Writer: Crystal Skillman
Director: Hersh Ellis
All signs point to this play carrying a positive message about the value of environmental protest. It even shows hints of interesting discussion about the tough impact a protesting lifestyle can have on those who pursue it, as well as a genuinely touching exploration of a young man’s coming to terms with his estranged father’s death. Those signs are hidden well, however, in a play populated with irritating characters, unbelievable events, inadvertent silliness and a seeming lack of serious engagement with the subject.
Energetic, earnest, idealistic and obliviously privileged rebel Zoe manipulates the worried and introverted Rain into stealing his dead father’s motorbike and driving from California to Philadelphia to attend a protest against an energy company. This seeming act of dedication is undermined by her utter failure to prepare for the days-long trip (packing some almonds, some string and a tarp for food and shelter), one instance of many where this young ideologue fails to consider the step beyond the next one and the impact she’s making.
Through the journey, there are dropped narrative threads, plot holes, impossible coincidences and trite attempts at gravitas. In all the meandering through the US, the pair go from 16 year-olds with a bike and a wish to protest to whipping themselves into a (self-) righteous frenzy with consequences for many people but themselves. Rain turns teenage McGyver, creating a bomb that destroys an energy company facility (and hospitalises workers) out of pipe-cleaners, glitter and a Koolpak. Zoe ends up using a 3D printed gun to threaten staff at another facility before ruining it too. There are, we’re told, some stressful years and lawsuits that follow, but it will all be OK for these two. This is an America with armed police in the high-school hallways, for them to escape serious jail time for bombing and armed intrusion at critical national infrastructure sites is stretching credibility beyond breaking point.
As the main pair Jordan Benjamin and Mei Henri as Rain and Zoe respectively try their hardest to bring the material to life. They attack with enthusiasm, but there’s little they can do to save this stuff and while there’s some nice moments, in general it seems they’re in two different productions. The rapportless pair wade through the material, making the “adventure of a lifetime” seem like a chore to get done. In the ensemble as Rain’s ghost-dad, a redneck bar-owner, and a frog Richard Holt is a bit of a show stealer. Along with Holt, the clear best thing in the whole production is Zoë Hurwitz’s intriguing and creative set which pits the industrialised modern world against nature.
Environmental protest is one of the most important growing movements out there, and great fuel for exciting theatre. It’s essential to get a message through and for real change to happen. If the piece is intended to show the folly of trying to engage without thought, consideration or planning then it’s bang on. But there’s a reason the word “organise” is used so much with protests, and attempting a serious play about people trying to make an impact without any of this key element is a true challenge. The piece does show the use of connecting, and a community, but the slapdash and trivial way in which it is discussed makes it all feel like a caricature of protesters written by a PR flack for big-oil.
Runs until 26 March 2022
The Reviews Hub Score
Trivial, convoluted and silly
