← August, 1994

Review: An Evening of Hostility

Limelight Playhouse, North Hollywood

by Teresa Willis

There is an Evening of Hostility at the Limelight Playhouse in North Hollywood, but I’m not quite certain whether the intent of the production is to explain the hostility inherent in the characters’ drama or to explore the hostility it generates in the audience. The disoriented Evening consists of two one-acts.

“Eight Minutes of Unproductivity” is a piece about men and their confused relationships with women. The point of the play is elusive. The actors work hard, but the material doesn’t give them much to work with.

The second piece is called “Q.” Its philosophical point of departure is not immediately apparent. The production introduces a character known as “Q,” and the piece tumbles forward from there into increasingly abstract territory.

A female character arrives late in the second act and provides a focus that the earlier scenes lack. Her writer shows promise; perhaps it is her closeness to the material that made her performance the least vital in the show. Many of the actors around her, though, were quite capable. Warryn D. Tucker offered a comely performance, and Anthony LaPaglia handled some of the more confusing bits admirably.

You have been warned. ♦