Emails about Rouge May 4, 2012
by Jessica
Here's a look at what's arrived in my inbox this morning about Julie Andree T.'s Rouge.
"Loved it. Another unique and bombastic reason I subscribe every year. File this one under Huge, along with The Shipment, A Bloody Mess and The Realest MC. Stay on your toes and prepare to have your edges pushed!" - Dave E
"There is something very familiar and likeable about Julie. Maybe it is because she invites you along on the ride. Maybe because she is clearly playing onstage. She is playing, she is dancing, she is exploring sex and war and death and art and music and all the things you wanted to do as a kid. Like show everyone the food you are chewing and painting yourself and curling up in a ball on the floor under a big warm blanket. She explores holidays and cliches and toys and "toys". She makes references to the performance artists who came before and "goes there" too...sometimes exactly as you expect, sometimes not. Things become very important briefly, then seem silly later...you move forward. She moves forward, inviting you to come along." - Jen F
"I've only left the space of Rouge a short span ago and I've been daydreaming about it since. Miss T. put me into a reverent head-space that I wish was present for more theatrical work. This is the kind of thing where, as a performer, I found myself in love with her work and efforts and ridiculously jealous that I couldn't move in with her. Well, into the world of Rouge.
"There are too many secrets involved in the piece for me too say too much; it would be a ruinous tactic. I will say this: the damn night felt sublime. There is a level of meticulous audacity happening this weekend in Seattle and you owe it to your society and culture, your mendacious intelligence, to participate and partake." - Pol R
"Rouge is a completely fascinating evening. I walked in knowing nothing about Julie Andrée T., and walked out in awe of her. The show is an amazing example of an artist in full command of the performance, able to elicit reactions from the audience with just a flick of her eyes. It is also what I would call "a very On The Boards show", meaning that I don't think I could see this at any other place in the city. And the fact that people like Julie continue to make their way to the OtB stage is what makes it such a special place." - Brett L
"Vis a vis Angelica Liddell and Julie Andree T.: history repeats itself, the first time as tragedy, the second time as farce.
"I did not like the current piece, though some of the people I was with did. I'm afraid I was reminded of David Sedaris's story about taking cocaine in college and deciding he was a performance artist. There were some entertaining moments, but that's about the most positive thing I can say. I felt like I was watching a good idea for a 15-minute piece stretched to 70 minutes." - Joe M
"Think Karen Finley for the new millenium, but in red, who takes you along with her deeper and deepe, further and further every step of the way until you are lost, --stunned and mesmerized." - John R
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Rouge, Friday May 4
So last night after seeing Rouge I dreamt about colors. Of things. It was like a slideshow and there were sounds.I woke thinking that unlike Red, John Logan's play about color field painter Mark Rothko, Julie Andrée T.'s Rouge is itself a color field painting. But the really cool thing is, not just visually.The sounds and meanings she wrings from her extremely focused subject are like parts of the painting, visual elements as concrete as textures of paint and the gesture of a brushstroke.It's pretty ballsy to select a color as a subject for a play and pair it with a single mantra-like text and but she knows what she's about.Just as there is something punk in her use of that electric drone (the uke cut off just as it starts to get sonically interesting heck yes), her cocky attitude and fearless use of her body she also radiates the serious conviction of a visual artist who commands her medium.Theatrically somehow she teases simple dumb red into evoking things like life, love, lust, appetite, struggle, materiality, immateriality, hope, hopelessness, relationship to others, to physics, to nature, comedy (that water bottle between the legs oh my god), tragedy - grand constants beyond the obvious scope of a color.She keeps teasing all of this meaning from the color until it starts to fight back. The last part is like a glorious visual emotional battle, human vs red. I'm still deciding who wins but it doesn't matter in the end somehow it is all visual, part of the painting.Thanks for this show.
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