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Regional Reviews: St. Louis Robbin, from The Hood Also see Richard's reviews of Babette's Feast and Flyin' West
Joyous Celestine is a beautifully articulated, idealistic teen as Robbin. Blazing video projections bolster her David and Goliath story set in the day of the modern robber barons. Brandon Avila is full of adolescent electricity as Robbin's friend Juan, an unbelieving street preacher, as this pair of exuberant high schoolers first enters the job market. They are consistently funny and extremely direct with each other. The extraordinary video projections are complex and subtle, thanks to the director. And though the more jarring images seem to crush the actors, like corporate life itself, each performer manages to weigh in with perfect humanity. Unassailable everyman Jeremy Thomas plays an upper level executive, Kyle, with a quiet reserve and a full helping of his usual great stage sense. He's the boss of Robbin's boss, going down the chain. And Robbin proves remarkably gifted at accounting. But, like an octopus, the tentacles of Kennedy Global threaten to pull them all down, one way or another. Robbin learns that bad news always comes from around the corner, as a bluesy melancholy takes the stage. Normal human relationships turn to something Shakespearean, as drama rises up in defiance of the status quo. Gradually, Robbin steels herself in a matter of honor. But her rebellion is set in a modern way, and you have to tip your hat to it, in Mr. Wyatt's script. Like all the mountains of money going into AI, all the seeming wealth of the Kennedy Global is shuffled around invisibly, with devastating results. Raising our suspicions, the show's quietly satirical videos put her employer, "KG," across as being "about everything, and nothing." Between Kyle and Robbin on the corporate ladder, Margaret maneuvers through it all with cool decisiveness, as embodied by Chrissie Watkins. She takes Robbin inside the behemoth firm, but there's always some third order of complexity keeping her mysteriously preoccupied. Everything else about the show creates a perfect sense of capitalism's own "us against them" struggle, even when the "us's" and "thems" happen to change. Margaret and Kyle are forced into a final confrontation, elegantly put across by the actors, building tension over their professional and domestic lives. Soul Siren Playhouse co-founder Bradford Rolen supplies very fine costumes throughout. There's a kind of parallelism at work, as Robbin and her Uncle Charlie (the excellent Trials Davis) seem to move in opposite directions within the play. One character goes forward in time and the other seemingly backward, along the same particular storyline. Maybe they prove the present collapse of the universe: past and future rushing across one another in a way that seems incomprehensible to them both. He arrives as an object of scorn, and she's filled with good intentions, in a world where "goodness has nothing to do with it." As Robbin's grandfather Percy, Don McClendon becomes more masterful with age, caught in a strange moment of "sundowning." He is both majestic and very small, also going two ways at once: one foot stepping into dementia and the other planted as a guardian in a world that no longer exists. For a St. Louisan, or for me anyway, theatre has come so far in fifty years that it no longer seems outlandish that a relatively new little company can have such mastery over complex human relationships, let alone put forth such a scintillating presentation. Only two people seem to manage the entire production, design, and backstage work. But, for plot and style and action, and pure fluidity on stage, the whole thing is gritty and hilarious, and romantic and harrowing. Robbin, from The Hood, produced by Soul Siren Playhouse, continues through March 29, 2026, at the .Zack Theater, 3224 Locust Street. For tickets and information please visit www.playsiren.com. Cast: Voice and Video Cameos by: Isaiah Di Lorenzo, Abby Vatterott, Michael Jordan, Shea Brown, Lisa Ramey, Lavonda Brown, Eileen Engle Production Staff: |
