Past Reviews

Regional Reviews: New Jersey

The High Water Mark Intriguing New Work in Progress Merits Attention

Also see Bob's reviews of Our Town


Andrea Maulella and Sabrina Profitt
Ben Clawson is a very talented young New Jersey playwright. Two years ago, Luna Stage commissioned and produced his historical drama The Dangers of Electric Lighting which centered on the rivalry of Thomas Edison and Nikola Tesla. It was an extremely entertaining and imaginative serious drama which I believe has all the elements necessary for popular and critical success. His latest play, The High Water Mark, is now receiving its world premiere production. There is a great deal of sharp, intelligent dialogue and much of the play's second act is intriguing and involving. Albeit a two hander, it attests to Clawson's range and ambition in that it is an imaginative, manic melodrama as far removed in style and content from Electric Lighting as a play could possibly be. Yet, while The High Water Mark has much to recommend it, there is much work to be done if it is to reach its potential.

The play spans little more than twelve hours. The setting is a hole in the wall apartment in a seedy apartment complex in suburban New Jersey. Living by herself in the apartment is Janet, a high school English teacher in her forties. The broken down and emotionally defeated Janet has turned completely inward. It is 1:30 a.m. on a Tuesday morning. Although lately they have grown distant, her best friend since childhood, Lily, is out in the hall drunkenly alienating the neighbors as she seeks out Janet's apartment. Both are in deep trouble.

The now divorced Janet has lost her house and the custody of her two children to her ex-husband Kyle to whom she is paying child support and alimony. One afternoon, Janet had been preparing dinner when she was disturbed by the carrying on of her two sons. She lost her cool and turned on her sons launching an out of control, verbal tirade at them while gesticulating with the large knife with which she had been cutting vegetables. Her older son made a video of the spectacle on his cell phone which he gave to Kyle. Kyle used it in court to establish that Janet was unfit to have custody of the children.

The sharply dressed, maniacally aggressive alcoholic Lily is smug and flippantly attacks Janet and the state into which she has fallen. Lily drinks from a wine bottle containing liquid soap which is under the bathroom sink. Janet asks why would Lily think that she had wine under the sink, and Lily caustically replies, "I'd have a bottle of wine under my sink if I lived here ... to keep me from killing myself every time I looked in the bathroom mirror." She chatters on and on to conceal her own desperation. Lily and her husband Jason are extremely rich and live in a veritable mansion. Jason hop scotches the world making his business deals, and sleeping around with other women. When Lily drove into the complex, she deliberately careened Jason's Jaguar off two rows of parked cars. She further reveals to Janet that before she left her house, she set it ablaze so that she wouldn't be able to go back. End of act one.

Despite the humor in Lily's caustic patter, Janet is so pathetic and Lily so cruelly desperate that I found it painful and depressing. I was ill-prepared by the play's advertising and program cover describing it as "a new comedy." Yet the fact is that Clawson intends The High Water Mark to be a comedy. Thus, the initial task that the author faces is to make the misery at hand funnier to the viewer.

Matters get much worse for at least one of these women and a horrendous behavior is the central motor of the second act. Clawson creates a situation that is outlandishly over the top awful and outraging. By depicting a hot button, troubling present day social behavior,The High Water Mark transcends the pain of the horrible situation that it depicts.

Additionally, Janet and Lily, even though we are told that they were drinking buddies, do not appear to have ever had enough in common to have been best friends. Part of the problem is that Janet is shown as so scholarly (possibly so that she can convey some brilliantly witty dialogue) that she could not have drank her youth away with Lily. There is also a reconciliation, a recapturing of warm feelings of friendship and forgiveness that is simply not believable after what goes down.

Sabrina Profitt (Lily) and Andrea Maulella (Janet) are fully engaged with one another and create sparks as they interact with passion and feeling. There is more connectively between Lily and Janet in their performance than there is in the text. However, it does appear that the role of Janet might benefit from a more comedic approach than it is now receiving.

Director Cheryl Katz has drawn strong performances from her cast. Her production is effective in bringing out the strengths in the play. The set by Charles Murdock Lewis (down to the takeout menus jammed behind the wall telephone) tells us much of what we need to know about Janet.

There can be no doubt but that with The High Water Mark, Ben Clawson, Andrea Maulella and Sabrina Profitt, and Cheryl Katz deserve any theatergoer's time and attention.

The High Water Mark continues performances (Evenings: Thursday 7:30 pm; Friday, Saturday 8 pm/ Matinees: Sunday 3 pm) through November 10, 2013, at Luna Stage, 555 Valley Road, West Orange. Box Office: 973-395-5551; online: www.lunastage.org.

The High Water Mark by Ben Clawson; directed by Cheryl Katz

Cast
Janet………….Andrea Maulella
Lily……………….Sabrina Profitt


Photo: Steven Lawler


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- Bob Rendell