Review: 'Pillowman'
By KAREN SHADE, 11/15/2006
Craig Walter (left) and Brian Rattlingourd appear in a scene from the Theatre Club production of 'Pillowman' at the Nightingale Theater. A. CUERVO / Tulsa World
'Pillowman' features fine ensemble, intense storyline
A sharp light from a fluorescent lamp flares out in a nanosecond without the residual indecisive flickering, and you get a bold sense that nothing seems safe in the room.
The man in the suit, Tupolski, introduces himself and his strong-arm partner to the tense man in the blindfold. Tupolski then carefully removes the blindfold from the wincing Katurian.
"Why didn't you take it off?" Tupolski asks like a father tired of his kid's nonsense. "It just looks stupid."
The audience chuckles, and you've witnessed what you need to know about "The Pillowman," Theatre Club's latest endeavor at the Nightingale Theater. Black comedy and drama doesn't come much darker than Martin McDonagh's play.
And, the thought occurs more than once that these cops are mentally and physically torturing this guy for unspeakable acts, and, "Why am I laughing?"
With a title that sounds like a cheap slasher flick or the latest must-have holiday toy, McDonagh isn't playing for the obvious.
His Pillowman is a fictional character created by the writer Katurian. Made entirely of pillows, right down to his tiny pillow teeth, he's the sympathetic fellow who helps children in peril, or those about to be. The out he offers -- a quick, painless death.
The title character never appears during the play, which opened Thursday. He's more a suggestion written somewhere on the drab spattered walls dressing the set of a play more complex, more unsettling than anything you'll find direct-to-video.
If you want a creature feature, look elsewhere. "The Pillowman" shakes sensibility and pushes the question "How far can you go in art?" with an incredulous story and performances you believe.
Director Scott Heberling has cast this play well and handled the material thoughtfully.
Tupolski (Craig Walter) makes a clear distinction between himself and his brutish partner, Ariel (Randall Whalen). He is a detective, but Ariel is a policeman.
Ariel takes every turn to rough up and intimidate Katurian, a writer who has been brought in for questioning. The writer doesn't know why, and he's scared.
The cops are investigating two horrific child killings that appear to have been carried out to mimic several short stories written by Katurian (Brian Rattlingourd). The cops also are looking for a third child, who is missing and presumed to be the latest victim of the sadistic perpetrator.
Katurian becomes their prime suspect because the stories under the scope are known only to him and to his mentally disabled brother, Michal (Bryan Reed).
What follows is 2 1/2 hours of quick, smart dialogue with an edge of dread as Katurian's stories are read and his own family's gruesome past is revealed.
Walter is the amiable character actor we've seen in recent plays (such as "The Goat") with an all-smiles, mellow demeanor, but there is a welcome, uneasy shift in his presence that becomes apparent here. Whalen's bad cop with the angelic name is just that -- a bad guy even at his most reasonable.
I was a little puzzled with Reed's Michal, who wasn't born brain damaged. Michal avoids eye contact and talks like an old Speak & Spell, but becomes more affecting as his story is made known and as he interacts with Katurian.
The humor of the show almost always comes from Tupolski and Ariel's good cop-bad cop sideshow or out of human behavior coupled with timing.
Heberling has a nice handle on stage movement and communication with his actors, but "The Pillowman" is clearly Rattlingourd's show as the layers of fear, anger, disbelief and pride alternately surface. His eyes know how to call madness by its name without saying a word.
But then, who is this seemingly decent man who would write about such things? Katurian's babes in the woods are hardly innocents. And, who are these men who are supposedly on the side of right but are reckless enough to injure and kill without aim.
"The Pillowman" keeps suspense throughout except when Katurian steps out of time and reads his stories aloud for the audience. A soundtrack accompanies the stories. Usually following on the heels of a drawn out monologue, Katurian's readings dragged in spots as Rattlingourd seems to run out of steam and puts on another face during these points. Theatre Club does not act out Katurian's stories, although there had been plans to include them as shadow puppets.
"The Pillowman" is at its best in solid ensemble work that is as engrossing as it is intense, and for its curious grasp of the fantastical yet bleak.
The play is for a mature audience and there is smoking in the production. It continues at the Nightingale Theater, 1416 E. Fourth St., at 8 p.m. Thursday-Saturday.
For reservations, call 557-8012 or 583-8487 [As of February 2007, 633-8666].