BrightestYoungThings: PlayDC: suicide.chat.room @ Flashpoint's Mead Theatre

I wanted to love suicide.chat.room (as much as you can love any work about suicide, I guess). It's an exciting concept: the piece (you can't call it a "play," really) blends text from actual suicide chat rooms with movement, set to a score by local band Beauty Pill. And the space in which it's presented is intimate and spare. And the actors are earnest and energetic. And Taffety Punk is a spunky little theatre company that takes interesting risks (i.e. last year's all-female Romeo and Juliet).

But I didn't love it.

Suicide is, by definition, a solitary endeavor, but an online community of mutual support and encouragement has evolved with the internet. Those at the end of their proverbial ropes can now find chat rooms to learn the most effective way to tie literal ones (slipknots will do, apparently). What does this mean? Do suicide chat rooms lead necessarily to death, or do they provide an outlet that is effective in deterring actual suicides? I had hoped suicide.chat.room would shed some light on this modern phenomenon, but the piece's structure wasn't organized in a way that gave any answers. But who has the answers to suicide, really? Those who are successful can no longer share their experiences.

So. It's hard to fault suicide.chat.room's helter-skelter approach to its subject because suicide involves so many raw emotions (violent and sanguine). Here, six actors gradually take the stage, zipping about, at times speaking at once, while Beauty Pill's music and distorted recordings of spoken text accompany their "dance." But there is no time to absorb what is being said or obliquely conveyed through movement. There are too few moments of stillness to appreciate the music, and the actors seldom have time to portray more of a character than an out-of-breath dancer, shouting at the audience.

So. I'm left to think that something is missing. There are interesting tricks of sound (distorted microphones, recorded voices echoing words spoken on stage), and certain repeated movements become more affective as the show progresses (a particular cradling/rocking process comes to mind), but I didn't feel much for the people. It's difficult to discern specific characters, so I never formed attachments. (Or, more likely, just as I decided who was who, there was a shift and EVERYTHING CHANGED.) And because I never formed attachments, I almost didn't care about the fate of the people in this staged suicide chat room. As interesting and conceptual as the movement and text are, they do little to frame a cohesive narrative. I'm not asking that every piece of theater follows strict rules of story-telling, mind you, but I wonder if some of the power of suicide as a heart-breaking and confusing act wasn't lost in translation. Or perhaps the audience is to feel a part of a frantic chat room, where various IP addresses, rather than friends and family, register crippling sorrow.

It is clear that the director (Marcus Kyd), the choreographer (Paulina Geurrero), Beauty Pill, and the Taffety Punk company intended suicide.chat.room to be sincere and respectful. What is unclear is the point. After watching the actors tear around stage and listening to a continuous cacophony of sound, I left feeling berated and exhausted, without knowing why...Like someone who's suicidal? Maybe that's the point.

suicide.chat.room plays through February 13 at Flashpoint's Mead Theatre. Directed by Marcus Kyd. All tickets $10 [So honestly, regardless of what I thought, check it out. Only $10 to see something new and interesting and to support a company that has the moxie to try.]

suicide.chat.room

Brightest Young Things

Live DC

PlayDC: suicide.chat.room @ Flashpoint's Mead Theatre

FRIDAY 2/24

Attack Attack! w/ The Ghost Inside • Sleeping with Sirens • Chunk! No, Captain Chunk! @ 9:30 Club

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Tara McCredie!