Resolutions to Keep

One-act plays, music and stand-up comedy at the P.S. Collective
By David Williams
The postage stamp-sized stage of the postcard-sized P.S. Collective will host a moveable feast of one-act plays, music and stand-up comedy this weekend as Andrew McGreevy assembles a fine troupe of performers for his production of an original, collaborative work, “Resolutions: A Culture Buffet.”

P.S. Collective owner Amy Ryan is glad to host this throwback to cabaret days as she beams with enthusiasm about her vision regarding the role of artists in the revitalization of the increasingly trendy Benson neighborhood once known more for thrift stores and dive bars than as a weekend destination. The smallish size of the space works to everyone’s advantage, she explains, as “this is an intimate venue where audiences can have a very personal experience with the artists.”

A half-dozen short plays written by Nora Vetter and Geoffrey Stienblock are performed by a young and attractive cast as themes of life, love and longing take to the stage in this very clever and funny show.

In “Car Wash,” Darrick Silkman shines as, of all things, a gas pump. Imagine those “talking” gas pumps that play commercials while you fill your tank, take it to a new level of “sentient being-ness,” and we are left with one hilariously manic, moralizing man-machine that taunts customers in one moment only to caress them in the next.

Silkman returns in “Penis Dialogues,” where he and McGreevy play “Average Joe” men on a fishing trip where moonlit “guy-talk” raises the specter of latent homosexuality, which burns like the glowing embers of their campfire.

Oh, did I mention that this adult-themed show is definitely not one for the kiddies?

But it is the tender, bittersweet “Timing” that really made me sit up in my chair as Rachel Lien and Todd Zimbleman flex their dramatic acting muscles in a touching tale of lost love and the difficulties involved in “just staying friends.”

“It’s All in Your Head” finds us in a coffee shop to witness a flirtation between Jenny Lassley (she of the coquettish smile) and the rubber-faced Chris Harris (he of the Napoleon Complex…as in Dynamite, not Bonaparte). Writer Nora Vetter has crafted a very smart piece where we, the audience, are allowed into the heads of the two would-be lovers. The actors speak no lines, but we can hear their “thought bubbles” as delivered by offstage voices when a rather awkward, yet familiar mating ritual is played out in pantomime to great comedic effect.

Each performance kicks off with the music of Ricky Hernandez (guitar) and Kaitlyn Filippini (violin). Comedians Matt Gieler (Friday only) and Alisha Pagali (Saturday only) warm us up for the one-act plays and each evening concludes with still more music from Adam Weaver and the Ghosts.

Witty writing populated with intelligent references to pop culture, versatile acting and guffaws galore left this writer anxious to see more from this talented band of emerging performers.

An old adage says something like “May your woes expire before your New Year’s resolutions do.” The laughs in “Resolutions: A Culture Buffet” are sure to give new legs to that optimistic dream.

Lion Queen

Cancel that missing persons report…Nora Vetter found alive and safe
By David Williams
If you haven’t seen her around town in the past couple of months, you’ve merely been looking in all the wrong places. I can just imagine the missing persons detective mulling this one over. “Piece of cake…Nora Vetter, the actor, director and emerging playwright… check the stages of Omaha” he’d chuckle, and the case would be brought to a quick end.

While juggling no less than three other stage commitments of her own and appearing in two TV ads for auto dealerships during a recent five-week time span, Vetter also worked as a dresser in the “The Lion King” for, among other characters, those gangly giraffes that loped across the stage in what may be remembered as the biggest event in Omaha theater history.

Dressing the giraffes, some of the more striking and crowd-pleasing of costumes in a show rife with one stunningly garbed character after another, was a major production of its own, Vetter said in a recent interview.

“First came the padding, then the costume shell and gloves before I’d position the ladder,” Vetter explains. That’s right. The ladder. A rather ordinary six-foot stepladder gave the actor the elevated perch required for the strapping on of the awkward arm and leg stilts that allowed the giraffes to tower above it all and execute that laconic locomotion that so captured the imagination. The same ritual was repeated in reverse to undress the character, but only after Vetter gingerly guided the back-peddling actor’s tush to the proper position on the ladder.

She also assisted in “swing training,” the pre-show practices where an actor who was learning the character would take their first baby steps in the strange giraffe contraption.

“The swings gave me a real appreciation for the actor’s skill when I saw firsthand how difficult it is to learn to walk naturally in that thing,” she explained.

The giraffes, Vetter happily reports, came off without a hitch, but she recalled a “nail biter,” as she put it, with another of her characters one night as she described the surreal scene of “chasing an eight-foot tall plant while desperately trying to fasten the last pin that held him all together” as the seconds ticked down to his cue, she said.

Working 37 straight performances of “The Lion King” on top of her day job at an advertising company may seem like a daunting task, but Vetter appears to be something of an overachiever as she tackled three other stage events going on at the same time. This column gave warm reviews for “Resolutions” at the P.S. Collective, where Vetter wrote three of the one-act plays and directed another. Complimentary notice followed on these pages for “From Shelterbelt with Love 6,” where she directed three pieces.

And then there was the Shelterbelt-sponsored reading of her new play, “Why Can’t This Be Love?” (also at the P.S. collective) that made this reviewer anxious to see it taken into production.

I sometimes ponder the future of theater in Omaha and wonder where the next wave of talent is going to come from. Then along comes the likes of Nora Vetter and all seems right with the world again.

And if she “disappears” again anytime soon, skip the missing persons report and just cast your gaze to the glare of the footlights.