Urbanite Hits Audiences Right Between the Eyes with Freak

SARASOTA – With high expectations set by a remarkable debut summer season, SRQ’s newest theater went back to the well in opening its fall schedule with Freak, the most recent work by up-and-coming British playwright Anna Jordan, whose award-winning Chicken Shop served as Urbanite’s maiden production in April.

Freak is vintage Jordan, examining themes of youth, sexuality and the various relationships of power and leverage within each. The 90-minute, one-act tour de force plays like a high-speed car chase despite featuring only two actors occupying a single set, while remaining unaware of the other’s presence until the final third of the play.

Freak tells the story of Leah and Georgie, whose intersecting stories contrast the fleeting innocence of youth with dark and desperate despair. Leah is 15 and racing into adulthood and sexuality at a frightening pace. Georgie, 30, is a bona fide mess, though only a few fateful choices removed from Leah’s tender station in life.

Former Booker VPA and current SCF film student Ellie McCaw dazzles as Leah, managing to convey the young girl’s vulnerability with startling authenticity. We also get to see the Urbanite debut of one of the theater’s co-founders, Summer Dawn Wallace, who has been absent from local stages since finishing her master’s at the FSU Asolo Conservatory for Actor Training in 2012.

Wallace, who is barely recognizable sans her blonde locks, gives a haunting turn as the fractured Georgie. In fact, Wallace’s affecting performance is at times so riveting that it makes for difficult viewing during the more tormented scenes, such as when her character so vividly describes a sexual assault that one might leave the theater half-mistaking they’d witnessed it on the stage. Her other depictions of various events throughout the play add significant depth, very nearly creating an illusion that there have been more than two actors in the production.

Ellie McCaw and Summer Dawn Wallace. Photo by Cliff Roles.

Director V. Craig Heidenreich, a seasoned theater veteran and co-founder of the Banyan Theater in Sarasota, effectively exploits the considerable chemistry between McCaw and Wallace and the effect is a tight, drum-beat rhythm that keeps the play hopping at a brisk pace, especially considering that the first two-thirds or so consists entirely of monologues. This is progressive theater well-executed.

Urbanite has managed still another expert configuration of their small space and the production benefits considerably from a stylish, artistically-designed set by Kirk Hughes, as well as Becki Leigh's perfectly-chosen costumes and a backlit glow from lighting director Ryan Finzelber. Freak is a raw and powerful play that gets its due in this worthy and well-honed production. It runs through November 15. Visit Urbanite’s website for more information.