Theater: Wilderness, a backpacking drama about troubled teens, comes up short
There have been a number of recent productions in NYC with teen themes and protagonists. Several have been excellent, including The Sensuality Play and Mercury Fur. Wilderness, a new play by Seth Bockley and Anne Hamburger produced by En Garde Arts at the Abrons Arts Center in Chinatown, failed to deliver in last night's performance. The evening began awkwardly. It was the evening after the Trump victory, and the theater director came gloomily forward to say that this day was "interesting" and inviting us to a talk back about the play with a clinical psychologist. I wonder if she was more worried about the general mental health of post-election Manhattanites? In any case, we faced a stage with backpacks and assorted basic camping gear scattered about. What followed was a play about troubled teens who are "kidnapped" with the consent of their parents and are taken to the southwestern wilderness to learn basic survival skills and presumably resilience, non-addictive behaviors, and socialization skills. The portrayed activities looked familiar to those who know Outward Bound (a similar, but voluntary program)--solo time, journaling, physical endurance tests, discomfort. It turns out there is a cottage industry in such programs--I count over 50 on a summary website here. Similar to what a friend of mine describes about Outward Bound, there are liberal doses of new age psychology, "imagine you are a Native American" verbiage and pop psychoanalysis that honestly seemed better suited to their parents' formative years in the 1980's and 90's than this one. I am guessing the designers of such outdoor programs have their roots in earlier eras.
The play unfolded using a combination of short scenes involving six teens and 1 adult, most of them playing two roles in alternating guises as guests and camp counselors. Some of the most genuine acting I saw was from filmed excerpts of statements from their concerned parents..these seemed more realistic than the acting onstage. On reading more afterwards, it turns out that these were clips of actual parents who had sent real kids into these programs, and upon whom the staged stories were based. That was a nice touch, but unfortunately, it shone too much light on the amateurish performances of most of the onstage "kids" (most of whom were 20-something recent MFA graduates). Besides the performances, the very-well-meaning text failed to resonate with me. The sad kid stories (eating disorders, ADHD, self-mutilation, parental abuse) were nothing I had not seen on cable TV (Lifetime et. al.), and the alternating monologues and interactions were not very well connected, nor were the teens' interactions very genuine. A Chorus Line did this sort of common-goal serial-testimonial thing better, but without the trail mix. Sexuality and sexual tension was almost nil--hardly realistic for agitated teens trapped together in close-camp confines. There were interspersed video excerpts, abstract filmed backdrops of rain, rocks, sun, etc., but also choreographed movements (the kids as they restlessly slept were filmed Busby Berkeley style from above, e.g.) to keep things varied. This was sometimes interesting, the whole thing just did not hang together or move forward compellingly. Other than topical references to music and to social media, this was something that could easily have been written in 1990. Well, with one exception. Like nearly everything involving millenials, there had to be a transgender kid (medically in transition, not just questioning) in the mix. I truly wonder how the few national transgender medical-surgery centers keep up with the hordes of in-transition transgender kids that one would surmise exist based on their representation on stage, movies, and TV these days. It seems that gay/lesbian issues are now passe, and transgenders are the new talismans (festishes?) of the millenials. Perhaps they are the ultimate metaphor for current n of 1, fluid, create-your-own pathway upbringing? That hypothesis is worthy of some future sociological/literary analysis, I think.
As the play wound down there was some fast-forward time warping (also trendy these days) with the kids telling us how they turned out (mostly on the positive side). But I never really cared, honestly. The final conclusion was a bit odd, sort of like the film was cut abruptly just as a parent arrived for a potentially traumatic visit to their abused child--neither cloying, triumphant, or dark, just blank. Overall, this well-reviewed play was a great disappointment to me, largely a collection of current theater trends and over-ripe teen crisis stereotypes, badly acted for the most part. If I want more moving teen portrayals in soap opera guise, I will wait for the next season of The Fosters on cable.
The play unfolded using a combination of short scenes involving six teens and 1 adult, most of them playing two roles in alternating guises as guests and camp counselors. Some of the most genuine acting I saw was from filmed excerpts of statements from their concerned parents..these seemed more realistic than the acting onstage. On reading more afterwards, it turns out that these were clips of actual parents who had sent real kids into these programs, and upon whom the staged stories were based. That was a nice touch, but unfortunately, it shone too much light on the amateurish performances of most of the onstage "kids" (most of whom were 20-something recent MFA graduates). Besides the performances, the very-well-meaning text failed to resonate with me. The sad kid stories (eating disorders, ADHD, self-mutilation, parental abuse) were nothing I had not seen on cable TV (Lifetime et. al.), and the alternating monologues and interactions were not very well connected, nor were the teens' interactions very genuine. A Chorus Line did this sort of common-goal serial-testimonial thing better, but without the trail mix. Sexuality and sexual tension was almost nil--hardly realistic for agitated teens trapped together in close-camp confines. There were interspersed video excerpts, abstract filmed backdrops of rain, rocks, sun, etc., but also choreographed movements (the kids as they restlessly slept were filmed Busby Berkeley style from above, e.g.) to keep things varied. This was sometimes interesting, the whole thing just did not hang together or move forward compellingly. Other than topical references to music and to social media, this was something that could easily have been written in 1990. Well, with one exception. Like nearly everything involving millenials, there had to be a transgender kid (medically in transition, not just questioning) in the mix. I truly wonder how the few national transgender medical-surgery centers keep up with the hordes of in-transition transgender kids that one would surmise exist based on their representation on stage, movies, and TV these days. It seems that gay/lesbian issues are now passe, and transgenders are the new talismans (festishes?) of the millenials. Perhaps they are the ultimate metaphor for current n of 1, fluid, create-your-own pathway upbringing? That hypothesis is worthy of some future sociological/literary analysis, I think.
As the play wound down there was some fast-forward time warping (also trendy these days) with the kids telling us how they turned out (mostly on the positive side). But I never really cared, honestly. The final conclusion was a bit odd, sort of like the film was cut abruptly just as a parent arrived for a potentially traumatic visit to their abused child--neither cloying, triumphant, or dark, just blank. Overall, this well-reviewed play was a great disappointment to me, largely a collection of current theater trends and over-ripe teen crisis stereotypes, badly acted for the most part. If I want more moving teen portrayals in soap opera guise, I will wait for the next season of The Fosters on cable.
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