WHERE THERE’S A WILL,
THERE’S A WAY OUT

A son gets the boot,
his parents get their kicks,
and the audience gets a riot

In keeping with the expectation at Trap Door Theatre, when one walks into the performance space, the stage is occupied by performers: stage-center, a stone-faced woman in an enormous apron chops carrots in a manner more befitting a butcher, or a stoic serial killer, than a housewife; in the corner, a man in too-high pants and suspenders writes with a quill pen at a lectern, pausing every so often to strike a metal shade, then turns and sways in a manner that’s both deeply unsettling and deeply arresting, while on a raised platform, a young man is curled up in the fetal position; every now and then the bleary-eyed man sits up and bursts into sobs, before lying down again.

These three characters form a nuclear family: Papa Ferdinand (Lawrence Grimm) invents aphorisms for work. Mama Mona (Shawna Franks) does something with vegetable medallions that I didn’t quite catch. And son, Will (Lenin Izquierdo) does, well, nothing.

It is Will’s birthday and he’s turning twenty-five. He gets a cake that he does not want. He also gets news that he does not want: his parents are throwing him out. In the grand tradition of layabouts everywhere, Will freaks out. He accuses his parents of abandoning him, of being unfeeling, of being cold, of being cruel. And when they refuse to yield, Will leaves and finds a sidewalk; there he lies down, crawls into what I assume to be the fetal position, and waits to die.

The Chicago premiere of S.L. Daniels’s Any Rebellion of Will is the second production at Trap Door this season. A collaboration of the Independent Projects Initiative and Grey Area Productions, the play, a sui generis exercise in absurdity that recalls Ionesco, Beckett, and Preston Sturges, is directed by Spencer Huffman. I have not seen any of Mr. Huffman’s previous directorial efforts, but on the basis of this production alone, I am prepared to declare myself a fan.

Will has barely left the house when he is back again, and he’s brought a new friend. Uncoiling from what seems like an impossibly tiny space in a child’s pull cart is Giselle (Camilla Frontain). “Giselle” is a classic example of the “Manic Pixie Dream Girl,” a cinematic trope that I loathe most of the time but not here, primarily because Frontain is astonishing. It’s an assured performance, both in its sinuous physicality and its affecting richness, and scrupulously devoid of sentimentality—probably the reason why it works so well.

Having done what manic pixie dream girls are expected to do, Giselle shakes up the status quo of this moribund trio and makes her exit, leaving Will with an unreal bird cupped in his hands.

“How do you feed a bird that isn’t real? With food that doesn’t exist.”

There are three types of performances on display in Any Rebellion of Will, and given the drastic difference in style, it’s remarkable how well they mesh. You have Frontain’s hypnotic and surreal turn, as described above. And then there are Franks and Grimm, who seem to have walked out of a Punch and Judy puppet show and into an Ionesco play (now that I’ve typed that out, it doesn’t sound all that strange). Franks could stand to bring a bit of variation to Mona—she’s a bit too dialed-up-to-11 all the time—but she’s a formidable counter to Grimm’s Ferdinand, and their banter is hilarious.

Lawrence Grimm is a revelation here. There’s not a trace of the suave confidence men that he so beautifully embodied in Gaslight and The Targeted. He’s almost unrecognizable here as the pompous and fussy wordsmith Ferdinand, who is convinced that his as-yet-uncompleted magnum opus, Great Sayings That Should Be Said Universally and Immediately, will change the world. Myron Elliott’s marvelous costumes help quite a bit with this radical camouflage.

Every comedy, whether surreal, absurdist, or run-of-the-mill, needs a straight man, and in Any Rebellion of Will, that duty falls to Lenin Izquierdo’s Will. That’s not to say that it’s a bad part. Will is the emotional center of the play. Without a robust performance in the part, the edifice would crumble. Fortunately for the show, emotional honesty is Izquierdo’s stock-in-trade, and he is excellent. He has wonderful chemistry with Frontain and (especially) Grimm: there’s a touching and deeply sad subtext to this father-son pair who will always disappoint each other. The more raucous and hysterical Ferdinand and Mona get, the more Will recedes into himself, shrinking with each broadside, until his final departure from his home and oppressive family is not so much a choice but a necessity.

Izquierdo turned 25 on the night of the performance. It’s the third superb performance—in three drastically dissimilar roles in shows of varying quality—I have seen from the actor in the past year, and I am more convinced than ever that he is a genuine talent.

“I have less than nothing. That’s all I need.”

Any Rebellion of Will is so fast-paced and funny, both wryly and laugh-out-loud, that it’s easy to elide over the sadness at its core. Despite Ferdinand and Mona’s complaints and squabbles, they have each other. The horndog vitality that elevates their battles is refreshing; most of them end in frenetic make-out sessions—this is a long-married couple that still lusts for each other and is focused on each other to the exclusion of everything else. So where does that leave Will? It isn’t enough that he’s plagued with ennui, crippling depression, and self-loathing; he’s an outsider in his own life. The implicit cruelty in the final scene drives this point home. It’s exaggerated, sharp, bizarre, and dark: everything absurd theater should be.

It’s also funny as hell.

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photos by George Hudson

Any Rebellion of Will
Trap Door Theatre
in association with Independent Projects Initiative and Grey Area Productions
Trap Door Theatre, 1655 W. Cortland St. in Chicago
Thu–Sat at 7:30; Sun at 2
ends on November 1, 2026
for tickets ($5–$30), call 773.384.0494 or visit Trap Door Theatre

for more shows, visit Theater in Chicago

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