Rep Lab

Each year, the Milwaukee Rep’s Emerging Professional Resident ensemble creates a show to highlight the talents of its artists. However, for the 9th annual Rep Lab, as it is called, the 2018/19 EPRs chose something entirely different. Instead of offering a half dozen or so new short plays, the group chose to stage an entirely original production.

The change took the young artists into the worlds of dance, video art and individual performance. The theme was: “What does it mean to you to be an American in 2019?” The show worked – sort of – although it also was a bit of a letdown after the successful format of the previous Rep Labs.

The production began with an interpretive dance, in which the students began by washing themselves as one would as if in the shower. Ready for the day, they formed tableaus and created concentric circles. Holding hands, they bobbed and weaved among each other. To this reviewer, the dance may have represented the actors’ Milwaukee journey as an opening chapter in their careers (the program draws actors from around the country, including California to New York, Ohio and Utah).

In any case, the Rep Lab is sort of a public goodbye for the months these young artists have spent studying acting, performing small parts in mainstage productions, and understudying some of the productions’ major roles. The performance offers cryptic (and sometimes outlandish) commentary on subjects ranging from women’s biological freedom and sexual harassment, to politics and living the American Dream.

In one of the earlier segments, a woman pretends to be an infant while another woman taps on a computer tablet. The “baby” is given a ball and plays happily. The first woman hands the baby a computer tablet and takes away the ball. The baby is also happy with the tablet. Suddenly, all the other actors, dressed in baby clothes, cute bonnets and diapers, come out and surround the baby. They start to run in a circle around the baby. Eventually, the other actors don masks that look like computer tablets. The effect is comical but effective. What are the risks of bringing mere babies into the computer age? At the end of the piece, even the “baby” is wearing a blank computer mask instead of a face. Is this the consequence of delivering “designer babies?,” one might ask.

The consistently funniest segment was a game show spoof called “Living Insecurity.” A smarmy, red-suited host was charged with the initial task of eliminating opponents. Once the contestant pool was trimmed to one pair of men and one pair of women, the host began asking a series of questions. If both teams got the correct answer, the men received 100 points while the women got 78 points (to illustrate the gender wage gap, apparently). The men, whose team eventually won, weren’t done with the game yet. The host declared that the winner would be the contestant who killed his opponent. Although the men seemed hesitant at first to begin, it didn’t take long before the frenzied atmosphere brought out their violent tendencies.

Interspersed between “acts” were brief monologues in which each actor spoke of their growing up experiences and their ties to family. A bit of audience participation made it into the line-up, as well.