So, I don’t venture downtown often anymore [no, I’m not proud of this fact]. Especially not on a Thursday night. Last Thursday night was different and though Matt and I were skeptical of what we were about to experience, we went into Notice Me, by Blair Singer, with open minds.
When one ventures to Alphabet City you’re either going to end up in a recently renovated beautiful [although tiny] space or a complete dump. We lucked out and the former was where we ended up after a relaxing dinner at The Life Cafe, feasting on shrimp, tacos, and a chicken sandwich (Matt, as always, chugged his third and last Stella). We found ourselves inside The Wild Project, a 100% eco-friendly and recently renovated tiny theatre space.
Notice Me is about four attention starved teens in southern California (Tarzana, to be exact). Think of it as the love child of American Idiot and subUrbia. Starring as the four teens are Jason Shelton, Annabel LaLonde, Jake Green and Susan Spratt, with Sofia Alvarez directing. An extremely sparse set was designed by James Bolenbaugh, and impressive lighting and sound were design by Eric Southern and Daniel Roland Tierney respectively.
I was completely entertained for the first 45 minutes with the ever-present vulgar language of these high school seniors and their on-going name calling. I loved watching two of the characters fall for one another, and one go insane after taking steroids. The show fell flat for me towards the end when one of the two characters in love does something so completely ridiculous, it’s almost hard to believe that the character believes her reasons for justification of the act.
In this quartet, the obvious stand-out was Jason Shelton as the super-stoner Harry. His portrayal of Harry was believable and the audience was on his side from start until finish.
All in all, it turned into an enjoyable evening. Notice Me plays at The Wild Project through this Sunday, August 1st.
That Girl Allison 