Terry (Bill Bowers) and Mona (Esther Williamson) en route to a gig in Peter Sinn Nachtrieb’s The Making of a Great Moment.
The Making of a Great Moment is, at least the press release implies, supposed to be about a cross-country bike trip. But it turns out that Peter Sinn Nachtrieb’s play at Urban Stages is mostly about other things. Maybe even calling it a “play” isn’t quite right; it’s closer to performance art, or an actors’ exercise, a chance for Bill Bowers and Esther Williamson to try on a closetful of identities, all the while philosophizing about the meaning of art, the meaning of life, the value of performing. Which they attack with great enthusiasm, at times making you forget the banality of much of the material. Is The Making of a Great Moment interesting? Sometimes. But it lacks discipline.
Terry and Mona in Great Moments in Human Achievement.
At first, it’s not clear where we are, or what these two argumentative people are doing. Terry (Bowers) and Mona (Williamson) are obsessing over an uncooperative light switch, which turns out to power the only light in a small black-box theater in a New Hampshire nursing home, where the pair are performing Great Moments in Human Achievement. Their magnum opus, it goes on for four hours; fortunately, we don’t have to sit through all of it. But we do witness a healthy sampling of such Great Moments, from the invention of the wheel to the dawns of farming, science, and religion.
These should be fun, and they do allow Bowers and Williamson to run through a variety of accents. But Nachtrieb’s writing is kind of flat, and if he’s trying to persuade us that this is a terrible play, he succeeds all too well with too many examples of it. We want to escape the Great Moments and know more about Terry and Mona, and rest assured, we will.
“The theatrical dishing might be the most fun for the listener, and Williamson makes an utterly convincing theater geek.”
Both Terry and Mona hail from the Victoria, Canada, theatrical community, and for Terry, a fiftyish actor, Great Moments in Human Achievement is his 407th play. “Oh, Bill Bowers is wonderful,” somebody enthused in the lobby, and maybe he is. But Terry is at best a two-dimensional, unlikable scold, and listening to him rant, complain, and sulk, one can easily grow as impatient with him as Mona does. Both are on a tour-by-bicycle of lesser theatrical outlets in New England, arranged by their penny-pinching producer, and Mona is by far the more enthusiastic, the more philosophical, and the more enterprising when disaster strikes, and it does. It’s their first time in the States; very little is made of that. Nor does Nachtrieb answer some fundamental questions, such as: How the heck do they keep their phones charged, biking 62 miles at a time through nowhere?
The humor is, how does one put it, Canadian, which is to say it’s dry, it’s understated, and it was funnier on the Canadian theater series Slings & Arrows. Terry and Mona do get into some lively debates on ad-libs, cast parties, and Schadenfreude when others’ plays get panned (one review summary: “Judith is miscast. Lucas is overacting. The sound design is racist”). The theatrical dishing might be the most fun for the listener, and Williamson makes an utterly convincing theater geek, someone who gave up family, love, and prosperity to chase the dream of making a difference through dramatic art. But she’s not going to make much of a difference if this is the dramatic art she’s peddling.
Terry extols Mona, which doesn’t happen too often in Great Moments. Photographs by Andrew Greto.
Lines that read funny on the page don’t necessarily come out that way. Maybe it’s James Barry’s go-for-broke direction, with much talking over each other; or that Bowers and Williamson, who ought to have at least a little chemistry together, don’t. Matt Whiton’s set is utilitarian, and he has contributed some quite lovely projections of the country roads Terry and Mona have to traverse. But they traverse them on bicycles affixed to bike stands, and the obstacles they call out to each other—“Carback!” “Gravel!” “Glass!”—don’t show up, forcing more suspension of disbelief. Mona changes a tire right before our boggled eyes, and the solution Terry comes up with to get their incapacitated bikes moving, if not exactly credible, is inventive and enjoyable. Among the Great Moments presented, one speculating on the evolution of the kiss is especially amusing.
Some excellent lighting (John Salutz) and resourceful, non-racist sound design (Tom Shread) help the audience muddle through, and whatever Bowers and Williamson do next, it’ll probably be worth seeing. But The Making of a Great Moment could use more great moments, and fewer Great Moments. The invention of metallurgy? Really?
The Urban Stages production of The Making of a Great Moment runs through Oct. 29 at Urban Stages (259 W. 30th St.). Evening performances are Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday at 7 p.m.; matinees are Saturday and Sunday at 3 p.m. For tickets and more information, visit urbanstages.org.
Direction: James Barry
Set: Matt Whiton
Costumes: Charles Schoonmaker
Lighting: John Salutz
Sound: Tom Shread
