Grace Bokenfohr and Daphne Charrois in The Spotlight’s Shadow, Light in the Attic Productions. Photo supplied
The Spotlight’s Shadow (Stage 14, Café Bicyclette Stage at La Cité francophone)
By Liz Nicholls, .ca
This ambitious new musical from Light in the Attic Productions getting its start at the Fringe is set backstage in a dressing room at the Ziegfeld Follies in the 1920s. And in a series of scenes, with exits onto the unseen stage, it chronicles a fraught love story: two Ziegfeld girls in love and up against it in a homophobic world.
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Vigilante secrecy is one option, a careful life in the shadows. The other is boldly stepping onto the well-lit public stage. The story, by the playwright team of Daphne Charrois and Dan Charrois, unfolds in a series of short scenes, many with songs. The theatrical conceit in Vanessa King’s production is that every exit from the scene is an entrance into a more public world — the rehearsal hall or the show stage. And every entrance into a scene in an atmospheric backstage “closet” is accompanied by a change in a glorious profusion of silky costumes (with great vintage underwear and shoes).
The story is meaningful in the history of gay rights (charted elsewhere at the Fringe in The Pansy Cabaret). But if the narrative arc feels leisurely instead of urgent, it’s perhaps because the scenes unroll with such steady regularity, along with repeated and predictable reversals in the dynamic between Nettie (Grace Bokenfohr) and Vera (Daphne Charrois). First one, then the other, wants to play it safe, with objections from the other. But there is an escalation to a crucial moment of decision: honour love at any price, or figure out a conventional work-around. Both have heartbreak potential, as the musical recognizes, in a series of exchanges that carefully explain that very subject.
Maybe the script doesn’t quite trust the wordless power of these two appealing actors. But in this first outing of the musical the dialogue often sounds “written” rather than spoken by the characters. “Every word you write makes me realize what we could have if things were different.” Or “I cannot bear to see you in another’s arms.”
The period is evoked by musical references to the vintage 20s songbook (“let me call you sweetheart” and others). The original songs created by the playwrights (and well-sung by the cast) aim at this atmosphere, but there’s a certain sameness to them, and they tend to illustrate what we’ve just seen within the scenes. Honourable exception to the catchy finale anthem.
The premise and the story are worthwhile and have big drama potential. Future versions will, I’m sure, give this brand new musical the lustre it deserves.
