By Deanna Dement Myers
“Colder Than Here” – Written by Laura Wade. Directed by Nicole Galland, Featuring Noni Lewis, Matt Winberg, Abigail Dickson, Ellie Brelis. Stage Manager: Lynda Johnson. Presented by the Newton Nomadic Theater at various interesting venues in and around Newton, April 5 to 28.
“While I’m here, I can help. When I kick it, you’re on your own.”
The performance opens on lovely fall day, with two women setting a picnic with all of their favorite things. The younger woman, Jenna (Abigail Dickson), can’t find anything to like about her surroundings, while the older woman, Myra (Noni Lewis), who is quickly revealed to be her mother, is trying to have a more positive view. After all, this could possibly be her eternal resting place. Yes, this family outing is designed to find a burial spot for Myra, who has bone cancer and has been given six months to live.
Armed with facts about do-it-yourself green burials, Myra is determined to ease her fractured family’s worries and die on her own terms. Jenna, the fractious, younger daughter, is a shop girl with a tumultuous love life, Harriet (Ellie Brelis) is the married, more tightly-wound older daughter, and Alec (Matt Winberg), the taciturn husband and father. Each is used to a certain way of interacting with each other, which relies heavily on intervention from Myra. This crisis doesn’t seem to encourage them to revise their views about one another. As the winter wears on, and Myra becomes more ill, she focuses more and more on the details of her funeral, which include ordering and erecting a flat-pack casket. Actively facing her mortality helps Myra to create the wake-up call this family needs.
Meant to be a black comedy, the subject of death is at times treated with shocking callousness. Playwright Laura Wade creates stilted conversations when the family is forced to interact and react to their mother’s increasingly specific funerary arrangements. None of them can see past their own personal problems to come to terms with the reality of Myra’s imminent death. Instead, they focus on the other systems that have broken down around them, mainly the broken boiler which fails to heat the house. This metaphor bops the audience over the head repeatedly to show the emotional chill that dying has on these characters. Alec in particular has odd, insouciant responses to his wife’s frailty, contrasting with an explosive, frustrated phone call with the boiler repairman. Myra engineers situations to compel her family to improve their relationships, and that is seen as transparent by both the characters and the audience.
Noni Lewis is brilliant as Myra, keeping herself in tight control in response to her fears. Her matter of fact outlook leads her daughters to examine their own self-centered concerns, and allows them to finally confront what they need most from their mother (and each other) in their last few days together. The younger actors are quite skilled at bringing nuance to what could have been one-note characters (rebellious screw up vs obedient OCD girl), using body language to bring humor and connection to somewhat mawkish dialogue. Matt Winberg is sweetly awkward, and gives the impression that his frustrations at various problems with the house are really about his helplessness in resolving his wife’s cancer. Some of the humor and phrasing seem meant for a British audience, with various jokes and interactions reading as distant and unemotional, instead of with the wryness I am sure that writer intended.
The staging, which switches between living room and various outdoor locations, is a bit tight, and creates some strange blocking moments. Perhaps the flimsy set pieces were meant to suggest the impermanence of this family structure? Indeed, when the scenes were located out of doors, the stage seemed to be transformed by the actor’s words and presence, with the trees and birds materializing out of thin air.
In the end, this play has interesting things to say about control and how to best show your love and care in times of unimaginable grief. Take some time to share this mediation on preparation and letting go. Do try to catch this production in one of the various locations in and around Newton. Tickets and info at NewtonNomadicTheater.org.
