"The Soup Comes Last"

Theatre review
"The Soup Comes Last" at the Kitchen Theatre
Ithaca Times
July 9, 2008
695 words
"East-West Side Story"

full text here

East-West Side Story
By: Mark Tedeschi
07/09/2008

The Soup Comes Last, written and performed by Rachel Lampert. Directed by Margaret Perry. Original music composed by Mer Boel, Set Design by Dan Meeker, Costume Design by Lisa Boquist, Lighting Design by E.D. Intemann.

Remember the last time you traveled to a place completely unfamiliar? Where people looked, sounded, and acted different than everyone you were used to? With a traveling partner whom you'd never met? When you, with your companion, staged a production of West Side Story with a cast and crew almost completely unfamiliar with American theatre?

No? Then you haven't seen The Soup Comes Last, Rachel Lampert's solo storytelling performance at the Kitchen Theatre about her voyage to China 11 years ago. She transports you along on a piece-by-piece recollection of the trip and all of its hilarious, uplifting, heartbreaking elements. Gather round - it's story time at the Kitchen.

Lampert, Artistic Director for the KTC since 1997, opens "Soup" with her familiar pre-show announcements, a precursory explanation, a list of things she brought with her on the trip - and you might not even notice the lights dimming, because you're into the story before you have time to realize it.

A group of authoritative Chinese theatre historians invite Lampert to choreograph and South African Joanne Gordon (the co-traveler mentioned earlier) to direct the first-ever in-China staging of West Side Story - in Chinese. Gordon, "competitive, controlling, and used to being the boss," decides early on that outrageous pantomime is the best way to communicate with non-English speakers. Lampert's enacting of Gordon's consistent, misguided zeal elicits laughs and cringes alike.

Upon her arrival, Lampert says the airport is "everything [she] expected communism to look like," setting the tone for her trek into unfamiliarity. At her hotel, people flock to the showers after an announcement about the hot water's precious few minutes of availability, the Chinese dance teachers think Michael Jackson's "Thriller" video exemplifies American dance, and in the grand event of a Chinese meal, eyeballs are a delicious delicacy.

Dan Meeker's set - chiefly Chinese stools and tables for Lampert to climb around and step on - keeps the attention on the performer and her story. E.D. Intemann's lighting design functions the same way, but with an extra-red touch. The mostly clean-white backdrop houses a small projected box, sometimes mentioning the location but more often displaying a light aphorism such as, "In a multitude of words, there will certainly be a mistake."

That one is definitely true; thankfully, Lampert and Gordon eventually are introduced to a capable, 21-year-old, "fascinated with language" translator named Emma who helps correct some of the myriad miscommunications they run into, including a late script-translation overhaul. Some concepts are more difficult than others, though: many of the actors and actresses confuse sexual liberation with prostitution and filial disobedience with political radicalism.

In time, they dig up ways to cope. Lampert separates Jets from Sharks by the idiosyncrasies of their movement and introduces the word "buffalo" as a signal for Emma to stop translating if a slip of the tongue may bring trouble.

Lampert, under the adept direction of Kitchen vet Margaret Perry, plays a handful of characters, and her changes in voice are immediate enough to recognize each. Lampert ebbs quiet and earnest when, in the story, she considers the consequences of her teaching students to appreciate freedoms they'll likely never have; and she shows off her capacity for complex delivery by recalling an anecdote while repeating a complicated dance sequence.

Eleven years ago, communication hadn't yet advanced to a point where most people took it for granted. Lampert emphasizes that "if you wanted to connect with a place, you had to go there." It's easy to sit at a computer and pretend to experience somewhere new, but then you lose all of the comfort-zone shakeup, an important component of travel that a few people I know would insist builds character (and I agree).

The title The Soup Comes Last refers both to a simple cultural dissimilarity and a treat of an ending far too enjoyable to give away. When it's time for her to head home, Lampert has grown attached to many of those she's closely worked with - it's sad to see her have to leave the environment that was initially so dissonant. But, of course, had she stayed, we wouldn't have been able to enjoy all she's contributed to the consistently reliable Kitchen Theatre.


©Ithaca Times 2008