My
English teacher once admitted every story is a variation of a handful of tired
archetypes. "The beauty," she said, "is in a familiar narrative being told in an
exciting way."
This was on my mind while watching “All The Ways To Say I Love
You” at the Lucille Lortelle theater, thanks to the skills of playwright Neil
Labute, director Leigh Silverman, and particularly Judith Light who all deliver
us Mrs. Johnson, an English teacher bound by her curiosity of a student’s
obtuse question about lying, her intrigue with the fluidity of the truth, and
by her burden of transgressions she admits to but can’t in good conscience
condemn.
In
a few minutes the familiarity of the rather simple story is clear, but malaise
has no time to set in thanks to Judith Light’s portrayal. Her seemingly fragile
frame is betrayed by a powerful drum beat of a performance, complete with
moments of delicate calm interspersed with erratic explosions of movement and
force. Her honesty is palpable and often moves faster than she can, resulting
in us piecing the story together less from her enthusiasm but in the moments she
recoils at simple words spoken before she’s fully ready to meet their emotional
weight, leaving us with multiple pregnant pauses and the uneasiness that this
teacher, who also acts as the school’s guidance counselor, is as in need of
guidance as any of us.
There
is an argument that the tone of her performance borders on unmotivated at
times. She clenches her hands, clutches her stomach, and bellows air out of her
like an animal, and some of these events do more to disrupt the pace than
accent a moment, though all I had to do was remember the unpredictability of
some of the more colorful teachers I’ve had the pleasure of knowing and
suddenly these jarring outbursts seemed in the realm of possibility. On a few
occasions though even I was thrown off by some of these choices, along with
stiff motivations of movement around the small set that lacked the honesty of
the rest of her performance.
The
claustrophobia of the set is telling, as we are treated to merely a portion of
her classroom office lit by a lone ceiling light, and equally sterile office
windows covered by blinds, the room cluttered and busy, framed tightly in about
half the available space the of the theater which cuts off the proscenium to
allow just enough space to let her move, but not enough to let her find comfort
for longer than a moment.
It’s
hard to imagine this play working without Judith Light. LaBute’s writing is
solid and specific as usual, but it’s Judith’s energy that coerces us to listen
and her pain that we take with us on the ride home. This story has been told
many times, but never quite this way.
Review: Dave Columbo
Photo: Joan Marcus
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