Award-winning playwright Caridad Svich is known for her quirky and sometimes experimental plays that frequently encourage productions to explore their own ways to interpret and stage her scripts.
Red Bike was written for one actor [or several, as the individual production determines]; the current Theatre AUM's production directed by Val Winkelman engages a tight ensemble of three actors to delve into Svich's investigation of children and their responses to the adult world.
As actors Tara Laurel, Yahzane Palmer, and Michael James Pritchard portray the child/children at its center, we are invited into their world of play and imagination as they come to terms with the authority of adults who seem to ignore them while they pursue earning a living, providing for their families, engaging in business and politics while remaining oblivious to the effects their behavior has on the younger generation.
And, the adults are shown to be inconsistent [at least from a child's point of view], or too focused on material things to the detriment of connecting better with the children.
Childhood can be scary, growing up can be frightening, and parenthood wields a lot of power. -- So the child/children here escape on a red bicycle from the confines of home and adults to a magical world where they can assess their place in a society that disregards them. It is through a child's imagination that solutions might be found. -- Reminiscent of the song "Children Will Listen" from Into the Woods, we are offered a teaching moment advising adults to pay more attention to their children, and to listen to them as well. -- It is abundantly clear that "No one wants to be nothing".
Played on Michael Krek's framework scenic design, with plenty of open space for the actors to depict various locations, and "ride" their bikes [I wish there was more of that bike-riding to sustain the energetic commitment of the company], the actors are a top-notch ensemble who feed off one another and manage to insert narrative moments throughout the one-hour running time.
Theatre AUM's season of new or new-ish works gives their students and audiences rare opportunities to listen to new theatrical voices; well done.
