Many writers have examined tensions in the Middle East, a particularly thorny issue. Playwright Monica Raymond does so with a poetic eye in her new work, The Owl Girl. Taking the conflict to an absurdist extreme, she distills the historic schism down to two families — one Arab and one Israeli — and places them in the same dwelling. Both can reasonably claim ownership of the home. Zol and Leedya were raising their teenagers, Joze and Anja, in the house when they were all sent to a camp in the West Bank. Rav and Ora then purchased the property for their family, which includes daughter Stel and young son Capi.
Stel still feels the spirits of the other children in her room, where she chooses to keep two marks on the wall that indicate Joze and Anja’s heights at the time they were forced to leave. Meanwhile in the camp, Joze has also started to feel a draw, eventually convincing his father to give him the key to the old front door so he can visit one last time. He happens to choose a night when Stel is home alone and the two form an instant connection. Stel invites Joze to come back, but when he does, his parents and sister follow. Rav, Ora, and Capi return, and the eight decide to share the space as a cultural experiment.
Yaara Shilony and Julian Alexander as Stel and Joze in The Owl Girl
Raymond employs a number of metaphors to make her points about battles ideological, cultural, and territorial. The most graphic of these symbols is the Owl Girl of the title. Anja stopped developing at the age of 13, literally stunted by losing her place in the world. Stuck in exile, she fell under the spell of her rage-filled grandmother. Since Anja hasn’t matured into a woman, she tries on a number of animal personas, settling on the owl. These birds represent power and destruction in her culture, but also possess vision and insight. Returned to her rightful station, she not only starts menstruating, but swoops about the house, eventually sprouting literal wings in order to gain a better vantage point.
Ms. Raymond has been developing this piece for 15 years, and some sections flow with the passion she obviously feels for her subject. Her understanding of the thin line that can exist between enemies is well articulated, at one point represented by a literal string running down the kitchen. Her use of magic helps her reveal emotions that can be difficult to articulate. But she defuses her message by adding too many layers. There are aggressive chess matches, a hellish hidden room, and a jar of mysterious ointment. Then in the middle of the second act, Raymond introduces a subplot involving the lust Rav feels for Anja. Eventually, like a child’s painting, the metaphors are so thick that they turn muddy.
The Owl Girl is presented by THML, a majority female-run theatre company that promotes stories by and about women. It is therefore unsurprising that the exchanges that have the most rhythm are the ones between the two mothers. They share a frustration with their sexists husbands and are both raising challenging younger children. Ora and Leedya bond as almost any two women will eventually do, finding common ground and poking a little fun at their differences. Director Bryan Raanan Kearney who plays Ora has good timing and provides some comic relief. The other relationships don’t work at least in part because many of the actors are miscast. One in particular is the wrong age and ethnicity and has not gained mastery over an unnecessary accent. The exception is Julian Alexander, who brings a delightful softness and sense of wonder to Joze.
Having received awards from the Castillo Theater, Peacewriting, Portland (Maine) Stage, and the Jewish Plays Project, The Owl Girl is a promising work that still needs to find a clear voice. It is playing through March 20 at The Center at West Park, upstairs in the Balcony Theater. Tickets are $30 and can be purchased at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-owl-girl-tickets-53977563345.
All Our Children
At a time when the US government has been separating families at the border, All Our Children sends an impassioned message about the responsibility we share as a society to protect the most vulnerable among us. The play by Stephen Unwin is a work of fiction based on true events that took place in Germany between 1939 and 1941. In a lesser-known chapter from that time, the Nazis sent 100,000 mentally and physically impaired people to the gas chamber. It was felt that their deaths were efficient and even compassionate since these citizens could never properly contribute to the development of the Third Reich.
The intentionally claustrophobic piece is set entirely in the office of Victor Franz, a doctor whose clinic has been repurposed to quickly diagnose and dispatch the children under his care. Director Ethan McSweeny has staged the work in the round so that the audience encircles the doctor, witnessing the slow dismantling of the acceptance he has maintained of his role in these casual murders. The audience in turn is enveloped in a wall of file cabinets which contain the children’s medical files, a powerful image in the minimalist set by Lee Savage. Somber radio music, part of Lindsay Jones’s sound design, is used to effectively illustrate the passage of time. Simple period costumes by Tracy Christensen complete the look and tone, sending us back to that horrible period.
Karl Kenzler brings a combination of gruffness and vulnerability to his role of Dr. Franz as he ping-pongs between professional obligation and personal discomfort. But the actor cannot escape the circular emotional arc with which the character is burdened. Unwin is a seasoned director and teacher and this is his first time as playwright. The results are heartfelt but thinly executed. The other four characters are drawn in stark black or white, a weakness that often plagues stories that involve the Nazis. Furthermore, Franz’s tolerance for many of his encounters isn’t properly explained or realistically motivated.
KARL KENZLER and JOHN GLOVER, Photo by Maria Baranova
Among Franz’s foils are his pious maid, Martha, (a fluttery, sweet Jennifer Dundas) a genuinely caring woman who tries to reconnect him with his sense of responsibility to heal and give comfort to his young patients. There is also Elizabetta (a too broad and harsh Tasha Lawrence) representing all the grieving mothers who love their children no matter their limitations. Most important is Bishop von Galen (the always excellent and engaging John Glover) who attempts to appeal to Franz’s long-lost soul. Counterbalancing them all is the clinic’s administrator, Eric (an appropriately oily Sam Lilja), who is not only a member of the SS, but also guilty of statutory rape. He’d be twirling his mustache if only he had one. It is only his embodiment of pure evil that eventually breaks through Franz’s trancelike state.
Recommended for ages 13 and older, All Our Children lacks nuance, but delivers on its examination of a particularly shameful practice. It is playing through May 12th in the versatile Black Box Theater at The Sheen Center, a project of the Archdiocese of New York. Runtime is a scant 90 minutes with no intermission. Tickets are $65 and $80 for general admission and can be purchased at https://www.sheencenter.org/shows/allourchildren/2019-04-06/. For those wanting to delve deeper into the topic, post-performance talkbacks are scheduled throughout the run. The play is also accompanied by an exhibit in the Sheen Center gallery, Little Differences: The Portrayal of Children with DisABILITIES Throughout History.