Show Response (pt. 2): 21st Century Princess

by Joey Merlo

This show response is the second of two; the first featured Joey’s thoughts before seeing the current production. You can read the first part here.

all photos: Angela of York / Andrew Hardigg, Misha Brooks, Jess Barbagallo, Zach Donovan, Carolyn Kettig, La Daniella, Pauli Pontrelli

Jordan Baum’s 21st Century Princess was like I remembered it—but also not. The seemingly quieter production at The Collapsable Hole had me leaning in to watch a mesmerizing cast of thirteen actors perform—what seemed like a hundred characters—in a play that was simultaneously a miniature and multiverse. At times I felt like I was on a lazy river—although there was nothing lazy about this meticulously crafted and precisely executed hyper-real fantasia. I floated through scene after scene—winding this way and that, getting stuck in little coves and under waterfalls. Currents carried me along but never rocked the boat too much—and that was part of its strange, unfolding charm. I was lulled by the play and, in a way, it made me feel like a child again, in the sense that I was filled with joy, wonder and awe.

At the same time the play is like being lost at the amusement park—maybe after dark. You can kind of choose your own adventure. There are no adults to pull you this way or that—just Jordan’s invisible yet persuasively gentle directorial hand. I overheard some audience member say that the show is like the best kind of people-watching and I thought that was pretty accurate—I found myself eavesdropping on intimate conversations between characters, as if I were a fly on a wall—or a magic cricket. Each scene took me on a different kaleidoscopic ride through the hearts, minds, social lives, trials, and tribulations of the equal-parts mundane and whimsical Disney employees and their patrons.

Zach Donovan

“Disney is like the Mecca of Capitalism,” my friend Marissa Joyce Stamps commented to me after the show—and the play contained this sentiment as well: the subtle sense of the class disparities that perpetuate any capitalist endeavor—the economic realities that make Disney the happiest place on Earth for some and, for others, a way to make ends meet. The play seemed to say that Disney is not only a paycheck (or a price tag) but a way of connecting—a way of life. Disney means community on many levels—there are the tourists who exist in a kind of pretend community simply because they are there at the same time—waiting on lines and eating the same exorbitant Mickey Mouse-shaped popsicles. These are the folks who were all at the airport together—united by their common love for a giant rodent and their ability to pay big bucks for quality time with their families.

But the play also shows us another community—the community formed by the workers who make Disney World go round—everyone from the person who cleans the toilets to the guy who dresses up as Prince Charming. This is the community we get to spend most of our time with at Jordan’s Disney Universe—and thank God for that. 

Andrew Hardigg, Misha Brooks, Jess Barbagallo, Zach Donovan, Keyana Hemphill, Carolyn Kettig

The play takes a third shape—a kind of carousel. I saw this most clearly in a labor meeting scene of Disney employee introductions that went round and round and round and round—each actor playing character after character after character. The meeting is being held because the powers that be suspect that some employees might be living out of their cars—not in Mickey’s parking lot, they don’t. The play gives us a tender peek at the romances and tragedies these employees face. We get to know them as we believe they know each other and, as we do, the park becomes more human than fantasy. 

Baum’s cast is fine-tuned and they operate as a kind of unified organism that makes their chemistry feel molecular. There is an approach to character that is the opposite of heavy-handed—it’s relaxed, chill—yet theatrical. From Jess Barbagallo’s fantastically embodied performance to Zach Donovan’s song-and-dance number, this cast is full of miraculously physical actors with impeccable comedic timing. These are actors who know how to use their entire bodies to convey character in ways that never overshadow anyone else—time plays by their metronome as they move together to build this big small world. I stayed for a while after the show to bask in its communal magic.

21st Century Princess closes May 31.