By Robert St. Martin
Hollywood, CA (The Hollywood Times) 8/25/34 – Thursday evening was the opening night of a new play in Los Angeles – Happy Fall – by the celebrated Rogue Artists Ensemble with their immersive, multi-dimensional “hyper-theatre.” Dubbed Happy Fall: A Queer Stunt Spectacular written by Lisa Sanaye Dring and directed by Sean Cawelti, the production in on stage at the Los Angeles LGBT Center’s Renberg Theatre in the Lily Tomlin/Jane Wagner Cultural Arts Center through September 8. David Ellard, Kurt Kanazawa and Amir Levi star in this story about the professional and romantic rise and fall of two queer, closeted stuntmen in the Hollywood world of faux masculinity. The Rogue Artists Ensemble is known for their innovative multi-media “hyper-theatre” and this new play happily indulges in film trickery, live video, life-stage and miniature puppetry as well as complex stunt acts on stage.
The actor-host of the “show” is Amir Levi who promises us a “fabulous” queer stunt spectacular with a love story embedded in it. This high-energy production explores the antics of Hollywood stunt work with a special window into the uncharted participation of LGBTQAI+ stunt performers in a world where Hollywood has long survived on “straight” stereotypes. The production is an intoxicating mixture of multi-media video on television monitors as well as a large screen on which serves a typical “green screen” on which typical action scenes can be projected as the stunt people perform fighting scenes for the camera. Match this is the use of miniature puppets for a run-through easily recognized action scenes from famous Hollywood films.
The play as narrated by Amir Levi covers the history of stunt work in Hollywood from the early days with Buster Keaton to the technology breakthroughs with computer-generated images. But that history as narrated and performed with puppetry and big screen projection is only part of the play. There is some clowning around as members of the ensemble cast participate in various stunt activities including the most challenging – the high fall on a heavily-padded bed. These energetic hijinks are impressive and were built into the play with choreography by Cody Brunelle-Potter and fight direction by professional stunt performer Celina Lee Surniak, who also acts as intimacy director. The ensemble is amazingly skilled at hopping around the stage, up and down scaffolds and dashing in and out of a dizzying amount of costume changes.
The real focus of the play is the waning stunt career of Clay (David Ellard) as a middle-aged closeted gay man who specialized in fight scenes. After the less-than-stellar fight scene between David and a female fighter, the director of the supposed film in production discovers a younger Asian-American actor Felix (Kurt Kanazawa) who is willing to take the part, knows how to do fight scenes, and is willing to do dangerous stunt “falls.” What draws Kurt to David is a complex desire to be part of David’s world as a stunt performer despite David’s macho image and closeted sense of self: Felix is younger and more comfortable in his own skin (as is his willingness to perform as a woman).
Clay’s self-image is rooted in traditional Hollywood stereotypes about faux masculinity, and it is difficult, if not impossible, for him to break free from that. Their relationship emerges somewhat one-sided but perhaps in the course of the play both men seek to find themselves.
“As a lover of cinema and how movies are made, I’ve had a life-long fascination with stunt shows,” says director Sean Cawelti. “Their mix of humor, strong men and audience participation was a formative theatrical ingredient in my youth, perhaps one that also titillated my dormant queerness. As a young kid, I used to create mini stunt shows with special effects and puppets and tell wild stories. For me, the daring fearlessness of the stunt performer is akin to what it felt like when I was navigating coming out and understanding my own authenticity. This play has truly been a labor of love and is a very personal piece to me.”
There are so many components to this play that it is difficult to summarize them all. Most significant is the fact that the playwright Dring has drawn on true-life stories and direct testimonials from stunt actors. And in doing so, Happy Fall illuminates the issues of racial and cultural identify in the film/television industry. The play’s title Happy Fall is a metaphor for many of the themes that resonate in the play – including the most dramatic “fall” from a high place that is done by Felix from a towering platform onto the padded bed on stage – “happy” perhaps because it is the beginning of his trust in Clay and their stunt work together in a number of film/television roles.
The constant movement on stage is so fast-paced that the audience cannot help but be caught up in the pace of the spectacle – true to the aesthetic of Hollywood filmmaking. The sheer energy of the ensemble in this production is impressive. They include: Lucas Brahme, Carlos R. Chavez, Gabriel Croom, Kelsey Kato, Maia Luer, Candy Pain, Tiana Randall–Quant and Kody Siemensa.
I must include a word about the life-sized puppet version of Clay in Happy Fall: Clay’s alter-ego is often portrayed on stage by this life-sized puppet version of himself, as he provides the voice from a perch on the scaffolding. The puppetry design is by Jack Pullman and Adrian Rose Leonard, with additional design and fabrication by Morgan Rebane, Greg Ballora and Kelsey Kato – who manipulate the puppet’s arms, legs, and head on stage as they move behind it. All this ingenuity is typical of the work of the Rogue Artists Ensemble and their “hyper-theatre” commitment to creating design-forward theater incorporating puppetry and multimedia.
Playwright Lisa Sanaye Dring is currently the Tow Foundation Writer-in-Residence with Ma-Yi Theater Company. Her play SUMO was produced by La Jolla Playhouse and Ma-Yi Theater Company in 2023 and won Broadway World San Diego’s award for Best New Play. Their play Kairos received an NNPN Rolling World Premiere with East West Players, Know Theatre of Cincinnati and Theatre Nova. The work marks the first of three productions in the 2024 season of the company, which serves as the nation’s largest producer of Asian American theatrical work. “Kairos” ran at the East West Players’ David Henry Hwang Theater April 4-April 28, 2024.
Happy Fall features original music by composer Adrien Prevost. The inventive scene design is by Keith Mitchell and director Cawelti with video design assistance from Sam Lopez. The complex staging is the result of many hands, and it is a tribute to the LGBT Center and its cultural arts department that curates and produces an annual calendar of events at the Lily Tomlin/Jane Wagner Cultural Arts Center, home to the Renberg Theatre, Davidson/Valentini Theatre, and Advocate & Gochis Galleries.
Coinciding with the production and sure to expand the experience, Advocate & Gochis Galleries, home to the visual arts at the Lily Tomlin/Jane Wagner Cultural Arts Center, offers a visual and mixed media art exhibit titled “Take/Action: Stunts, Spectacle and Queer History in Hollywood.” This exhibit examines the role of the action star through a distinctly queer lens, featuring interpretations of Hollywood and a look at the history of stunts by LGBTQIA+ artists. The gallery is open 45 minutes before each performance and features unique interactive photo opportunities.
Performances of Happy Fall: A Queer Stunt Spectacular takes place August 22 through September 8 on Thursday, Fridays, and Saturdays at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 3 p.m. The performance on Sunday, Sept. 1 will be a Pay-What-You-Can understudy performance. The Los Angeles LGBT Center’s Renberg Theatre is located at The Village at Ed Gould Plaza, 1125 N McCadden Place, Los Angeles, CA 90038. Tickets range from $45 to $78 (including fees). For more information and to purchase tickets, go to: bit.ly/happyfall24.
