THEATER REVIEW: Vigil @ Lantern Theater Co.

Vigil's only characters, a sexually stifled middle-aged banker and his aunt on death's door, waltz through the onslaught of rants and quirky monologues that take up most of Lantern Theater Co.'s two-hour production.

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THEATER REVIEW: Vigil @ Lantern Theater Co.

POSTED: Friday, June 3, 2011, 1:00 PM

Leonard C. Haas as Kemp and Ceal Phelan as Grace in Lantern Theater Company's production of Vigil (2011). Photo by (Mark Garvin)

A painful reminder of the gloriousness of life

With a smirk and a nod, the lights dimmed on what was a fitting end to a masterful retelling of life in its purest form — through the eyes of the beholder. Vigil’s only characters, a sexually stifled middle-aged banker and his aunt on her death bed, waltz through the onslaught of rants and quirky monologues that take up most of Lantern Theater Co.'s production.

For two hours, Vigil's main character (Leonard C. Haas) tends to his aunt whom he believes to be dying, dousing her with an ample supply of butterscotch pudding and tragic accounts of his dismal childhood. Throughout the nephew's tales of neglect, his aunt speaks mostly with her eyes, save for a few whimsical utterances at key moments. Aside from the nephew's revealing dialogue, what's really striking is his body language. Through animated jeers and jerks, the pain built up over a lifetime of bottled-up resentment comes through crystal clear, adding to and unbuckling the layers of the plot.

The play keeps the audience guessing, embedding subtle hints about the nephew’s past in seemingly innocuous sections of dialogue — like when the nephew recalls his father’s suicide right after telling his aunt about how his mother shipped him to a Catholic school because "all the queers grow up to be priests anyway.”

At play's end, once secrets are revealed and dust settles, it becomes clear that all the words had been said that needed to be said.

Vigil runs through June 12 at Lantern Theater Co.

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