THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, May 18, 1995 TAG: 9505160113
SECTION: NORFOLK COMPASS PAGE: 17 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Theater review
SOURCE: MONTAGUE GAMMON III
LENGTH: Medium: 72 lines
``The Praying Mantis'' offers audiences at the Magnet School Theatre a sharply produced and well acted production of a script that is a little out of the ordinary.
The plot relates the events of one evening in an isolated house, where two strange spinsters live with their younger sister, their alcoholic father, and with something, or someone, who moans ominously from behind a closed door.
The basic set-up has all the elements of a real chiller. There is mystery about a cursed past. There are hints of violent eccentricity or downright insanity. There is a heavy overlay of sexuality. There is even a monster in the basement, so to speak.
Elder sisters Lina and Llalla have each had a suitor, and each young man met a suspicious and violent end. Because of the strangely similar supposed accidents which took the lives of those young men, the townsfolk shun this family. The two women have chosen to lead a reclusive existence.
As the play opens, preparations are being made for the arrival of an admirer of third sister Adela. It comes as no surprise that the progress of young Juan's first visit to the home of his beloved follows a course similar to what must have happened to the men who loved Lina and Llalla.
What does come as a surprise, if one does not read the program until intermission, is the author's description of ``Praying Mantis'' as a political play. Fourth sister Teresa - the one who moans from behind the closed door, who eats live chickens and who can leave a lover torn and bloodied - is meant to represent ``the people.'' The three sisters who live in front of that door are meant to represent ``different aspects'' of ``the bourgeois way of thinking'' that ``the play attacks.''
Author Alejandro Sieveking is apparently trying to use a popular formula - the lonely house full of vaguely threatening weirdos into which strays an innocent victim - as a vehicle for ideological expression.
What happens, at least in this English translation from the original Spanish, is that the themes are unclear and the suspense and horror incomplete.
Once one knows the author's intent, one can look back on passages of the play and tease out the parallels between his work and a political situation, but there is nothing immediate that compels the viewer to interest himself in that level of meaning. Deciphering in retrospect which character stood for what socio-political concept, and what their interactions meant, is like a paleontological expedition. The exercise is full of cerebral challenge but the material dug up isn't particularly lively.
Neither does the play produce enough tension to grip that same viewer with the thrills of foreshadowed horror that mark fine suspense drama. The gradual revelation of past events and the anticipation of what may come are precieved on a thoughtful, rather than an emotional level.
This is not for lack of good work by the young actors. Kirsten Leigh Aymer and Lori C. Blackmon turn in admirable performances as Llalla and Lina. Aymer is especially adept at projecting the barely controlled manic energy of the repressed and disturbed.
Michael S. Leamer is most convincing as a petulant teenager, and David Wells has the right idea about Juan's blend of bravado, eagerness, and bemused reservation.
Will Dickerson makes two relatively brief appearances, as the father Aparicio, that confirm the range of his acting abilities demonstrated over the last several years of Magnet School productions. Mary Faber's highly effective work as Teresa is best left undescribed, production's sense of mystery.
Jefferson Lindquist directed, Scott A. Skiles designed lighting and set, and Jorja Jean designed costumes. Like the acting, their work meets the professional standards that can always be applied to the Governor's School for the Arts. by CNB