Palm Beach Dramaworks Unveils a Stark Portrait of Parental Desperation

 

Dangerous Instruments by Gina Montet receives its world premiere at Palm Beach Dramaworks in a searing, emotionally charged production. Told through a series of vignettes spanning a decade, the play traces the downward spiral of Laura, a single mother desperate to secure appropriate educational and emotional support for her intellectually gifted but emotionally challenged son, Daniel. It’s a damning portrait of an educational system ill-equipped—and increasingly underfunded—to meet complex, individualized needs.

What could have become a piece of overt social commentary à la Dickens is instead elevated to compelling drama under the sensitive direction of Margaret Ledford. At its center is a stunning performance by Savannah Faye as Laura. Faye captures the vulnerability and ferocity of a mother fighting a system that insists on blaming her rather than helping her child. Her performance anchors the play with authenticity and emotional depth.

 

Savannah Faye by Curtis Brown Photography

Montet’s play was one of five selected for the 2023 Perlberg Festival of New Plays. Of the piece, the playwright says: “Several of the characters blame Daniel’s problems on Laura, which I think is representative of our culture in general. That’s the default setting: blame the parent. I’m trying to tell the other side of the story—to say, ‘What if the parent did everything she could, and it wasn’t enough?’”

The production resonated all the more for me after recently viewing the 2024 West End revival of Next to Normal, a rock musical that also examines how systems fail those with complex needs. Like Next to Normal, Dangerous Instruments critiques one-size-fits-all solutions that ignore the nuances of individual cases. Both works highlight the human cost of a society that refuses to prioritize education and mental health. There are no happy endings here—and that’s precisely the point.

Faye’s performance is especially noteworthy as this marks not only her PBD debut but also her professional acting debut. Her raw, deeply human portrayal builds to a heartbreaking crescendo when she pleads, “Help us. Please? He’s still my baby… he’s my baby… my baby.” It’s unforgettable.

 

Matt Stabile and Savannah Faye by Curtis Brown Photography

Also making their PBD debuts are Matt Stabile as Paul—Laura’s one sympathetic counterpart, despite his professional obligations—as well as Jessica Farr and Maha McCain, who nimbly play multiple roles. PBD veteran Bruce Linser is a standout in dual roles as an emotionally detached principal and a quietly empathetic police officer.

The design team powerfully supports the production’s themes. Samantha Pollak’s sterile, institutionalized cinderblock set becomes a visual metaphor for Laura’s imprisonment within an uncaring system. (Pollak herself is a Dreyfoos School of the Arts alum, making her Florida design debut.) 

 

Roger Arnold’s sound design makes use of both Sesame Street-esque tunes and a haunting recurring theme of “Frère Jacques,” subtly asking: “Are you sleeping?”—a pointed critique of societal apathy.

Brian O’Keefe’s costumes trace Laura’s decline through poignant wardrobe changes, mirroring her dwindling resources and psychological state. Lighting by Dylan B. Carter and video design by Adam J. Thompson add dimension to the narrative, particularly through shadows of children and faux news-style interviews with the play's educational professionals, each justifying their actions. Director Margaret Ledford uses these video segments to chilling effect: everyone was “just doing their job.” So, who’s accountable?

Dangerous Instruments is a serious, sometimes devastating work.  It hits hard because it feels all too real. Yet, Paul, with a new red folder in hand, closes the show with a glimmer of hope.  We see a silhouette of a young child arriving for school suggesting the possibility of change.  But is hope enough?

 

Party Like There’s No Tomorrow – There Might Not Be

 

Dubai Token2049

The May 3 Wall Street Journal describes a bacchanalian bash—unimaginably over-the-top—in “What Happened in Two Days at a Very Wild Crypto Party. Arrests from just a year ago are forgotten. Executives ride zip lines, champagne flows, and deals are struck in Dubai.”

After 100 days, Trump’s presidency is essentially a revenge tour aimed at wrecking the institutions we’ve relied on since World War II. Instead of stability, we have chaos—fueled not by coherent strategy, but by his seemingly impulsive, seat-of-the-pants decisions. It may take generations—if we have that time—to restore public and global confidence in American governance. Behind the chaos stand crafty, avaricious power-seekers, armed with the Project 2025 playbook.

They’ve ravaged the judicial and educational systems, shifted our culture from tolerance to intolerance, and turned Congress and an unqualified Cabinet into obsequious followers. Our international commitments—on trade, the environment, and the defense of democratic allies—have been gutted. We have, in many respects, become the rogue state we once vowed to oppose.

In this sense, Trump’s second presidency represents the most consequential seismic shift in American governance since FDR. But this didn’t happen to us—it happened through us. We hastened it, abetted by a performative “woke” culture that quickly gave way to a reactionary cowboy ethos, supercharged by platforms like TikTok, YouTube, and X that allow anyone to spin their own version of reality, unmoored from fact.

If that were the end of it, we might breathe easier. But the Wall Street Journal article suggests the story only deepens. Beyond the partying at “Token2049,” “the biggest names in crypto and 15,000 of their biggest fans marked a new era of freedom.” Ah yes—“let freedom ring.” But freedom for whom? This is the kind of deregulated “freedom” that enriches the few—like the Trump family—at the expense of everyone else. Quite convenient, when the foxes write the rules of the henhouse.

One marquee attraction: Eric Trump, alongside Zach Witkoff—son of Trump’s Middle East envoy—promoting their company, World Liberty, and its so-called stablecoin, “USD1,” a dollar-pegged cryptocurrency. I don’t claim to understand the technical aspects, so I turn to Wired:

The model is simple: World Liberty Financial receives US dollars in exchange for coins that customers can trade freely in the crypto market. It keeps some of those dollars in cash and cash equivalents and invests the rest in US government bonds—also called Treasuries—which yield interest. The profits of stablecoin issuers depend partly on the going interest rate—right now, short-term Treasuries yield a little over 4 percent—but otherwise scale in a linear fashion with supply. The larger the amount of a stablecoin in circulation, the heftier the underlying reserve of assets from which the issuer can generate income.

How convenient. We’re talking about U.S. government securities—the very instruments that underpin our bloated national debt. About 30% of Treasuries are held by foreign governments or by institutions. The Federal Reserve holds nearly as much. Among other roles, it buys Treasuries to help finance government operations.

And then this torpedo from the Wall Street Journal article: “To whoops and applause, [Eric] Trump said nothing would give him more joy than to see crypto help kill off the big banks that cut ties with his family.”  [emphasis mine]

There it is: the final destination on the Don Corleone Trump revenge tour. About seventy banks were involved in his near personal bankruptcy as well as the bankruptcy of six of his hotel and casino businesses in the 1990s, including Citibank and Chase. These same large banks serve as primary dealers in Treasury auctions. If crypto eclipses traditional banking, the global role of the dollar as a reserve currency is jeopardized. The financial regulatory rules for crypto are being written by those who have most to gain by their easing. 

When the banks have to crawl to Dear Leader, it’s the final nail in the coffin of what was once a flawed but functioning republic.

This article from the March 7 New York Times shows this has been developing right in front of our eyes, as have all his transgressions.  Note the symbolism of the staging:

 

 

 

Watching the Game, Remembering the Dream

 

Ranger Suarez Delivers a Pitch at Roger Dean Stadium

Ah, the start of the Minor League Baseball season—and with it, the return of our regular “Silver Slugger” Wednesday night games at Roger Dean Stadium in Jupiter. We come to see either the Palm Beach Cardinals or the Jupiter Hammerheads, both Single-A ballclubs: the former affiliated with the St. Louis Cardinals, the latter with the Miami Marlins. The entire season of Wednesday night games—including a hot dog and soda and one free tee shirt—costs just $40 for us old-timers.

 

As if that weren’t already a great deal, the level of play is impressively professional, and the stadium itself is a gem. It never fails to move me: climbing the steps, then suddenly that wide green vista opening up before me—the field, the sounds of warm-up, the pop of the gloves, the crack of the bat. It’s a ritual that stirs something deep.

 

Lately, I’ve become especially mindful of the rules of the game. Though mostly unchanged over the decades, recent developments have enhanced the experience: the pitch clock, slightly larger bases, the runner on second to start extra innings (a clever way to speed things up), and at the minor league level, a limited pitch challenge system—two per team. MLB is likely to adopt it next year; it was already tested in spring training.

 

I used to think of the United States Constitution’s “rules” as similarly immutable. But recent months have shown me how bendable—and even breakable—they can be. In contrast, the orderliness of baseball has taken on a special resonance. Not just the written rules, but the traditions. Take the bat boys, for instance: their duties aren’t outlined in rule books, but in the close-up intimacy of minor league games, you notice their little rituals: delivering fresh balls to the umpire after a foul, retrieving gear after a player reaches base, clearing bats—these details form part of the game’s cadence. By comparison, the current political arena feels like chaos, laws broken and traditions ignored. Baseball’s steadiness is a kind of comfort, especially in these times.

 

I came to my first game this season with particular interest, having just finished what I consider the most revealing account of life in the minor leagues during the 1950s: A False Spring by Pat Jordan. I, too, had my major league fantasies back in that same decade. Even then, I knew they were far-fetched—but it was nice to dream.

 

For someone as gifted as Pat Jordan, however, those dreams had more substance. A “bonus baby,” he signed with the Milwaukee Braves right out of high school in Bridgeport, Connecticut—for $36,000. To us kids, it was awe-inspiring to see someone our age being paid that kind of money to play the game we loved. He had a blazing fastball and would sometimes strike out nearly every batter on an opposing high school team—talent most of us couldn’t imagine. But his abilities peaked early. Over the next three years, he found himself playing in forgotten towns, living the lonely, uncertain life of a young man on the road, his once-sharp edge mysteriously dulled. I’m not sure he ever fully understood what happened. Yet, he went on to write one of the finest baseball books I’ve ever read—introspective, lyrical, and profoundly honest about those years.

 

Here’s a passage I chose at random, describing John Whitlow Wyatt, Milwaukee’s pitching coach. Wyatt often stood beside Jordan and quietly coached him in the bullpen during training:

 

Whitlow was a handsome, gracious Southerner in his early 50s. He was tall and erect and loose-limbed, and he had the alert blue eyes of a much younger man. His face was soft, pink, except for a light stubble of beard, while the rest of his body was the color and texture of worn leather. Whitlow spoke with a measured drawl so creamy that each word blended into the next and whole sentences became sweet parfaits. When he spoke, his lips curled back from his teeth the way a horse’s do. He seemed to be tasting each word carefully and with pleasure before swallowing it.

 

And so I walked into Roger Dean Stadium, thinking of Pat Jordan—long retired from baseball but having found himself as a writer.

 

There are more than 5,000 players in the minor leagues at any given time. That night, I was about to see 60 of them. Single-A teams like the Palm Beach Cardinals and Jupiter Hammerheads can carry 30 players each, with no more than two having five or more years of minor league experience. That ensures plenty of turnover from season to season. Of those 5,000 players, only about 10 percent ever make it to “The Show”—and some of them only for a few fleeting games. Over the years, I’ve watched players like Giancarlo Stanton (then known as Mike), Christian Yelich, and Andrew Heaney rise from this very level. Most do not.

 

But last Wednesday, we were lucky. On a rehab assignment with the opposing Clearwater Threshers was starting pitcher Ranger Suárez of the Philadelphia Phillies. I love sitting behind home plate to watch pitchers work—especially crafty lefties like Suárez. He can hit in the low 90’s with his fastball, but he uses it to set up his curve/slider and a devastating changeup, which breaks like a screwball—a pitch you don’t see much anymore. For several innings, he had a no-hitter going. The final score: Clearwater Threshers 7, Palm Beach Cardinals 1. But honestly, the score means little compared to the pleasure and familiarity of the game itself.

 

Most of these players will go on to other things in life. Few will become writers like Pat Jordan. But they will have played the game—and that is a reward in itself