A dark ride or ghost train is the British term for an indoor amusement ride where the participants are guided through specially lit scenes that typically contain animation, sound, music, and special effects. The effect is surreal. This concept is the basis for Len Jenkin’s ‘DARK RIDE,’ in which peculiar actions increasingly create “convoluted disquisitions on the nature of coincidence.”
As one past reviewer of a production of the script stated, “’DARK RIDE’ offers quirky entertainment for an audience that is not terribly concerned about making sense of what is going on.” To which I say, “Right on!”
The cast of characters includes a book reading young woman whose boyfriend has disappeared, the boyfriend (a thief), a couple who from time to time appear to run a carnival, a would-be translator of what is possibly a fake third-century-B.C. Chinese document, a blustering soldier of fortune, a waitress, and a woman who is an expert on coincidence, and assures us that “Jonah was in the belly of the whale for three days and Jesus was entombed for three days. What a coincidence!”
Jenkin weaves the mélange together into a whole that he assumes the viewer will, somehow, be able to merge. But like a fun house ride, he also allows for the fact that the whole doesn’t have to blend together. By the end, as the young man sitting next to me stated, “I’m not interested in philosophy, just tell me how it ended and why.”
Geoffrey Hoffman has the task of directing the play. Despite that on opening night there were numerous line flubs, all in all, he does a nice job. There were many laughs from the sold out opening night audience, some because of the plot’s ridiculousness, some from actually funny lines.
Lucy Bredeson-Smith, she of tall angular body and “creative make-up,” fills the role of the laughing lady of coincidence at the amusement park, with her usual bizarre sense of humor and high quality acting. The rest of the cast fulfills their roles in blending together the ride, with various levels of success.
Capsule Judgement: ‘DARK RIDE’ isn’t for everyone. It takes a special person, with a strange sense of the ironic and flexible logic, to enjoy the machinations of Len Jenkin’s mind. If you are one of those, you’ll appreciate con-con’s latest offering. And then you can return to see ‘HUNTER GATHERS,’ Peter Sin Nachtrieb’s “outrageously libidinous farce meets penetrating social satire” from July 16th though August 14th.
From Cool Cleveland contributor Roy Berko. Berko’s blog, which contains theatre and dance reviews from 2001 through 2009, as well as his consulting and publications information, can be found at http://royberko.info. His reviews can also be found on NeOHIOpal and CoolCleveland.com.
Roy Berko, who is a life-long Clevelander, is a Renaissance man. Believing the line in Robert Frost’s poem “Road Not Taken,” each time he comes to a fork in the road, he has taken the path less traveled. He holds degrees, thought the doctorate from Kent State, Univeristy of Michigan and The Pennsylvania State University. His present roles, besides husband and grandfather, are professor, crisis counselor, author and entertainment reviewer… Read Roy Berko’s complete bio here