Plays like Eastern Front’s Extinction Song make it very difficult to write without cliches. Phrases like “tour de force” and “an emotional rollercoaster” jump immediately to mind. But this play deserves much better than that.
Its writer, Ron Jenkins, never resorts to cliche, despite writing about the oft-explored dysfunctional family. This is James’ story, son of an alcoholic father and a mother who fails to protect him. James is both unlike any seven-year-old you know (articulate, precocious and disturbingly disturbed), and a lot like every child (curious, infuriating, imaginative, self-absorbed…). Actor Ron Pederson is utterly convincing as a child, so much so that it’s easy to forget he is a man in boys’ pajamas. As James tells his story, he acts out things that have happened to him, adopting the voice and mannerisms of the adults in his life. It’s both hilarious and frightening, words that pretty much sum up Extinction Song.
This article appears in Nov 12-18, 2009.
I agree with Kate Watson’s review: it’s not often you see a story on this subject that can still surprise you at every turn, but Jenkins and Peterson have both done a tremendous job, leaving the images sticking in your mind. Ron Jenkins put on an incredible performance creating a young boy who is both alien and easy to empathize with in turn — hilarious and frightening yes, but also haunting. One of the only things I didn’t like about this play was the poster, which had a good concept but was unfortunately rendered to look like a low-res Photoshop mismash, which was similar in quality to the digital projections used throughout the piece. The projections grew on me somewhat while the poster did not, but the play itself was visually sharp regardless, with lights coming out of drawers and one boy’s bedroom changing from forest to house to frozen parked car thanks to smart lighting and set design and (I’ll mention again) a brilliant acting job from the performer.