Tracy Letts’ August: Osage County is a very big play for the tiny black box where it is performed. But the set—designed by Patrick Huber—seems anything but small. Huber has managed to angle three floors and numerous rooms into this pocket space, and the play’s tension is heightened by its physical layout and our ability to see what’s going on in other rooms. And there’s a lot of tension.
Directed by Wayne Solomon for Saint Louis Actors’ Studio, August won the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and is the story of the Weston family that gathers after the death of Beverly, the alcoholic patriarch. It’s an anguished tragicomedy of the most intense kind. “My wife takes pills, and I drink,” slurs Beverly as there’s a loud thunk in one of those upstairs rooms and a hand appears clutching a prescription bottle. It’s Violet’s, and, in addition to popping pills like Jujubes, the woman has mouth cancer, a smoking habit and, indeed, a vicious way with words.
But that’s the least of it: Nearly every facet of family dysfunction is tackled here (marital, sibling, parent-child) and, with this cast (led by Kari Ely as Violet), it’s a riveting, rollicking ride. Ely is mesmerizing in her role, alternating fluidly between various states of delirium—wielding spiteful blows to those she is supposed to love or struggling up from near unconsciousness.
All three of Violet’s daughters galvanize in their own ways, but Rachel Fenton is particularly captivating as long-lost Karen, who has returned for her father’s funeral with slime-ball fiancé, Steve. “I’m finally happy,” she says, fiddling with her beads, steadying herself on the carpet. “I’m really happy.” It’s a masterful, multidimensional portrait of drunkenness and all the complexities that lead to it.
There is some sanity in all this madness. William Roth as Charlie provides a measure of stability, and so does Wendy Renee Farmer, who plays Johnna—the Cheyenne woman hired to look after Violet. She is kind and quietly nurturing, preparing meals that end up on the floor and stepping in with a frying pan when Steve misbehaves. The play ends with her—upstairs singing a lullaby to Violet after everyone has left—a tiny bit of balm on a raw wound.
At The Gaslight Theater through April 30.
