Page 20 - the NOISE March 2016

REDEMPTION SONG Cousins Yazmin (Caitlin Shepherd) and Elliot Ortiz (Eddie Pinson) deal with a family emergency in a scene from NAU Theater’s
PHOTO & STORY BY
A PLAY AS POWERFUL AS WATER production of Water by the Spoonful.
GEAN SHANKS
Water by the Spoonful flows through the interconnected lives — harmonized both online and in the real world — caught up in addiction, loss, recovery and redemption. The Northern Arizona University Theater Department is producing this Pulitzer Prize-winning
play by Quiara Alegría Hudes in its Studio Theater February 26 to March 6.
Described by New York Times writer Charles Isherwood as a “moving collage of lives in crisis,” it’s a drama that, despite its many dark themes, “gives off a shimmering, sustaining warmth. Ms.
Hudes writes with such empathy and vibrant humor about people helping one another to face down their demons that regeneration and renewal always seem to be just around the corner.”
Elliot Ortiz (Eddie Pinson), an Iraq War veteran, still combats his experience as a soldier physically, with a leg injury, and mentally, with ghostly visions and a haunting phrase in Arabic on repeat. As he continues his struggle and relies on his close relationship with cousin Yazmin (Caitlin Shepherd), a chatroom of recovering addicts enter the cadence, and it’s eventually revealed how the groups interweave.
Director Kathleen McGeever, theater department chair and professor of performance, said Water by the Spoonful has stuck with her in the years since she first saw it performed. “The power of the play is palpable, leaving me thinking about the story, the characters and their journeys long after the curtain fell,” she said, adding she “knew the play was something our audiences needed to see.”
The playwright’s ability to portray both brutal truths and human strength is what made this production a strong candidate to fit into the season’s theme of great stories by great storytellers. “Hudes has honestly laid bare our warts and blemishes as human beings, but equally builds us
up with human kindness and connection,” Ms. McGeever said.
The familial trials and bonds of Elliot and Yazmin bookend the chatroom setting populated by
Haikumom (real name: Odessa Ortiz), Chutes&Ladders and Orangutan, played by Leticia Carrasco, Je’maya Hereford and Uyen Hoang respectively. Their scenes, though they take place mostly in cyberspace, are written to not be played as if the characters are typing. Instead, they comfortably reach out to their fellow addicts, naturally speaking into the void from around the world.
Orangutan, the youngest, communicates from Japan, where she has traveled from her adopted America in an attempt to temper her identity problems and addiction.
“Her being adopted was what caused her abandonment issues and was one of the reasons she started doing drugs,” Ms. Hoang said. “By moving back to Japan, she hoped to gain acceptance. She believes that if she were able to meet her birth parents, then that would fill the void left by her adopted ones.”
As we see her struggle and ask for help, her connection with Chutes&Ladders deepens. It is in their interaction that Ms. Hoang said she finds her favorite line of the play: “Chutes&Ladders says, ‘That little white rock sure doesn’t discriminate.’ Literally, he is talking about Maine, but metaphorically the ‘little white rock’ represents crack — an example of how poetic this play can be and why I really love it.”
These are not the only two who collide after a cry for help. On her path to recovery, Odessa has an especially bad relapse after her sister’s death, and she connects with chatroom newcomer Fountainhead as he begins his steps toward recovery.
“She distracts herself from her real life torments and focuses her energy to help others such as Fountainhead,” Ms. Carrasco said about Odessa. “There’s a scene where they meet up at a cafe, and she not only tries to get him to open up to her but also to understand coping with his addiction is something that he can’t do on his own — we all need someone to lean on.”
The idea that all people need support and connection is central. “We are not perfect, and our false hope that we can ‘do it alone’ is our own worst enemy,” Ms. McGeever said. “We must forgive and accept and reach out to be whole. Without that, we are lost; we are incapable of finding redemption and spirit.”
As the name implies, water is thematic, adding a fluid, churning, complex metaphor as each character drifts and seeks solid ground.“We are capturing the world of the play as an ink drawing that slowly resolves to full watercolor,” Ms. McGeever said. “We are embracing the image of water as destroyer and savior, as the power to kill and the power to cleanse us spiritually and to bring us to rebirth.”
with lighting and sound design by Ben Alexander and Amy Pinkham. Costume designers Jennifer Peterson, Heather Coleman and Sophia Sherman round out the artist staff, and Jared Hansen heads up the production staff as the stage manager.
Another resonant theme relies on jazz elements, which is highlighted through a meta lecture given by Yazmin, an adjunct professor of music, as she sasses her students about dissonance and the brilliance of John Coltrane.
Yazmin herself is a note of dissonance among the others. “She doesn’t fit with the rest of the characters,” Ms. Shepherd said. Though she experiences an identity crisis to rival Orangutan’s and is Elliot’s companion through their mutual loss, she remains an outsider.”
“The majority of the characters are dealing with obvious problems with addiction to cocaine, or Elliot’s addiction to prescription pills, while she doesn’t suffer from those issues,” Ms. Shepherd said. “She tries to be the person who has her life together, but in trying to be okay with the situations she’s facing she’s hurting because she often does not let her emotions show prominently.”
Ms. Shepherd, who said she fell in love with the character of Yazmin immediately, has formal training with piano and has performed jazz pieces for competition, but it wasn’t until taking on this role that she warmed up to the genre.
“I never had a passion for it like my character does,” Ms. Shepherd said. “I always found it very stressful to play, and I associated the feelings of stress to any jazz piece I listened to after that point. Now I can actually listen to it without any negative feelings.”
Auditioning for the small cast began early to make up for a late-start semester.
“I’ve got a great young cast of actors, I was a little worried about casting and considered looking to the community, which we do every now and then,” Ms. McGeever said. “Luckily
enough, young people showed up.”
As the play is mostly about people older than your average theater student, pulling off
the maturity and physicality was a challenge overcome in myriad fashions. For example, Mr. Hereford simulates a big fake gut under a stuffy suit to play Chutes&Ladders, an IRS agent in his fifties, but he wasn’t the only one who has to reach.
“I am obviously not a 31-year-old, divorced music teacher, so it is difficult to physically convey this difference as well as address the issues in such a way the audience can relate to and feel with the character,” said Ms. Shepherd, a senior theater performance major.
Many specialists were consulted to help cast and crew, preparing them to present the sensitive issues of dependence and disability. “We brought in psychologists, sociologists, professors, and people living with various diseases or struggling with returning home after war. We allowed for rich conversations with experts and people living through the challenges,” Ms. McGeever said. “We kept rehearsal as a place for free dialogue and open discussion.”
Though that openness had the potential to create uncomfortable situations, Ms. McGeever said it was essential. Many of the play’s layers rely on “territory that is raw in the human psyche, too raw to approach sometimes” but necessary to tackle to present an honest story. “The honesty must be there always,” she says.
Ms. Carrasco said she benefited from the provided resources. “I had the opportunity to interview people and learn about their struggles and hear their stories,” she said. “Hearing each and every one was like a jigsaw piece, and I slowly put them together to help create Odessa.”
The cast and crew believe there are many morals for the audience to take away from the play, including the messages that addiction does not discriminate, people should not lose sight of hope, there is power in overcoming the past to build up the future and, as Yaz says, “Nobody can make you invisible but you.”
“I believe everyone will leave with their own message and feeling,” Ms. Carrasco said. “There is so much to this play that you could watch it a hundred times, and a hundred times you will experience something new.”
Water by the Spoonful will be performed February 26-27 & March 2-5 at 7:30PM, with 2PM matinee performances on Sundays, February 28 & March 6. Nau.edu/CAL/Events/NAU-Theatre
| Gean Shanks is often found photographing the finer moments.
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20 • MARCH 2016 • the NOISE arts & news • thenoise.us