June 2010 Theatre Review by Lawrence Bommer
Dead Letter Office
The title tells all because the setting shapes the story in Philip Dawkins’ claustrophobic creepshow. Billed as a thriller, this Dog and Pony offering is more of a puzzler, exploring the literally buried lives of postal workers who visit a colleague in the dank depths of a Midwestern post office. Called “parcel purgatory,” the dead letter office, so gloomily believable in William Anderson’s cluttered set, is at the bottom of a soon to be condemned building, directly under a porous river so the pipes bang and leak at the same time. Undeliverable mail is sorted into categories (porn, Santa, God, religious) or, if it’s a “blind reading” and so indecipherable, sent to the furnace. Christian presides over this depressing chamber (which inevitably recalls the dead-end office that Herman Melville’s drudge occupied in the famous story “Bartleby the Scrivener”).
The denizens of this facility have as many secrets as the letters that have reached the wrong destination. Christian (John Fenner Mays) is an ex-boxer with a troubled conscience and a failed marriage. Chirpy and irritating, Agatha (Susan Price) is also estranged from her daughter but hopes a Christmas party (which no one will attend) will end her lifetime streak of bad luck. Their horny boss Rolo (Joshua Volkers) is a pig who’s cheating on his pregnant wife, most recently with comely Je T’Aime (Kristen Magee), the 22-year-old newbie who improbably becomes Christian’s assistant in this subterranean cloister. She has the most secrets to hide and you end up wishing that’s how they could have stayed.
In fact by play’s end there are way too many unsought disclosures—and, worse, they come out of nowhere. Surprises, alas, can’t shock when we’re not prepared for them. Too often “Dead Letter Office” plays, despite Krissy Vanderwarker’s expert staging, as if it’s making itself up as it goes along. Dawkins even adds an avenging ghost in the final catastrophe who seems to be stalking Christian and, in the process, destroying this dump for reasons we can only guess at (assuming you care enough after two hours of false leads and inconclusive revelations).
Mays does a fine job betraying repression. Price conveys passive aggressive cheerfulness as if she were supplying a casebook history. Volkers, as the comparatively normal boss (except for making a fetish of the sex abuse of staffers), radiates smooth superiority (until it all goes south), while Magee tries hard (but not enough) to suggest the needy yearnings behind all her blatant come-ons. But, despite their hard work and occasional bursts of black humor, the only response to a “thriller” that goes postal is: Return to Sender.
Dog & Pony Theatre Company presents the world premiere of "Dead Letter Office" at Chicago DCA’s Storefront Theater at 66 E. Randolph Street, through July 18, 2010. Performances are Thursday, Friday, and Saturday at 7:30 pm. and Sunday at 3 pm. There will not be a show on Sunday, July 4, due to the holiday. Tickets for Dead Letter Office are $22 for general admission and $17 for students and seniors. Tickets are available by calling 312.742.8497, visiting www.dcatheater.org, or at the box office. More information on Dog & Pony Theatre Company is available at www.dogandponychicago.org.
About Lawrence Bommer
A
native Chicagoan, Lawrence Bommer has been an active free-lance
writer and playwright since 1975. For twenty years he wrote a
weekly column, "Opening Nights" for the Friday section of
the Chicago Tribune, where he also regularly contributed theater
criticism and feature writing. His work has appeared in
Stagebill, the Pulitzer-Lerner newspapers and The Advocate.
Mr. Bommer was theater editor for the Windy City Times since its founding until 1999; from 1986 a theater critic for the Chicago Reader (where he has also written for the "Calendar" and "Our Town" sections); Chicago Free Press, where he was contributing editor until the paper’s demise in spring 2010; Chicago Footlights, where he has been a regular contributor; and Plays International, where he is the Chicago correspondent. He has also contributed to the Hollywood Reporter, PerformInk, Screen Magazine, CitySearch, the Chicago Illini, Inside Chicago, Illinois Entertainer, the International Theatre Festival of Chicago newsletter, Plays International, CitySearch, Playbill Online, TheatreMania, CurtainUp.com and Chicago Enterprise. Mr. Bommer is a three-time finalist for a Peter Lisagor Award for Exemplary Journalism in the "arts criticism" category. In 1991 he became a regular theater and, dance critic and arts writer for the Chicago Tribune. His commentary has also aired on LesBiGay Radio, WGN and on Milwaukee Public Radio.
As a playwright, Mr. Bommer's work has been produced in Los Angeles, New Orleans, and Madison and, in Chicago, by the Organic Theater Company (Jonathan Wild [1979], Poe [1980]. Gulliver's Last Travels [1993] and by Lionheart Gay Theatre (Gunsel, The Tyrannicides, Killers and Comrades). Since 1976 Mr. Bommer has taught at the Francis W. Parker School and was a lecturer at the University of Illinois at Chicago from 1969 to 1975 (where he received his Master's degree in English), as well as a guest lecturer at the College of DuPage, Roosevelt University, DePaul University and the University of Chicago. Mr. Bommer is a member of the American Theater Critics Association and has been a member of the National Writers Union and the Dramatists Guild.