Palm Beach Dramaworks Production of 'The Humans' Captures the Angst of Our Times

 

Stephen Karam’s ‘The Humans’ is a gripping 90 plus minute exploration of the existential post 9/11 dread of the 21^st century, the equivocality of the human condition, touching the tenuousness and tenderness of family ties. While it has many humorous moments, this production is both profoundly philosophical and deeply human. Director J. Barry Lewis and the PBD ensemble of actors and technicians make this a memorable theater experience.

 

It takes place in real time, at a family Thanksgiving dinner in a rundown basement duplex in Manhattan’s Chinatown. Parents of the Blake family, Eric and Deidre, drove from blue-collar Scranton, PA, with Eric’s 79-year-old mother, “Momo” who suffers from dementia, to the “new” apartment of their younger daughter, Brigid, and her partner, Richard.  Also attending is their older daughter, Aimee. 

 

The dinner begins pleasantly with light family banter until emotions begin to ebb and flow, becoming a cauldron of confrontations and hurts, revealing well-worn family pressure points and secrets.  These are “the humans” who are trapped in conflict with external forces and within the family structure.  Their interactions, punctuated by wit and pathos, reveal layers of disappointment and anxiety: families know how to push emotional buttons. Strange sounds emanating from the building are foreboding, the gloomy apartment another character in the play. 

 

Each character in this Chekhovian gem of heightened realism reflects one or more of the play’s themes.  The cast’s chemistry makes their interaction feel authentic and deeply connected.

 

Laurie Tanner, Andy Prosky, Anne-Marie Cusson, Lindsey Corey, Casey Sacco, and Daniel Kublick. Photo by Jason Nuttle

Andy Prosky (PBD debut) is Erik Blake, the family’s patriarch, now mired in a middle-class financial crisis, having recently lost his job as a school custodian. Anxiety, regret and guilt hang heavily in Prosky’s performance.  Brigid now lives near ground zero after 9/11 which has heightened his concern for his daughters’ welfare.  He also has issues which threaten his marriage and his very dignity while fears of mortality and nightmares stalk him.  Prosky’s interpretation deeply resounds:  pensive, anxious, he looks off in the distance asking, “don’t you think it should cost less to stay alive?” His troubles and morally ambiguous nature make him a classic antihero. His is truly a bravura performance.

 

His wife, Deirdre Blake, is equally hauntingly played by Anne-Marie Cusson. Her long suffering as a wife prevails in her performance, as well as her Catholic upbringing and traditional values, frequently putting her at odds with her daughters. Religion and marriage are at the core of her beliefs, lacking in both her daughters.  Even when not talking, her knowing looks are both sad and comic.

 

Laurie Tanner (PBD debut) portrays Fiona “Momo” Blake, Eric’s mother, suffering from dementia.  Most of her dialogue is monosyllabic gibberish, but with occasional breakthroughs of clarity such as this brief monologue which could describe all the characters in the play and has Theatre of the Absurd insight:  “where do we go? Where, where do we go? Where do we go? Where do we go? Where do we go? Where do we go? Where do we go?“  Tanner’s is a mostly sad visage, but she explodes into the play’s resolution. The rhythm of her language has allegorical meaning as do the non-sequiturs.

 

Casey Sacco plays Brigid, the younger daughter who is hosting the dinner. She takes pleasure in playing this adult role for her family and yet reveals her profound disappointment as a marginalized millennial. She aspires to be a musician but is bartending. Yet Sacco tries to show her character’s brave positivity as being the “new adult” in the family, even her excitement about having a large window upstairs, although it looks down at an enclosed backyard dump.  Her depression about her career is countered by Eric’s impassioned plea that she display the “Blake bounce back” as if it was only so simple.

 

She tries to distance herself from her parents’ values, living with, but not yet married to Richard Saad, twelve years her senior, played with concerned likability by Daniel Kublick (PBD debut). While he has a disturbing dream world in common with Eric, the comparison stops there as his demeanor is calmer, analytical, and as he is from a family of privilege, symbolizing the financial disparities between classes.  Richard effectively keeps the flow of the dinner when he senses the family is off track.  Whereas Erik is lost in the sea of stress, Richard advocates coping strategies although one can see from Saad’s mannerisms and glances that he is still struggling to find purpose. 

 

Lindsey Corey’s performance as Brigid’s older sister, Aimee, is heartbreaking, negotiating many life changes, all negative. She suffers from ulcerative colitis, with the anxiety of its economic impact, and loneliness, longing for her former female partner.  Her position as an attorney is soon to be terminated; even the highly educated are subject to the precariousness of professional life.  Ironically only Deidre is fully employed, as an office manager, but underpaid and underappreciated. 

 

All these humans are in the same boat of life’s fragility, both literally and philosophically.  If the Theater of the Absurd sought to reveal the absurdity of existence, ‘The Humans’ looks at the condition from the vantage of the everyday lives we lead. 

 

By the time the toasts around the dinner table take place (a family tradition under the amusing rubric of “Smashing the Pig”), emotions escalate, from Richard’s that he is joining a new family, to Eric’s thanks for unconditional family love, and then a change of tone: Brigid blurting out that she wants to be cremated when she dies, to Deidre’s expression of religious horror at that thought, to Brigid’s rejoinder that no one in the family can handle honesty.  But Aimee contradicts that by speaking honestly “in a year where – I lost my job, my girlfriend, and I’m bleeding internally… really a banner year… I’m thankful for what’s right, okay? I love that in times like this I have a home base, a family I can always come home to.”

 

The dinner culminates in a reading of an email Momo wrote to her granddaughters when she was first diagnosed with her illness four years before, a tear jerking monologue read aloud by Deidre.  Then Director J Barry Lewis introduces a long silence to let this sink in with the family and the extended family of the audience.  Soon afterwards, Deidre breaks down in silence, solitary on stage, Cusson’s sadness palpable. 

 

From there the play’s context shifts to the cosmic nature of the human dilemma, the ominous sounds escalating as the lighting fades with Erik’s motions and interrupted monologue resembling his nightmares of faceless figures in a tunnel, expressing his guilt and fear of irrelevance -- until complete darkness settles like the black hole of a quasar.

 

Director J. Barry Lewis orchestrated a dynamite cast in developing this play, taking it from its realistic roots into the uncertainty of absurd theatre. He skillfully meets the challenge of directing actors in multiple stage locations sometimes engaged in separate discussions; it is purposely disquieting, the tension building until finally released in a sense of bewilderment. We recognize the characters as ourselves.

 

The scenic design of the two-story duplex with a spiral staircase is by Anne Mundell, a tour de force, squeezing the second level onto the compromised PBD stage.  The monotone set captures the grunge of a NYC basement apartment in a turn of the century building with exposed pipes, electric meter and circuit breaker, a worn kitchen, stage left.  It is in just moved in condition, with mismatched folding bridge tables, open unpacked cartons, paper plates and cups at dinner, a perfect setting for the themes of this play.  Although it is dark and dank place, it is not inhabited by ghosts, except the ones trapped in the characters.

 

Brian O’Keefe’s costume design is another sign of the random nature of life. What would these people wear getting together for this particular Thanksgiving meal, a happenstance that one gets the sense will not be repeated?  No costume changes required; only our attention to real life characters in a realistic play.  

 

Lighting design by Kirk Bookman had to cope with the two-level set and the anomaly of tired light bulbs in the apartment slowly popping off and the fading light at the conclusion.  The lighting hones in on Eric’s tunnel dreams as an ambiguous denouement develops.

 

Roger Arnold’s sound design includes the jarring sounds from the old building, a sudden thud from the apartment above, the banging pipes, the trash compactor; the groans build as the play evolves. These sounds are especially grating to Eric, the character most vulnerable to paralyzing unease. He has an immediate, instinctive, reaction to them as a perceived threat in his state of anxiety.  There is deep rumble as the play opens, that thud from upstairs, a flushing toilet. Frequent overlapping dialogue is a sound challenge successfully addressed by the designer.  There is the obligatory barking dog but no outside noise of the city.

 

'The Humans' is another great play selection by Palm Beach Dramaworks and its execution flawless, capturing the temper of the times.  Emphatically, this is theatre to think about.

 

Tragedy Over and Within Washington, DC

 

Matt Davies, Newsday’s Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial cartoonist

Who do YOU believe, a Congresswoman from Texas or our President?  Rather than writing commentary, I let them speak for themselves:

 

From Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett

No one knows what caused last night's tragic crash outside DCA.

Investigations are ongoing, and no one - not Donald Trump or anyone else - should be drawing conclusions until all the facts have been released.

But here is what we do know.

On his first day in office, Donald Trump froze the hiring of federal employees—including air traffic controllers.

Also on January 20, Elon Musk pushed out the Chief of the Federal Aviation Administration.

Trump didn’t appoint an acting replacement until after last night’s crash

On January 22, Aviation Security Advisory Committee members were told Trump was cutting members of all advisory committees in a “commitment to eliminating the misuse of resources and ensuring that DHS activities prioritize our national security.”

Also on January 22, Trump fired the heads of the Transportation Security Administration and the Coast Guard.

In June 2023, the United States Department of Transportation Inspector General found that 77% of air traffic control facilities critical to the industry's daily operations were short-staffed.

FAA staffing shortages have been exacerbated by @HouseGOP's repeated near-shutdowns of the government and their refusal to fully fund critical government functions.

These programs were only funded because more Democrats than Republicans voted to prevent these shutdowns.

 

Trump’s News Conference (as reported by Associated Press)

Q: “Are you saying this crash was somehow caused as the result of diversity hiring? And what evidence have you seen to support these claims?”

TRUMP: “It just could have been. We have a high standard. We’ve had a much higher standard than anybody else. And there are things where you have to go by brainpower. You have to go by psychological quality, and psychological quality is a very important element of it. These are various, very powerful tests that we put to use. And they were terminated by Biden. And Biden went by a standard that seeks the exact opposite. So we don’t know. But we do know that you had two planes at the same level. You had a helicopter and a plane. That shouldn’t have happened. And, we’ll see. We’re going to look into that, and we’re going to see. But certainly for an air traffic controller, we want the brightest, the smartest, the sharpest. We want somebody that’s psychologically superior. And that’s what we’re going to have.”

Q: “You have today blamed the diversity elements but then told us that you weren’t sure that the controllers made any mistake. You then said perhaps the helicopter pilots were the ones who made the mistake.”

TRUMP: “It’s all under investigation.”

Q: “I understand that. That’s why I’m trying to figure out how you can come to the conclusion right now that diversity had something to do with this crash.”

TRUMP: “Because I have common sense. OK? And unfortunately, a lot of people don’t. We want brilliant people doing this. This is a major chess game at the highest level. When you have 60 planes coming in during a short period of time, and they’re all coming in different directions, and you’re dealing with very high-level computer, computer work and very complex computers.”

Q: “The implication that this policy [hiring people with disabilities] is new or that it stems from efforts that began under President Biden or the transportation secretary, Pete Buttigieg, is demonstrably false. It’s been on the FAA’s website —”

TRUMP: “Who said that, you?”

Q: “No, it’s on the website, the FAA’s website. It was there from 2013 ... it was there for the entirety, it was there for the entirety of your administration, too. So my question is, why didn’t you change the policy during your first administration?”

TRUMP: “I did change it. I changed the Obama policy, and we had a very good policy. And then Biden came in and he changed it. And then when I came in two days, three days ago, I signed a new order, bringing it to the highest level of intelligence.”

 

To preserve my sanity I am trying to avoid watching news and writing about the actions of the Provocateur-in-Chief. But the politicalization of everything sometimes makes the latter impossible.  No sense analyzing the foregoing.  Matt Davies’ political cartoon says it all.

But nonetheless I slide on the slippery slope into the fray, focusing on the normalization of absurdity, perhaps for no other reason than preserving documentation.  Our Gish galloping Provocateur-in-Chief is a Festivus for one, airing his imagined grievances, celebrating the misery deportations will cause, daring anyone to oppose him, his J6 army locked and loaded.

An excellent article “Trump and the Collapse of the Old Order” By Peggy Noonan in today’s Wall Street Journal goes deeper into the seismic nature of it all.  Here are some bullet points:

·       No modern president has achieved this level of complete cultural saturation. It gives him power in this ill-educated, broken-up, low-attention span country.

·       [T]he second rise of Donald Trump is a total break with the past—that stable order, healthy expectations, the honoring of a certain old moderation, and strict adherence to form and the law aren’t being “traduced”; they are ending. That something new has begun. People aren’t sure they’re right about this and no one has a name for the big break, but they know we have entered something different—something more emotional, more tribal and visceral.

·       There’s a sense we’re living through times we’ll understand only in retrospect. But the collapse of the old international order and the break in America’s old domestic order are shaping this young century.

She warns Democrats: not to talk but do. Be supple. The Trumpian policies you honestly support—endorse them, join in the credit….Most of all, make something work. You run nearly every great city in the nation. Make one work—clean it up, control crime, smash corruption, educate the kids.

Perhaps the pendulum has swung too far.  It is time for the Democrats to take some responsibility and implement change.

But, what about Republicans and Supreme Court Justices?  Are there are few brave ones in Congress and/or on the Bench who will recognize the uber-seriousness of this moment, and choose those critical issues that truly threaten Democracy, and do the right thing to preserve the three branches of government?

Traditional journalism is part of the problem; even Noonan’s article which although insightful, normalizes the dangers being created by these first few days of the new “administration.” 

 

 

2025: Year of The ‘Imperial Me’

 

Peter Sellers as The Imperial Me

I’ve written several “New Year” entries, some hopeful, some less so, such as this one after the Trump-inspired violence and invasion of the Capitol on Jan. 6,2021.

 

Also, this is not the first time I found a profoundly eerie prescient message in an old movie such as the dialogue from the 1957 film A Face in the Crowd , written by Budd Schulberg and Directed by Elia Kazan, about the power of a megalomaniac. There are parallels to Trump’s first run at the White House.

 

On Christmas Eve Turner Classic Movies carried Carol for Another Christmas, Ron Serling’s warning to the world about the consequences of a nuclear holocaust modeled after the Dickens’ Christmas classic.  

 

While Serling’s 1964 TV movie is focused on the doomsday clock, a portion of the film directly relates to where we seem to be going in a 2^nd Trump administration: controlling the masses for the benefit of a few while abandoning decency and honor and lawfulness.  It is also ironic that the main character in the film is named “Grudge” as grudge seems to be a motivating factor in Trump’s Cabinet choices, all seemingly designed to destabilize societal norms.

 

The film portrays a wealthy industrialist, Daniel Grudge (Sterling Hayden), who like Scrooge, needs a lesson in ignoring the needs of mankind. As Wikipedia details,  Grudge emerges into destroyed ruins that he recognizes as having been his local town hall, where he encounters the Ghost of Christmas Future (Shaw). This Ghost explains that the town hall was wrecked in a disastrous nuclear conflict that killed most of the world's people. A handful of survivors enter, led by a demagogue called "Imperial Me" (Sellers) who wears a Santa suit and a cowboy hat cut into a crown. The crowd cheers as Imperial Me is paraded in and gives a speech exhorting each person to act as an individual in their own self-interest. Grudge watches his butler, Charles (Rodriguez), try unsuccessfully to convince the crowd that acting collectively for the greater good of all is essential for humanity's survival.

 

It is the dialogue that begins with Peter Seller’s appearance, playing a cult leader (sound familiar?) by the name of “Imperial Me” (sound familiar?) who gleefully whips up the rage of his followers to abandon all vestiges of civility and law (sound familiar?)

 

Here’s the part that can serve as a metaphor for Trump’s role in January 6:

 

IMPERIAL ME: Now, folks, the first item on today's agenda is this business of the people from down yonder and the people from across river wanting to come in here and talk about what they call our mutual problems, our common differences.

[ Crowd murmurs ]

Now, they want to talk, talk, talk, talk, talk about our problems. They want to debate, debate, debate about solutions until somehow they get their problems solved. They want to waste our time. They want us to commit ourselves to that kind of surrender.

[ Indistinct shouting ]

Unpatriotic!

They're...

They're insane.

Unpatriotic!

[ Shouting stops ]

Now, then. They don't come out in so many words and say that they want to take us over.

[ Chuckles ]

They're too clever for that..But that's what they want. They want to take over us individual me. And if we let them seep in here from down yonder and across river, if we let these do-gooders, these bleeding hearts propagate their insidious doctrine of involvement among us, then, my dear friends, my beloved mes, we'se in trouble...Deep, deep trouble.

[ Laughter ]

And because...Because we have now reached a pure state of civilization, the world of the ultimate me is finally within our grasp...This world where only the strong will exist, where only the powerful will love, where finally the word "we" will be stamped out and will become "I" forever. Because we are each the wise...We are each the strong...And we are each the individual mes!

[ All chanting "me!" ]

[ Chanting continues ]

CHARLES: Listen! Listen! No, listen!

CROWD: No!

CHARLES: Please!

CROWD:  No!

CHARLES: Listen! Listen to me!

[ Chanting continues ]

Please, let me speak!

[ Chanting stops ]

IMPERIAL ME: Let him speak.

CHARLES: To the best of our knowledge, we are all of humanity who remain alive, all that's left. Now, we have survived the Holocaust, and if we are to go on surviving, we must work together now. We must talk together.

[ Light laughter ]

And if other people want to join us, if they want to talk with us, we... we must listen to them.

[ Laughter ]

And we must respond to them. We must begin again. We must have law again and  ethics and honor and decency.

[ Laughter ]

These things were not destroyed by the bomb!

[ Laughter continues ]

This time, they must be made real! They must be made facts!  Only these things can guarantee our survival!

[ Laughter continues ]

The potential goodness of man.

[ Laughter continues ]

The potential morality of man.

[ Laughter continues ]

The capability... that's it! The capability of human beings to achieve dignity and decency. Together! Not "I" or "they," but "we." Don't you understand? The only alternative to that is nothing! Don't you see that, people?!  Don't you see?!

[ Laughter continues ]

[ Microphone bangs ]

IMPERIAL ME: That's enough. Bring him over here. Come. Bring him over here. You are charged with the treason of involvement. You are charged with the subversion of the individual me. How do you plead?

WOMAN: Guilty, guilty!

ALL: Guilty, guilty, guilty!

[ All shouting ]

[ Microphone bangs ]

[ Shouting stops ]

IMPERIAL ME: You anything to say? It's your right as an individual me, you know. Just say anything that comes in your head. You don't have to think about it. Just say it. Go ahead. Oh, you want to use the microphone?

CHARLES: I may be all the sanity that is left. I may be all the conscience that remains on earth. I can't let you kill me!

[ Laughter ]

 

The “treason of involvement and the subversion of the individual me,” chilling in every respect.  This was the America when Trump left office and we voted for a reprise.  The death of Jimmy Carter and the impending passing of the baton, again, to DJ Trump mark the laying to rest “we” and the reemergence of “me.”

 

It will be the 4^th anniversary of the January 6^th insurrection tomorrow.  Indeed, the American Flag should fly at half mast out of respect for Jimmy Carter, but as well for abolishing justice for the events of January 6, 2021. At least there will be poetic justice: it still will be at half mast inauguration day.

January 6, 2021, also a day which will live in infamy