This time last year, I was working my way through the (digital) stack of original plays submitted to our inaugural “New Year, New Play” Sunday Salon. When I got to the title page of Jim Moran’s Fangs, I thought, “Vampires? Werewolves?” But what I read was something very different — delightful, even. We gave Fangs a developmental reading in January and were thrilled to learn it would receive full production at Eclectic Theater and would even feature two of the actors from our reading –Samantha Routh and Shane Regan — albeit in different roles. Fast forward to last night, when Joseph and I attended its opening.
One thing I appreciate in Fangs is Jim’s excellence at crafting simple, inherently comedic characters — ably balancing text and space so the actors can really crack them open — with a more subtle approach to humor that yields the biggest laughs… every time. In this production, Ashley Bagwell takes the already wonderfully quirky character of Ed and develops him with such a fullness of presence and action that it’s hard not to walk away without feeling that this smaller role actually anchors the entire show. And Shane Regan takes Toby from his unassuming, uptight beginnings through a complete unraveling that… you should see for yourself. Jim has less success with the other characters, whose banter or attitudes are “trying” to be witty or funny, and through them we feel the playwright trying a bit too hard: these larger characters, ironically, become reduced in such a way that they never transcend caricature. That said, while Joseph and I have endured many a “funny” play of late that delivered few real laughs at all from anyone other than friends/family of the production, Jim’s Fangs succeeded in making us laugh a lot. The character of Ed alone — LMFAO!!!
Want to support new work by local playwrights in a vibrant community of development? Check out Fangs. Want the old-school, small theatre culture legacy of Capitol Hill to survive the neighborhood — and artistic — gentrification? Get out and support Eclectic and the other orgs hanging onto their real estate by the skin of their teeth.
