Review: An Evening in the Men's Room
Jane Clement as Joan Clapper in An Evening in the Men’s Room at the American Renegade.
American Renegade Theater Company, 11305 Magnolia Boulevard, NoHo Arts District, (818) 763-4430
by Jim Berg
“An Evening in the Men’s Room” examines what its title says it will: two acts, both set in a typical public bathroom. What isn’t typical is what happens in this place.
The first play, written by Katz, is entitled “Forty-Nine Sexual Fantasies by Dr. Max Anderson with Joan Clapper.” The title of the play refers to the title of the book that the two main characters, Dr. Max Anderson (Richard Cooper) and Joan Clapper (Jayne Clement) are “collaborating” on. Max is a psychiatrist and expert on human sexuality, and Joan is his assistant whom he has hired to assist him in acting out each of the sexual fantasies. The play begins with a fiasco—
(Steve Adkins) is hiding in the men’s room for reasons that aren’t clear until the second play. He ducks into a stall when Max arrives to use the bathroom. What follows is the acting out of the central sexual fantasy at the heart of the first play: to have sex with a woman, dressed as a man, in a men’s room.
The premise raises some very interesting issues that explore the fringes of heterosexuality and prostitution. Unfortunately, Katz chooses the safer, less controversial route and doesn’t really explore these issues. Instead of probing taboos and the grayer aspects of sexual relationships, the audience witnesses two confused people attempting to work out professional, sexual, and therapeutic roles. In these days of AIDS and codependency, the milieu just isn’t right for this kind of play. Despite this, the play is apparently finding an audience with senior citizens, for whom sex is much less threatening.
The second play, “The Bomb Inside,” written by Joseph Coyne, is less controversial, though it doesn’t raise the consciousness of the audience any more. A jealous ex-husband is attempting to prevent Sherry (Kelli Maroney) from re-marrying. He ends up taking hostages in the men’s room to force his ex-wife to speak to him. The hostages are a dreadlocked transient named Zeke (Christopher Dukin), a reluctant groom (Paul Roache), and an eager bride (Tracy Katz).
Duff Dugan gives a rich performance as the ex-husband, and Jayne Clement delivers as the bewildered wife. His switches between a frightened, insecure, shabbily organized persona and a cocky, self-assured, abusive personality are distinct and believable, ending with a knock-down-drag-out fight with himself. ♦