Displaying items by tag: sam hubbard

What brings people together? Similar interest, physical attraction, and availability? Or could it be just a side effect of the medication the doctor prescribed? Strawdog Theatre Company kicks their 32nd season off with the Chicago Premier of Lucy Prebble’s The Effect.

Tristan, a cheerful young man hungry to see the world, and Connie, a bright young woman unsure of her purpose in life, volunteer as subjects for a new antidepressant. The study is being monitored by Dr. Lorna James who battles with her own depression. From the moment they take their first dosage of this new medication, Connie and Tristan find themselves falling in love. An attraction that appears as a blessing to Tristan but troubling to Connie who is already in a relationship with an older man. As the experiment proceeds, and the dosage Tristan and Connie ingest increase, so does their attraction with one another. Connie offers that the antidepressant could very well be the reason they are willing to change their lives for one another. Believing what is pulling them together is simply a side effect. That’s until one of them finds out that the other is on a placebo.

Acclaimed writer Lucy Prebble, Co-Executive Producer and Co-writer of HBO new hit show Succession has created an impressive catalog. The Effect originally premiered at the National Theater and won the Critic’s Circle Award for Best New Play and has been dazzling audiences since then. The dialogue feels authentic to the point that it hurts. Free of any restraint, allowing the characters to reveal the best and worst part of themselves. 

Chicago based director Elly Green gives displays The Effect on a cube shape stage. Using the monitor in the center as into the character’s dosage amount, their EKG, and bio. It’s presented in a way that to make the audience feel like doctors sitting before the stage in lab coats, analyzing the experiment at hand. The production very well deserved an applause along with the actors for catapulting the audience into the play like a 2001: A Space Odyssey trip in a vortex of lights.

Each actor holds their own in this fine play, but the one I want to place the spotlight on is Justine C. Turner who plays Dr. Lorna James. She handles the transition from a calm, collected doctor doing her job to a broken woman in an astounding way. As if you’re watching Lady Macbeth struggle to rub that damn spot from her clothes for an entire half of a play. 

The Effect is modern love tale that deeply absorbs the reality of prescribed medications and its weight in our society. These new medicines, its shady providers or overuse by the consumer, brings new questions for this generation and others following to answer. We must find a balance between ourselves and this new medicine. Establish a way we use them to aid us through our everyday lives and not hinder or disrupt. The Effect takes on this subject with intellect, humor, and plenty of heart. 

Through November 23, 2019 at Strawdog Theatre.

Buckle up for Damascus, the intensely suspenseful thriller having its world premiere at Strawdog Theatre.

Bennett Fisher’s tightly crafted script follows the journey of Hassan, a financially struggling Somali-American taxi driver at the Minneapolis airport, as he ferries Lloyd, a young man who says he is desperate to catch a flight out of Chicago’s O’Hare. Damascus, a clue to what will unfold, is also a township not far from O’Hare.

Cramming the six-hour drive into 90 action-packed minutes, we watch as the relationship between the two develops. Terence Sims as Hassan delivers a captivating performance, as he resists efforts by his passenger Lloyd (Sam Hubbard) to engage him in a conversation that moves too quickly and uncomfortably to the personal.

In the opening scene we learn Hassan is struggling to make a go of it, sleeping in his cab in order to pay the lease on his taxi. When Lloyd wakes him out of a solid sleep to ask for a ride to Chicago, Hassan is reluctant to do so – it’s a violation of the rules to drive inter-state; he could lose his license and even his vehicle. After Lloyd offers $300 for the fair and claims his mother is ill – that after a cancelled flight, he needs to get to Chicago to make the next plane home - Hassan agrees, then bids the fare up to $600. 

As the journey progresses, we begin to gather there is more to this story. . . and it turns out there is much much more. Avoiding a spoiler, suffice it to say that Hassan becomes a captive to Lloyd, though at points the role is reversed. You must see the play to watch how the story unfolds.

The shifting dynamic of any long distant drive is artfully on display, as the two get on each others nerves and dance into and out of intimacy. Lloyd, who seems just a tad off the beat, veers toward menace and puts us, along with Hassan, on alert.  

Nearly as compelling is the way the set – stripped down see-through minivan – keeps us focused on the facial expressions of Lloyd and Hassan. Since they are sitting and talking for most of the show, these faces carry the dramatic load. Sims is exceptionally good at keeping our attention with his highly emotive expressions. Hubbard carries off bringing us a far less sympathetic character

Cody Estle, newly appointed artistic director at Raven Theatre, makes a strong directorial debut with the company. And the set by Jeffrey Kmiec – a van on a turntable that affords us many vantage points on the dialog – is very inventive.

Bennett Fisher’s excellent script has been optioned for a film. It’s the kind of work you will want to see first on stage, and you’ve got until June 23 to make it to the Strawdog Theatre for Damascus.