author: Chris Pence
Life on The Ice Floe: Quitting Time at The Baltimore Theatre Project
In today’s world, discrimination is an all-to-prevalent problem that plagues modern society. It has many faces, including by race, sex, religion, and political affiliation. One of the faces least addressed in today’s world is age discrimination. Agism is an issue that many people face daily, yet few people are ready to discuss its true impact.
It’s never an easy task to tackle a difficult subject, particularly when attempting to speak about a narrative that isn’t necessarily your own. What Was Done, a world-premiere play by Jack L. B. Bohn currently being produced for the Baltimore Playwrights Festival by Miriam Bazensky and Directed by Barry Feinstein as a co-production with Spotlighters Theatre, is a play that leaves the audience with more questions and awkward comments than anything else.
War does horrific things to people. A reality that our country is still struggling to come to grips with; we send young boys off to fight battles, to lose their humanity when they kill other human beings. They return home with PTSD, survivor’s guilt, strung-out and self-medicating, often taking their own lives. Robert Garcia’s Unlucky Soldiers is an semi-autobiographical experience of returning home from the Vietnam War and the war within himself that rages on long past the combat “in the Nam” has ceased.
Can something be cathartic and desensitizing at the same time? In order to achieve catharsis then you must feel something but if you’re desensitized then you’re numb. Such a phenomenon is possible, as proven in the climactic and harrowing drama Time Stands Still by Donald Margulies now appearing on the Main Stage of the Fells Point Corner Theatre. Directed by Barry Feinstein, this shattering theatrical experience is a memorable masterpiece that shakes the fibers of your core beliefs,