Saraniya Tharmarajah and Meghan Stanton. Photo by Chris Hartlove.
In 2013, an NSA subcontractor named Edward Snowden stole classified information and leaked it to members of the press. This play isn’t about him.
…complex, satisfying theatrical experience…a plate-spinning trick which never breaks a saucer.
“Is Edward Snowden Single?” by Kate Cortesi is a complex, satisfying theatrical experience in the hands of Director Alix Fenhagen and her team at Single Carrot. The nomadic Baltimore company has planted its flag this month in a North Avenue storefront that used to be The Windup Space, shuttered since 2019 and spiffed-up very nicely for this engagement. Cyd Cohn’s staging makes use of the bandstand, the bar, the pool table, and every inch among them—sometimes with sight lines blocked by thick columns. In-person audience is seated at cabaret tables, and online streaming is also available.
In this play, we meet Mimi (Meghan Stanton) and April (Saraniya Tharmarajah), a pair of roommates in Brooklyn. April is an actor and model whose physical beauty and charm outstrip her partying stamina. Mimi slings coffee at a family-owned café. It’s not her family, but she’s fully embedded. She klatches with grandma, babysits the youngster, and has an on/off fling with the hipster barista. Together, Mimi and April are BFFs who present a theoretical answer to the question “what would the Ab Fab ladies be like in their 20s, in America?”
About half an hour in, we also meet Edward Snowden (Parker Matthews). He and Mimi share a rather hallucinatory exchange, as Snowden repeatedly cuts away from a television interview to address Mimi directly, and by name. They flirt, hilariously (“This whistle isn’t gonna blow itself”). Their encounters repeat. They fall in love. Through all of this, Snowden appears only in two dimensions. He is a live projected image, using a video camera and a projector on a rolling cart, both of which are maneuvered by Matthews. The effect is absolutely ingenious. While it’s a simple technical idea, its execution had to be painstakingly choreographed. An array of different surfaces is used for Snowden’s appearances, and each one is both difficult to perform and fabulous storytelling. It’s amazing work by Video Designer Sean Anthony Preston.
Cortesi’s piece starts as a romp, delightfully no-fourth-wall, and full of crackling intercut dialogue. The timing between Stanton and Tharmarajah is exquisitely zany in those moments. Later, the pace eases while other relationships are explored. Stanton and Tharmarajah perform many, many roles in this play aside from just Mimi and April. It’s a plate-spinning trick which never breaks a saucer. Mimi’s flaws are revealed as darker themes develop, and by the end of the story, the play feels like a psychological thriller. A major perspective shift calls facts into question, and Meghan Stanton’s craft is essential to the fact that it all works really well. Even with very strong performances by Tharmarajah and Matthews, Stanton steals the show. When Snowden calls Mimi “a supermodel of courage,” Stanton shows us the impact of his words. When he reminds her that it “takes a lot of courage to love a man with a fiancée,” we get the joke, and also the pain. “A lie turns a mistake into a choice,” April scolds her friend, as Stanton’s Mimi is about to lose everything that matters to her.
Aside from Fenhagen’s masterful directing work here, big kudos are due to agile stage management by NJ Saroff and Jalon Payton. Helen Garcia-Alton’s lighting is a tricky task, given limited resources and widely distributed areas, and it’s nicely done. Sound by Ava Weintzweig is a tough ask too, as multiple speakers had to be invisibly deployed throughout the space for underscoring. It’s natural and very effective, if just a teensy bit loud at times. Overall, an A Plus grade for the Carrots.
Running Time: 110 minutes without intermission.
Advisory: Obstructed views, drug use, profanity.
“Is Edward Snowden Single?” runs through March 12, 2022 at The Windup Space, 12 W. North Avenue, Baltimore 21201. Tickets are available for purchase online. Patrons are required to provide proof of vaccination and must remain masked.
