This is Life as We Know it...: 2001
Five seemingly unrelated stories told by seven narrators interweave in a collage of style using television advertising and news snippets, sleight of hand, runway modeling, classical story-telling, discordant sound effects, a gestural dance form and a tip of the hat to Bugsy Berkeley. 58 scenes make up an extraordinary 90 minute performance, mirroring the short attention span of contemporary times and our search for an appropriate reaction.
Performance History: 30 Minute laboratory version: Out North Theater, Anchorage, The Santa Fe Playhouse.
Reviews
"extraordinary ensemble...genius...Theater Grottesco may become to stagedom what abstract expressionists such as Pollock and Rothko have become to painting: penetrating and enduring."
THE Magazine
"brilliant...masterful...hilarious...portrays, with fearsome success, that fraught, poignant thing which the unfettered expression of emotion has become in the age of globalization."
Santa Fe Reporter
"Like a painting that grabs you on a purely visceral level, This is Life... compels you to look...the simplest action - the washing of a face, for instance - is performed with operatic grace..."
Santa Fe New Mexican