CRAIG WALLACE DALE
From left, Deborah Hedwall, Annette Hammond, Taylor Graves, Matthew Lawler and Jon Krupp co-star in “Circle Mirror Transformation,” which is at the Mile Square Theatre in Hoboken through July 2.
In a scene from the play “Circle Mirror Transformation,” four acting students and their teacher lie on the floor at the community center of their small Vermont town. One calls out “one,” another one calls out “two” and so on, until they get to 10.
They don’t take turns in a pre-set order or at a pre-set pace, so that sometimes, two people call out the next number at the same time. When that happens, they have to start again at “one.”
“I don’t get what the point is,” says the youngest in the group, Lauren (played by Annette Hammond).
The point, her teacher Marty (Deborah Hedwall) says, is to learn how to be present in the moment, and not second guess yourself.
“I want to know how to become a good actress,” says Lauren.
“That is how you become a good actress,” responds Marty.
Annie Baker’s Obie-winning play, currently being presented by Hoboken’s Mile Square Theatre in its first production at its new space at Clinton and 14th streets, is indeed about the mysterious process of transformation. Being present in the moment and taking your artistry to the next level involves honesty, and — as in the musical, “A Chorus Line” — coming to terms with uncomfortable truths about yourself.
Lauren and classmates Theresa (Taylor Graves), Schultz (Matthew Lawler) and James (Jon Krupp), who is Marty’s husband, may have signed up to learn something new — and, in the case of Theresa and Schultz (both recently split from their significant others), meet some new people. But they get a lot more than they bargained for.
(Note: Just as one spouse should never psychoanalyze the other, one should never teach the other acting. As Marty and James eventually learn, nothing good can come of that.)
The set is realistically plain — just a big, empty room, really, with a mirror on the wall and a fan in the corner. Theater-goers might suspect they have stumbled onto the theater’s rehearsal room, not its main stage. And the costuming is even plainer, though it seemed odd — and a bit distracting — that even though the action takes place in various classes over a couple of months, the actors wear the same clothes in every scene.
Still, the production bodes well for Mile Square Theatre’s future. “Circle Mirror Transformation” is a little gem of a play — amusing at times and moving at others — and the actors, under the direction of Chris O’Connor (also Mile Square’s artistic director), do it justice, letting its themes emerge slowly and, sometimes, surprisingly. It’s a sophisticated play, though not in a heavy-handed way — just the kind of thing that should appeal to the culture-loving residents of New York’s unofficial sixth borough.
“Circle Mirror Transformation” is at the Mile Square Theatre through July 2; visit milesquaretheatre.org.
