{"id":5819,"date":"2013-04-21T17:50:51","date_gmt":"2013-04-22T00:50:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/forallevents.com\/reviews\/?p=5819"},"modified":"2013-04-21T17:52:32","modified_gmt":"2013-04-22T00:52:32","slug":"stuck-elevator-is-astute-musical-look-at-immigration-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/forallevents.com\/reviews\/stuck-elevator-is-astute-musical-look-at-immigration-2\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Stuck Elevator\u2019 is astute musical look at immigration"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Julius Ahn portrays Gu\u0101ng in A.C.T.\u2019s \u201cStuck Elevator.\u201d Photo: Kevin Berne.<\/p><\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

Like God with a capital G, the little-g theater gods work in mysterious ways.<\/p>\n

Or maybe it\u2019s all happenstance.<\/p>\n

Either way, A.C.T.\u2019s \u201cStuck Elevator,\u201d an insightful peek at the mental meanderings of Gu\u0101ng, an undocumented Chinese worker, coincided with the U.S. Senate beginning debate on immigration reform and feasible pathways to legalization and citizenship.<\/p>\n

The American Conservatory Theatre\u2019s world-premiere musical leans on a true story of a takeout delivery guy trapped in a Bronx elevator 81 hours.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s chiefly about fear:<\/p>\n

Rescuers might learn he has no papers, and that would lead to deportation.<\/p>\n

Gu\u0101ng frets, too, about thieves stealing the seat of his bike, a Mexican deliveryman \u201cgetting all my tips,\u201d and being fired because he\u2019s too old.<\/p>\n

Stuck Elevator,\u201d like Joseph\u2019s biblical coat of many colors, rapidly becomes a metaphor, in this case unveiling deep personal feelings of apprehension, frustration and prejudice.<\/p>\n

Its framework is a bilingual montage that conveys multi-pronged points (led by the strain of being an outsider).Thematically, the 80-minute, one-act show works incredibly well.<\/p>\n

Yet it lacks the musical power it might have had despite the commendable operatic voices of Julius Ahn as Gu\u0101ng and Marie-France Arcilla as Ming, his wife (who\u2019s also stuck \u2014 in a Nike factory in China).<\/p>\n

Because the issues are so blatant, the blandness in some of the sung-through score by Byron Au Yong and verbal redundancies by librettist Aaron Jafferis may leave audiences desiring more oomph. That\u2019s true even with the show\u2019s two dozen tunes cross-fertilizing contemplative Chinese melodies (albeit sometimes too withheld, other moments too screechy) with bouncy Latin airs and wistfully romantic refrains.<\/p>\n

Ahn, as an immigrant caught as much in his fantasies and self-limitations as he is by the shaft, gets enough stage time for a one-man performance though four supporting actors play multiple roles.In rapid succession, he thrusts his voice, body language and facial expressions into an emotional gamut: fear, sadness, joy, acceptance.<\/p>\n

But it\u2019s Joel Perez as Gu\u0101ng\u2019s co-worker, Marco, who stops the show with a\u00a0hip-hop tune.<\/p>\n

In addition, Raymond J. Lee is artfully villainous as Snakehead, the human parasite who forced Gu\u0101ng into lifelong debt by charging $120,000 to smuggle him and his nephew into this country. And Joseph Anthony Foronda is appropriately over-the-top in the drag role of the Ross\u2019 Wife and the armor-clad Elevator Monster.<\/p>\n

It takes no time for Ahn to bring home everyone\u2019s dread of elevator entrapment and claustrophobia.<\/p>\n

And it takes no time for the crowd to adjust to supertitles that alternately translate the lyrics into Chinese or English, depending on which language is being sung.<\/p>\n

Occasional bittersweet humor makes the sung-through show\u2019s earnestness more palatable \u2014 like a line referring to Gu\u0101ng\u2019s predicament being \u201cthe first time in my life I haven\u2019t had to share a room.\u201dQuirky characters that populate his past, current and future daydreams and nightmares also amuse.<\/p>\n

Gu\u0101ng sings and sings and sings \u2014 to himself, to his family, to the elevator.<\/p>\n

His mental twists and turns include, at one point, being attacked in song by a<\/p>\n

mugger, his boss\u2019 wife, his own wife \u2014 and his bladder. At another juncture, he imagines becoming so successful he can make Donald Trump deliver chicken to him.<\/p>\n

In his darkest reverie, though, he watches \u201cthe edge of mind\u2026starting to fray.\u201d<\/p>\n

His fantasies sharply vary in tone.<\/p>\n

The best one may be a sequence in which characters drum with chopsticks and then use them as utensils to poke at a carcass on a table.\u201cStuck Elevator\u201d is ably supported by Daniel Ostling\u2019s set design (with dreamlike frame and simple cage), effective projections by Kate Freer, lighting by Alexander V. Nichols that facilitates quick mood changes, and costuming by Myung Hee Cho that detail characters\u2019 socioeconomic status as it showcases flamboyant figments of Gu\u0101ng\u2019s imagination.<\/p>\n

The Bay Area, with its large blocs of new Hispanic and Asian immigrants (as well as older Italians, Russians and you-name-its), people who fled poverty and oppression, should be particularly receptive to \u201cStuck Elevator.\u201d<\/p>\n

Regular theater buffs are likely to enjoy it because it\u2019s different.<\/p>\n

Once-in-a-whilers might consider it because it\u2019s inspirational, a paean to the human spirit.<\/p>\n

\u201cStuck Elevator\u201d plays at the American Conservatory Theater, 415 Geary St., San Francisco, through April 28. Night performances Tuesdays through Saturdays, 8 p.m., and Sundays, 7 p.m. matinees, Wednesdays, Saturdays. Tickets: $20 to $85. Information: (415) 749-2228 or www.act-sf.org.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  Like God with a capital G, the little-g theater gods work in mysterious ways. Or maybe it\u2019s all happenstance. Either way, A.C.T.\u2019s \u201cStuck Elevator,\u201d an insightful peek at the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"yasr_overall_rating":0,"yasr_post_is_review":"","yasr_auto_insert_disabled":"","yasr_review_type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-5819","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-woody-weingarten"},"yasr_visitor_votes":{"stars_attributes":{"read_only":true,"span_bottom":"