Sketchbook Festival Collaboraction
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Graney’s I’S N UR B1UDStR33M COZIN FA60SITOSIZ uses leet, the Internet slang that’s become the bane of English teachers, to tell the story of a 13-year-old boy making his online farewells as he’s dying of an unidentified congenital disorder. The piece amounts to a brief meditation on reduced expectations—for language and for life. Directed by Michael Patrick Thornton, it features Bubba Weiler as the boy, who sits silently in a wheelchair while his text messages flash on screens surrounding the audience and a voice-over translates them. An astonishing array of emotions is embedded in the shorthand, including sorrow for the guilt-ridden mother left behind and regret for a life unlived. I’S N UR B1UDStR33M is a strong example of completeness in a small package, and Weiler’s body language captures the oceanic currents beneath the character’s superficial stillness.
By contrast, Jacqmin’s Parkersburg is an underdeveloped riff. Directed by Greg Allen, it follows a trio of young female coal miners—in garish party dresses—who must find a vein of coal or lose their jobs. Alliances shift as fear mounts—particularly when the proverbial canary in the coal mine keels over. Allen’s stylized staging lends physical energy (the girls swing pickaxes into the wooden bottom of a reclining chair as they desperately seek bituminous salvation), but Parkersburg remains an idea for an allegorical play rather than a fully realized work.
Like most trips through an artist’s sketchbook, this year’s festival yields some clunky moments, but those are overwhelmed by the festival’s atmosphere of communal joy. As a sampler of some of the best writers, directors, and actors in town, it delivers an exhilarating gallery of voices, images, and insights.v
