April 28, 1998

When the play was over and the lights came up and the members of the audience headed out or to the bar for their next drink, I sat for a moment in my chair and thought of Tom Taylor, the actor responsible for playing most of the roles in Only Productions' strong version of Eric Bogosian's Sex, Drugs, Rock & Roll.

His performance had me speechless. It blew me away. And despite all the other things I could have been thinking about in that moment, the ideas brought up in Bogosian's play or the excellent, involving production, it was Taylor's performance, how it had covered a full spectrum of depth and soul and still managed to rely heavily on nuance, that captivated me.

At that moment, I suppose most people were thinking of the subject matter of the play. Bogosian's specialty is social commentary, and Sex, Drugs, Rock & Roll is a veritable hour and a half of it. Done in Bogosian's trademark one-man-show style, the play consists of a series of dramatic monologues presented by a slew of diverse characters, each of which begins in stereotype and then grows into something three-dimensional through each character's rant on the numerous problems in our society. The play is preachy, informative, angry, abusive, funny, crass, unbearable, and, if done right, hypnotic.

Director J.J. Ruscella and his production team definitely get that hypnotism part down. It's one thing to do a fine production, but it's a true achievement to make a political play (and a play that has no plot as well) continuously enthralling even when the you disagree at times with what's being said. I may not agree with everything Bogosian says in his play, and at times the ranting grows tiresome, but Ruscella puts the play so solidly together, and Taylor acts so well that I could not take my eyes off of it.

But I really must say this: Tom Taylor literally steals the show. I mean, here you have a skinny guy, lanky, a bit awkward looking, with a very plain face - sort of everyday - and from him, with little more than a slight adjustment of outfit and a tumbling of the hair, emerge 11 or so distinct characters. An English rock star condemning drugs despite admitting that the best times of his life occurred while he was high. A sour bum paranoid of all the feces in the world. A well-endowed, promiscuous Texan. A hard-ass, egotistical corporate boss. A druggie philosophizing on the universe and his anti-social behavior. A Bill Hicks-like spoken word artist who revels in his own selfishness. A local boy obsessed with a stag party he throws his friend. Each of these characters were distinct and memorable. Taylor escapes into all of them like a true chameleon, gets to the soul of these people, and manages to clearly convey Bogosian's points. Quite an accomplishment, I must say. In fact, I was so amazed by his performance that I had to congratulate him after the play.

There were a few glitches in the play, but nothing major. For one, the first act, in my opinion, had more humor going for it and was better paced, and because of that, it was easier to swallow than the second act. At times, the use of the microphone made what was being said unintelligible. Also, the idea to keep Taylor in a T-shirt in jeans for most of the play (save for a few accessories, like a vest or tie or such) worked well until the scene with hard-ass boss: Here, the fact that Taylor was wearing jeans was a little distracting. I realize that there is limited time for costume changes between scenes, but slacks would have done the job more effectively.

But those are all minor problems which did not take away from the whole here. In the end, I was left with an elated feeling of having been privileged to see this fantastic production and the remarkable performance of Tom Taylor, who, I suppose, can now consider me his groupie.

Eyal Goldshmid I am a fiction writer supporting myself as a government clerk for the US army. Until I can fully live off writing, I plan to milk all the luxury I can from the American taxpayer. Other Articles I've Written