Sonoma State Star > Arts & Entertainment
"DOG SEES GOD" is a fresh take on adolescence
Published: Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Updated: Tuesday, April 20, 2010 23:04
In the intimacy of Ives 76, Sonoma State's Stage One Theater Club has produced a clear and poignant rendition of Bert V. Royal's "DOG SEES GOD: Confessions of a Teenage Blockhead."
The play itself uses the familiar characters of Charles Schulz's beloved "Peanuts" cartoon and douses them in the reality of stereotypical teenage angst and identity confusion. Royal's play strips the former innocence from Charlie Brown and his friends as they transition into adolescence.
Charlie Brown (known as CB in "DOG SEES GOD") and his gang struggle with ordeals involving drugs, alcohol, sex, homosexuality, love, acceptance, death, pregnancy and the like. Witnessing the "Peanuts" gang navigating through this harshly real world completely combats the easy, light melancholy of the cartoon.
To say the least, Royal's take on Charlie Brown's world as a teenager is intriguing. And this Stage One production, which also sees sophomore Kimberly Hoffman's directorial debut, executes the humor and intensity of this fictional, now teenage, icon more than satisfactorily.
The entire ambiance exuded by the set compliments the mood of the play. Hoffman and her crew created a simple, clean and direct, almost bare, set that was not only necessary, but entirely fitting.
The play is short, around 75 minutes without an intermission. Its length suits the intensity of the subject matter; short and sweet. The heavy, confessional story seems a mix of a poetry slam and a teenage soap opera (in the most entertaining sense of the term).
As the main plot unfolds, CB and his sister often speak facing toward the audience, in profound and thoughtful words. Questions of life and existence are addressed very straight-forwardly in these instances.
Though this type of display may be deemed a cheap attempt at "art" it builds a sympathetic and even empathetic sentiment toward the characters.
Dylan Waite as CB and Claire McCaffrey as CB's sister, speak their monologues with effective emotion; McCaffrey is very humorous as called for by her pieces, and Waite very thoughtful and pleasingly pathetic.
Both actors exude their character's individuality without actor gimmicks, but clear and honest depictions. In fact, all actors did such.
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