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Photo by Don Kellogg

Thursday, February 16, 2017

The Object Lesson

It seems the entire season at New York Theater Workshop is one full of "alternate theater".  In the latest installment - once again - we have a non-theater "experience" rather than standard drama.  NYTW - it's getting a little old - and it became literally uncomfortable 2 shows ago.

Geoff Sobelle is indeed a unique individual.  He wrote and stars in his one man show, The Object Lesson.  It is not so much a show as it is performance art.  There is only a vague reference to what I understand is the message behind the play - memories, keeping things, packing them up and where they end up.  The entire evening seems to be a metaphor for the concept.  The only thing is - nobody bothered to tell us.  The audience is in the dark watching Sobelle ramble on about France and a traffic light, make salad for an audience member with ice skates, and have a conversation with himself (this was clever) and have a non-verbal performance pulling endless items out of a bottomless box.

If that were not bad enough, we all sat on wooden/cardboard boxes for 100 minutes of this torture.  Enough is enough NYTW.  Did you forget how to put on a normal play where the actor is on stage and the audience is in a comfortable seat?  I get it - you're Avant-Garde.  Well if you continue down this path you will be nothing more than a traveling circus.  Maybe that's a good idea since Ringling Brothers is no longer in business.