Review of "August: Osage County" by Tracy Letts
Jeff Furman 10/24/2011 Theatre 1 section 1.


I saw the September 30, 2011 City Lights TheatreCompany performance of "August: Osage County."

Tracy Letts' play, directed by Virginia Drake was performed in the City Lights Theatre on Second Street in the SOFA district of San Jose.

Beverly Weston (Michael j. West) is at the end. His indescretions and stalled poetic aspirations can't be recalled. His wife's blazing illness informs her mental state. He leaves the stage early, but his shadow remains to the play's end. The gathered extended family, unconstrained by the insulation of social distance, unburdens their opinions and insights of each other. The hermetically sealed house extends the pressure cooker metaphor. I think of "No Exit" with a larger cast. The play ends as it begins, with paired characters, essentially alone and isolated: Beverly and his proxy Johnna introduced to Violet (Lillian Bogovich,) starting, finally Johnna and Beverly's widow, Violet ending. TS Elliot quotations in both scenes reinforce the depressing mood.

This performance was beliveable to me, but way more complicated than my personal experience. I visualized the family members' usual internal monologues escaping due to drugs, alcohol, or the stress of the situation.

This play has its protagonists and antagonists; one of the characters I chose to examine has a supporting role. She holds up the mirror for us. Johnna (played by Alika Ululani Spencer)has limited interaction with the family. Her speeches are too short to vocalize the underlying meaning to the play. Most of her communication was through gesture and facial expression. My impression of Johnna was one of coyness and obedience, but with an underlying strength and moral detachment from the family. The coyness wass conveyed through deliberately lowered eyes in interactions. To me, this seemed to be an exaggerated expression, however, it conveyed the idea of condescendece. This character as a critical observer must remain mute in the presence of extreme emotions. The meaning of Johnna's role is being Beverly's alter ego: a passive observer with a low profile (but positive) interaction. I gained this sense of meaning from Ms. Spencer's performance: this became clear in the last scene. Johnna was Beverly comforting his own widow.  


The other character I chose is Karen (Dana Zook.) Karen first appears at the beginning of the second act, helping setup the post funeral dinner. Karen's character attends this event as a formal social obligation. Ms. Zook's broad and free delivery of Karen's recent personal history set me off. Zook's excited, wild eyed manner helped to develop a dislike for her character as she proceeded. Her oblivious and indecorous comments may have been an opportunity for some humor, but the delivery seemed too real for anything but pity. To Letts' credit, Karen's occupation selling Florida real estate seals her case. I put Karen in one of the national sororities. As retribution, Karen's honeymoon in Belize will be anything but tennis and golf, when her new husband combines business and pleasure.

The set showed appropriate detail for the house interiors, however, the kitchen was not shown. The separation of the kitchen from the dining area further reinforced the spiritual isolation of Beverly from others in his family. Violet's comment that Johnna's effort is fully compensated by her pay is a dig at Beverly. Costuming matched the time of the play and its situations.  I didn't notice any lighiting miscues in the performance I saw. The sound design needs some work in the time between acts. There was full silence immediately following the blackout of the terminal scene of the first two acts. This was too severe a transition for me. I was taken from any thought of the just finished scene to watching furniture being rearranged in a warehouse. I believe the silence time following a blackout should be only long enough for you to internalize the just completed action, and no longer. A fade up of apropriate music is necessary to pass the time of the intermission. The performance I saw abruptly started leadin music just before the beginning of the next act-- this should at least have been faded in over a longer time. The music played before the play started during audience seating was appropriate mid-tempo country-western instrumental to set the scene.


This play has more sturm and drang than I usually prefer. Virtually all of the thirteen characters have defects to be worried about. I was able to parse most of the complications, but the barrage was not entirely cathartic for me. I believe focusing on a few tragic characters is a way to get through this in one piece. I think Letts wanted to include features that most people might identify, if not identify with. I was too entangled to properly identify with a particular character, so, I remained an observer rather than a fellow sufferer.

The City Lights Theatre is a cavernous space likely a converted commercial warehouse. Within, a proscenium style stage with an extended apron faces about 100 fixed seats in several raked rows. Most surfaces are painted flat black in the black box tradition. The entry/lobby/box office is a typical idiosyncratic shape behind the auditorium. This has the feel of an established community theatre.