by Teresa Jusino
For a play whose playwright and director bill as a “horror” play, The Little One wasn’t terribly frightening. Granted, I was always a little unnerved whenever one of the vampires in the play would snap a human’s neck, and Patrick Shearer’s sound design would kick in, forcing me to rub my neck in sympathy with every CRACK. However, I was never afraid. Perhaps casting it as a “horror” show is simply meant to attract lovers of that particular genre, but I never once feared for any of the characters, or for my own well-being. Lest you think this is a criticism of the piece, it isn’t. I just didn’t get that fright was really the point of this story.
The Little One tells the story of Cynthia (Becky Byers), a “doormat” of a girl who can’t even break up with her boyfriend without him not letting her get a word in edgewise as he breaks up with her first. After this humiliating moment, she goes outside to hail a cab, only to be attacked by a vampire who turns her, then kills himself, leaving her without a natural mentor. Enter Marie (Rebecca Comtois), an extremely ethical vampire who takes Cynthia under her wing, adopting her as her fledgling, her “little one.” From here on in, we watch as centuries pass in the blink of an eye, and Cynthia learns how to survive in her new state, and why she can never really consider human beings friends ever again.
What drew me to this show was the fact that it was a story to be told from the vampire perspective. Humans enter merely as playthings or food. Playwright James Comtois adds a series of fascinating concepts to vampire lore. One of the more interesting things about the vampires in the world of this play is that they see and hear humans very differently once they’ve turned. To a vampire, humans look kind of like Sloth Fratelli from The Goonies, and they sound muffled like they’re underwater. This is how vampire biology has evolved to make it easier for them to kill. They can’t hear screams, and they never have to look into a cute, kind face. Also, vampire stories generally don’t get into what happens to newbies, and so I was intrigued by the progression from newly-turned vamp who can’t understand her own body to cold-blooded killer.
However, focusing that exclusively on the vampire side of things was detrimental to the play as well. First, for all that the vampires insist that they are monsters and cold-blooded killers, they actually seem really nice. Since the play doesn’t focus on any of their victims enough to hear them say otherwise, the vampires are never challenged. We are never given the opportunity to fear them, or fear for them. We constantly hear about the threat of human “hunters” in this play, but because we never meet any we never get to know the level of the threat. The vampires also seem very blasé about them, and so even when vampire blood is shed at the hands of these hunters, you don’t feel much at all.
So, the source of the conflict in this play wasn’t fear. It was watching the decade to decade struggles of the young vampire. Becky Byers’ performance as Cynthia held the entire production together. A trained dancer, her physicality was breathtaking to watch as she went from mild-mannered human, to new vampire experimenting with how her body moves and feels now that she’s become something else, to brazen, older vampire who uses her body with laser-focus to get exactly what she wants, be it to seduce lunch, or fight for her life. Along with the physical nature of her performance, the emotion was definitely there, and while the other vampires are a bit…bloodless, Byers’ Cynthia rings out like a shot, and you have to follow her wherever she is on stage.
Strange then, that there are scenes in which we are also asked to pay attention to something else while she’s doing something important. Comtois tries to bring in an unnecessary element of political intrigue to the play, and he’s written it, and director Pete Boisvert stages it so that the discussions about politics are happening while Cynthia is on the other side of the stage hunting, feasting, and figuring out who she is. Hot vampire and human foodtoy gyrating on the right; three older vampires standing around discussing politics on the left – what are you going to pay attention to?
The Little One is at its best when it focuses on Cynthia’s evolution. A heartbreaking moment comes when she insists on living in the human world with her mother and her best friends, only to discover that time passes differently for her, and that she will never understand humanity again. Those moments in the play are gold, and that scene in particular nearly had me in tears. So it was frustrating to go from that, to starchy vampires in a drawing room talking about politics and their pasts.
And that’s probably the biggest flaw of the play. We are hammered with the idea that time is relative for vampires. They think about it differently, and accept certain things – like the deaths of their human former loved ones – because they see the “bigger picture” over a span of centuries. Why, then, do they spend so much of this play concerned with and talking about their pasts? Why is Marie still guilty over something that happened centuries ago? Why does Gogol (Patrick Shearer), the vampire governor of their region, still hold a grudge about money of all things? And all of it leads up to a vaguely politics-related ending in which Cynthia grows up and can assert herself as an adult vampire.
The Little One has a lot to offer lovers of vampire stories and fans of fantasy and horror. It brings a lot to the table in terms of lore. Ms. Byers’ performance is also one that shouldn’t be missed. The Little One is great Geek Theater. However, uneven storytelling, direction, and fight sequences that were well-choreographed but lifelessly executed mean that it’s not solid theater.
THE LITTLE ONE IS PLAYING AT THE KRAINE THEATER IN NYC NOW THROUGH JULY 10TH. For showtimes and tickets, please visit the Nosedive Productions website.
Photo by Daniel Winters
Teresa Jusino was born on the same day that Skylab fell. Coincidence? She doesn’t think so. She is a contributor to Tor.com, a website that covers sci-fi, fantasy, “…and related subjects.” Her work has also been seen on PopMatters.com, on the sadly-defunct literary site CentralBooking.com, edited by Kevin Smokler, and in the Elmont Life community newspaper. She is currently writing a web series for Pareidolia Films called The Pack, which is set to debut Fall 2010! Get Twitterpated with Teresa, Follow The Pack, or visit her at The Teresa Jusino Experience.
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TERESA JUSINO was born on the same day that Skylab fell. Coincidence? She doesn't think so. As a writer, her work has appeared in Elmont Life newspaper, and on the sadly defunct website, CentralBooking.com. She is a founding member and editor of The Revolving Door Commune Blog, is currently at work on a collection of short stories, and is writing a web series for Pareidolia Films called The Pack, which is set to debut this fall! As a geek, Teresa loves all Star Trek, Lost, Fringe, comics, and anything Joss Whedon, Brian K. Vaughan, and Neil Gaiman ever touched. She is also an aspiring fangbanger. 
