Feb. 08, 2012 - Issue #851: Jon Mick

Blind Date

Arriving at Blind Date, you'll find a cocktail party already in full swing: the Rice Theatre lobby is filled with tables, drinks, and people drinking around tables, and through it all wanders a striking woman with a french accent and a red clown nose. It's Mimi, who you may meet there, but will become much more acquainted with when it's time to head into the theatre, where, under a wash of Parisian accordion music, she plops down, solo, at a table for two. It's a simple, if unconventional beginning to a very charming, very clever and uproariously funny show that seems equal parts social experiment and quirky comedy.

Mimi tells us she's waiting for her blind date to arrive. She has been for hours. So she turns to us to find a new date, and based on who she's chatted up earlier, it could very well be you. Even if the thought of public participation makes your skin crawl, you'd be foolish to say no: Blind Date's well structured and impeccably executed by a performer who's an expert at taking care of whoever's sharing the stage with her (she's also backed by a pair of witty waiters with a knack for timing). There's plenty of safety built in, both in Northan's performance—she's adept at getting people to open up—and in the form of a time-out box onstage, where she and her guest can go to break out of the reality of "making up a little play" (as Mimi calls it), and discuss what's going on, performer to performer.

At its heart, the show is all about navigating tension: of getting to know someone new, and the worries and wonders about romance (Should I kiss her? Can I do that? In front of an audience of total strangers?). For us watching, the voyeurism of watching these moments play out are funny, tender, and honest in a way that theatre rarely reaches. From the outside, we know exactly what to do; if we were in Sam's shoes, we'd be sweating bullets.

On Saturday night, Mimi's date was Sam, a chemical engineer who's outer meekness hid ridiculous socks under business professional garb (he was there with a group from work) and whose pregnant wife was at home, the baby due this week.

That Sam's wife wasn't in the room perhaps made her spectre loom a little larger, and made him perhaps a bit meeker than he otherwise would've been with the romance of the date than if she'd been there—though perhaps the most hilarious tension of the night was watching Mimi clearly want to be kissed, and Sam squirm and try to talk his way around it. They didn't, in the end, but Northan's an improviser of the highest calibre, completely charming in character and impeccably skilled as performer: even Sam's hesitations played out brilliantly with her onstage. I've seen a lot of improv, but I've never seen an audience member so well taken care of on a stage. That alone says plenty. That it was all brilliantly funny to watch says more.

Until Sun, Feb 19
Created and performed by Rebecca Northan
Citadel Theatre, $40.95 – $67.20 vueweekly.com comments: powered by Disqus