Kitty Hawk: First Solo Flight
Then again, storytelling has been in our blood since cavepeople’s grunts first evolved into language. We tell stories to solidify shared values, to clarify confusion, to recognize one another. Foucault may see institutionalized confession as a tactical deployment of regulatory power, allowing the Authorities to “normalize” and delimit behavior. But it can also bring us together and remind us of the limitless potential of human experience. Each of us has–and is–a story.
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For the solo performer, however, autobiography is unequivocally dicey. Our willingness to listen to perfect strangers tell their stories, whether in a theater, at a cocktail party, or on a subway platform, is directly proportional to two factors: how interesting the story(teller) is, and how safe we feel listening. In our media culture, which is saturated with human-interest curiosities, finding a fresh angle on romantic entanglements or family relations–two favored topics of the monologuist–demands keen insight. And in our puritanical culture, the risk of scaring audience members right under their seats with grossly intimate details looms large. Rather than bringing us together, such stories can drive lasting wedges between us.
The other monologuists have yet to develop much sense of craft (with the exception of Antonio Sacre, who creates deft family portraits with great efficiency). Showing little concern for style or for a performance personality, they reduce craft to little more than witty, often unneeded embellishments. They speak artlessly, directly, with mixed results. Strangely, the two performers who seem most ill at ease–David Scott and Paul Turner–create the most engaging pieces. They stumble and bumble but display a deep connection to the stories they tell. The others tend to stay on the surface, working through their texts rather than the experiences that give the texts meaning: it’s as if they’ve memorized someone else’s life. Their scripts are by and large endearing–the preternaturally self-doubting Sullivan Hester takes us on a tour of her psyche’s parlor, for example, showing us her collection of half-empty glasses and her own personal black cloud–but the performers seem more concerned with saying things exactly right than with sharing an emotional experience.
