Review of The Primrose Path at The Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis

Quote of the Day:  It is the character who is willing to bare it all, to risk going against the norms of society, who has the best chance of a happy ending. Summary of what I observed from watching The Primrose Path at The Guthrie Theater, and from the discussion with the actors after the show.

Image from The Guthrie Theater, photo by T. Charles Erickson. Jim Stanek as Mikhalevich, Christian Bardin as A Maid from Mtsensk

Music is a central theme of The Primrose Path, a new play by Crispin Whittell. The composer, Wayne Barker, wrote the music for this show, which is moving and captivating, with sad undertones, and at times, humorous. Tom Bloom, who portrays the private music instructor Christoph Lemm, plays much of the music live on stage, giving us (the audience) a feeling of being in the parlor with the family and their guests. Music is an emotional creative outlet, a vehicle for finding one's voice, literally and figuratively, as some of the characters in this play are trying to do.

The Primrose Path is a play based on the Russian novel Home of the Gentry by Ivan Turgenev, published in 1859. The playwright, Crispin Whittell, is British and wrote this play for The Guthrie Theater, an American stage with national standing. Does this play have an identity crisis? Maybe. Some of the language and much of the setting give you the feeling of a distant time and place. The costumes are incredible, very much period dressings.

Sally Wingert as Maria, Suzy Kohane as Elizaveta in

The Primrose Path, photo by T. Charles Erickson

"It's a poofy dress kind of play," I told my sister as we were driving into the city. "I love poofy dress plays," she responded. 

It's also a play that digs into what is truly important in life, a timeless theme. Some of the language and actions seem very modern. What was Maria doing with a plastic bubble blower in 1845 Russia? And, what of the music that had a classic feel although it was written specifically for this play here in the year 2013? Maybe what Whittell and the director Roger Rees are trying to do is show us (the audience) that we are connected to the past. While fashions change, the need to control our environments (and sometimes each other) doesn't. From the time the first humans were born on this earth, they have been searching for the best way to live out this, relatively, short life, to love freely, to pursue one's deepest desires, and to make a splash that gets people's attention.

Or, maybe, it's just fun to spend Mother's Day with my sister watching a "poofy dress" show, listening to new music that feels familiar, and dream of what could happen if we dared.

The Primrose Path is playing on The Guthrie's Wurtele Thrust Stage through June 15. Go to The Guthrie for show times and tickets!

(Here's what I really wanted to write for my review.) It's pretty good. I think you should go, and see for yourself what works, what doesn't, and what you'd dare to do given the right circumstances. Anyway, that's what Millie and Willie Cottonpoly (sock puppets) would say. I heard Millie sigh when it was over. That's always a sign of a good play.

Go. Create. Inspire!

Journaling Prompt:  What would make you bare it all and jump into life with arms wide open?

Adventure Awaits the Daring, or Run! You're going to miss the bus!

Quote of the Day:  Take the first step in faith. You don't have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

This is a fitting quote as I describe further adventures with Krista Rolfzen Soukup and her boys on our Spring Break, daylong, excursion into the Mini-Apple (Minneapolis). I would also like to remind all you readers that I am a country girl. I learned how to drive on gravel roads where you drive down the center unless you meet a combine or large tractor, then you both hug the side of the ditches.

After our lovely lunch and visit to the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, we headed out onto the streets.

I barely had time to stop and take a picture of an interesting looking house and a few letters for my AtoZ Challenge posts. I had to run to catch up as Krista yelled behind her, "Let's take the bus!"  The next thing I know, I'm crowding in behind her and the boys, trying to make room for the other riders, and Krista hands me a twenty dollar bill. I look at the bus driver, and she says, "I can't make change." I look back at Krista, rather bewildered. I am a country girl and have no idea how much it costs to ride the bus. If I'd known I was going to hop on a bus today, I would have found out how much it was and had the exact amount of money ready to go. The very kind bus driver added up our total, an even $5, which luckily I had in my wallet, as we were already on our way to downtown Minneapolis.

The bemused (I hope) regular riders explained how to open the side seat once the man in the wheelchair exited. The bus driver gave us a message about needing the whole village to raise up a child and shut all the windows so she could turn on the air conditioning since it was an unusually hot day for mid-March in Minnesota. Normally, we'd be needing our winter coats, not extra deodorant. When Krista got up to shut our window, the riders told her to give it a harder shove. (Thanks, folks. We're from the country.)

Once downtown, we noticed that the buildings were way taller than the Brainerd water tower.

The boys thought it would be fun to go up to the observation deck of the Foshay Tower. I was against it, being a very grounded acrophobe from the country. I barely climbed past the second overhanging branch of a tree when I lived on the farm.

The boys said that they could stay up there all day. (That made me glad that I'd faced my fears and stepped out of my comfort zone.)

The view from above.

The residents' private patio.

Krista and her boys enjoying a little more breathing room on our bus ride back towards the theatre. We had a momentary pause at one stop, so the bus driver sang to us an Irish song that her grandmother had taught her.

City bus drivers are cool.

Now that I'm an official bus-riding city girl, I'm ready to...

Go. Create. Inspire!

(Honestly, I'd enjoy the city much more if it wasn't so noisy and there weren't so many people.)

Journaling Prompt:  Have you ever jumped into adventure?

Insecure and afraid of Getting the Hook

Quote of the Day:  Real Vaudeville shows would Drop The Cow on bad or overly long acts with "the hook", a shepherd's crook extended from offstage to pull away the performer. But in cartoons, you don't even need to be on a stage to get the hook. Any bad performance can get the hook, even if you're performing on top of a fence - it just reaches out from Behind the Black and drags you offscreen. Wearing a red-and-white vertically striped shirt and a straw boater makes you especially susceptible to this, as does dancing while holding a cane. Spending a while dodging the hook, continuing to perform all the while, before eventually getting snared is a common feature.

Though he didn't originate it, the hook is forever associated with "Sandman" Sims, a tap dancer who would use the hook on bad acts at the Apollo Theatre.
from www.tvropes.org

It's the first Wednesday of the month and year and another round of the Insecure Writer's Group. Alex J. Cavanaugh is the host and many, many of us bloggers have signed up. My hope is that acknowledging the insecurites, naming them and facing them, will be like staring down our dragon and slaying him. 

I was out the other evening with these lovely ladies for a pre-New Year's celebration and some collaboration. My best writer-mama-pal Roxane B. Salonen was visiting from Fargo, and we had dinner with my friend and publicist Krista Rolfzen Soukup. Sure, we talked a little business, but our main event was the delicious food and time to talk, minus our collective 13 children!

During our discussion, I confessed that I felt like I was playing a part in a play (one that I wrote?), where I'm being thrust onto center stage, given all the great lines, then sent home to write about it. I keep expecting the curtain to close, or that I'll get that proverbial hook and yanked off the stage. Who am I to be invited to shows and restaurants, meet and review the performers and performances?

I had this note by my desk before I moved that said, "Sometimes, you look out at the audience waiting for the applause and all you see are empty seats." (I just went upstairs to look for it and couldn't find it. Maybe it got lost in the move, or maybe it's no longer something to hang onto.)

Krista keeps telling me that people want me to come to their shows, clubs, or restaurants. She told me that the owner of a newly opened establishement said, "It's about time someone wrote reviews for us." And, "I hope she likes it." I also heard from some friends when I told them that my reviews were now on the Brainerd Dispatch website. They said, "That's great that someone is writing reviews for us for places like the Guthrie theater and local shows."

Dare I say it?  They need me.

Since my word for the year is Dare!, I do need to say it. I'm needed, and I will be invited, and I'll do my best to describe the food, the atmosphere, the performance, the location, anything that people would want to know before they go. Bring on the invites! I've been dared!

We did small plates to share.

Delicious Fare

We flirted with the fine, young waiter (who indicated that he & Krista weren't supposed to be photographed together *wink),

and chatted it up with Jim Olsen, the guitarist for the evening.

(He'll be playing at the newly opened Moonshine Lounge on Jan. 14.)

Go. Create. Inspire!

And, dare to be the one invited, attending, and reviewing.

Journaling Prompt:  Have you ever felt like you might get "the hook?" What have you dared to do lately?