Twelfth Night at Seattle Shakes a bit tame

My Sweetie, the official scorer, and I have a special place in our hearts for Twelfth Night. We saw the Seattle Rep's 1991 production of the play on our first "big time" date, which included dinner at the late, great Lofurno's Restaurant. We've seen several stagings recently. The Rep did it again two years ago, GreenStage did it last year, Oregon Shakespeare Festival ran it in 2005 and is bringing it back next season, with the dee-lish Miriam Laube in the role of Olivia.

This year's production at Seattle Shakespeare Company, directed by Stephanie Shine, stands up pretty well to the rest of them, thanks especially to marvelous performances by Susannah Millonzi as Viola/Cesario, Carol Roscoe as Maria, Darragh Kennan as Sir Andrew Aguecheek, and John Bogar as Malvolio. Kennan was alternately comic and conspiratorial as the not-so-brave knight, and Roscoe lit up the stage whenever she was there. It was our first time seeing Roscoe on stage. She directed the brilliant End Days at Seattle Public Theatre  back in February, and the disappointing Dead Man's Cell Phone at ArtsWest in September. That's Roscoe, Kennan, and Ray Gonzalez as Sir Toby Belch above in the company photo by Erik Stuhaug.

One beef with the play is that it was just a little too timid. Twelfth Night is one of the Bard's bawdiest, but they almost seemed to be playing down the dirty jokes and lechery. Case in point was Gonzalez as Sir Toby, who was played as sometimes a little tipsy, sometimes still a tough knight, but just not the bigger-than-life character that the role requires and we know Gonzalez can deliver. Mike Dooly was boisterous and fun as Antonio, but it's a small role and we didn't get to see nearly enough of him. We enjoyed Chris Ensweiler as Feste, the fool, but he, too wasn't nearly so amped up as he was playing another clown, Truffaldino, in The Servant of Two Masters on this same stage back in January. Nonetheless, he's a funny man.

The music was fun, and included an audience sing-along round, which we practiced in the pre-show warm-up, not knowing we'd be performing later.

Twelfth Night is a good time. It runs through Dec. 27.

Adding Machine a great debut by New Century Theatre Company

There's a new player on the Seattle theater scene, and if its inaugural production is any indication the New Century Theatre Company is going to be around for a while. NCTC is staging Elmer Rice's 1923 play The Adding Machine, directed by John Langs, in ACT's Falls Theater through Dec. 13.

The Adding Machine is an ambitious choice for the first production, given that the cast consists of 15 actors -- a big load to carry for a company just starting out. NCTC pulls it off; The Adding Machine is a visually stark and stunning, thought-provoking piece on work, life, death, and the afterlife.

Co-artistic director Paul Morgan Stetler plays central character Mr. Zero, arithmetic whiz in a big store's beancounting department. Zero gets the pink slip after 25 years "without missing a day" -- the "title device" has made his services unnecessary. Zero offs the boss and makes no effort to cover up the crime. The jury convicts him despite his perfectly logical contention that the boss had it coming.

Stetler's Mr. Zero is tormented by a torrent of figures, never far from the top of his mind. He's oblivious to the deep dissatisfaction of his wife (marvelously played by Amy Thone) and to the fact that ditsy co-worker Daisy (Jennifer Lee Taylor) really wants him. Daisy offs herself after Zero's execution, but somehow they don't manage to hook up when they meet at the Elysian Fields, either.

The funniest performance of the show is turned in by Darragh Keenan as Shrdlu, a nervous, chain-smoking character who has killed his mother. He makes a better case for justifiable homicide than Zero did! The two first meet sitting in the graveyard (it could be that Thornton Wilder ripped off the idea from Rice for the cemetery scene in Our Town) as Shrdlu explains that he smokes to ward off mosquitoes.

In the end, the suffering souls go back to life to do it all again. We're just not sure they weren't better off when they were monkeys.

NCTC aims to be a resident theater company and currently has eleven members, including Hans Altweis, who joins Stetler as co-artistic director, Thone, Taylor, and Kennan. They're aiming for somewhere in between the big guys and the fringe theaters in Seattle. Special props to one of the big guys, ACT, for its generous support.

NCTC's mission statement says the company will let the story be king. They are committed to plays that are fearless and will not do your thinking for you, and promise "timely works of the 20th Century, provocative 'second looks' of under-produced contemporary masterpieces, and annual world premieres from some of our country's most talented up-and-coming writers."

They've scored with The Adding Machine. Weisenheimer can't wait for their next show.