Attend any of the SMU theater department’s productions and it’s easy to see how remarkably talented the students are as they work to hone their skills. A number of students are taking this a step further, proving their professional caliber as actors and designers in Kitchen Dog Theater’s current production of “Our Lady of 121st Street.”
Kitchen Dog Theatre, located in downtown Dallas, is renowned by audiences and critics alike for producing high-quality, thought-provoking plays that often candidly examine controversial subjects. “Our Lady,” which runs through Dec. 16, is no exception.
The play’s Harlem setting is established by a unique rotating structure created by students in SMU’s MFA design class. Each of the sides of the structure depicts a different location in the “urban jungle” – a seedy bar, a church confessional and what a neon sign blatantly advertises as a “funeral parlor.”
The premise revolves around the funeral of Sister Rose, a beloved, if troubled, nun. We quickly learn from the barelegged, apparently homeless Victor (portrayed by undergraduate Ryan Johnson) that Rose’s body has been stolen from her casket. The body snatchers have also stolen his pants.
Rose’s post-mortem predicament, however, is merely a backdrop for the play’s main action: the emotionally-charged exchanges between the eccentric characters who have returned to their hometown after 15 years to mourn the nun’s death.
When the funeral is delayed to search for Rose’s body, they are forced to spend a day with one another, dredging up painful memories and unresolved conflicts that they have avoided for more than a decade.
SMU students portray seven of the play’s 15 diverse characters. Giselle LeBleu gives a dynamic performance as the overly aggressive and mad-at-the-world prostitute Norca, who hurls insults in a hilariously comical screaming match with the alcoholic detective investigating the morbid theft.
Two third-year graduate students, Gwen Templeton and Joshua Peterson, also give comical performances as Marcia, a neurotically high-strung asthmatic and the “exceedingly gay” actor Gail, respectively. These parts showcase the actors’ versatility, for they have both performed much darker roles in recent SMU productions.
Johnard Washington’s Flip and Amelia Johnson’s Sonia are more subtle, though the actors show that they are no less complex. Flip is a gay professional who has not come out to his old friends, while Sonia is comically out of place both in her naivete and her modest skirt and sweater.
The harsh dysfunction of the world is perhaps best expressed through Keenan Olson’s heart-wrenching performance as Pinky. Mentally damaged as a child, his pain is no less real when the characters become too annoyed to grant his simple request: All he wants is a hug.
The cast is rounded out by experienced professional actors, including SMU theater professor Bill Lengfelder. Yet their interactions are so fluid it is hard to tell which of the ensemble are the students and which are the professionals.
The seven student performers gained invaluable experience that can never be taught in a classroom. However, LeBlue said she hopes that her SMU classmates can learn from her opportunity.
“We are all better performers through this,” she said. “It is our obligation to bring the energy into our classes.”
Perhaps the most telling assessment of their professional abilities comes from Lengfelder, the 14-year member of Kitchen Dog Theatre, who is also their professor.
He said, “Overall, the students were for me what they are in the classroom: talented colleagues.”
