<html xmlns:o="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" xmlns:w="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:word" xmlns:st1="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40">
<head>
<META HTTP-EQUIV="Content-Type" CONTENT="text/html; charset=us-ascii">
<meta name=Generator content="Microsoft Word 11 (filtered medium)">
<o:SmartTagType namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags"
name="Street"/>
<o:SmartTagType namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags"
name="City"/>
<o:SmartTagType namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags"
name="address"/>
<o:SmartTagType namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags"
name="State"/>
<o:SmartTagType namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags"
name="place"/>
<!--[if !mso]>
<style>
st1\:*{behavior:url(#default#ieooui) }
</style>
<![endif]-->
<style>
<!--
/* Font Definitions */
@font-face
{font-family:Georgia;
panose-1:2 4 5 2 5 4 5 2 3 3;}
/* Style Definitions */
p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal
{margin:0in;
margin-bottom:.0001pt;
font-size:12.0pt;
font-family:"Times New Roman";}
a:link, span.MsoHyperlink
{color:blue;
text-decoration:underline;}
a:visited, span.MsoHyperlinkFollowed
{color:purple;
text-decoration:underline;}
span.EmailStyle17
{mso-style-type:personal-compose;
font-family:Arial;
color:windowtext;}
@page Section1
{size:8.5in 11.0in;
margin:1.0in 1.25in 1.0in 1.25in;}
div.Section1
{page:Section1;}
-->
</style>
</head>
<body lang=EN-US link=blue vlink=purple>
<div class=Section1>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 color="#333333" face=Georgia><span
style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:Georgia;color:#333333'>This is Christine Howey’s
review from her blog (<a
href="http://raveandpan.blogspot.com/2008/08/god-of-hell-bang-and-clattercleveland.html">http://raveandpan.blogspot.com/2008/08/god-of-hell-bang-and-clattercleveland.html</a>
)<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 color="#333333" face=Georgia><span
style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:Georgia;color:#333333'><br>
If you’ve ever wanted to scream, and not stop screaming, at this
beautiful country’s drift (some might call it a march) towards fascism,
then you need to see <i><span style='font-style:italic'>The God of Hell</span></i>
now at <a href="http://www.bnctheatre.com/">Bang and Clatter’s Cleveland</a>
venue. This is a heartfelt screed, wrapped in a polemic and stuffed into a
snarl. And it should be music to the ears of those who feel abused by the Bush
administration and their agenda of preemptive war, torture, lying, and other
assorted affronts to the constitution.<br>
<br>
Written by Sam Shepard, this play isn’t exactly polished. But it
doesn’t want to be. And the B&C folks give it an essentially flawless
performance that ripples with the muscularity of outrage and helplessness that
so many have felt in the past seven agonizing years.<br>
<br>
The entire 80-minute one-act takes place at a small family farm in <st1:State
w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Wisconsin</st1:place></st1:State>, where Frank
tends to his new heifers and Emma fusses over a profusion of indoor plants in
the front room. They seem as normal as two cheese-heads ever could, until we
learn that Frank’s “old friend” Haynes is staying in the
basement, and won’t even come out when the morning bacon is served.<br>
<br>
The reason for that is eventually revealed after the doorbell rings and a pushy
traveling salesman named Welch arrives, peddling American flag cookies and
other patriotic claptrap. But his sales pitch soon evolves into a series of
questions, and he seems particularly interested in the basement and who might
be down there.<br>
<br>
>From that point on, the startling transformation of all four characters is
enacted in scenes that snap and sizzle with the kind of energy you just
don’t see very often. Once Welch reveals his true intent as a government
operative, and forces the others to “get in step” by leading his
guinea pig Haynes around by an electric cable attached to his cock, a cold
chill should run down your spine. And if it doesn’t, you’d better
check for a pulse and <a
href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/jul/15/terrorism.civilliberties">read
this</a>.<br>
<br>
The splendid cast includes Joseph Milan as unsuspecting Frank, spooling off
farmer references so easily you’d think he just meandered onto the set
from a nearby barn. And Jen Klika is superb as Emma, her dead eyes and deadpan
delivery registering nothing—and yet everything—as she putters
about.<br>
<br>
John Busser is a righteous and appropriate mess as Haynes, who shakes every
time a place called Rocky Butte is mentioned and who is beset with a
cataclysmic case of static electricity every time he touches someone. But the
most fascinating performance is handed in by Daniel McElhaney, who smears the
smarm when Welch is in salesman mode, chuckling eerily at the tag end of his
sentences, and then morphing into a Donald Rumsfeld/Dick Cheney wet dream as a
righteous torturer without remorse.<br>
<br>
Director Christopher Johnston gets the lion’s share of credit for
ratcheting up the tension in this piece and blending Shepard’s black
humor with his bleakly dystopian view of the current government.<br>
<br>
The point of all this is given an icy sheen when Welch confronts Emma and asks,
“You didn’t think you were going to get a free ride on the back of
democracy forever, did you?” And that is the essential value of the new
fascism: Democracy as a weapon, meant to be wielded by the super-wealthy and
the powerful to keep everyone else under their collective heel.<br>
<br>
<b><i><span style='font-weight:bold;font-style:italic'>The God of Hell</span></i></b><br>
<b><span style='font-weight:bold'>August 1 – August 23</span></b><br>
<b><span style='font-weight:bold'>The Bang and the Clatter Theatre Company</span></b><br>
<st1:address w:st="on"><st1:Street w:st="on"><b><span style='font-weight:bold'>224
Euclid Avenue</span></b></st1:Street><b><span style='font-weight:bold'>, <st1:City
w:st="on">Cleveland</st1:City></span></b></st1:address><br>
<b><span style='font-weight:bold'>330-606-5317</span></b><br>
<b><span style='font-weight:bold'>www.bnctheatre.com</span></b></span></font><font
size=2 face=Arial><span style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Arial'><o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
</div>
</body>
</html>