Jordan Wright
October 24, 2017
Special to The Alexandria Times
 Kathy Gordon as Wendy Darling and Alex Mills as Peter Pan ~ Photographer: Johnny Shryock Despite current accepted psychology ascribing ‘Peter Pan’ as a term for a man who refuses to accept adult responsibilities, we love this familiar tale of an English family of three children who fly off to a fantasy world where Peter and the fairy princess Tinkerbell reside in Neverland – a place of rip-roaring adventure populated by dastardly pirates, beautiful mermaids and motherless boys. Veteran of numerous Synetic productions, the chameleonic actor, Alex Mills, plays Peter to Ana Tsikurishvili’s lovable Tinkerbell. Ryan Sellers, who recently gave a formidable performance in Synetic’s The Mark of Cain plays Hook with panache satirizing Trump when he’s threatening the boys. Zana Gankhuyag is Peter’s mute Shadow – a fully developed role that shows off Gankhuyag’s incredible physicality.
Director Paata Tsikurishvili conceives Peter as a symbol for man’s desire to stave off aging. As he points out in the Playbill, “Everyone from the characters in Greek mythology to the Knights of the Round Table to Indiana Jones – they have all sought the kind of immortality which Peter Pan so effortlessly and carelessly displays and takes for granted in his playful rejection of the real world.” Echoing that theory, the play opens with a dark scene in the graveyard where Peter mourns the death of his sister. Thankfully, we needn’t dwell on a deeper meaning to revel this swashbuckling tale of an adventurous lad and his followers.
 Ryan Sellers (Captain Hook), Tori Bertocci (Starkey), Nathan Weinberger (Smee – top right) ~ Photographer: Johnny Shryock When Peter takes the Darling children the island of Neverland, Wendy (Kathy Gordon) becomes mother to Peter’s crew of Lost Boys who ride unicycles animal heads. Her brothers, Michael (Scott Whalen) and John (Thomas Beheler), join the motley group in their fight against the evil Captain Hook and his band of ne’er-do-wells. Nathan Weinberger plays Smee with a comically distended belly wrapped in stripes. Smee’s explanation for Peter’s eternal youth, “a healthy diet and yoga.” Peter’s explanation for his youthfulness, “Worrying takes the fun out of everything!” Sage advice.
 Kathy Gordon as Wendy Darling and Ryan Sellers as Captain Hook ~ Photographer: Johnny Shryock As you’d expect Choreographer Irina Tsikurishvili gives the troupe plenty to work with plunging us headlong into a fantasy world filled with high-flying acrobatics and crackling good swordfights masterfully co-choreographed by Vato Tsikurishvili. (Yes, it’s a family affair.) She aims to please with a rousing, River Dance style Irish reel to celebrate Wendy’s arrival, another from the Roaring 20’s and a dance for the pirate’s duel with Peter and his Shadow.
Fabulous costumes, especially Tinkerbell’s multi-colored LED lit fairy frock including glittery swimsuits on androgynous mermaids, by Kendra Rai. Colorful dialogue from Captain Hook’s smarmy crew will have your kids talking like a pirate is by the play’s adaptor, Ed Monk. My 8-year old seat neighbor was blown away by the spectacular swordplay.
 Lost Kids Dancing (from left to right) Thomas Beheler (John Darling), Scott Whalen (Michael Darling), Nate Shelton (Nibs), Anna Lynch (Slightly) ~ Photographer: Johnny Shryock Highly recommended for all ages.
Through November 19th at Synetic Theater, 1800 South Bell Street, Arlington in Crystal City. For tickets and information call 1 800 494-8497 or visit www.synetictheater.org.
Jordan Wright
July 21, 2017
 Ryan Sellers (Cain), Philip Fletcher (God) ~ Photographer: Johnny Shryock In his apocalyptic vision of the end of the world Georgian-born Director and Adaptor Paata Tsikurishvili offers up a slo-mo intro to the birth of Evil. In it he provides God (Philip Fletcher) with a large mobile Modernist statue with serpentine arms from whence to rule his kingdom. This Tree of Knowledge representation is where Adam (Scott Brown) and Eve (Tori Bertocci) meet their fate in the Garden of Eden.
Synetic has long been a theatrical vehicle for the interpretation of world politics and has consistently sought out ways to parallel their productions to the ills of modern society. Describing his inspiration for The Mark of Cain with Machiavelli’s immortal words, “Absolute power corrupts absolutely. We see this popping up everywhere,” he adds suggestively. Tsikurishvili’s latest fantasy after a five-year dry spell, reads like a graphic novel of the world’s ills.
In committing their original sin, the doomed couple bite into the shiny red apple symbolized by a balloon in a cage. We see God’s tears begin to fall from white balloon “eyes” encased in a pyramid – like the eyes on the U. S. dollar – and backlit by flashlights. There will be many more balloon symbols indicating sadness, death and destruction. It’s an awkward device at best, but you’ll get the drift.
 Ryan Sellers (Cain), Dallas Tolentino (Abel) ~ Photographer: Johnny Shryock Our jeans-clad lovers soon encounter the Dark Angel (Kathy Gordon) and her minions before running off to give birth to their twins, Cain (Ryan Sellers) and Abel (Dallas Tolentino). This colorless Garden of Eden may augur the evils to come, but it seems an unnecessarily grim setting for paradise. Abel is the sensitive one of the two, representing Culture and the Arts – playing stringed instruments woven from strips of white fabric. Cain is the penultimate destroyer, torturing the dancers that frolic to Abel’s music. More balloon eyes “cry” and a death is symbolized by the popping of a red balloon filled with red dust. We will come to see this again and again as it depicts Death symbolized by black balloons. After Cain kills off his entire family and appears to briefly mourn their loss, the use of dancers carrying helium filled black balloons is yet again employed while God marks Cain for life with red powder, a device used to symbolize blood, anger and/or defeat.
 Kathy Gordon (Dark Angel), Ryan Sellers (Cain) ~ Photographer: Johnny Shryock When the Dark Angel again returns she anoints Cain with a wreath of golden laurel leaves. As his conquests mount ever more elaborate “crowns” serve to describe the level of power that Cain has achieved. In a banquet scene in which all the guests wear crowns, they kill each other off in a dramatic fight scene. Some inexplicably return to march to Music Director Irakli Kavsadze’s choice of Ravel’s “Bolero” as Cain becomes power mad and the wars increasingly militaristic. The music is perfectly timed to mirror the staccato sounds of machine guns. At this point we have transitioned into modern day warfare and thankfully there are no balloons to distract from this electrifying scene.
 Tori Bertocci (Ensemble), Ryan Sellers (Cain), Megan Khaziran (Ensemble) Photographer: Johnny Shryock I don’t want to be the spoiler, but let’s just say Cain appears as Trump in elongated red tie and aviator sunglasses spewing executive orders and looking noticeably smug. You don’t want to know what miseries he has in mind to wreak upon the world at large. As with Synetic’s famous “Silent Shakespeare” series, this play is wordless which is hardly noticeable for the wealth of dance expression choreographed by Irina Tsikurishvili, the fierce battle scenes by Vato Tsikurishvili, and the use of electronica composed by Konstantine Lortkipanidze. Trust me. You’ll get the picture.
Through August 13th at Synetic Theater, 1800 South Bell Street, Arlington in Crystal City. For tickets and information call 1 800 494-8497 or visit www.synetictheater.org.
Jordan Wright
May 14, 2017
 Philip Fletcher as Frollo (center), with Gargoyle Ensemble Photo Credit: Johnny Shryock The first five minutes of Synetic’s latest production is so haunting you may think you’re having an out-of-body experience. It comes at you slowly, unwinding like a cobra from a basket. It’s a visceral sensation from an avant-garde theatre troupe that knows how to jolt the senses and play with the mind. It starts with the monophonic sounds of Gregorian chants and the tolling of church bells scented with the heavily-perfumed aroma of a smoking incense-burning censer that plunges you into the cosmic world of religious rituals. It is at this moment that we first see Frollo backlit by a giant blue cross. He removes his cassock and mask. We have just come face to face with the dark forces of the church. Did I flash on Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code? In a New York minute.
 Irina Kavsadze as Esmeralda – Photo Credit: Johnny Shryock Symbols of faith, religion and power are stunningly shattered in Director Paata Tsikurishvili’s highly inventive interpretation of The Hunchback of Notre Dame – Victor Hugo’s brilliant classic tale. It tells a story of the gypsy girl Esmeralda (the lithe and emotive Irina Kavsadze) worshipped by hunchbacked bell ringer Quasimodo (Vato Tsikurishvili in one of his finest performances), his patron Frollo (the chameleonic Philip Fletcher), the naïve musician Gringoire (Robert Bowen Smith) and Esmeralda’s paramour Phoebus (Zana Gankhuyag). In one of Synetic’s most exciting productions to date Tsikurishvili places the emphasis on the dichotomy between the sanctity of the church and the reality of the human condition, and like the troupe’s highly regarded “Silent Shakespeare” series of plays, this production is done without words.
 Vato Tsikurishvili as Quasimodo – Photo Credit: Johnny Shryock Set in 15th century Paris the hypocritically pious Frollo is depicted as a high priest rather than the government minister in the original tale. As in the original, he is conflicted by his religious beliefs and the desires of the flesh. Scenic Designer Anastasia Rurikov Simes’ set consists of an enormous spiked silver wall constructed with multiple levels. Within the wall writhing, tormenting gargoyles perch atop the stage serving as judge and witness to those who offend the church. Simes’ design progressively rotates to reveal a massive glowing cross, Esmeralda’s fiery funeral pyre, a hangman’s platform and ultimately the fixture for Frollo’s self-flagellation and self-crucifixion.
 Tori Bertocci (Gypsy/Ensemble) being thrown by Vato Tsikurishvili (Quasimodo) – Photo Credit: Johnny Shryock Dramaturg Nathan Weinberger focuses predominantly on the story’s emotional elements of jealousy, lust, betrayal, domination and retribution. And as Hugo warned his readers, it challenges the church’s abuse of power through its insistence on blind faith and strict adherence to canonical law.
As is Synetic’s signature, a unique fusion of music, sound effects and lighting play a large part in heightening the drama. Music Director Irakli Kavsadze’s mix of classical music interwoven with electronica and tango, Composer Konstantine Lortkipanidze’s original music and Brian Allard’s suggestively lurid lighting combine with Erik Teague’s highly inventive costumes and wide array of intricately designed masks.
Highly recommended.
Through June 11th at Synetic Theater, 1800 South Bell Street, Arlington in Crystal City. For tickets and information call 1 800 494-8497 or visit www.synetictheater.org.
Jordan Wright
February 21, 2017
Special to The Alexandria Times
 Ryan Sellers as Petruchio and Irina Tsikurishvili as Katherina. Photo Credit: Johnny Shryock Some of Synetic’s “Silent Shakespeare” series productions are of the more classical variety. Knights in leather armor and ladies in diaphanous gowns, kings with proper crowns and gallant, swaggering lads who rescue damsels. That works for those who like their Shakespeare neat and undiluted. For my money, the crazier, the more outlandish and the sexier, the more I’m going to love it. Directed by Irina Tsikurishvili, one of the founding members of the Georgian troupe together with her husband and Artistic Director, Paata Tsikurishvili, this new version of The Taming of the Shrew is decidedly over the top outrageous. We need this. A straight 90 minutes of madcap silliness strung together by a familiar plot and performed by a cast of inspired dancers. Sign me up.
In a stunning Magritte-like formality, fellow mourners gather. Clad in black Victorian garb with umbrellas held aloft, they grieve the demise of fashion designer Baptista’s wife. The explosive sounds of thunder and lightning frame their little scene. As they depart, several of the gentlemen lovingly kiss the hand of Katherina (Irina Tsikurishvili). One brazen swain grabs her, bends her backwards and plants one on her lips. She is the most sought after, and unattainable of all – a girl on fire garnering headlines in the scandal sheets for her uncontrollable behavior. Her sister, Bianca (Nutsa Tediashvili), a flirty starlet, glamorously clad in electric yellow mini dress, is no match for her sister’s intensity. As for her paramour, Lucentio (Justin J. Bell) he must woo Bianca on the QT, and does it as a woman in a tiny dress and Louise Brooks bob as her music teacher. It’s outlandish. Beyond the pale. Such fun!
 Irina Tsikurishvili as Katherina and Ryan Sellers as Petruchio Photo Credit: Johnny Shryock The story is set in PADUAWOOD, the iconic Hollywood sign has been replaced. Here the men are flashy hipsters in pegged trousers, the women fiercely trendy and the paparazzi ubiquitous. It’s all about the nightlife, hooking up at the club and vogueing for the camera. Fashion shows are where they strut their stuff and here we are treated to an ersatz Victoria Secret runway scene, as elaborate as anything from Ziegfeld’s follies, with models in de rigeur feathery angel wings and erotic lingerie. Additional suitors Tranio (Scott S. Turner), Hortensio (Stephen Russell Murray), Gremio (Zana Gankhuyag) and Grumio (Alex Mills) swarm around the ladies, alternately posing and roughhousing, eager to impress their targets.
Petrucchio, selected by Katherina’s father to pursue her in marriage, is a painter bereft of inspiration. He is portrayed by the sensational dancer Ryan Sellers, whose acrobatic leaps are Baryshnikovian and whose physical attributes are swoon-worthy. His fights with Katherina are as deliciously chaotic as the steamy love scenes. Tsikurishvili mirrors his enmity and passion exquisitely. This may be one of her greatest roles – one in which she shows her magnificent range as a both a comic actor and powerhouse performer.
 Full cast (minus Irakli Kavsadze as Baptiste and Chris Galindo as Ensemble). Photo Credit: Johnny Shryock Zana Gankhuyag has choreographed this unique and visually sensuous production, showing off this talented cast to their fullest. And credit Anastasia Rurikova Simes for the countless, elaborate, crazy costumes that never fail to amuse, most inexplicably a banquet wherein all the guests save Katherina wear massive chicken heads and a girl in skimpy black patent leather biker gear lures Petrucchio from atop a motorcycle. A lobster codpiece makes an appearance. Don’t ask. Just go.
Highly recommended. (And for those of you who have never been to a Synetic Theater production, they have garnered a total of 93 Helen Hayes Award nominations and 27 Awards for directing, choreography, acting, costume design and best play.)
Through March 19th at Synetic Theater, 1800 South Bell Street, Arlington in Crystal City. For tickets and information call 1-866-811-4111 or visit www.synetictheater.org.
Jordan Wright
December 15, 2016
Special to The Alexandria Times
 Irina Tsikurishvili, the Witch – Photo Credit: Johnny Shryock A rather streamlined presentation of what we’ve come to expect from Synetic Theater’s no-dialogue series, is Sleeping Beauty. We half-mad aficionados of this famed Georgian troupe have been spoiled by a cast of thousands (well at least more than the ten cast members we have here), extraordinary water features, terrifying physical battles and surprisingly innovative visuals. But for this incarnation of the classic fairy tale written by Charles Perrault, later reinterpreted by the Brothers Grimm, we will have to be satisfied with a more balletic approach by a Prince played by veritable heartthrob and company member, Zana Gankhuyag, and his inamorata, Briar Rose, played by the delicate-as-a-feather Eliza Smith. Notwithstanding our immodest expectations, there is a sort of magic in the simplicity of Director Paata Tsikurishvili’s version and its brand of story-driven fantasy.
 Eliza Smith, Briar Rose (Sleeping Beauty) and Zana Gankhuyag, the Prince Photo Credit: Johnny Shryock Paata envisions the Witch, played wonderfully by real-life wife, Irina Tsikurishvili, as a sympathetic creature haunted by the destruction of the forest and its animal denizens by the king’s huntsmen. Leaning heavily on moral relativism to re-interpret her motives, Paata views her as a fierce protector of nature, a sort of anarchical environmentalist, if you will, who wreaks vengeful havoc on both the Prince (who in this version is the Witch’s son) and his intended, Briar Rose. The fairies (Kathy Gordon, Francesca Blume, Emily Whitworth) are imagined as a trio of ditzy butterflies who hover over the Prince and Briar Rose as protectorates against his mother’s fury.
 Eliza Smith, Briar Rose (Sleeping Beauty), Zana Gankhuyag, the Prince and Irina Tsikurishvili as the Witch – Photo Credit: Johnny Shryock As usual in these wordless renditions, the most popular of which have been the much lauded series of wordless Shakespeare productions, we must exercise our imaginations around the basic story as we are enveloped and transported by the classical sounds of Tchaikovsky’s ballet mixed with Phillip Glass-inspired electronica, the original musical compositions of Konstantine Lortkipanidze and Thomas Sowers’ oftimes frighteningly real sound effects.
 Francesca Blume, Kathy Gordon and Emily Whitworth as the Fairies with Eliza Smith as Briar Rose (Sleeping Beauty) Photo Credit: Johnny Shryock Dallas Tolentino, who also plays the King, designed the fight scenes to play up Gankhuyag’s strengths, which are indeed impressive. Taking vicious battle blows from both his mother and demons with thorn-covered swords, he weightlessly tosses his lithe body in a gravity-defying series of leaps, tumbles and somersaults. It is gorgeous to see. Credit too, goes to Irina who, doubling as choreographer, has lent elements of charm to the reindeer that frolic in the wood. Scenic designer, Phil Charlwood, informs the fast-moving action through the use of silken panels, creating separation, inclusion and high-flying dramatic elements. Special multimedia effects by Riki Kim heighten the nefarious activities of the dark spirits who act as sentinels and familiars to the witch.
Though this isn’t my favorite Synetic production, I took a friend who had never witnessed the company’s highly imaginative work and she was gobsmacked. I’d made a convert. So perhaps, you’ll do the same. Invite a friend. Start small and build to a crescendo – that’s how it’s done in the theater.
Through January 8th at Synetic Theater, 1800 South Bell Street, Arlington in Crystal City. For tickets and information call 1-866-811-4111 or visit www.synetictheater.org.
Jordan Wright
October 5, 2015
Special to The Alexandria Times
 Kathy Gordon as Alice, Vato Tsikurishvili as Caterpillar. Photo by Johnny Shryock Alice is very, very, very unhappy. She has had to surrender her favorite playthings to a recently hired cruel-hearted governess, Ms. Prickett (Renata Veberyte Loman, later seen in the role of the Queen), who eats her tarts, insists she recite poetry and insults her intelligence. In this dark telling, and merging, of Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass, Director Paata Tsikurishvili takes us down the rabbit hole to a fantasy world unlike any other. After all, this is Synetic Theater. Did you expect a fairy tale? Lloyd Rose’s script adaption, divided into twelve parts, keeps the madcap charm yet affords little room for niceties.
 Renata Veberyte Loman as Queen of Hearts, Justin J. Bell as King with Ensemble. Photo by Johnny Shryock. This is an upside down world this growing-up thing – fraught with danger, nonsensical creatures and twisted logic – and Alice (Kathy Gordon) intends to sort it all out and in the process teach Wonderland’s inhabitants a few lessons in commonsense. Setting out she finds her toys have morphed into the Cheshire Cat (Alex Mills) and the White Rabbit (Tori Bertocci) who lead her into an evermore phantasmagorical dimension filled with shrouded creatures of the night who feed her cakes to change her size in order to enter a tiny portal to the realm of the Queen of Hearts.
 Alex Mills as Cheshire Cat, Kathy Gordon as Alice, Tori Bertocci as White Rabbit. Photo by Johnny Shryock Eventually Alice arrives at the tea party where she meets up with the Mad Hatter (Dallas Tolentino), Doormouse (Zana Gankhuyag, who graces us later as the Lobster) and the March Hare (Justin J. Bell, who does double-duty as King). “It’s always tea time,” they riddle her pop-locking to electronika and calliope in this carnival-like atmosphere.
 Dallas Tolentino as Mad Hatter, Kathy Gordon as Alice, Justin J. Bell as March Hare. Photo by Johnny Shryock Costume Designer Kendra Rai does not disappoint. Well known to Synetic fans and the Helen Hayes Awards committee (who bestowed upon her the 2015 Outstanding Costume Design Award for her work on last season’s The Island of Dr. Moreau, thus besting herself for her other two noms for Beauty and the Beast and Twelfth Night), she has outdone herself with eye-popping creations.
 Zana Gankhuyag as Doormouse, Alex Mills as Cheshire Cat, Dallas Tolentino as Mad Hatter, Justin J. Bell as March Hare. Photo by Johnny Shryock. The Queen’s Guard, as you’ll recall, are playing cards that dash about looking for heads to chop off, as per Her Majesty’s whims. But it’s Tweedle Dee (Augustin Beall) and Tweedle Dum (Thomas Beheler) as punk rockers that nearly steal the show reciting the Jabberwocky, “Twas brillig, and the slithy toves did gyre and gimble in the wabe: All mimsy were the borogroves, And the mome raths outgrabe,” finishing with a high-five. I’ll admit it is one of my favorite bits of nonsense poetry and I was totally captivated by this odd duo in leather jackets and spiky mohawks reciting Carroll’s famous 19th century verse.
 Dallas Tolentino as Mad Hatter. Photo by Johnny Shryock. Humpty Dumpty (Vato Tsikurishvili) makes a brief appearance before his precipitous fall, confounding Alice with the pronouncement, “When I use a word it means what I choose it to be. You can’t let words have the last word.” But it’s the Queen’s appearance at the garden party, replete with towering red pompadour and black and white patent leather dress plumped up with paniers, that truly blows our minds. “Off with their heads!” she familiarly commands as she neatly tucks a croquet ball into a wicket.
 Alex Mills as Cheshire Cat. Photo by Johnny Shryock. Resident Choreographer, Irina Tsikurishvili, works her magic, filling the stage with phenomenal dancers, most especially Mills who in one scene as the Cheshire Cat toying with a mouse, undulates, contorts and twists his lithe body into unimaginable feline positions, bending in half to lick his leg and slinking on to one of Scenic Designer Daniel Pinha’s giant arcing scaffolds to avoid discovery.
Highly recommended.
Through November 8th at Synetic Theater, 1800 South Bell Street, Arlington in Crystal City. For tickets and information call 866 811-4111 or visit www.synetictheater.org.
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