The Justice

Writer Samuel Zelitch '08 took the title of his parody production of The Siegel from a Chekov work titled The Seagul. Zelitch's play concerned the life of J.D Salinger's wife and her tawdry affairs. The show mocked Hollywood culture and mass-media fads. Actors delighted audiences by adopting their characters before the curtain went up. David Sheppard-Brick/the Justice.

The Free Play Theatre Cooperative presents "The Siegel!"

Not laughing at this wacky, yet profoundly satirical title? Then you should've seen all of the zany shenanigans that occurred onstage at the Shapiro Campus Center Theater this past weekend. The Siegel, according to the program is "a ridicule," or, for the uninitiated, a parody. The story is about the elusive yet extraordinarily famous writer J.D. Salinger just after he releases the much-anticipated seventh installment to his Holden Caulfield series. Salinger himself does not appear for most of the play, but remains the source of conflict among the characters. The lives of a pompous Hollywood producer, Salinger's promiscuous wife, a clingy outsider and a vampy wanna-be actress collide in a superficial web of Californication, intricately spun by a phantom celebrity.

As if there was any danger that the audience would misinterpret the play as anything other than a parody, the actors assume the role of their peculiar characters even before the play begins Samuel Zelitch '09 walked among the audience as Vincent, a portentous Hollywood producer, fat with his father's inheritance and repulsed by the common folk. Had I only stayed for his pre-play antics and not seen the actual performance, I would have guessed that his role in the play was that of a socially disinclined robot from 1896 who accidentally managed to time-travel to 2007. As if in a daze, he shuffled over to where I was sitting, sporting a fake moustache and scarf, stared at me for three seconds and asked to see my program. "Is…Is…this play "The Segull" by Anton Chekhov?" I told him that he was mistaken, that this play was "The Siegel," a ridicule. "Wh…wh…what? I think that you are wrong," he proceeded, "I paid $80 for these sea-what's a ridicule?" I explained that I wasn't sure, but I think that it meant that it was a parody on something. "Ahh…(pointing to the name Samuel Zelitch on the program) who's that!? How do you pronounce….this…name? There's too many consonants in a row, it's ridiculous!" I tried my best to pronounce his name correctly, and with that, he thrust the program back to me and walked off, in the pursuit of dazzling another audience member.

Continued...

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