Dennis Creaghan and Chris Oden in Freud’s Last Session.(Photo by Alicia Donelan)
By Hap Erstein
With Freud’s Last Session, playwright Mark St. Germain follows a simple formula for success – put two compelling characters with differing viewpoints onstage, then stay out of their way and let them speak.
In this case, the characters are two towering thinkers of the 20th century. There is Sigmund Freud, the father of psychoanalysis and a staunch atheist, and C.S. Lewis, a fervent convert to Christianity who would later become renowned as a religious philosopher and famous for writing such allegorical works as the Chronicles of Narnia series.
There is no evidence that these two ever really met, but St. Germain takes his inspiration from a book by Dr. Armand Nicholi, The Question of God, who suggested that such a meeting of the minds would have been fascinating. And indeed, St. Germain has Freud – suffering from oral cancer and contemplating suicide – summon Lewis to his London consulting rooms for a combustible conversation about the existence of a higher being, as well as the nature of good and evil, the purpose of sex and the very meaning of life.
Yes, it is heady stuff, but St. Germain frames the actual words of these two men in an entertaining fashion, leavened with humor that keeps matters from becoming dry. And the play – which continues off-Broadway after five months – is produced locally in its Southeastern premiere by Palm Beach Dramaworks, a company that prides itself on offering “theater to think about.”
Director William Hayes puts the emphasis of this gem-like production on the words, moving his actors around the stage just enough to avoid the action-challenged play from feeling static. He is fortunate to have a pair of first-rate actors, Dennis Creaghan (last seen at Dramaworks as the junk shop proprietor in American Buffalo) and Chris Oden (Werner Heisenberg in a similar play of factual supposition, Copenhagen), as Freud and Lewis respectively.
Creaghan again demonstrates that he is one of South Florida’s most versatile performers, a chameleon disappearing behind Freud’s snowy beard and Viennese accent. Oden is a worthy foil, in awe of Freud yet drawn to attacking his nihilistic view of the world with respect and a bit of sadness. Together, they pick apart each other’s arguments with surgical precision.
Freud’s Last Session runs only 70 minutes, but they are densely packed with ideas, served up by a pair of actors who make the time spent with these two historical figures bracingly cerebral.
FREUD’S LAST SESSION, Palm Beach Dramaworks, 322 Banyan Blvd., West Palm Beach. Through Sunday, Feb. 6. Tickets: $47. Call: (561) 514-4042.
Deborah L. Sherman and Erin Joy Schmidtin Goldie, Max & Milk.
(Photo by Ken Jacques)
Speaking of characters with opposing viewpoints, consider what happens when Maxine, an unemployed lesbian from Brooklyn who has given birth to a baby girl by artificial insemination, meets Goldie, a judgmental Orthodox Jewish lactation consultant.
The sparks fly in Karen Hartman’s world premiere comedy, Goldie, Max & Milk, at Florida Stage, even though it is not hard to predict that the two women will rub off a bit on each other, teach one another a few important life lessons and, after some tidily resolved crises, reach a truce of understanding and respect.
Yes, Hartman’s play is sitcom-convenient, but this decidedly offbeat look at alternative family values still manages to win us over with its humanity and its heart-on-the-sleeve argument for tolerance.
As the play begins, Max is down in the dumps. Her apartment has fallen into disrepair, her longtime lover Lisa has left her in a sudden fit of heterosexuality and Max has no prospects of landing a job. But she cradles in her arms her gorgeous new daughter, tiny Lakshmi Rose, named for the Hindu goddess of wealth and prosperity. If only there were milk flowing in her breasts so she could nurse her baby.
Enter Goldie, sent by the hospital to help matters, which she does, even though she opposes Max’s sexual orientation. So they spar with some clever, pointed exchanges, but Hartman soon runs out of comic barbs. What gives the play its follow-up punch is the arrival of Goldie’s teenage daughter, Shayna Brucha, who comes laden with a noodle casserole and a dilemma of her own. You see, she is a closeted lesbian, who worries if she tells her mother she will be ostracized from the family.
Wait, there’s more. As the first act ends, Lisa rashly kidnaps little Lakshmi to gain Max’s attention. Not much is made of this intermission cliffhanger other than turning us off to Lisa.
Goldie, Max & Milk is directed by Margaret M. Ledford of Promethean Theatre, making her Florida Stage debut. To her credit, she reins in the play’s potential for caricature, getting an earnest, dimensional performance from Deborah L. Sherman as Goldie, full of practical wisdom as well as a religious code that knows no compromise. She is a vivid presence, but the production belongs to Erin Joy Schmidt (Max), endearingly clueless on child-rearing and perpetually exhausted, but with a natural maternal instinct.
Sarah Lord is a petite wise-beyond-her-years dynamo as Shayna, Carla Harting adds some nuance to the play’s villainess Lisa and David Hemphill lends solid support as the odd-man-out, Lisa’s brother Mike, the sperm donor dad who moonlights as a drug dealer.
Florida Stage gives further evidence that it is learning how to use its new home at the Kravis Center’s Rinker Playhouse, thanks to Timothy R. Mackabee’s scenic design, which has far more set pieces than would ever have fit in the Manalapan playhouse. Goldie, Max & Milk is lighter than much of the company’s usual fare. Maybe the company wanted to ease up for the holidays as it continues to search for an audience in West Palm Beach. Still, the play weaves some substance in between its strokes of warm humor.
GOLDIE, MAX & MILK, Florida Stage at the Kravis Center’s Rinker Playhouse, 701 Okeechobee Blvd., West Palm Beach. Through Sunday, Jan. 16. Tickets: $47-$50. Call: (561) 585-3433 or (800) 514-3837.