Morris Panych’s Vigil is a curious little play–a dark comedy that’s equally enamored of existential panic and pop-you-in-the-jaw punchlines. Imagine Harold Pinter writing for Saturday Night Live and you’ll have some idea of Panych’s tone. Next Act Theatre’s production opened this weekend.
Instead of Pinter’s characteristic “pauses,” Panych gives us blackouts, lots of them, especially in the early scenes, when we meet the dying Grace (Ruth Schudson) and her nephew Kemp (Mark Ulrich), who arrives to see her through her last days, and nab his long-coveted inheritance. In quick succession, we see vignettes suggesting that Kemp is not a pleasant fellow at all. It seems like each scene, in fact, ends with a variation on the same theme: “Aren’t you dead yet?”
As life lingers on, we get to know Kemp a little better, even as Grace remains a mute mystery (she spends most of the play in bed, silent). He’s had a hard life, this guy, bereft of love and filled with various rejections, and he’s grown into a world-class misanthrope. That’s the polarity of the play—a seemingly pleasant woman who clings with dignity to life as it wanes, and an ill-adjusted human specimen who would just as soon shut the world out.
There are surprises along the way, of course. And director Mary MacDonald Kerr finds the humor and sweetness in Vigil as it moves through its paces. Ruth Schudson has a beatific stillness that is perfect for the role, creating a warm glow in the center of the story. Mark Ulrich is faced with one of the most challenging roles imaginable—a cartoonishly hateful man who must somehow gain the audience’s interest and sympathy. The timing and tone is there, but he sometimes seems to work too hard. He could use a measure of Schudson’s stillness to get at the deeper resonances of his character.
There are still rewards in Vigil, including a doubletake development that ends with a satisfying sense of reflection and hope. In fact, as the lights go down for the last time, you may find yourself wanting to spend a little more time with Kemp. Imagine that.
