Natalie Palamides plays Mark, here having his meet-cute with Christine, orange juice in hand, in her solo show Weer.
Relationships are hard—even moreso when you’re working from the literal points of view of both parties. In writer/director/performer Natalie Palamides’ Weer, love takes a dangerous—if a bit weird—turn while jumping through time across the entire lifespan of one couple’s wild relationship. Making its début at the Cherry Lane Theatre, newly reopened under the acclaimed independent film studio A24, the play arrives after a successful run in London.
Christine refuses to have a New Year’s kiss with Mark.
Inside the Cherry Lane, it’s New Year’s Eve 1999, and amid the festivities storm in couple Mark and Christine. This may sound like a typical start to a play, save for one detail: the two characters are portrayed onstage by Palamides herself, who appears literally halved as each character in costume. Palamides soon sets up the couple’s dynamic, literally switching sides as they get into a disagreement about an inebriated Christine driving out in the woods alone. The two toss and haggle with the keys with the help of an audience member named Sarah as a fellow partygoer (“Sarah!” exclaims an exasperated Mark, who tosses the keys back to the participant for safekeeping).
But Christine gets them and heads out in the car; she eventually crashes into a deer on the road. Mark rushes (or as much as one who is a literal half of a person can rush) to her side, and as Christine begins to fade, the two look back on various moments of their relationship three years earlier—from first meet-cute to first fight and everything in between.
There is an important element at play in Weer: Palamides’s background in clowning, which has resulted in a knack for physical comedy and improvisation, causing delightful chaos across the stage. Much of the comedian’s physicality is due to Ashley Dudek’s clever sartorial patchwork of costumes, with Palamides not-so-gracefully switching from Mark and Christine’s meet-cute outfits of a suit and trenchcoat into attire fit for a nightclub, where they have their next meeting and their relationship blossoms.
Palamides’s every move as the two characters is comedically heightened by Gabriel Evansohn and Lucas A. Degirolamo’s scenic and prop designs, respectively, with strings pulled at strategic moments to reveal props and set pieces that serve as the punch line to various visual gags—all to much hilarious effect. Other props—and even water (the first couple of rows are designated splash zones and as such, members of the audience are given rain ponchos)—are strewn about, and by the play’s end, both the stage and Palamides herself have been put through the wringer.
Working without any script, Palamides delivers off-the-cuff dialogue in a rapid-fire flurry of romantic comedy references one minute and monosyllabic millennial upspeak the next: upon their meet-cute colliding into each other with Starbucks orange juice in hand, Mark brings Christine over to his apartment and asks her, “Y’know that neighborhood, what’s it called? Notting Hill?”
Palamides tackles the onstage set-up in Mark’s apartment. Photographs by Cherry Lane Theatre/A24.
Also helping to shape and fill out Mark and Christine’s love story are further instances of audience participation. Crossing paths at the club, the two would-be lovebirds enlist two attendees as their respective wingman and wingwoman, who awkwardly get together as Mark and Christine get to know each other on the dance floor (Mark to Christine: “Look at them, there’s so much sexual tension”).
Further along in Mark and Christine’s relationship, they get into a lovers’ quarrel, wherein Mark's fidelity is questioned. Several female audience members leave salacious voicemail messages, with Palamides riffing off each message as the couple. A phone call from a man in the audience as Christine’s ex shows she’s not quite the innocent party: “You know I still love you,” her ex proclaims on a mike discreetly handed to him just moments prior.
As a whole, Weer offers up the chance not only to take in a fresh vantage point on the romantic comedy genre, but also to take in the talents of a performer to watch. The stamina and comedic “danger” required to keep up the task of playing two literal halves of a couple, one might argue, is a seemingly impossible feat. However, Palamides manages to keep the antics going and the laughs coming as well.
Natalie Palomides’s Weer runs through Nov. 9 at the Cherry Lane Theatre (38 Commerce St.). Performances are at 8 p.m. Tuesday through Thursday, at 9:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday, and at 6 p.m. on Sunday. Tickets are available by visiting cherrylanetheatre.org.
Writer & Director: Natalie Palamides
Scenic Design: Gabriel Evansohn
Costume Design: Ashley Dudek
Lighting Design: Paige Seber
