Big Love

Signature Theater Company

What better for Valentine's Day than a play about sister brides running away from their grooms, being pushed to finally marry them and then kill them on their wedding night? Nothing.

Personally, I love Charles Mee. He has a bit of a gimmick going, but when you have a gimmick and it works and you can do it better than anyone else, why not? He takes very old Greek plays, makes them very new, starts with a clean stage and by the end of the evening has a very messy stage. But, oh what a joy it is to watch that stage devolve from beautiful, clean order into absolute chaos.

We read about half of the play Big Love was based on, The Suppliants by Aeschylus. If the question is whether the play is still relevant today, almost 2500 years after it was written, that answer is a very easy "yes." 

We have an oppressed group of people being forced to do something against their will fleeing their nation, landing anywhere hoping for a better, more free life. They ask the powerful person on the coast they've landed for help and protection. It's not offered. That person has their own safety to think of. They take matters into their own hands, out of a last resort. What does one do when one is oppressed, help can't be found and one is out of options? How do you balance justice and love? Is it justice before all other things?

The dramatic tension is held together by the first sister NOT murdering her husband because she has fallen in love and breaks her sisterly pact. 

It's a rather simple story, in some ways. But, Charles Mee pulls out all the stops to sort of sex it up and make it modern. We start with a nude actress. That certainly focuses attention in an audience pretty quickly. There is song and dance, a jukebox musical feel at times. There is a cacophony of action on the stage as the night wears on. There is video projection, rarely used effectively, but here very well done.

These plays are timeless. They hold up. And, the new version, it holds up, too. Any theater goer knows that an evening at Signature will deliver. And, last night it did not disappoint.