Writer-director Brenda McFarlane’s Shut Up comes after two pretty good shows earlier this year from her Far Fetched Productions, Suzi Got Her Lips Tattooed and Good in Bed. Shut Up follows the same pattern: sharply choreographed movement, character sketches, black-outs, quick-hitting dialogue and soul-baring monologues. McFarlane’s directorial pizzazz and intelligence are still in evidence, but as a writer her ideas may have begun to grow thin.
There are some inspired bits, especially Jackie’s Letter, in which Astrid Van Wieren as Jackie sits in a restaurant writing a letter to a former lover, going more and more out of control, while Jonathan Tanner and Gabrielle Epstein, as a couple with problems of their own, and Erik Kever Kyle as bemused waiter, watch and listen. But the script is repetitious, and the quartet of final monologues unconvincing.
(H.J.K.)