Playwright: Adam Rapp
At: Profiles Theatre, 4147 N. Broadway Street, Chicago
Phone: (773) 549-1815; $18-$22
Runs through: May 2
It's a good thing playwright Adam Rapp doesn't work in a casino. The unfair way Rapp stacks the deck against the two desperate characters in his 2001 play Blackbird would prompt endless investigations by the Illinois Gaming Board.
Just look at the rotten hand Rapp deals out in Blackbird to Baylis and his girlfriend, Froggy: He's a down-and-out Gulf War veteran/ex-junkie living in pain and rancid squalor thanks to his severe back problems that have left him both impotent and incontinent. She's a runaway/former stripper hooked on heroin and turning yellow because she's been lately diagnosed with hepatitis. To add to their misery and broken dreams, Rapp sets the play in a freezing New York apartment on Christmas Eve.
These basic facts alone make Blackbird sound like a pummeling exercise in wrist-slitting drama. The question for audiences is if they really want to spend nearly two hours with these two unlucky souls at the bottom of the heap?
Thankfully, all is not so bleak with Profiles Theatre's skilled Midwest debut of Blackbird. Even with the debilitating odds faced by the self-destructing characters and their distressing revelations that are dumped throughout the play, Profiles Theatre nearly comes out with a winning hand on Blackbird.
Despite all the hurdles he gives them, one can clearly see that Rapp cares for his complex characters. Sharp and engaging dialogue help to put Baylis and Froggy's messy co-dependent relationship into emotional perspective as it painfully veers from caressing lovers to fatherly caretaking. The relational dynamics between Baylis and Froggy are compelling, if wincing, most of the time.
Blackbird also flies on the one-two-punch of Profiles Associate Artistic Director Darrell W. Cox as Baylis and the guidance of Artistic Director Joe Jahraus as director. Both use Blackbird to find theatrical treasure by wallowing in Blackbird's depressing depths.
With his nicotine-stained baritone voice and bloodshot eyes, Cox masterfully inhabits the many extremes of Baylis. Whether it's screaming at his stabbing back pains or quietly slouching while changing up his adult diaper, Cox is a constantly thrilling and unsettling physical presence in Blackbird. On the psychological level, Cox is heartbreaking as he comes to terms with the consequences of his violent actions and learning of the horrible things Froggy faced before they found each other.
The only questionable note in Cox's performance is the odd way Baylis lashes out at the noisy blackbird clacking outside his window. Baylis' anger toward the play's title bird may display his dangerous hot-headed impulses, but it also comes off as symbol-heavy way for to justify the play's odd moniker (Rapp is also partly to blame for this).
Measured against Cox's performance, recent Northwestern University graduate Lindsay Gould pales by comparison as the heroin fiend Froggy. Unlike Cox who instantly conjures a believable character by his physicality, it takes time and a lot of plot revelations for Gould to make her hard-working performance credible. Still, Gould does have an age-appropriate way of making Froggy's endearing and annoying habit of making adjectives by attaching '-alicous' to every noun as part of her impetuous and tragic character.
Director Jahraus keeps things moving along briskly, wisely clipping any morbid tragedy milking from going on too long. Jahraus' staging emphasizes why these odd lovers won't be able to survive together or apart from each other for too much longer.
Although Profiles Theatre warns about Blackbird's 'strong language, drug use, sexual situations and nudity,' don't expect the latter to be particularly titillating unless you're a fan of scat. And let's just be thankful that Jahraus' stained set design of rotting trash and diapers doesn't extend to the olfactory sense.
Blackbird is clearly not an up show, but Rapp's misery framework is finely served by Profiles Theatre's strong company. Blackbird is a gamble that mostly pays off, even if all the winnings weigh you down instead of lifting your spirits up.
