Company One’s “Hype Man” Exceeds the Hype

November 11, 2019November 12, 2019 michaelhobanLeave a comment

(Kadahj Bennett, Michael Knowlton, and Rachel Cognata in Company One’s ‘Hype Man’ – Photo by Paul Fox)

by Mike Hoban

“HYPE MAN: A Break Beat Play” – Written by Idris Goodwin; Directed by Shawn LaCount; Music Direction by Kadahj Bennett; Sound Design by Lee Schuna; Lighting Design by Jen Rock; Costume Design by Cassandra Cacoq. Originally resented by Company One at the Boston Center for the Arts, Plaza Theatre, 539 Tremont Street, South End, Boston through February 24, 2018. Limited Return Engagement at Oberon, 2 Arrow St., Cambridge November 14-16, 2019 https://companyone.org/production/hype-man-limited-return-engagement/

You don’t have to be a fan of hip-hop to appreciate Company One’s illuminating production of Idris Goodwin’s HYPE MAN: A Break Beat Play, now receiving its world premiere at the Boston Center for Arts. Not only is it one of the best new plays in years, it’s one of the best plays of the 2017-2018 season, period. HYPE MAN takes the age-old dilemma that many artists face, namely, where to draw the line between maintaining artistic integrity and personal beliefs versus chasing fame and fortune, and further juices the story by injecting one of the most politically charged issues facing America today – the shooting of unarmed people of color by police officers.

Morgan Maslow on ‘Vietgone,’ “You Don’t Have to go Crazy”

May 19, 2019May 19, 2019 michaelhobanLeave a comment

Morgan Maslow discusses “Vietgone” in this video review.

On Instagram @theatermirror YouTube: Theater Mirror

Full review embedded in the YouTube link below.

“Vietgone” – Written by Qui Nguyen. Michelle Aguillon, Director. Presented by Company One at the BCA Plaza Theatre, 539 Tremont St., Boston through May 25.

Audience member, Morgan Maslow discusses “Vietgone” in this video review, stating that the actors and producers are “trying really hard to make it good” and “it’s hard to put yourself out there.”

While recognizing that this romantic comedy about two people who meet in a refugee camp is “a very personal story,” Maslow feels that the rap songs don’t “give you too much insight into what the characters are feeling.”

“There’s not a plethora of Asian stories,” Maslow elucidates. “You don’t have to go crazy. You don’t have to put rap in it. You don’t have to have this narrative device where it goes back and forth through time. You can tell a simple story. And because it’s personal and it’s unique, it’s going to stand out and it’s going to be important.”

Company One’s ‘Vietgone’: Stereotype-busting Superheroes

May 8, 2019May 8, 2019 michaelhobanLeave a comment

(Quentin Nguyen-Duy and Rob Chen in Company One’s ‘Vietgone’ – Photo by Paul Fox)

by Linda Chin

“Vietgone” – Written by Qui Nguyen. Michelle Aguillon, Director; Kadahj Bennett, Music Director; Misha Shields, Choreographer; Jessie Baxter, Dramaturg; Jasmine Brooks, Assistant Director; Jessica Scout Malone; Assistant Dramaturg & Intimacy Coach; Izmir Ickbal, Scenic & Projections Designer; Debra Kim Sivigny, Costume Designer; Jennifer Fok, Lighting Designer; Aubrey Dube, Sound Designer; Kelly Smith, Properties Designer; Nate DeMare, Technical Director; Jadira Figueroa, Assistant Stage Manager. Presented by Company One at the BCA Black Box Theater, 539 Tremont St., Boston in partnership with Pao Art Center through May 25.

Once upon a time shortly after the fall of Saigon in 1975, a strong and handsome 30-year old Vietnamese man named Quang and a strong and beautiful 30-year old Vietnamese woman named Tong fled their war-torn country and journeyed over 8000 miles to a land in the “middle of nowhere” called Arkansas, crossing paths for the very first time at a relocation center for evacuees. Except for their respective travel companions-turned-bunkmates (Quang’s best bud Nhan and Tong’s martyr-ish mom Huong) everything and everyone seemed foreign. Even though the meals included “too much meat” and the environs were not as “super nice” as “what was advertised” they came to accept that navigating and adapting to unfamiliar territory was part of their journey. For refugees, however, the stress-inducing immigration and assimilation processes are compounded by traumatic memories of violence, persecution and what they left behind. Tong, Huong, and Nhan are determined to give it a go but Quang, devastated about losing his family and country and wary of Americans’ negative attitudes towards “refugees who look like me/peeps reminding them of their enemy,” is determined to get home.

Theater Mirror’s Linda Chin Previews Company One’s ‘Vietgone’

April 20, 2019April 20, 2019 michaelhobanLeave a comment

(Christina Mei Chen, Quentin Nguyen-duy and Rob Chen will be in “Vietgone” at Company One, from April 26 to May 26. (Image courtesy of Andrew James Wang.)

by Linda Chin

Greater Boston theater audiences – time to buckle your seat belts and get ready for a rollicking ride across 1970s America. In collaboration with the Pao Arts Center, Company One Theatre’s Vietgone by Marvel Studios writer Qui Nguyen opens April 26, and knowing the team of authentic artists involved, they will tell their truths and touch our hearts. Set in and around the fall of Saigon in 1975 the subject matter is serious, but with the playwright’s irrepressible and irreverent style promises to be a hilarious road trip.

Asian Stories, Artists Finding Home on Stages of Greater Boston

February 23, 2019February 25, 2019 michaelhobanLeave a comment

(First Read-Through for Company One’s *Vietgone)*

By Linda Chin

Lunar New Year 2019 brings good fortune to Greater Boston theatergoers hungry for stories about Asian culture, and the growing pool of talented and experienced theater artists of Asian heritage. To those producers/artistic directors creating these opportunities on professional stages, a simple xie xie (thank you, e.g. when someone passes you the salt at dinner) isn’t a big enough expression of gratitude.

ART/Company One’s ‘Miss You Like Hell’ a Musical Latina Road Trip

January 16, 2019January 20, 2019 michaelhobanLeave a comment

by Mike Hoban

‘Miss You Like Hell’ – Book & Lyrics by Quiara Alegría Hudes; Music & Lyrics by Erin McKeown; Directed by Summer L. Williams; Music Director: David Coleman; Scenic Designer: Erik D. Diaz; Costume Designer: Danielle Domingue Sumi; Lighting Designer: Justin Paice; Sound Designer: Rachel Neubauer. Co-produced with American Repertory Theater as part of the A.R.T. Breakout Series at Oberon, 3 Arrow St. Cambridge through January 27.

Company One and the A.R.T. couldn’t have picked a better time to stage Miss You Like Hell, a mother-daughter road trip musical by Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Quiara Alegria Hudes (who also wrote the book for the Tony Award-winning In the Heights) and singer-songwriter Erin McKeown. With the anti-immigrant rhetoric being spewed on a seemingly daily basis throughout the midterms and into the New Year by the president and his supporters, the plight of the undocumented in this country is top of mind for many – and front and center of this flawed but entertaining work.

Company One’s ‘Really’ a Painfully Brilliant Work of Art

February 17, 2017February 26, 2017 michaelhobanLeave a comment

Rachel Cognata and Kippy Goldfarb in REALLY (photo by Paul Fox)

Really – Written by Jackie Sibblies Drury; Directed by Shawn LaCount; Costume Design by Amanda Mujica; Lighting Design by Jason Fok Scenic & Properties Design by Ben Lieberson; Sound Design by Lee Schuna. Presented by Company One Theatre in Partnership with Matter & Light Fine Art, a gallery in SoWa, 450 Harrison Ave., Boston through March 12.

There’s a touchingly beautiful song by Jackson Browne called “Fountain of Sorrow,” which begins with the songwriter stumbling across some photographs of an old girlfriend and remembering what their time together was like. In the song, he’s struck by one of the pictures of her that he knows she may not have liked as much as the others, but that showed her “true” spirit, including a “a trace of sorrow in (her) eyes” – that forces him to realize “what I was seeing wasn’t what was happening at all” in the relationship.