Autobahn

Two weeks ago I sat in a small black box theatre and for two hours watched a play take place in a car. I guess a lot of people would call that boring; there were no big fight scenes, no sex scenes, and no dancing and singing musical numbers. However, this play was incredibly intriguing and thought provoking. Written by Neil Labute, Autobahn is a series of vignettes that give the audience a peek into different kinds of relationships and actions, all taking place within a car. These seven scenes range from a young couple going "parking", to a pedophilic teacher and his young student going on a road trip. What was fantastic about this production and the direction was how the scenarios and the relationships, at first, seem familiar and bland; the scene picks up mid-dialogic conversation, forcing the audience to play catch-up and analyze what is taking place in the scene. However, as the scene progresses, the audience realizes that not everything is as it seems. As the director points out in his notes in the program, "some form of betrayal cries out to be addressed...the destination often holds a potential for violence, violation or the disintegration of a relationship."

There is also an interesting tension that is created by the confines of the car. Each actor is spatially constricted by the car, forcing them to think creatively in respect to their physicality in their acting; furthermore, the characters are restricted by the car and their relationships in that within the climax of the scene, the characters are forced to stay and talk--there is no escaping the inside of the speeding car, which only amplifies the drama and raises the stakes. For each character, the car is simultaneously a prison and a safe-haven, barring themselves in, while also ensuring the presence of their other-half. The characters are also restricted by the confines of language. Each scene is full of misunderstanding as characters struggle to articulate their desires and their fears.

While I loved the production and the directing, my main complaint comes as a consequence from the acting choices that were made. While it could be argued that my problems came from the work of the director, I feel as if the choices that were made were from a lack of preparation and studying by the actors, not as a result of the directing. I feel that it is the job of an actor to present something new to the audience that they would not have been able to discover on their own just by reading the play. It seemed that some of the actors in this production just focused on memorizing their lines and then delivering them in a natural-sounding tone. All of the actors are trained very well technically, that is obvious. However, there seemed to be a lack of commitment in a few of them to do their homework and discover what their characters wanted, what was in their way, and to then discover new tactics to getting their objective. Each scene was, on average, fifteen minutes in length; fifteen minutes can be a long time for an audience member when they are watching an actor do the same thing the whole time. What is brilliant about Neil Labute, and why he is one of my favorite playwrights, is that his writing seems so effortless and natural; however, this can be a trap for actors because an actor could become complacent in just sounding natural and decide to not push or strive for the deeper meaning of the work. In the end, all of the scenarios collide in a car crash, symbolizing the reckless decisions made by the characters that then lead to consequences, fatalities, and injuries when they crash into the lives of the other characters. If some of the actors had done more work, this last scene would have been much more dramatic and impacting. Unfortunately, some of the actors were on cruise control, and couldn't keep up with the racing performance of their cast mates.