A few months ago, I was talking to my mother and I must have mumbled something strangely because all of a sudden she turned to me wide-eyed and exclaimed “What are you?” It made me laugh at the time, because it made no sense. But I found myself thinking differently about the incident last night watching Adam Bock’s The Typographer’s Dream at Portland Center Stage, as Annalise the Geographer, Margaret the Typographer, and Dave the Stenographer struggled to explain who they are through the veil of what they are, or more accurately what they do.
The Typographer’s Dream is presented as a sort of panel discussion (with a few asides), with Annalise (Laura Faye Smith), Margaret (Sharonlee McLean), and Dave (Kelsey Tyler) each there to discuss their jobs. The play is about identity — how we define ourselves, how we see ourselves versus how others see us, and how well (or how ill) we feel those definitions fit us. The characters are all both very passionate and somewhat disillusioned with their careers and, by extension, with themselves. They strive to explain what it is about their jobs that is so meaningful, what drew them to those careers in the first place. Annalise is always running out of the room for visual aids, Dave fixates on the act of typing, and when Margaret finally gets the room’s attention she has trouble figuring out what she wants to say. It’s funny, at times very funny, and also sad.
Smith, McLean, and Tyler are all excellent, creating characters that we can all identify with, even if we don’t want to admit it: Dave, with his willful blindness; Annalise, who can see everyone else’s problems so clearly; and Margaret, who just…wants…things…in…order. Until she can’t take it anymore and very slowly, very deliberately pushes a glass off of the table, freeing them all from the burden of keeping up appearances and allowing them to start exploring the who.
I loved how director Rose Riordan staged the show. The panel discussion format, with the lights up most of the time, means the audience plays a double role — as the audience for the play and as the audience for the panel. It was like we were there to learn about people and their jobs, and through that reflect about how our own jobs define us, whether we want them to or not. There were times when it got very personal, and I felt like I was eavesdropping on a moment or conversation I shouldn’t really have been seeing.
To me, The Typographer’s Dream was about learning to articulate that one thing that means everything to you, like the idea of pressing letters onto acid-free paper using high-quality ink. Even if it means nothing to anyone else. Even if it sounds silly when you say it aloud.
I started this blog to try to articulate my one small thing. What’s yours?
I'd Rather Be at the Theatre 