May. 05, 2010 - Issue #759: Life of Yann

Revue

Unwrapping the past

The Gift's best interpersonal moments don't quite translate when the drama gets bigger

There isn't a loaded gun in the first act of The Gift, but there are enough hints that something is about to go off that the explosion in act two feels tensely inevitable. Opening in a living room whose old couch and tiny table perfectly evoke the shabby-but-cared for Alberta Avenue home where we spend the entirety of the play, the first moment is a fairly simple disagreement involving some penis enlargement spam: Carson (Chris Bullough) has opened the computer to Lee's (Lora Brovold) still-open email window, and their ensuing scuffle pulls us into the understated tension in which they're living.

It's a sharp scene, one that both works as a kind of quotidian domestic tiff—it could just be that Lee is generally private and Carson is kind of insensitive—and that lays some tracks for the drama to follow. The Gift could do with more scenes this ambiguous, but there are big things at stake here: Carson and Lee are so tense because this is the night they're fulfiling their suicidal friend Brian's last request by opening the eponymous gift. They haven't seen his ex-wife, Bettina (Amber Borotsik) since the split, but one of the conditions is that she join the couple to tear off the wrapping; though they were once great friends, a rift has formed, and Carson and Lee seem to be as upset about Brian's death as at the prospect of revisiting their past, dealing with all these things they've left behind.

The lead up to the crucial opening is where The Gift is at its best. Writers Collin Doyle, who's rather good at domestic drama, and Jeff Page have a sharp insight into old friends forced into close confines, and the uneasy circling and reminiscing is deftly explored, the tension typified by the scorn with which Carson treats Shane (Garrett Ross), Bettina's current beau and an uncomfortable outsider to the whole proceeding. It's also helped by Borotsik's performance: she is a tornado in a gaudy cardigan, and her unrestrained brassiness is effortlessly displayed, and goes a long way towards explaining the couple's reservations at seeing her again.

Things don't fare quite as well once the contents are revealed. Without giving too much away, initially piercing insights into character are replaced by drama that just feels too big for this intimate setting and space. Oddly, that's typified in Brovold's performance: she's an actress that I'm rarely disappointed to see in a program, but here her emotional scenes—especially her crying—are performed like she's doing outdoor Shakespeare, and it overwhelms any rawness or intimacy. It's not necessarily out of pace with the script, but that too would benefit from a more domestic scope: the ultimate reveals here are gargantuan, and seem overly dramatic and out of step with a play that, until then, is very adept with its interpersonal relationships. V

Until Sun, May 9 (7:30 pm); Sun, May 9 (2 pm)
The Gift
Written by Collin Doyle, Jeff Page
Directed by Page
Starring Chris Bullough, Lora Brovold, Amber Borotsik, Garett Ross
Old Cycle Building, (9351 - 118 Ave), $10 – $20, PWYC Tue, May 4 
 

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