Exposure X 2 - Just a touch of the Gothic

Exposure X 2 is billed as a program of two solo plays, but the first of the evening - Mrs. Sorken by Christopher Durang - serves more as an intro to Vancouver playwright Sally Stubbs' new one-woman piece Eyes.Two.

Mrs. Sorken is a meta-monologue on the nature of theatre delivered directly to us by seasoned vet Joan Bryans in a dead-on impersonation of my tea-kettle-and-crumpet British auntie Jaki. Apparently sent in to lecture us on the history and necessity of theatre, Mrs. Sorken has all the blustery charm of a long-dormant Olde-English housewife finally given the chance to talk to...anybody. The piece also makes it clear that we're in for some theatre aimed at a more...ahem...seasoned audience, to paraphrase the press release.

We quickly move on to the longer of the two solo works, Eyes.Two., a dissertation on the pain of growing old and barren as a woman, and this piece switches the tone of the show from airy charm to one of creepy...well, just creepy. Stubbs has drawn a woman unravelled by her own inability to keep a meaningful love connection and who has, as a result, descended into a twisted state of deluded longing. Virginia Allan is a high school teacher with an abiding obsession with both Edgar Allan Poe and "John", another faculty member with whom she had a one-off quickie in her car some enchanted evening ago. John has since developed a touch of the Nabokov with one of Virginia's students, which really throws a monkey paw into Virginia's imaginary love life. None of this gets her any closer to the baby she yearns to replace her battered old dolly with. Like I said...kinda creepy.

Once unveiled, the story line is familiar from many a melodramatic movie of the week aimed toward a middle-aged female demographic. But in this solo stage version the play unspools in an inner-monologue stream-of-conciousness that feels like a suburban middle-class beat poem. The script offers a real opportunity to explore the depths of this particular kind of despair and abiding sadness, but to have it truly affect us we need to feel it from the actor more than hear it in the dialogue.  The acting is outsized for such an intimate venue. Sharon Wahl as Virginia is all over the stage looking for stuff to do, and pushing the action and dialogue at us as if she didn't trust that just she alone, with all her sorrow, is interesting enough to watch.

The casting is actually pristine, and Ms. Wahl clearly knows her way around a stage; in the all-too-rare moments where she allowed herself to remain still a real sadness began to peek out at us. What I wanted was to be devestated by it. What I got, to quote from Mrs. Sorken's judgement on modern theatre, was slightly irritated by it.

Presented by Beare Pursuits Equity Co-op. Directed by Sally Stubbs; Mrs. Sorken written by Christopher Durang - Starring Joan BryansEyes. Two. written by Sally Stubbs - Starring Sharon Wahl

For more information on the show and join in the debate go here.