Big Scary Animals @ Theatre Three
—Jill Sweeney
Playwright Matt Lyle sets up a sort of theatrical experiment with precision in Big Scary Animals: put six people together onstage who differ in every possible way—with regard to gender, race, sexuality, religion, politics, class, age, and so on. Agitate; then observe. The play that results is a sort of reversed (and even more layered and complex) Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner?, charting the course of a dinner party between new neighbors gone very, very wrong. Originally produced by Theatre Three in 2017, Big Scary Animals is as topical as ever, if not more so. The funny thing is it may feel too optimistic about the odds of success for “reaching across the aisle” these days. That being said, T3 has put together a talented cast (with a couple of veterans from the show’s first run) who keep the jokes flying and the tension high.
All that East Texans Rhonda (Charlotte Akin) and Don (Bob Reed) wanted to do was be closer to their granddaughter. How were they to know their new condo in Oak Lawn was smack dab in the heart of Dallas’ “gayborhood” (though Rhonda just LOVES all the rainbows)? Akin, reprising her role from the original run, perfectly embodies a small-town Texas gal of a certain age, with all the good and bad that goes with that. And a lot of both will come out as she and good ol’ boy Don accept an invite to dinner from their new neighbors, Marcus (Bradley Atuba) and Clark (Chad Cline, also from the show’s original run). Not only are the couple out and proud, Marcus is also Black, adding more potential land mines to the evening as the two couples do their best to keep the talk as small as possible.
Tempers fray as the night goes on and the gaffes pile up. But things really heat up when Marcus and Clark’s daughter Sophia (Monica Jones), aggressively smart and (honestly) just plain aggressive, crashes the evening and decides to investigate Rhonda and Don’s “troubled” 18-year-old son Ronnie (Brady White), stuck at home next door. Things are said—things that can’t be taken back. Is there any chance these couples will reach common ground—or just scorched earth?
The show’s main quartet is a mix of old and new. Under director Rebecca McDonald’s steady hand, Akin clearly has Rhonda down pat, and Cline’s Clark, who could come off as a colorful collection of stereotypes in lesser hands, lets the layers peel back slowly to show the depth of feeling underneath. Atuba and Reed have the tougher roles in some ways—both are the “straight man” (as it were) in their couple, with Reed keeping quiet for much of the action, (except when opening his mouth to insert foot, over and over again).
Atuba’s Marcus wants to be gracious, but the actor shows his shifting emotions, as Marcus unleashes his resentment and then reins it back again. And the play maintains tension between Marcus and the straight couple, but also gives space to tension with Clark: a debate over “who’s more oppressed,” the gay white man who can’t pass as straight or the gay black man who can—is nicely spiky and unresolved. A scene from Reed near the play’s end, detailing an act of violence Don witnessed in childhood—the source of the play’s title—is devastating, not only owing to Reed’s tremendous performance (Don, though not exactly “still waters,” surprises us with his depth here), but to the powerful reactions from the other listening actors, Cline in particular.
The B plot, as it were, of teens Sophia and Ronnie meeting and bonding, was less effective for me, as neither character is given a whole lot of “there” there in the script. Sophia in particular seemed like a somewhat mean-spirited caricature of the Zoomer generation, spouting performative “wokeness” and aggressive pronoun checks. The play mocks the follies and foibles of the older generations too, but a lot more gently. And Ronnie gets little more characterization than the generic label of being “troubled.” More is hinted at, but so vaguely it’s hard to feel any particular interest in the character.
The show’s set (designed by T3 artistic director Jeffrey Schmidt) is a visual of the play itself—two very different worlds, side by side. The stage is literally split, with Marcus and Clark’s half full of modern art, clean lines, lots of white (ecru, I should say), and Rhonda and Don’s full of clunky wooden furniture, Western flair, and a whole lot of chickens. (Rhonda’s a fan.) The clever lighting design from Jacob Hughes keeps the action clear and separate, moving seamlessly between the two homes.
As with the best scripts, there are no villains and no heroes, just people. Early in the play I was concerned that we’d be trying to resolve too much, wrap things up too neatly and cleanly. But Lyle is more savvy than that. He gives us context that helps us understand why characters are the way they are, but doesn’t ask us to forgive their bad behavior just because of their background. While Big Scary Animals may not center on the most ground-breaking idea—we can resolve most of our differences if we just talk them out—it’s worth being reminded that very few people fit perfectly into the boxes we try and put them in. The world’s full of big scary animals—but some of them are us.
WHEN: Through September 25th
WHERE: 2688 Laclede St #120,Dallas, TX 75201
