Eve Ensler’s ‘O.P.C’ is Politically Ambitious and Has Huge Heart
By David Brooks Andrews/Wicked Local Arts Correspondent
Posted Dec. 8, 2014 @ 5:31 pm
Original Link: http://www.milforddailynews.com/article/20141208/ENTERTAINMENT/141207105/11541/ENTERTAINMENT/?Start=1
Michael T. Weiss as Bruce, Kate Mulligan as Smith, Olivia Thirlby as Romi
There’s no question that “O.P.C” (Obsessive Political Correctness) by Eve Ensler is politically ambitious and has a huge heart.
The play – it’s almost more of a happening – tackles overconsumption in our world as it teeters on the edge of environmental implosion. And it tackles or attempts to tackle the question of whether the enormous issues we face are best approached by working within the system or by opting out of it. The play is being given its world premiere by American Repertory Theatre with Pesha Rudnick directing it.
ART has taken the play’s themes to heart, at least for this show, and has turned to recycled materials for much of Brett J. Banakis’ set – cardboard grocery boxes, wooden shipping pallets, and plastic water bottles. And they don’t provide paper playbills or press kits but make them available electronically online.
At the heart of the show are a mother and daughter who are in conflict. The mother, Smith Weil (Kate Mulligan), is running for the United States Senate with a great willingness to play the game so that she might seize at least some of the reigns of power. Her daughter Romi (Olivia Thirlby), who has always done things her own way, is living as a freegan – eating leftover, day-old food she finds by dumpster diving, squatting in an industrial loft space, and making her own clothes out of whatever she can find.
Smith arrives at her daughters “home” – think of an eco-friendly set for “Rent” – having never seen it before. She brings a little housewarming gift – wooden napkin holders with elephants on them. “These aren’t going to work,” says Smith. “I was imagining a table.” The play could be billed as a political comedy. Romi immediately thrusts one on her arm as a bracelet. And she offers her mother bruschetta with bruised tomatoes she rescued from a dumpster. Smith is horrified and deeply concerned over how the connection with a freegan daughter could ruin her political chances. In a line that could serve as a political bumper sticker for the play, Romi says, “You want to be boss of the world. I want a new one.” Ensler’s sympathies clearly lie with Romi, although she pits the two against each other.
From the get-go, Thirlby as Romi (the name comes from the fact she was conceived in Rome) is full of spunk, life, and charm. She’s very appealing and clearly the best actor on the set. Mulligan as Smith spends too much of the opening scene shouting at Romi. It makes you want to say, “Just talk to her as a real person.”
The play hinges on a highly improbable invention. One day Romi brings her mother a dress she made for her out of apricot skins. At first her mother is aghast, but she finally puts it on, seeing that she can trade on her daughter’s concern for the environment. Her boyfriend Damien (Peter Porte) soon has created a big business out of fruit skin dresses.
Romi’s father Bruce (Michael T. Weiss) has real sympathy for his daughter, and Weiss makes him a likeable, appealing guy as he tries to serve as the bridge between daughter and his wife/Romi’s hard-driving mother. Romi’s sister Kansas (Nicole Lowrance) is a prototypical conservative, business suit woman. Yes, she got the name from being conceived in Kansas.
Thirlby brings a lot of pop to a scene where she caves for a moment and uses money from the fruit skin dresses to buy a pair of Prada boots that she has always wanted. She practically comes unglued, she is so thrilled. It’s fun to watch.
Much of the second act takes place in a mental institution where Romi has been committed for her obsessive political correctness and for caring too much. An amplified woman’s voice speaks for the institution. True to Ensler’s own inclinations (she’s best known for the play “The Vagina Monologues”), Romi is told that one solution to her problem is sex.
In one sense, the play is a hoot, but it doesn’t really function as a play. There’s nothing subtle about the characters or the storyline. It’s more of a political polemic, but even that doesn’t totally work. Smith is a hardboiled, hard-driving candidate with no real ideals of her own but who’s willing to compromise to succeed. And while one can’t help but love Romi, her lifestyle is hardly practical or something she could stick with for a lifetime. Neither character provides a real option. The play, however, does get us thinking about issues of overconsumption that many of us have ignored.
In a talk-back session on opening night, Ensler spoke very movingly about the importance of fighting to save the world even if all the statistics show no hope. One can’t help but love her.
“O.P.C.”
WHEN: Through Jan. 4
WHERE: American Repertory Theatre, 64 Brattle St., Cambridge
TICKETS: Start at $25
INFO: 617-547-8300: www.americanrepertorytheater.org