Theater Review: A GOOD GUY (Rogue Machine)

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by Tony Frankel on September 15, 2024

in Theater-Los Angeles

NO GOOD DEED GOES UNPUNISHED

Take a look at the highly decorated diorama just before you go upstairs to the Henry Murray Theatre for one of the most exciting world premieres you will ever see. It’s a miniature school room with one open text book about statistics and others involving math problems. Notice the circles. A pile of children’s backpacks are on the floor. And after you see A Good Guy, the pile-driving, emotional, frightening and compassionate new play by David Rambo, re-visit the diorama to help you reflect on the enormity of your experience.

Wayne T. Carr, Evangeline Edwards, Suzen Baraka

Shockingly, this play involving a school shooting, the plight of teachers, war in Syria, dreams achieved and deferred, bullying, and the sorry state of America’s educational system is hardly depressing. The main reason for this is that Rambo ensures that his play is not about these issues. Instead it’s a universal tale about a woman whose world comes crashing down, and how, in the most dire of circumstances, there may just be a light at the end of the darkest and dankest of tunnels.

Evangeline Edwards, Wayne T. Carr

The woman is 8th-grade math teacher Anna. At rise, she is being gently questioned by the police immediately after she pulled out a gun in class to kill a student who was in the midst of a murdering rampage. How did it happen? Why did this lovely young woman keep a gun in her desk? Although the officer is assuring her there will be no arrest, Anna feels like she is being interrogated.

Evangeline Edwards, Suzen Baraka

What follows is jump-cutting from events prior to and after the shooting. The result is a sense of confusion, heightened emotions, and — intentionally or not — disorientation. Instead of declamatory dialogue about the issues at hand, Mr. Rambo is plotting the scenes such that we are in Anna’s experience. And given Evangeline Edwards‘ extraordinarily expressive face, and her tightly-wound performance as Anna, that experience is breathtaking. When she is frustrated, we are frustrated. When she’s angry, we are angry. Don’t be surprised if you find yourself wiping away silent tears. Those who saw Edwards in Rogue Machine’s Heroes of the Fourth Turning will truly understand the range of this most watchable thespian.

Evangeline Edwards, Wayne T. Carr

On the heels of his retirement announcement as Rogue Machine’s artistic director, John Perrin Flynn stages A Good Guy with sensitivity and a creeping urgency. Jan Munroe‘s set is more detailed than previous shows in the tiny theater, with trompe l’oeil panels offering forced perspective of a classroom and a home. The carpeted floor is masked with the kind of tape and red crosses used to identify bodies and bullets at a crime scene. Christopher Moscatiello‘s directional sound devices have an approaching storm above our heads and a barking dog from downstairs. Dan Weingarten‘s lights shine through plastic panels above with colors to inform some scenes and a bright, intrusive fluorescent-like white for others.

Evangeline Edwards, Suzen Baraka

Equally impressive — if not more so — are actors Wayne T. Carr and Suzen Baraka, each brilliantly shape-shifting into fully informed characters throughout. Playing five roles each, and aided by Christine Cover Ferro‘s quick-change costumes, these consummate actors bring such nuance in physicality, voice and manner that every little detail will astound you. That also speaks to Flynn’s guidance. It’s sort of a spoiler to tell you who to expect, but I especially loved Baraka’s excited colleague of Anna’s, who drinks from a coffee cup that reads, “I’m Silently Correcting Your Grammar.” Logan Leonardo Arditty makes an impressive cameo as a former student.

Suzen Baraka, Wayne T. Carr, Evangeline Edwards

All Anna ever wanted was to be a teacher. Her navy blue gingham dress, worn throughout, and Edwards’ posture, brings to mind a dedicated, resilient schoolmarm of the ages. But budget cuts, intrusive parents, cell phones, and a country that no longer knows how to respond to the mass murders of children isn’t helping. And now, the Republican Party Platform and the conservative Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 manifesto includes the abolition of The Department of Education. Yes, the realities of our time are stunning. But nothing is more stunning than great theater.

photos by Jeff Lorch

A Good Guy
Rogue Machine
Matrix Theatre’s Henry Murray Stage, 7657 Melrose Avenue
75 minutes; recommended for ages 14+
Mon & Fri at 8; Sat at 5; Sun at 7 (dark Fri, Sept. 20)
ends on October 13, 2024
for tickets ($25-$45), visit Rogue Machine
Show4Less Fridays: Sept 27 ($15+), Oct 4, 11 ($20)

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