Arouet's The Gene Pool at Annex: Well Executed Familiar Bubblegum
A lot has been said about Christi Stewart-Brown's 1996 play, The Gene Pool. It premiered at Washington, DC's Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company in 1998; it's been heralded as "the best sitcom ever written," praised for having "nailed the humor and poignancy of real-life family values," and adored for its "sincerity and heart." The play has been addressed extensively, and fawned over.
A couple of the first questions I ask myself after seeing a performance are, "What is this play doing in Seattle?," and "Why now?" Arouet Theatre, the company behind this production, allows that the plot of this play is "familiar," (making specific mention the plot's similarity to The Kids Are All Right with Julianne Moore and Annette Bening). By today's standards, the narrative doesn't venture too far from the sidewalk, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it strikes me that the company that's staging the work is going out of its way to address the point.
To my particular interest the show's talented director, Roy Arauz, tackles my questions head-on in a recent blog entry. He describes how he came to adore The Gene Pool, why he wanted to direct it, and the subsequent 'journey to opening night' -- he even goes so far as to credit the work of the playwright with "[introducing him] to fringe theater." One of the stated objectives of his brand new theater company (The Gene Pool is Arouet's second show) is "to present works that speak of civil rights, tolerance...social justice, and celebration of our differences." Certainly this production of The Gene Pool is consistent with the missions of the company that's producing it. It is.
In overview: Mira and Claire Grey, a lesbian couple, live in the "mid-1990s; Anytown, USA," where they deal with, and reel from, many of the familiar toils of the conventional nuclear family. Someone works too hard, someone is under-sexed, someone isn't feeling appreciated, someone isn't feeling understood. They also endure some special struggles of their own. This all clips along at a fun and familiar canter.
The dramatic thrust of the play concerns what happens when their sperm-donor-conceived son Peter, who is delirious with adolescent hungers for both food and sex, begins to wonder about his biological father, and eventually seeks to contact him. It's like King Lear lamenting, "Who is it that can tell me who I am?," except Lear is a prolific masturbator, has a potty-mouth, and is constantly confiding his innermost sexual desires to his two moms.
The play starts out very light and takes a little time in arriving at a conflict. Once our story gets underway, however, we hit paydirt. We get some affecting scenes in which the fibers of relationships are tested, values and morals are weighed and consequences are realized. My favorite moments were those in which laughter ceased, which either says something about the execution of this particular comedy or my own taste. Probably both.
The actors are topnotch; particularly Amelia Meckler and Colleen Carey as Mira and Claire, portraying a dynamic and believable couple, complex individuals. It's so nice to see complicated characters from so many angles and these two handle the task masterfully. Kyle Johnson's portrayal of Peter Grey initially stuck in my craw, my knee-jerk assessment being that he played the seventeen-then-eighteen-year-old too 'young for his age.' Upon reflection, however, I realized that the script calls for Peter to be naive, irreverent and lovably coarse, and Johnson does good work with a challenging character.
In the end, I can testify to having been moved by this production. Since my viewing of the show, I've thought about some moments of the production in reference to my own life, and have gleamed some insight from them. The ride, while tidy and organized and at times a little safe, is worth the price of gas. Maybe it's a bit bubblegum, but The Gene Pool is a show that hits its mark.
Friday through Saturday at 8:00 p.m. June 3-19; additional performances Thursday June 9 and Sunday June 19 at 2:00 p.m. // Annex Theatre, 1100 E. Pike St. (11th Ave. at E. Pike St.) // $12 - $18 general admission, tickets available through Brown Paper Tickets // The Saturday, June 11 performance will be interpreted for the hearing impaired.
