Theater Reviews

Feb 14, 2009 - Laugh and the world laughs, cringe at the dearly departed Bush Administration and you have Bruka Theatre's "The God of Hell"

By Jack Neal

In one of his acerbic comments about democracy, critic and playwright George Bernard Shaw offered this biting observation: “Democracy is the kind of government where people get the kind of government they deserve.”

When good people ignore (or don’t notice) the signs of despotism, Sam Shepard’s play, “The God of Hell,” points out how those good people can become shackled by the kind of society someone else thinks they deserve.

Under the pointed and sensitive direction of Tom Plunkett, “The God of Hell” is getting a politically sizzling presentation at Reno’s Bruka Theatre. Plunkett has assembled a first-rate cast of four who give the play about lost freedom - a powerful indictment of the George W. Bush Administration’s lack of constitutional empathy - a punishing interpretation that at once evokes laughter over mundane daily lives, then frightens over the loss of freedoms of genuinely sweet people.

Shepard’s play, Plunkett’s direction and strong performances by Sandra Neace as Emma, Adam Neace as Emma’s husband Frank, Scott Dundas as a modern-day lodger and Frank’s longtime friend Haynes, and John Lutz as Welch a government man who knows too much, drags an audience into a Hitchcock-meets-“Twilight Zone” encounter of a weird kind for 85-minutes of fear and loathing on a rural Wisconsin dairy farm.

The action, set amidst Lew Zaumeyer’s uncanny virtual creation of a Wisconsin farm-house living area (one can almost smell the hay), never lets up. Dave Simpson’s lighting and special effects, always important, but integral to the success of “The God of Hell” (operated nightly by Jason Burke) is eerie and excellent. The play, first produced in 2004 as an attempt to influence that year’s presidential election, is an impassioned wake-up call to a once sleeping nation (the Obama election may have ended our most recent long national nightmare) to do something before it’s too late.

Welch, who arrives knowing much too much about the farm, accuses Emma and Frank of not being patriotic because there are no Stars and Stripes on their flagpole. He also worries that they are harboring Haynes, someone the government views as an extreme security risk. The idiosyncracies of the disheveled Emma, who loves her plants, and Frank, who loves his heifers, sets a tone of light comedy that soon darkens into mystery followed by Abu Ghraib-style torture.

Fussy, busy and ultimately deeply distressed, Sandra Neace is a splendid, poignant Emma. Adam Neace presents a warm, touching portrait of Frank who wants nothing more than to work with his heifers and enjoy the simple life he shares with Emma. Scott Dundas plays the tormented Haynes with the kind of twitching intensity Montgomery Clift used to such gripping success in “Judgment at Nuremburg.” In his relentless pursuit of fascism, John Lutz’s Welch is the personification of evil.

With his attack on the values of what appears to be a more-and-more discredited Bush Administration, Shepard is speaking to the liberal choir. At its best, “The God of Hell” has an angry and absurd ring of truth that reminds viewers that theater can prompt out-of-the-loop good people to pay attention, and – just maybe - save our world.

“The God of Hell” can be seen at the Bruka Theatre, 99 North Virginia Street, Reno, Nevada, February 13, 14, 19, 20, 21, 26, 27, 28, March 5, 6, 7 at 8 p.m. and February 22 at 2 p.m. In advance $18, students and seniors $16, at the door $25. For information call 775-323-3221.