Post-9/11 production
is a powerful memorial
"The Guys," presented by the Actors Group at 7:30 p.m. Thursday through Saturday and 4 p.m. Sunday, through Sept. 28 at Yellow Brick Studio. Tickets are $10. Call 722-6941.Several themes percolate through the Actors Group production of "The Guys," playwright Anne Nelson's look at post-9/11 New York as refracted through the experiences of Nick, a fire captain grieving for eight men from his unit killed at the World Trade Center, and Joan, a writer who volunteers to help him prepare their eulogies.
TAG veterans Eric Nemoto (Nick) and Frankie Enos (Joan) team up with director Brad Powell to make this two-character play powerful and thought-provoking theater.
Paul Guncheon and Henry Deardorff share credit for an imaginative set that adds another subtle perspective: Almost everything is painted flat black, but a few brightly colored items here and there suggest the first glimmers of life returning to the area.
Nemoto does a stellar job, giving a brilliantly nuanced performance as a man struggling to control his emotions -- not only grief, but also an occasional twinge of survivor guilt.
Nick is carrying that double burden when he brings his men's personnel files to Joan's apartment. It is a week since 9/11, and memorial services and funerals are being planned. Some of those lost were old friends. Others were "probies" (still on probation) he'd barely had time to meet.
As for guilt, Nick could have been on duty that morning, but a friend had taken the watch instead; it was the first time the other man hadn't given a reason when asking for a schedule change.
Nick mentions that the only survivor from one truck was the driver. A traffic cone had gotten jammed in a wheel well, and someone had to stay behind long enough to pry out the smashed cone. The driver got the assignment.
As Nick shares his memories, we meet a great group of guys. Each becomes a vibrant three-dimensional character. One was only a few weeks away from a certain promotion. Another was a "probie" for whom 9/11 was his first "real fire." There was the likable guy who was a bit of a loose cannon, and Bernhardt, known to his friends as Barney, the master welder who loved his tools and could build or repair just about anything made of metal.
Joan assembles Nick's memories into insightful, deeply moving portraits of men who loved life and loved being firefighters.
Enos provides the other half of the picture with her portrayal of a writer who finds new purpose and a sense of participating in the city's rebuilding when she helps Nick share his memories and talk out his emotions. Enos holds the attention of the audience through several lengthy monologues that add backstory on Joan's life and express her initial sense of powerlessness at being unable to assist in rescue operations.
"The Guys" premiered in New York barely three months after 9/11, so it isn't surprising that Joan's monologues also express America's outrage. She talks about encountering foreigners who dared suggest that the United States had gotten what it deserved after decades of American attacks on people in other parts of the world.
Fortunately, each time "The Guys" drifts into nativist territory by playing to a selective sense of American victimhood, the focus shifts back to Nick's memories and Joan's skill in pulling them together. At that point we mourn our dead anew -- particularly these guys.
Nick wrestles with the mystery of why he happened to survive, but appears to have come to terms with it by the time we see him deliver a moving and comforting eulogy. Joan, who feared at first that her writing skills would be irrelevant to the business of healing, makes an important contribution but seethes with growing anger that there is no way to run the videotapes backward so that the shattered towers will rise from the rubble, the firemen ride backward to the station and the two planes fly tail first to their point of takeoff.
"I want them all back the way they were," Joan demands passionately.
"How do we cut deals with God?"
Click for online
calendars and events.
