Theatre in Review: Old-Fashioned Prostitutes (A True Romance) (The Public Theater)

	Alenka Kraigher, Nicolas Noreña, and Rocco Sisto. Photo: Joan Marcus

The set is cluttered with all sorts of paraphernalia -- pillows, bouquets of flowers, gilded picture frames, newspaper pages pasted to the wall. Also affixed to the wall are hundreds of letters, carefully arranged not to spell any words. String is everywhere, stretching across the stage and out into the house. As the play begins, a voice intones, "Places, please, for the top of the show." The cast appears and, about 30 seconds later, the voice says, "End of play." Blackout.

Hey, everybody, Richard Foreman is back in town. In truth, he never left, but he did announce his retirement from the stage after 2009's Idiot Savant. Apparently Foreman, one of the last men standing of the old-guard avant-garde of the '70s and '80s, has continued to collect bits of mental ephemera to string together in yet another of his singular dream plays. In Old-Fashioned Prostitutes, Rocco Sisto is as Samuel, the more-or-less protagonist, appearing in a bizarre-looking white suit, the jacket of which is covered with hello-my-name-is labels. Affixed to his chest is an open book. A monocle and black beret complete the ensemble. (Say what you want about Gabriel Berry's costumes, they are certainly imaginative.) Samuel has had a dream in which he heard the words "Go to Berkeley, my friend. Make film." Is he being guided to film school at Berkeley? Or is this a comment about Bishop George Berkeley, contemplating the thin film of reality? Both possibilities are considered at length.

Meanwhile, Samuel is fixated on Suzie (Alenka Kraigher) -- either a prostitute or a coquette or both -- who appears with her companion Gabriella (Stephanie Hayes), both of them fitted with long dresses and headgear that allude to the 1920s. Meanwhile, a character named Bibendum (Nicolas Norena), who is dressed as the Michelin man with the addition of round black glasses and a cigar, crosses the stage carrying various objects, while Alfredo (David Skeist), who is dressed in black with aviator glasses, leads the ladies, who are carrying cardboard boxes that they then drop into a trough in front of the stage. Fragments of the brief text are repeated over and over. Poses are struck; lights flash in our eyes, buzzes are heard, along with gunshots, telephones, and a voice shouting "Hold it!" Forming a kind of soundtrack independent of the action is a succession opera tenors, swing bands, and string quartets.

As I've said before, Foreman's theatre disarms any attempt at criticism because it is so clearly not interested in delivering the usual pleasures of narrative and character. It has even been suggested to me that paying close attention is a fruitless endeavor, that the clashing notes of text, sound effects, and visual distractions are meant to lull you into a semi-hallucinatory state. I cannot vouch for this point of view; I merely offer it as a possibility, along with the notion that Foreman's work is really a kind of three-dimensional visual art meant to be contemplated rather than parsed. Certainly it is like being lost in someone else's dreams, overwhelmed by the flow of freely associated, if utterly opaque, images and motifs. And for some people, Foreman is a master: The woman sitting next to me, who informed me that this was her third visit to Old-Fashioned Prostitutes, stared intently at the stage for its full running time of 65 minutes, nodding, and smiling. Somehow, I feel she should be writing this review.

Anyway, there is no question that, as mind-numbing as Old-Fashioned Prostitutes is, it has been executed by an artist who knows what he is doing, and he has a cast of actors -- a term I use loosely under these circumstances -- who are more than willing to go along for the ride. Foreman also designed the wildly cluttered, yet visually arresting, set; I guess he is responsible for the sound, too, so nobody else is credited. Yael Lubetzky, using every kind of conventional lighting unit known to man, creates a series of looks, including those audience blinder cues that Foreman is so fond of.

Anyway, if you've wondered what Richard Foreman is all about, here is your chance. If you're a Foreman fan, don't delay. If you'd like to see a play, there's a nifty little one upstairs at the Public called Here Lies Love.--David Barbour