VOICES INSTEAD OF BULLETS
Although Arms Around America, which opened last night at The Nimoy in Westwood, is about guns and their people (or “ammo-sexuality,” to steal a wonderful phrase from the show), it is also a feast of sounds, a display of musical bravura and an all-around fabulous evening of unconventional live theatre. Serving to remind us that the root meaning of audience is not to see, but to hear (from the Latin, audire, to hear), this production from Dan Froot & Company — which heads out on tour after tonight — features six oral histories of real people impacted by guns. In true Studs Terkel fashion, Froot&Co. compiled these stories from families in California, Montana and Florida, and they are here performed by actors who succeed in bringing to life a diversity of scenes and characters with precious little movement (the set is a podcast, an “on the air” sign hangs down from the ceiling, and the actors sit at tables, for what we have here really is a tremendously refined live reading, replete with sound effects, many of them expertly produced by Froot’s Foley-esque mouth or by manipulating random objects. In exploring gun violence, these stories necessarily engage with such difficult problems as masculine ideology, domestic violence, suicide, and family legacies.
Artistic Director and Foley Artist Dan Froot
Dan is the Puckish master of ceremonies, at his DJ-esque post in between the tables. Interspersed in the narratives is dance-worthy live music by a three-piece band, not including saxaphonic contributions from Froot. This music also functions cinematically, as background sound in dream sequences and flash backs. At the end of each narrated performance, the real person behind the story is honored and identified on an upstage TV screen. We had grown close to them over the course of their stories, and there was a certain release in knowing their real names.
Justin Alston, Krysta Gonzales, Donna Simone Johnson, and Anthony Rey Perez
Krysta Gonzales and Donna Simone Johnson amid voicing multiple characters
Each of the stories is valuable and engaging, often tightly composed and with impactful endings. Because of the themes of gun violence, certain lines assumed greater resonance; in one of the stories a harried mother and graduate student ignore phone calls from her friend, who asks her how she can let her kids go to school, “after what’s just happened,” referring, of course, to a recent school shooting. At the end of this story — which features hilarious dream sequences in which her children help her finish her dissertation — this same friend calls again, and the question of “answer or ignore” was repeated portentously, paralleling our own indecision and passivity as a nation. The first narrative was about kids and guns, and featured a shocking reversal at the end that put into perspective the absence of real love and care in communities afflicted by violent armed youth. Another one was a mini-thriller about a misplaced pistol.
Anthony Rey Perez and Justin Alston
Dan Froot & Company in action
The house was packed and attentive on Friday night; bunches of college students from nearby UCLA (the piece was co-commissioned by CAP UCLA) were observable in the audience, and again, though the subject matter threatened a repellent one-note solemnity, each story was performed with such specific attention to character and to narrative structure, that nothing was heavy-handed, and no story dragged.
Justin Alston adding emphasis to a scene
“The Kitchen Table” discussion immediately following the performance was an actual table, situated in front of the audience, at which sat such individuals as firearms instructors, retired professors, and other community members who modeled what each of us would do after the play to discuss the subject with our friends and family. Many in the audience did not stay for this post-show oddity, and the “Kitchen Table” was nowhere near as engaging as the recreated oral histories onstage.
The 3-piece band, Tom Moose, Isaac Rodriguez, and Julian Gomez
Dan Froot & Company
The audience was directly addressed throughout the show, and in closing Dan Froot hoped for more civil dialogue. And the human voice and instrument really is the triumph of this show, with the actors often doubling up on roles and sliding between adolescence and senility in seconds. Of special notice are the talents of Donna Simone Johnson, who rightfully narrated most tales, and the remarkable Krysta Gonzales, visibly moved by the graduate-student-mother story she vocally inhabited.
The Arms Around America cast brings the show to a close:
Anthony Rey Perez, Justin Alston, Dan Froot, Krysta Gonzales, Donna Simone Johnson
Just as “Arms” in the title could be either lethal weaponry or the embracing hold of a loving listener, words might convey hate or love. This production insists the choice is ours, and begs us to extend our attention and sensitivity well beyond the 75 minutes of these moving and memorable true stories.
photos by Gunindu Abeysekera
Arms Around America (World premiere)
Dan Froot & Company
The Nimoy
co-commissioned by CAP UCLA and NPN
reviewed on Friday Nov 15, 2024; ends on Saturday Nov 16 at 8
for tickets, visit CAP UCLA
for more info and tour dates, visit Arms Around America