by Kirby Lindsay, posted 14 February 2015
At Stone Soup Theatre, Joanna Goff Sunde directed ‘The God Of Hell’, for the consideration of modern audiences. This play, where the home of a married couple of Midwest dairy farmers becomes battleground for a symbolic fight between citizens and an agent of their government, resonates most strongly when examined alongside today’s hot topics – corporate greed, government secrecy, political apathy, political fascism disguised as patriotism, and the (ab)use of torture tactics.
From February 20th – March 14th, audiences can see this uproariously provocative farce, as hilarious as it is sobering, performed by the considerably talented cast of Maureen Miko, Gianni Truzzi, Keith Dahlgren, and Edwin Scheibner – in a play written by Sam Shepard, one of America’s most celebrated, award-winning dramatists.
‘A Version Of Reality’
While he has authored nearly 50 plays, “the thing about this Sam Shepard,” Goff-Sunde explained about ‘God Of Hell’, “it’s very pared down. There are no long monologues. This is a political allegory.”
Goff-Sunde refers to the play as “drop dead funny,” where the dumbness and blindness of the main characters creates comedy and pathos at the same time. “They are completely dense,” she observed, “you want to laugh at them, and you want to shake them.” As she explained, “one way to establish empathy is to allow the audience to laugh.”
Often known for plays about loners of the American West, ‘God Of Hell’ will strike many as a departure for Shepard – particularly in the hands of director Goff-Sunde. “For this one, I took my cues from presentational theater,” she said, “It presents a version of reality – as if it’s a puppet show for grown-ups.” Rather than using ‘representational’ theater, as is often the case with Shepard, with everything being realistic and “kitchen sink,” Goff-Sunde chose to direct this production of ‘God Of Hell’ based on the expressionist styles of some Eastern European playwrights, using Shepard’s own descriptions of his influences.
Shepard’s main inspiration for ‘God Of Hell’ came from the events following 9-11, and again Goff-Sunde took guidance from interviews Shepard gave in 2004 (when the play was first produced.) In the interviews, he “talks about how fired up he is about the issues,” she said, “When you cannot question and you are not allowed to question.”
“I think he is an amazing writer,” Goff-Sunde said of Shepard (a view I share whole-heartedly,) and with ‘God Of Hell’, audiences can experience the talent of the writer, seen in an unfamiliar way. “It’s a battle,” she observed of this play, “good and evil, right and wrong, sleep and awake…”
Drawing On Personal Experience
A director, actor and playwright, Goff-Sunde only has recently returned to Seattle. While she grew up in Ashland, Oregon, she studied acting in California and Minnesota, and found work for many years traveling among theaters, from Iowa to New York to California.
When she chose to settle down, she chose Portland, Oregon, where her sons were born and raised. “I chose to have children,” she stated, “and they were everything I did for fifteen years.” To support them, Goff-Sunde found her way into academia. “I fell in love with teaching!” she proclaimed.
Yet, Goff-Sunde can draw parallels between the story of ‘God Of Hell’ and experiences she had at one school where she taught. For this production, she drew on her own experiences being caught in the gears of bureaucracy and chewed up by the institutional instinct of others for money and power over art and community.
Since that experience, Goff-Sunde has continued to act and direct, and teach, and a few years ago she took classes in playwriting. She found it a challenge – nearly every other facet of theater is social, group work as opposed to the solitary activity of writing. “It takes a lot of discipline,” she acknowledged, but the effort is paying off – her play ‘The Curve Of Memory’ has been given staged readings twice, once in Ashland and once here at Theater Schmeater.
‘Theater That Makes A Difference’
With her vast, and diverse, experience of theater, Goff-Sunde has returned to Seattle for the job opportunities, “I want to do theater that makes a difference.”
Take a chance and enter the provocative, theatrical ride of ‘God Of Hell’, with all its darkly comedic and biting indictments of government fervor and blind pursuit of the American dream. Performances take place Thursdays – Sundays February 20th – March 14th, with general admission tickets priced $20 – $25 – but buy your tickets, through Brown Paper Tickets, before February 21st for only $18.
If you feel powerless, or powerful, in our current political climate, see ‘God Of Hell’ for the wake-up call it brings to effecting change in this slightly surrealistic farce!
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