of time, we hope. Being without [a venue] is no different than being homeless in any other way. It's hard to think about creating art when you're thinking about subsistence."

Curtain falls on Arts Equity

Monday, February 25, 2008
By Mary Ann Albright, Columbian staff writer

Clark County’s first professional venue failed to attract audiences

After three years and 467 shows in downtown Vancouver, Arts Equity Onstage is vacating the Main Street Theatre. Disappointing ticket sales made it impossible to pay the bills, said founder Llewellyn J. Rhoe.

Arts Equity opened in 2005 as Clark County’s first professional theater to have its own venue.

“It was our biggest asset and our biggest liability,” said Rhoe, 59, of Vancouver, who estimates he and his wife, managing director Helene M. Rasanen, have sunk $400,000 into the venture.

Arts Equity will not stage any more productions in Vancouver, although the organization will maintain its nonprofit status and could be reinvented elsewhere, Rhoe said.

Arts Equity had only a handful of subscribers, and Rhoe said he’ll arrange for them to see other shows.  

Arts Equity made a name for itself producing edgier fare, including last year’s run of Paula Vogel’s “Hot ’N’ Throbbing,” complete with full-frontal male nudity and simulated sex.

Rhoe believes such bold choices only helped the theater, which has employed a total of 77 actors part-time.

“Being edgy was the only reason we got as many people as we did,” he said.

Still, it wasn’t enough to save the 126-seat black box theater. Rhoe based his budget on 32-percent occupancy, but some shows sold as few as 11 percent of tickets.

And the majority of patrons weren’t from Vancouver, he added.

The theater’s location may have contributed to the spate of empty chairs. Arts Equity rents a space on Sixth and Main streets, and Rhoe said several people indicated to him that they avoided the venue because the area seemed unsavory or unsafe.

“I have no desire to be the only theater in what is fast becoming the bar district of downtown,” he noted.

Arts Equity’s exit from Vancouver follows the Slocum House Theatre Company’s recent decision to pull back from ambitious plans to raise $2 million to renovate and expand the theater within the historic home at Esther and Sixth streets.

Arts Equity’s struggles did not go unnoticed by arts advocates who want to build a performing arts center in Clark County. The group behind that effort, which calls itself the Southwest Washington Center for the Arts, hopes to raise enough money to support construction of a  multi-purpose arts center near Esther Short Park in downtown Vancouver.

Such a center could provide a home for Clark County’s largest groups, the Vancouver Symphony and Christian Youth Theater, which currently have to perform in high school auditoriums. Both Vancouver Symphony and Christian Youth Theater have grown quickly during the past five years to command annual budgets of $500,000.

“It is a message to us that we have to be very careful with our programming, and have a variety of programs that meet the interests of children, families and adults,” said Val Ogden of Vancouver, chairwoman of the Southwest Washington Center for the Arts board.

The proposed center would house visual arts, theater, music, dance and lectures, and Ogden hopes the range of performances would be better received than Arts Equity’s narrower niche.

“They made a valiant effort and provided quality theater, but I’m not sure if people were ready for the serious, cutting-edge shows they were presenting. We may not be a large enough community to support that,” she said, adding that she was sorry to hear Arts Equity will be leaving. “I think they added an important dimension to the community,” she said.

Mary Ann Albright can be reached at maryann.albright@columbian.com or 360-735-4507.

Review: 'Exit the King' dishes gallows humor

by Bill Reinert for The Columbian

An ailing leader nears the end of his “term.” He has started wars with neither purpose nor end. His top advisers have moved on, leaving him isolated. He fails to grasp his irrelevance, or why his followers no longer march in lockstep with him. He is profoundly out of touch. The leader is King Berenger I, a 400-year-old monarch immortalized, so to speak, in Eugene Ionesco’s play “Exit the King,” which runs through Feb. 16 at Arts Equity Onstage at the Main Street Theatre.

The king (Rod Harrel), ruler of a nameless and crumbling kingdom, knows he is ill but denies his impending death.

“They told me I could decide when I’d die,” he complains.

“That’s because they thought you’d have chosen to a long time ago,” retorts his former queen, Marguerite, whom he abandoned for the younger and prettier Marie. The identity of the nameless and mysterious “they” is left to our imagination.

The king insists, “I’ll die when I want, when I make up my mind to, when I have the time.”

Death isn’t so easily denied, however. In fact, it’s knocking at the door. Marguerite (Virginia Belt), a dignified, businesslike woman sporting a blood-red blazer, and the king’s doctor (John Bangs) break the news to the king that he has but 90 minutes to live.

The play unfolds in approximately real time, an effective dramatic device. Ionesco uses the conceit to let the audience follow Berenger’s fleet journey through the metaphysics of life and death.

As Berenger, Harrel slips convincingly into denial and delusion and, ultimately, resignation and acceptance.

Propping him up — literally, at times — is his current queen, Marie, squeezed absurdly and provocatively into a black bustier, tutu and cowboy boots. Marie (Janice Janesky), in love with her king and deeply concerned for her status, counters Marguerite and the doctor. Marie insists the king is still vital, still keeper of his own destiny.

Harrel peels away layer after layer of Berenger’s frailties and defenses, reluctantly coming to grips, as his remaining breaths tick away, with his triumphs, failures and lost opportunities. He preens, slumps and staggers around the stage, clinging to his staff for support. As he peers toward the horizon, he feebly commands the sun to erase the surrounding gloom.

“I thought I banished the clouds,” he mutters, puzzled, as Marie coaxes him back to his throne.

Serving as a sort of Greek chorus are Juliette (Kiri Dyken), a caustic domestic, and The Guard (Stefan Kay), a military sycophant sheathed in what passes for a Soviet bloc officer’s garb. In the end, even these two lowly subjects ignore the king’s commands.

Liberal doses of gallows humor leaven the drama, which walks a fine line between naturalism and the absurdity for which Ionesco is known. Janesky overdoes her tarted-up drama queen role occasionally with her bawling, shrieking and imploring, but is generally strong and often funny.

Harrel deftly mixes humor, pathos and physical comedy as he stumbles and shuffles about in a shabby fur coat and red boxer briefs.

In the end, Marguerite’s compassion and abiding love for her ex-husband surfaces. Their mutual sniping behind them, the two connect in a resolution as deeply moving as it is plausible. At her strongest here, Belt brings enormous dignity to bear as the saddened former queen.

The play’s obvious and more subtle parallels to our current political circumstances make it particularly timely. With its sometimes soaring language and strong performances, “Exit the King” is a skillful exploration of the nature of life, death, power and memory.

Exit the King

A ruler who has run his country into the ground now refuses to let go. Sound familiar? Probably its resonance with our current national leadership crisis prompted Arts Equity to take on Ionesco’s political satire, and it does a fine job playing up the similarities. King Berenger (Rod Harrel) and his court speak with thick Texas accents, and Berenger himself makes apelike facial expressions and frequently lets fly a sinister airy cackle—heh, heh, heh—that will be instantly familiar to anyone with a TV. This spirited production—nimbly directed by Llewellyn Rhoe—successfully straddles the line between tragedy and farce, and it has the advantage of lending itself to contemporary allegory. Unfortunately, the script hasn’t aged well; what may have challenged audiences in 1962 drags in the new millennium. The second act features unforgettable monologues by Berenger and Queen Marguerite (Virginia Belt), and in general performances are solid. However, not all characters speak with the same accent—the maid is French, the guard is German, and the actors step on each others’ lines. JOHN MINERVINI. The Main Street Theater, 606 Main St., Vancouver., 360-695-3770. 8 pm Thursdays-Saturdays, 2 pm Sundays. Closes Feb. 16. $10-$24. All ages.

Theater review: Into the absurd with "Exit the King"
by Richard Wattenberg
Sunday January 13, 2008, 10:50 AM

Confronting our mortality, the inevitability of death, is not something we usually choose to do for entertainment.

Even so, theater of the absurd playwright Eugene Ionesco gives us the opportunity to do exactly that in his dark comedy, "Exit the King." This is a difficult play that Vancouver's ambitious Arts Equity is taking it on, and while the production lacks the power that it could have, it has some very effective moments

This richly poetic drama represents the final demise of King Berenger the First, an everyman whose kingdom is symbolic of the universe of thoughts, dreams, and experiences which each and every one of us have within ourselves. A mono-drama, in which the play's other characters seem to represent fragments of Berenger's psyche, the play follows the lead character as he moves through the various stages of dying: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and finally acceptance.

Ionesco's play is, in fact, a modern morality play. Just as the early 16th century English play "Everyman" represents the final stages of the title character's journey to death so does Ionesco's piece. And just as characters representing aspects of the self (Strength, Beauty, Knowledge, etc.) gradually desert Everyman as he approaches death, so do the characters of "Exit the King" abandon Berenger as he nears the end of his journey. Eternal bliss awaits Everyman who has done proper penance; however, in our more secular world no such guarantee awaits Berenger who slips away into the mists of non-existence or simply disappears in a blackout at play's end.

Ionesco's play may end without a heavenly ascent, but this is by no means a depressing drama. Somewhat wordy, Ionesco's play still abounds in wit and humor. It is this aspect of the play that the experienced Arts Equity cast directed by Llewellyn J. Rhoe most successfully
conveys.

What is missing from this production, however, is a sense of the stakes, the urgency of Berenger's situation. As the King, Rod Harrel has a wry sense of comic timing that gives Berenger an endearing petulance, but he lacks the desperation that one would expect imminent death to awaken. It is this terror and Berenger's response to it that drives the play forward -- giving the comedy its dark absurdist edge.

Additionally, the intensity of the drama is somewhat diluted by the choice to localize the action -- Berenger and his Queens speak with Southern accents. Perhaps this decision is related to the intent as expressed in the program to view this play as a political drama about the centralization of executive powers, at best a peripheral theme in the original text.

Still, there is praiseworthy work here: Harrel is often fun and Virginia Belt, as Queen Marguerite, is strong especially in her long monologue at play's end. Moreover, Rhoe's imaginative set with its rich texture provides an artful background for the tragic-comic action.

Continues 8 p.m. Thursdays-Saturdays, various times Sundays, through
Feb. 16, Main Street Theatre, 606 Main St., Vancouver; $10-$24,
360-695-3770, www.artsequity.org/stage.html

Exit the King well done

By Gregory E. Zschomler for The VanCougar | Posted Today at 12:50:24 PM



I have pretty much shied away from attending community theater. Risking a ten spot (or more) on a sub par performance is disappointing to say the least. And more often than not that’s the case. However, every once in a while it’s worth the risk. Like this time.



I was pleasantly surprised by the Arts Equity performance of Eugene Ionesco’s Exit the King I saw this past Saturday night. I absolutely loved the “organic industrial” set design, the beautiful lighting design and the fine acting. I really didn’t “get” the costuming (by Drew Foster) though—a bit too eclectic I think.

The play itself was a bit unusual—somewhat archaic in its humor—but striking in its relevance. Kudos to director/designer Llewellyn J. Rhoe

Ionnesco’s 1962 drama is part of the “theater of the absurd” movement (which was popular from 1940 to about 1970) and, therefore, has its odd moments. It is a deep, rich play—full of insightful commentary on life, death, power, vanity, entropy and nihilism—certainly, thought provoking.

Overall the performances were nicely delivered. Strangely, each player chose a different accent (British, US Southern, French, German and US English). Rod Harrel seemed to model his performance of the king (in facial expression and voice) after George Jefferson; I kept expected him to exclaim “Wheezy!”

The stand out performance of the evening was offered by Kiri Dyken who deftly played the role of Juliette. Her playful French accent made me wonder if she was indeed French.

Exit the King plays Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays, 8 p.m. through February 10th at the Main Street Theater, located at 606 Main in Vancouver, WA. The quaint, intimate theater was also part of the evening’s charm.

None of the 120 seats, which wrap around the stage, is more than ten feet from the action. It was an immersive experience. Stunning art decorates the lobby of the old brick structure. The box office number is 695-3770.

Wither the Arts...Coverage?

Filling the vacuum of regional arts criticism

By Jack V. Booch

Arts Equity at The Main Street Theatre—Vancouver’s sole company with a complete season of theatrical offerings—was recently passed over almost entirely by the regional press. According to Llew Rhoe, producing director at Arts Equity, all the usual suspects were guilty of this astonishing sin of omission; The Oregonian, The Mercury, Willamette Week, and yes, even The Columbian failed to review Rhoe’s 6-week run of Seascape by the great Edward Albee.
 
The two shining exceptions to this faux pas were The VanCougar (kudos to WSU Vancouver!) and The Vancouver Voice (blush).
 
Given this egregious oversight by local media, it was, to say the least, somewhat startling for me to discover a slew of Vancouver-specific supplements in the pages of the aforementioned offending publications. How dare these impostors profess to serve a Vancouver readership when they can’t be bothered to cover those artistic institutions that are the backbone of our cultural identity! Such special sections and supplements are nothing more than a transparent attempt to capture a share of a burgeoning Vancouver market without expending the slightest amount of intellectual capital in the process.
 
Sadly, the local daily, The Columbian, is so ensconced in provincial ignorance regarding the theatre that they regularly omit the names of playwrights when they deign to cover local theatrical productions at all. It would seem as though The Columbian’s theatre critics believe that American giants like Eugene O’Neill, Edward Albee, and Paula Vogel—Nobel and Pulitzer prize-winners, respectively—do not even deserve passing mention.
 
Prior to June 18, 2007, Arts Equity produced 431 performances at the Main Street Theatre. Nevertheless, it has proven to be a Herculean task for them to attract the attention of the area press. Occasional mention notwithstanding, it seems Arts Equity cannot even depend on regularly appearing in theatrical listings.
 
Despite the effrontery afoot, Rhoe recently assured me that he’s “still happy to be here.” While I applaud his enthusiasm, I cannot conceal my personal contempt for the failure of regional critics to faithfully respond to his show of artistic good faith.
 
As a professional company, Arts Equity is honor-bound to roll with punches when it comes to receiving favorable and unfavorable notices alike, but it goes without saying that they deserve to be covered one way or the other. It is the obligation of the news media to advise the public of the cultural opportunities available to them. To ignore this obligation is to diminish and inhibit the cultural potential of our community; the theatrical arts simply cannot flourish in an environment where they are barely or minimally acknowledged by the media. If the public doesn’t know, the public doesn’t go.
 
In my own professional life directing plays from Portland to Manhattan, Calgary to Buenos Aries, I only rarely encountered locations so devoid of critical faculties that reviews failed to appear in the press.
 
Of course, the newspaper business is an art, not a science, and even the best publications are bound to slip up from time to time. However, the fact that an entire region of media organs recently turned a blind eye to Vancouver theatre is either a sign of total indifference or utter incompetence.
 
Here’s an idea: The Columbian loves to fall back on syndicated content for its movie and television reviews, so why not ask Steven Walling at The Vancouver Voice to cover their theatre beat? I’m sure he’d let them reprint his work. I know a guy who knows a guy...

Pulitzer-winning Seascape on display in downtown Vancouver
By Zane Wagner for The VanCougar | Posted October 04, 2007, 01:47:30 PM
Edward Albee is famous for his plays that pit couples against one another, but his Pulitzer-winning Seascape, stands out as different from his others in one obvious way: one of the couples is a pair of lizards. Arts Equity Theater’s presentation of the play, designed and directed by Llewellyn J. Rhoe, is a wonderful look at the similarities and differences - amongst two couples.

A little background is in order: Nancy and Charlie are a married couple in the twilight of their years. Charlie, played by Rod Harrel, is a passive-aggressive grump of a man who wants to do little more than relax. His wife Nancy, played by Suzanne Owens-Duval, is a ‘life-is-short’ woman who might think that the years she spent raising her children might have been better spent out doing stuff, and doesn’t want to waste another day doing nothing.

This first act is ponderous despite the well-written and well-played dialogue: yes, Nancy and Charlie are a dysfunctional couple; they spat, they argue, Charlie is passive-aggressive and Nancy is whiney and manipulative. It’s a shtick, and it gets old.

But just as the audience starts to fidget in their seats, Albee brings in the other couple: a pair of lizards that are younger in appearance and demeanor than the humans they play against. Sarah (Adrienne Vogel) and Leslie (Joey LeBard) wear costumes that make them look like a comical version of a 1950’s B-movie, but they aren’t the sort of murderous things you might expect them to be. Rather, they are articulate, mostly harmless, and genuinely curious about human behavior.

It is this curiosity that prompts questions from both sides of the dialogue. It also shows how much the two couples have in common: both are loving, protective, and both males squabble too much. In one instance, Charlie too eagerly points out that the lizards are bigots for looking down on their fish neighbors, while in another Leslie can’t help but show disdain for the longer human gestation period, and the fact that humans keep their young with them for so many long years.

The drolly-comic second act is by far superior to the first, and really shows off the actors’ excellent chemistry. These are actors who have worked with each other before in other shows staged by Arts Equity and in other theater companies before, and they work well together.

In the end, Seascape really brings home the message of how much we humans have in common, even though we can’t help but squabble with those close to us.

Tickets for Seascape, which runs through October 13, range from $10 to $24, and can be purchased by calling the Arts Equity box office at (360) 695-3770. Arts Equity is located at 606 Main Street, just off exit 1B in the heart of downtown, two blocks east of the new Hilton Hotel and Esther Short Park.

As Vancouver Grows, So Does Local Arts Scene, Cultural Offerings

Steve Reinmuth’s Ascent AP at Art on the Boulevard.




Hankering for a day of gallery hopping? Heart set on an evening of music‚ dance or cutting-edge theatre? No need to cross that bridge to Portland – Vancouver has something to offer arts lovers of every stripe‚ whether your tastes run to The Nutcracker‚ contemporary sculpture or Harold Pinter.

Downtown Vancouver is increasingly home to visual and performing artists and their supporters‚ who have made impressive strides in recent years and plan more ambitious projects in future.

“I used to joke that Vancouver was a great place to live if you were in the witness protection program because we were such a sleepy little suburb‚” gallery owner Gene Wigglesworth says with a laugh. “We’re trying to change that perception‚” he adds. “The arts scene is growing with downtown Vancouver. We’re awakening.”

Wigglesworth and his wife‚ Grace Teigen‚ opened Art on the Boulevard in 2006‚ a good example of the downtown arts renaissance that is complementing existing arts organizations such as the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra‚ Vancouver Dance Theatre and the Vancouver School of Arts and Academics.

The latest of five downtown galleries and artist co-ops‚ Arts on the Boulevard is a 2‚000-square-foot exhibit space located in The Marketplace‚ a charming enclave of small shops. Its portable walls allow innovative staging of new shows each month‚ featuring everything from $25 pottery pieces to an $88‚000 bronze water sculpture. A non-profit project of Friends of the Arts‚ it is also part of a new organization‚ Southwest Washington Art Galleries (SWAG) that sponsors First Friday art evenings and plans to work with the popular Downtown Vancouver Association monthly Art Walk.

Launched in 2005‚ the Main Street Theatre is also boosting the downtown arts scene with a year-round calendar of productions by Arts Equity Onstage. The non-profit theatre group debuts innovative new dramas as well as offering more familiar fare by playwrights such as Eugene O’Neill.

More good news for the arts lies ahead. After long planning‚ including a 2003 community symposium that demonstrated wide public support for the idea‚ plans are under way for a Center for the Arts‚ a performing arts venue in Vancouver.

Friends of the Arts‚ which has been active in promoting arts in the community since 1996‚ views the arts as an economic development opportunity. Friends hope to establish ARTillery‚ a multipurpose arts space‚ at a former Army installation in the Historic Reserve. The proposed space – a former barracks – would function as a home for the arts community and would include a gallery‚ studio space for potters and printmakers‚ individual small studios that artists could rent at affordable prices‚ and an education component for children and adults. The project is contingent upon the Army’s donation of the property on which the future ARTillery barracks building stands.

“Our vision is absolutely firm to have a building that embraces the arts on the Historic Reserve‚” says Friends board member Jan Asai. “We hope that we will be able to move forward on it some day.”

Story by Laura Hill
Photo by Michael W. Bunch

A Most Unusual Season


For Vancouver, anyhow


By Steven Walling


Ah, fall. The time when the rainy days of the Pacific Northwest return. The time when the days of wine and jazz in Esther Short have passed, and the overcast skies drive the ‘Couve’s arts patrons indoors once more to view our city’s theatrical milieu. In fervid anticipation of the upcoming theatre season, The Voice has chosen to highlight what is perhaps Vancouver’s most unique lineup of plays for 2007—those on the docket at Arts Equity Inc. at The Main Street Theatre. Not to poo-poo The Pirates of Penzance, but it is a strong harbinger of the continued growth of the SW Washington arts scene when its theatrical organizations step away from community theatre’s stock repertoire. We spoke with one half of Arts Equity’s producing team, Llewellyn Rhoe, on the intention behind his selections.
 
First up for Arts Equity is Edward Albee’s Pulitzer Prize-winning Seascape (see dates for this month in our Performance Listings), a play that has been critically styled as “philosophical whimsy.” (A pair of humanoid talking lizards certainly sounds whimsical to this critic.) Rhoe commented that he thought the play was “probably Albee’s only comedy.” Though perhaps one of Albee’s less popular works, Seascape enjoyed a successful 2005 revival on Broadway, receiving the ‘06 Tony for Best Revival and Best Costume Design. I for one am anxious to see how Arts Equity will execute two believable lizard characters and a functional beach onstage at The Main Street Theatre. 


Next is a November-December run of Willy Russel’s offbeat musical Blood Brothers, which chronicles the separation at birth of twin brothers in Liverpool. A musical in a very similar vein to Arts Equity’s dark, one-man extravaganza Herringbone, this isn’t the play for those who live and breathe to hear “Oh, What A Beautiful Mornin’!” 
 
A new flavor of political subtext enters into the Vancouver theatre scene with Arts Eq’s January-February production of Eugene Ionesco’s Exit the King. While those familiar with Ionesco may most fondly remember the more madcap absurdist methods of The Bald Soprano or The Chairs, this meditation on the demise of absolute power has parallels with the impending end of the Bush administration that should surely stir the pot. 
 
To wrap up the season, Arts Equity will be performing Nikolai Gogol’s satirical classic The Inspector General. Written as a commentary on the bumbling bureaucracy of Tsarist Russia, it is one of the few political plays that needs little-to-no adaptation to reverberate with modern audiences. Rhoe related that it would be necessary to perform this work like Arts Equity’s rendition of O’Neill’s “Sea Plays,” in other words, with a rotating cast of nine actors performing approximately 30 roles. 
 
Constrained by the limitations of budget and working space—such as city code prohibiting the Main Street Theatre from performing any work that exceeds the onstage capacity of thirteen people at a time—Rhoe said that he was, in the end, choosing plays that he had simply not performed or produced previously. He amusingly called it something along the lines of “if I were gonna die tomorrow” theatre; plays he had always had a desire to bring to life. Though in New York or L.A. plays such as these would almost be considered de rigueur, here in Vancouver they constitute a new and exciting billing. See you there.

Steve Martin's Maiden Voyage at the Main St. Theatre


Picasso at the Lapin Agile


By Steven Walling


It is a rare occasion in the theatre when humor of the lowest brow occurs in equal measure with that of the highest. But this is exactly the case in Steve Martin’s inaugural stab at the stage, Picasso at the Lapin Agile, revived here in Vancouver by Arts Equity at the Main Street Theatre.

As the title would naturally suggest, the play concerns a fictitious, chance meeting between Picasso (Dusty Richards) and Einstein (Joey LeBard) at the Lapin Agile bar in Paris, before each man reached the height of his fame. Along with a host of secondary characters, the two young geniuses debate the relative merits and similarities of art and science, and the future of the nascent twentieth century. Somehow, Picasso’s combination of the bluntest and sharpest of puns mix to create an altogether entertaining evening (though not without some trying moments).

Martin sets his work in 1904, ostensibly in an attempt to find a common moment before Picasso and Einstein each unveiled their most celebrated works: the Cubist progenitor Les Demoiselles de Avignon and the general theory of relativity, respectively. But Martin’s play suggests that Picasso was inspired to paint Les Demoiselles three years before he began the work, skipping over the entirety of his Rose period. Furthermore, Einstein’s purpose in arriving at the bar is to court a pretty countess, this when he had been married with children for a year (no mention of any adultery is made, despite all the talk about Picasso’s philandering). Normally, I’d ignore such imprecision and suggest we just suspend our disbelief a little, but since Martin is obviously concerned with at least a modicum of historical accuracy, I’d like a little in return.

Inherent in a depiction of such well-known figures, the abilities required of the cast are different, if not more substantial. Joey LeBard as the young physicist in question is rock solid; not only did he have a steady dialect, amusing and evocative line readings, and a palatable conviction in Einstein’s ideas (something quite essential to playing the man who created them), but he looks just like the man. Sadly, the other half of this famous pair is quite the opposite. Dusty Richards as Picasso exhibits a muddled accent migrating around the globe, and though Picasso was known to have a large personality, Richards flops and flails about spastically all the way through to curtain call. What’s more, after what amounts to nearly an entire first act extolling Picasso’s womanizing skills and suave intellect, Richards’ oafish portrayal is unconvincing, to put it mildly. But aided by a robust supporting cast, a happy medium between Richards’ flawed performance and LeBard’s outstanding one is struck. David Paull makes a notable appearance as the art dealer Sagot, and Adrienne Vogel does an admirable job of shifting between several distinct minor characters. Together, the cast displays a strong camaraderie and a fluidity of exchange that ensured the conversation came off naturally and the punch-lines were hit.

Picasso lacks much in the way of real action, and is mostly comprised of conversation that imparts Martin’s theories on the progress of the twentieth century. But rather than solely being a platform for his musings, it carries off as a lighthearted celebration of some of the genius that contributed to this progress. Though it may seem a bit, well, cheesy to watch Picasso and Einstein view their names literally written in the stars, it is this concluding celebratory tone to Picasso at the Lapin Agile that creates an ultimately satisfying experience, and I gladly recommend that audiences see what is a fun and fascinating production by Arts Equity at the Main Street Theatre.

Picasso at the Lapin Agile plays at The Main Street Theatre, 606 Main St.; July 6, 7 and 8 at 8pm; $10-24; call 695.3770 or visit  www.artsequity.org for more info.

Picasso at the Lapin Agile


[NEW REVIEW] It's difficult to imagine a play about a chance meeting between two of the 20th century's greatest (and most serious) minds could be so hilarious—until you remember it's crafted by a more contemporary genius named Steve Martin. And Dusty Richards clearly channels that "wild and crazy guy" as the young Picasso, drunkenly grappling with a sweet but insistent young Einstein (Joey Lebard) about the relative merits of science and art. And then there's that messenger from the future with the sequins and the blue suede shoes. Director Llewellyn J. Rhoe and Arts Equity make the trans-river trip north to Vancouver well worth your time and gas money. WILLIAM CRAWFORD. Arts Equity at the Main Street Theatre, 606 Main St., Vancouver, 360-695-3770. 8 pm Thursdays-Fridays, 2 pm June 10 and July 8. Closes July 8. $8-$24.

Theater review Picasso and friends land in Vancouver
Steve Martin's "Picasso at the Lapin Agile" asks more than production can deliver Monday, June 04, 2007MARTY HUGHLEY
Actions are words moving, words are thoughts expressed. Thoughts are ideas formed. Ideas are energies come together. Energies are forces released. Forces are elements of existence. Elements are particles of God. Particles are the stuff of everything.

-- from an unknown source, quoted in the playbill for the Arts Equity Onstage production of "Picasso at the Lapin Agile."

Written by the comic actor Steve Martin, the one-act play "Picasso at the Lapin Agile" really does try to work with "the stuff of everything" -- from the atomic to the cosmic, the sexual to the intellectual, the artistic to the scientific, the silly to the grandiose.

Martin, too, might believe that God is part of it all, but he concerns himself chiefly with a point farther up the chain of the equation, where energies are bundled by historical circumstance into human genius and world-altering ideas and actions. His setting for this is a turn-of-the-20th-century Parisian bar (rendered with a warm, woody realism on the stage of the Main Street Theatre in Vancouver), a point of accidental conversational convergence for Pablo Picasso, Albert Einstein and several others who've yet to recognize how significant these young men soon will be.

Martin's play is a tricky creature, constantly shifting its comic aim from high to low, pivoting from one tone to another, all the while bouncing bons mots, puns and philosophical trial balloons off the walls. On Saturday night of its opening weekend, director Llewellyn J. Rhoe's cast played it with a pace and timing that suggested the lines arriving out of each character's psychology, and the result was a sluggishness that blunted much (though certainly not all) of the script's overflowing wit. Instead of a smart farce riding a beam of light, it felt like a clown car on a slow road to academia.

There were engaging performances by David Hudkins as Freddy, Debra Hudkins as the overly passionate barmaid, David Paull as a haughty art dealer and especially Joey Lebard, who played Einstein as a charmingly boyish brainiac. And yet, all that good work was offset by Dusty Richards' mannered, mush-mouthed turn as Picasso.

This was part of the general hodgepodge of splotchy European accents. Verisimilitude may not be crucial in such an antic comedy, but clarity is. At times, the rhythm and momentum of the jokes would have worked, but diction got in the way.

Einstein and Picasso
Friday, June 01, 2007
Their names are forever linked, the great geniuses of the early 20th century whose innovations recharged the world: Einstein. Picasso. Schmendiman.

What? You've never heard of Charles Dabernow Schmendiman? He invented Schmendimite, a very brittle and inflexible building material made from equal parts asbestos, kitty paws and radium, of course.

Well, then, perhaps you need to meet those other two -- and the other characters Martin concocts -- at a Parisian bar in 1904, the setting for Steve Martin's philosophical stage comedy, "Picasso at the Lapin Agile," which Arts Equity Onstage opens Friday at Vancouver's Main Street Theatre.

Martin (yes, the once "wild and crazy guy") lards his play with jokes, but the jokes are about history, geometry, algebra, modern art, photography. Sex and frequent trips to the loo are part of it, too, but for the most part Martin is using humor to pay sly tribute to the spirit of creative breakthroughs and how those in the 20th century so thoroughly altered our understanding of ourselves and the universe we live in.

As Einstein says, after delivering a brief description of his yet-to-be published theory of relativity, "What I just said is the fundamental, end-all, final, not-subject-to-opinion absolute truth, depending on where you're standing."

That's especially true if you're standing on the edge of genius.

Opens 8 p.m. Friday, Main Street Theatre, 606 Main St., Vancouver; opening night tickets $16-$30, other nights $10-$24; 360-695-3770. Continues at 8 p.m. Thursdays-Saturdays, plus 2 p.m. June 10 and 8 p.m. July 8.

-- Marty Hughley

A Shanghai Surprise
Arts Equity brings O'Neills "Sea Plays" to life
By James Walling

Director/designer Llewellyn J. Rhoe's talents are on full display with Arts Equity's admirable production of Eugene O'Neill's four one act plays about life at sea in the early 2oth century.

Surely Rhoe has long since grown weary of reviewers praising his innovative set designs, but it must be said--few companies achieve the kind of period-specific detail and engrossing ambience on any budget that Rhoe consistently delivers on the wisp of a shoestring that he has to work with.

The setting morphs seamlessly from tramp streamer at sea to a portside tavern complete with a shanghai tunnel in the floor.

Rhoe's cast achieves great cohesion, chemistry and realism, and it's clear that the group has melded together much like the crew of S.S. Glencairn in the play. Richard Garfield displays significant--if somewhat intermittent--charisma as seaman Driscoll. Rod Harrel and Alex Mackenzie also deliver strong performances. What this cast lacks in theatrical training it more than makes up for with hard work and obvious commitment to the text.

On a poor note, the heretofore-stellar Taylor Askman is miscast in the role of Smitty. The promising young actor's interpretation of the role demonstrated a disappointing failure to communicate the autobiographical nature of these plays. The character of Smitty gives voice to the author's own feelings and regrets about a specific period in his life, and much is lost in the actor's inability or unwillingness here to communicate the poignancy of the author's experience.

Happily, the activity onstage is diverting and engaging enough to make for a rewarding and worthwhile evening at the theatre. With "The Long Voyage Home", Arts Equity continues its laudable tradition of producing excellent, evocative work with few resources.

O'Neill at Sea
The Significance of personal history in art.
By Jack V. Booch

During the intermission of Arts Equity's "The Long Voyage Home", a collection of one-act plays by the late Eugene O'Neill, my thoughts drifted to recollections of the silk-screened posters advertising the original productions of O'Neill's plays that adorned the walls of my office in New York. The posters featured varied scenes of men and women in an array of vividly depicted locations--from a ship at sea to a pond in the country and even a far off jungle.

The thought struck me that the one thing binding all the scenes on the posters and the subject matter in O'Neill's plays together is the author himself. The through line in O'Neill's work was his life story, his history.

I've often had trouble convincing friends, students, and coworkers influenced by postmodernism of the importance of ascertaining accurate historical and biographical detail when dealing with an artists work. Yes a work of art doesn't spring from the void after all, it springs from personal experience.

These days, history is a touchy subject, or rather, a subject which isn't touched upon enough. Americans are notorious for their short memories and their shallow grasp of historical realities. However one chooses to approach the matter--whether it's in a library or a Wikipedia page--it's important to keep in mind the true significance of history. History is more than just a record of events, it's a collection of personal revelations about the lives of individuals.

O'Neill is considered by many to be the father of modern American drama--a status he attained by revealing his private feelings, regrets, and aspirations to the public in myriad guises. In the plays currently being produced at the Main Street Theatre, he shares his own sense of isolation, his inability to conform to society, and the fear and resentment he often inspired in those around him.

The plays in question are set primarily at sea. Through his character, Smitty, O'Neill tells how he ran off to a life at sea when he found he couldn't fit in at home, only to discover that he didn't fit in at sea either.

The value of these plays is not so much in their vivid settings and gritty characters, but in their potential to depict true human experience and teach us something about ourselves.

O'Neill penned the bulk of his sea plays prior to 1920. Today, we have Dan Brown and the like weaving pulp fantasies that use history for fodder and playwrights obsessed with hot button issues and current events. It's significant that O'Neill was the only American dramatist ever to receive the Nobel Prize for literature. It goes to show that history is more than window dressing, and the past--our own past and the past of others--can serve as a window through which the light of self-awareness can touch and inform our lives.

Theater Review
Prepare for rough water in this 'Voyage'

Eugene O'Neill - Arts Equity's four one-acts are uneven, but they have suprising impact

by Richard Wattenberg
Special to the Oregonian

Casting about on the waves of uncertain seas, ships and their crews often serve as a convenient device for authors seeking to represent the entire social body in a smaller, m ore contained form.

Herman Melville's Pequod in "Moby Dick" works this way, as does Eugene O'Neill's British tramp steamer Clencairn -- the floating home of the ethnically diverse group of sailors who are the focus of the Nobel Prize winning playwright's four early one-acts that make up "The Long Voyage Home"

In these short sea plays, O'Neill, who had spent time as a seaman himself, takes on some big themes -- life and death, friendship and betrayal, hope and dispair.

With the intertwining of the various crew members dialects, O'Neill's writing occasionally strikes the ear as strained. Yet each play has a surprisingly moving impact.

Some of the plays' powere comes through in a new production from Vanouver's Arts Equity Onstage, but the show has a lot of rough edges, and the acting often feels forced.

The unevenness os most apparent in the first play, "The Moon of the Caribbees" -- an intricate mood piece. The scripts evocative nature arises from the tension between the seaman Smitty, a comtemplative outsider, and the animal energy manifested by the rest of the crew as they enjoy the native women and alcohol that have been smuggled onto the ship temporarily at anchor near a West Indies island.

Neither the depths of Smitty's alienation nor the orgiastic frenzy of the others comes through.

The middle pieces, "In the Zone" and "Bound East for Cardiff," are the strongest -- especially the former. In this one-act set during World War I, anxiety over the fact that the Glencairn steams through German submarine-infested waters leads the crew to turn on the introspective Smitty.

Director Llewellyn Rhoe adeptly accentuates the humor that pervades the crew members' efforts to focus their paranoia on their innocent shipmate.

The last play, the title piece, is set in a London waterfront dive, manageded in this production by characters who seem to have more in common with Dickens than O'Neill.

Into this bar come a resonately sober seaman Olson (played with restraint by Alex MacKenzie) and some of his drunken Glencairn shipmates.

While Olson dreams of returning home to Sweden, unfortunately for him his pals become drunker. Their inebriation accounts for some of the tumbling and fumbling about the stage bu the piece lacks crispness.

Rhoe does a fine job designing scenery versatile enough to accommodate all four plays. While the background music doesn't have the rhythms suggested for the first play, suble sound effects go a long way toward conveying a sense of a ship at sea.

Theater Review of "Hot 'N' Throbbing"

Play Shows Pornography's Awful Legacy

'Hot' Night. A couple struggles to move past a history of nasty marital violence.

By Colin Mannex
THE OREGONIAN

So much is going on in Paula Vogel's "Hot 'N' Throbbing" at Arts Equity that it really shouldn't work, but it does.

With the congestion of overlapping narratives and literary allusions -- from Melville to Woolf -- Vogel's drama easily might have been lost on audiences outside of college classrooms. Scenes of alcholism, attempted rape and gunfire are improbably juxaposed against a dialectic of pornography and erotica.

Gut-wrenching and cerebral, this is not a "good" night out at the theatre. But it's absolutely necessary.

Vogel's politics are plain: Pornography perpetuates violence, while erotica advances sex as a romantic ideal. Her two main characters, Clyde (Drew Barrios) and Charlene (Sharon Mann), come to represent these respective arguments as they struggle to move beyond their own history of marital violence.

Arts Equity brings precision to an otherwise opulent mess of voices and conflict. Director Llewellyn J. Rhoe rightly favors the small-picture story, bringing focus to moments of comedy and vulnerability that build against Vogel's heavy polemics.

Alternately thrilling and terrifying, funny and sad, the relationship between Clyde and Charlene roils with conflicting emotional imperatives: security, forgiveness, shame, lust and revenge. It's all enhanced by the presence of two narrators (Adrienne Vogel and Stefan Kay) who enact the darker impulses of each from the figurative perch of their shoulders.

The dialogue is keen, and the central performances are remarkable. But the play loses intensity as it digresses in the arty interludes of these choric figures. Vogel's dramatic mastery lies in characterization, not theory or form.

This production works best when Charlene gets "a room of her own" in which to express herself as both strong and diffident, bound to work and family. Remarking that "great writers can see into the future," Charlene anticipates the hope of her children in the self-conscious style that would typify Vogel's most searing drama. And she poises herself at the center of a great cultural debate.

Written in 1990, "Hot 'N' Throbbing" illustrates the brutal legacy of porn in the living room well before the all-pervasive peep show of the Internet. However, it never beguiles us to shudder at the seduction of sexual abuse in the way that "How I Learned to Drive," Vogel's Pulitzer-winning play, does. "Hot 'N' Throbbing establishes Vogel's unflinching vision, but it lacks restraint.

Arts Equity Onstage keeps pushing The Envelope

Saturday, February 03, 2007
BRETT OPPEGAARD Columbian staff writer

Arts Equity Onstage opened its 120-seat black box theater a year and a half ago with a promise: "We won't be doing G-rated community theater fare," founder Llewellyn J. Rhoe said.

The downtown Vancouver troupe has struggled to find its place and purpose and identity. But it should be commended, at least, for taking the risk that is Paula Vogel's "Hot 'N' Throbbing." This disturbing piece, continuing through Feb. 25, is recommended for mature audiences, and there are many reasons for such a warning. Full male nudity. Simulated sex. Stripteases and blunt -- often profane -- language. Above all of that, though, are the questions it asks about our nation's general acceptance of sexual behavior versus acts of violence, especially domestic violence. There seems to be much more societal tolerance for one than the other.

Vogel wrote this work in the early 1990s following the uproar over Andres Serrano's "Piss Christ," when protestors, led by North Carolina Sen. Jesse Helms, were pressuring the National Endowment for the Arts to place restrictions on work funded by the federal government that was considered obscene. Vogel, financed by a National Endowment for the Arts grant, created this play as a response to those who think artists should be shackled. She also wanted to spur those who failed to even twitch over the amount of death and destruction in movies and on television.

Other Clark County theaters won't take on this type of risque material. They are too heavily reliant on audience reaction and ticket income, rather than grants and perpetual donors that support whatever work they do.

Clark College Theater, with state funding and a mission to challenge the program's students, has been the artistic maverick in Clark County, producing Steven Dietz's racism-laced "God's Country" in 1992; Peter Shaffer's "Equus" in 1997, which included the county's first staged nude scene; and Vogel's "How I Learned to Drive" in 2005. That Vogel piece, which revolves around a mature woman looking back on the illicit relationship she had with her uncle, starting at age 11, and comparing it to her own need to be with younger men, won the 1998 Pulitzer Prize for drama.

Arts Equity's version of Vogel's "Hot 'N' Throbbing," in comparison, is on the high-wire. It uses paid actors to present a play that probably will perturb a lot of people, without any public support. It's a show that starts with a seductive dance by the teen-age daughter of a woman who writes erotica for a living. Her finest work: an homage to Jack Nicholson titled "Sperms of Endearment." It only gets racier. And more vulgar. The point is to pressure our sensibilities, particularly when the violent ex-husband comes into the picture.

This guy, Clyde, is played almost flawlessly by Drew Barrios, showing a full emotional range as well as the vulnerability that keeps domestic predators hooked to their victims. He approaches this difficult part fearlessly, and the cast generally matches that passion. The fights are rough and reckless, and so are the lusty scenes. In this tiny theater, with the stage just a few feet from the front row, that aggressive approach is crucial.

Arts Equity still missteps too often technically, fumbling with similar fundamental flaws that have plagued past work. A door slamming that instead sounds like the banging of a tin pan is only one example. The lighting schemes are overly simplistic. The costumes are uninspired, including a black dress on the author's alter ego that looks like a cheap Halloween costume, complete with an unsightly and crooked seam up the back.

Maybe Barrios skews this, but the cast operates unevenly in several sections, dragged down by Stefan Kay's general stiffness as The Voice and Sarah McGregor's abrupt emotional transitions as the teenage daughter, Leslie Ann. The script isn't great, much broader than deep.

There were fewer than 20 people at the Thursday night performance I attended, and the theater has yet to be sold out.

Yet this is an important piece for Arts Equity and Vancouver. By exhibiting its sharpest edge, the company is demonstrating the kind of energy and excitement such entertainment can bring to a city. Overall, it's some of the best work the group has done so far, if you can stomach the content: This play explores topics that aren't usually broached outside of the downtown Portland core.

That pressing and stretching inevitably will benefit this community. It also will help Arts Equity discover if there is a place for this kind of theater in Vancouver.

Brett Oppegaard writes about the arts. Reach him at 360-759-8028 or brett.oppegaard@columbian.com

Applause for a play

Recently, Arts Equity Theatre Company invited theatre students from Fort Vancouver High School to attend their performance of "Herringbone." Approximately 30 of my fellow students were invited to this production, and I feel that this generosity deserves recognition.

"Herringbone" is about a small boy named George who becomes possessed by a small man named Lou. All characters are played by the fabulously talented Taylor Askman. This man is amazing in every aspect of the word and with that talent he brings to life every character.

The play is set during the Depression and tells about George and his poverty-stricken family. His family learns that child stars are becoming big in Hollywood and they see George as a ticket out of the slums.

Taylor Askman plays every character by Thumbs Dubois, his trusty piano player. Taylor has an undisputed talent that brings each character to life. He brings individuality to each character.

The play was no doubt one of the best I had ever seen in my life. It has brought my love for the performing arts, especially acting, into a new light.

I hope that I can one day impact others the way Taylor and "Herringbone" have done for me. Mallory Boswell, Vancouver.

Stage: "Herringbone"

There are nine performances left in Arts Equity's second run of "Herringbone" (one for each of the characters portrayed, coincidentally). I hope sole performer Taylor Askman has the fortitude to continue his enthralling work in the same energetic manner he has mustered for far. "Herringbone" is a one-man show that recounts the childhood terrors of fictional vaudevillian wunderkind George (or "Herringbone" as he comes to be known) after he is possessed by the angry spirit of toe-tapping midget dubbed "Lou the Frog." And believe me, this material is definitely as bizarre as it sounds. Nonetheless, the young George's fight to reclaim his body is a darkly fascinating tale, and the narration provided by the grown-up version of Herringbone lends clarity and amusement to the play. A warning though--some graphic scenes are not family appropriate. Even more remarkable that Askman's ability to make clear changes between his character's various personalities is the fact that he does it all while continuously exposing the subtext of the work. "Herringbone" makes strong statements about the sacrifices and exploitation of child stars, the dysfunctions of family dynamics and the drive to perform. I strongly recommend this wrenching and entertaining performance. Feature Review by Steven Walling The Vancouver Voice

Theater review
Tweaks boost one-man 'Herringbone'

Changes - Narration and an improved ending add to Taylor Askman's fine multiple-role show
Tuesday, November 07, 2006
HOLLY JOHNSON

Thanks in great part to Taylor Askman's mercurial, magical performance, "Herringbone" was ever so fine when it took the stage in July at Vancouver's Arts Equity Onstage.

Now it's back, once again with Askman as the solo actor in multiple roles, and it might be even better. Director Llewellyn J. Rhoe has tinkered a bit with his production of Tom Cone's play about an 8-year-old Depression-era kid performer inhabited by the spirit of a creepy adult vaudevillian little person. The result is a clearer picture of what's happening, and a little more connection with the audience.

Askman owns a host of well-shaped characters, inhabiting them with
lightning-quick speed. But this time a pinch of added narration helps shape Cone's brutal coming-of-age story. Also, the ending is vastly improved.

Did we forget to mention also that this is a musical, disturbing though it may be? Sparkling piano accompaniment by Kevin McElrath constantly reminds us we're back in a seemingly gentler time -- but what the rasping midget puts young George through is scarier than any 21st-century Halloween tale.

This is the kind of riveting, intimate show you can see more than once and repeatedly discover layers you didn't know were there. Cone, an American who lives in Canada, wrote it in the 1970s, and it's gone through various permutations. It first opened in Chicago as a straight play with support from the late Colleen Dewhurst, and later transformed into a musical (with tunes by Skip Kennon and lyrics by Ellen Fitzburgh) in New York featuring Joel Grey.

Continues 7:30 p.m. Thursdays-Saturdays (with variations) through Dec. 23 at The Main Street Theatre, 606 Main St., Vancouver. $8-$24; 360-695-3770.

"Herringbone" Theater review

One-man cast carries dark, funny 'Bone'

Monday, July 24, 2006
HOLLY JOHNSON

Do vaudeville and the dark arts seem likely bedfellows?

They get along just fine in "Herringbone," a terrifying yet mesmerizing play by Tom Cone from the 1970s (later revised into a two-act musical).

It starts with an unsuspecting 8-year-old named George bound for Hollywood during the Depression, who takes stage lessons, finds he's pretty good at tap-dancing, and is suddenly inhabited by the spirit of a louche 35-year-old vaudevillian dwarf. He's so creepy, it's easy to see why his former show-biz partner knocked him off.

Horrific, mesmerizing and funny, the play once featured Joel Grey in an East Coast performance, and artistic director Llewellyn J. Rhoe of Arts Equity Inc. in Vancouver offers a riveting production, with new songs by composer Skip Kennon and lyricist Ellen Fitzbugh.

Taylor Askman, 22, who plays all the roles in this intimate yet hugely complex show, displays an amazing quicksilver talent as he serves up a cadre of characters. He possesses a face actors long for: a combination of cartoon character and classical statue. But it's his ability to sketch characters with depth and mercurial speed that stands out.

One minute he's Louise, George's arch, ambitious Southern mom; the next he's young George, with a tiny voice and bemused stare. The contrast is stark next to the gnarled, gravelly voiced dwarf Lou, who materializes unannounced. And then there's George's imperious, looming dad, Dot the giggly seductress, and adult George, the grave narrator. The characters seem to materialize from a sideshow in Askman's brain. He's a big talent, and Rhoe has obviously found a vehicle that gives him a big tent in which to move around.

The play is a brutal coming-of-age story with a nod to Kafka or Stephen King, and the musical numbers mesh perfectly. Musical accompaniment by musical director Kevin McElrath on piano is a pleasure to hear. The gaping set, a textured affair in black and red surfaces designed by Rhoe, echoes the maw of hell itself.

Continues at 7:30 p.m. Thursdays-Saturdays through Sept. 1 at Main Street Theatre, 606 Main St., Vancouver; $8-$23, 360-695-3770.