Theater Review: MENSTRUATION: A PERIOD PIECE (Big Little Theatre Company at the L.A. LGBT Center)

I CAN’T GET THAT TASTE OUT OF MY MOUTH

Get ready for a show that is all vagina and no vulva. This bloody awful musical by Big Little Theater Company is of the women, by the women and for the women, especially lesbians — there are lesbians on stage, in the audience, and behind the scenes. Is it important to know that mostly queer women are all up inside this journey of a vagina? Do you remember that joke, “How many lesbians does it take to screw in a light bulb?” The answer: “That’s not funny!” And neither is this avant-garde 90-minute piece that actually feels like 28 days.

JANE HAE KIM

Claire (Jane Hae Kim) is showing a PowerPoint presentation to her unseen lover Mel. (Yet she confusingly speaks directly to audience members.) I’m not sure what Claire’s existential crisis is, but presently at age 38, she is triggered by a fellow “women’s issues” panelist (shown on a slide), who stated, “A lesbian period is the ultimate lesbian tragedy because a lesbian’s uterus will die a thousand times and never get what it wants.” To which Claire bursts out, “I am getting what I want.”

I’m already lost, because we aren’t told what her uterus is getting. Sperm donations? Great sex? A totality of womanhood? Is she defensive because she’s not getting what she wants? We will come to learn that she feels incomplete, and is merely questioning the idea of needing/having/not wanting a child (among her reasons for not wanting a child: “I don’t want to explain patriarchy”). But her menstrual cycle is slowing down! Oh, I get it, she just needs to talk about it. How’s THAT for a dramatic arc?! After this experience, I don’t even want to talk about talking about it.

AUDRA ISADORA, KATE LÝ JOHNSTON, KACI HAMILTON, MARNINA SCHON

Here’s where it goes from promising to wrong in one drop. Claire then takes us on a journey through her menstruation, anthropomorphizing individual aspects of her cycle in a performance art femme factory (“It’s all so abstract!” one of the Follicles says). Along with the follicles, The Brain, and Ovarian Advisor, characters include the Ultimate Egg Authority (substantial, strapping Kaci Hamilton); Emily the Hormone, aka the Eggs’ assistant (dynamite Bibi Mama); and the desperate-to-bond Egg (the wonderful and distinctive actor — Jesus! Sorry! Actress! — who also plays lover Mel, Jo Lampert). In this alternate universe with music you will learn about different aspects of the vaginal release.

KACI HAMILTON, AUDRA ISADORA, KATE LÝ JOHNSTON, MARNINA SCHON

I kept wondering while jabbing toothpicks into my eyes if this is some kind of meta-universe that mirrors Claire’s relationship with Mel. Barely. I think Claire visualizes some panelists up inside her, but it was just too much work figuring it out. The question for me is, Why weren’t the aspects of her menstruation played by people in her life so that we could relate to her struggle? There are no such people. There is no such story.

No, the uterine journey is all (s)exposition. Claire realizes that she doesn’t know that much about the menstrual process herself, so we get to learn about the corpus luteum, progesterone, and endometrium via a Uterine chorus, led by a Uterine Union Representative, who says on Day One (the days are projected on the wall), “Yes, we must liquefy the chunks so they will fit through the mouth of our country — “, to which the Chorus responds, “The Vagina!” Through Day Four, the chorus will claw, jackhammer, chisel and dynamite the uterine wall, sometimes singing. A few of my favorite lyrics are:

WE ARE THE FOLLICLES!
FA LA LA LA FOLLICLES!
EACH OF US CONTAINS AN EGG!

and

BLOOD! BLOOD! BLOOD! BLOOD!

Pithy, right?

KACI HAMILTON

The wholly forgettable music by Tova Katz is forgivable, given her inventive harmonies sung magnificently by Audra Isadora, Kate Lý Johnstone, and Marina Schon (the lyrics came from playwright Miranda Rose Hall). Above the stage, adding complexity to the score, are keyboardist Elizabeth Curtin Alonso, drummer Jesse Brickel, and cellist Karen Carvalho. Notably, Andrea Allmond balances all this sound in a small space.

THE COMPANY

It looks like a lot of money was spent on this show, and it shows. As with her work on Frankenstein and Cuckoo’s Nest, Lena Sands‘ costumes are imagination cubed, especially that awesome six-legged Corpus Luteum. Yuki Izumihara’s phantasmagoric, colorful, playground set looks like someone threw up a Chinese Checkers board and an East Village drag show on Pee-Wee’s Playhouse (that’s a complement). R.S. Buck’s whimsical lights and Nicholas Santiago’s hallucinatory projections dazzled. Director Miranda Rose Hall stages this like a sketch show, but the shenanigans don’t keep ennui from setting in.

BIBI MAMA

Oddly enough, I only saw one review besides mine — the critics must have smelled this from a mile away. And listen, I’m a gay man, so if this was a musical about the internal makings of a scrotum or cock, I still wouldn’t be interested, even if streaming crepe ejaculate was involved. Then again, that point is moot, as gay men surely would have insisted on better songs. So, if you’re not a pussy around lesbians, you could snatch tickets to see how an organ works — the whole pap schmear — but it won’t be the heart.

KACI HAMILTON

photos by Lex Ryan

Menstruation: A Period Piece
in association with the Los Angeles LGBT Center
Davidson/Valentini Theatre, 1125 N. McCadden Place in Hollywood
Thurs-Sat at 8; Sun at 2; Mon at 8
ends on April 16, 2023
for tickets ($35), visit LALGBT Center