The One True Dave

A new beginning!

It sounds a little cheese but like they said, several times, in Daniel MacIvor’s Bingo!, today is the first day of the rest of your life.

After neglecting this blog space (can one “neglect” a virtual entity like a blog? Am I the one to feel sympathy for it when, it, cannot feel?). I am again picking up the torch! I pledge write something, no matter length or rigorous insight, every week! That’s right! At least one per week. That is my pledge. Help me to achieve it. Oh, and some weeks I will talk about a show I saw (like old-fashioned theatre! Meatbags gesticulating and all that!) while other weeks I might discuss the game I am currently immersed in or I might wax eloquent on something I am reading that week (or saw on Netflix!). All I can promise is I will supply SOMETHING each week. And feel free to comment and post. There would be nothing I would like more than to get some discussion going about a current piece of theatre and/or game we are playing

Let’s start things off:

I saw Bingo! at Factory Theatre on Wednesday evening. Let be upfront with you, I think MacIvor is a fantastic playwright and an even more brilliant performer. With that said, I kind of felt like he kind-of called this script in, so-to-speak. Now, let’s be honest, a half-baked idea a brilliant playwright is still better than what most people strive to achieve.

            So, the positives are many! The cast was fantastic. No, really, not a weak performance in any of the cast. I especially enjoyed Dov Michelson’s performance. He gave a very honest portrayal of that inner struggle where you want to please your mate even though that pleasure may cause you pain. Not to get into any details, suffice it to say, I have experienced that inner struggle. I am sure a great deal of men and women have felt that same struggle. Articulating that struggle is the major contribution this play makes and sets it apart from the many other middle-aged/struggling for identity/it’s not too late plays out there.

            In the program MacIvor is quoted as wanting to write a play his brother-in-law would like. Now, this play doesn’t talk down to “non-artsies,” in fact it brings up some topics that don’t usually see the light of day in polite discourse. It is blue-collar only in that the characters are blue collar works still living in town. The only ones to leave (real estate – selling the land, to the rich OR Environmental Engineering – engineering the environment to better serve man) are the ones in dress shirts and ties, fixated on appearances and surface decoration. There is a lot here just beyond what the characters allow themselves to say and do.

            So, the major downside of this show, for me, was the feeling it was too relaxed in the language. There are spots early in the play (in that half hour before the intermission) that evoke ideas of using the text not only as a linear conveying of meaning, but as a multi-facetted bridge into contested spaces of relationships. There are a few moments that hint at the rhythmic word play of his previous works or the cutting wit and sharp contrast between his characters, especially when MacIvor performs them, but here it felt a little soft. It was performed exceptionally well but the script seemed to lack a certain polish and crispness I have come to expect from MacIvor’s work. I think this, coupled with the fact the intermission came so soon after the start of the play –here’s your hat, what’s your hurry?—that if felt like it was something not yet ready to take out of the oven and be served. My sarcasm and crude metaphors aside, a half hour of play for 15-20 minutes of intermission is a little…you know. Now if the second half of the play actually took place in the lobby around the bar, which would be playing with the idea a bit. …I just didn’t see that effort here.