Shoulder to the Wheel
There's a certain bravado on display in director/compiler Lyndsay Michalik's Shoulder to the Wheel; even her program notes have a daring assertiveness, deferring description of what the play is about until she explains what it is [emphasis hers]. And here, in an assortment of scenes and pieces purported to weave a tapestry of American life and culture, this confidence proves to be quite at home.
Michalik's eight ensemble performers take the construction-zone stage for vignettes ranging from heartfelt monologues to abstract juxtaposition to joyous group dances. With original material from fourteen writers, we spend little time with any single perspective, which gave me the disappointing impression of a shallow overview. Presented with a fractured assortment of one-off and briefly recurring characters, I was forced to take the long view, and in so doing realized that these uniquely American points of view were primarily united in being loud, self-assured, and helplessly indulgent. Brought into sharp focus by an expatriate character — who herself cannot help betraying shades of the Ugly American she supposedly abhors — the play wants to convince us that there are a lot of right ways to be American, but unintentionally reinforces how much Americans like to be right.
January 30, 2010