oblivion

We had the pleasure of attending a production of the Carly Mensch play Oblivion this weekend. It's a four-character family dramedy, where the first act is almost a sitcom but the end of Act One and most of Act Two supply the drama.

Two "cool" parents in their 40s struggle to connect with their teenage daughter. She is looking to organized religion to help explain her world, which drives her parents a bit nuts, particularly Mom (shades of The Americans). The performances are good, as is the play, although the somewhat happy ending was a disappointment after spending time with Nietzsche.

The main reason we were there was to see our friend Arthur Keng. We've been following his acting career for a long time, now ... there aren't many posts here with the "theater" tag, but they can be broken down into two categories: famous people come to Berkeley Rep, and Arthur. Since he went to SoCal, we don't get to see him as often, but he is guesting in Oblivion in Sacramento, so you know we had to be there. (It worked out perfectly ... I hope Arthur agrees ... after the matinee performance, we went over to Sara and Ray's house and went out for dinner, meaning Arthur got to meet the irrepressible Félix.)

Not only did we get a chance to see Arthur's latest role (he was quite good, with several monologues I'll get to in a second), bnt his character was a teenaged filmmaker who obsessed over ... Pauline Kael. Once in a while, he'd give one of those monologues, which amounted to him reciting letters he was writing to Pauline, thinking aloud and asking for her advice. A parallel is drawn between his connection to Kael and the daughter's attempt to communicate with God ... it's only a bit of a stretch to say both teens are up to the same thing. The daughter knows that Nietzsche said God was dead, and Arthur's character has a similarly deflating moment when he finds out Kael had died a long time ago.

The bios in the program draw our attention to Mensch's participation in Weeds, and I can see that, although as far as I can tell, she came on during the later, lesser seasons. Mostly, though, I mention the program because of something Robin noticed as we sat awaiting the start of the play.

She nudged me and pointed at Arthur's bio, which includes the following: "Arthur would like to dedicate this show to Steven, the biggest Kael fan around, and to Steven's amazing wife Robin. Their support has always, and will always, mean the world to him."

First time I wanted to cry before the play had even started.

Oblivion runs at the B Street Theatre in Sacramento through April 19.

Comments

[Arthur]

It worked out more perfectly that I could have imagined. I was so incredibly thrilled to see you and Robin again, and to get to meet Sara, Ray, and Felix added so much to the day, and to my (sometimes) meandering experience here in Sacramento. Thank you both again for seeing the show, for seeing ALL the shows. I hope you know that, put in ink or not, I'm dedicating every show to you guys.