red dirt / red storm

This is definitely a show that you need to fully pay attention to if you want any chance of understanding what's going on. If the script has one weakness for the average audience member, it's going to be how unclear the times / locations are for the first few flips between the past / present of our interplanetary couple. Personally, that only added to my enjoyment. I love a story that makes the gears in my noggin churn to grasp everything that's going on and, by the end, I think I had everything straight.

At the end of the day, it's a good character drama about two people and their relationship. If the sci-fi angle tickles your fancy, just be aware that the "fi" is much stronger than the "sci" so be prepared to suspend your disbelief.

Women are from Mars, men are from Mars (couples therapy on the red planet).... Nothing about a promising premise will prepare you for 60 minutes in the dreary company of S and Clark.... Check out the full 12thnight review!

Upfront, I will say that if you love emotionally complicated interpersonal drama, this is right up your alley. It's very much an intimate realtionship story with a sci fi twist to it.

What I Liked:

The acting is IMMACULATE, both actors shine in this, bouncing between the present of a relationship disintegrating under the weight of diverging life goals and not being able to see each other's side, and the past of flirtation turning into romance between two colleagues with two planets' worth of eyes on them. Both performers sell it wonderfully, and the actor playing S especially was great at getting across the energy of feeling trapped by someone else's ambitions and unable to get out.

The staging was beautiful and simple, the lighting set up of the swirling red lights on the roof and the star projectors is really something to see. Without spoiling anything, a frequently repeated phrase in the present-segments is that the female character S "is starlight" and there's a beautiful moment where you SEE it, the actress stood still with the red swirls and green laser-lines reflecting off her.

Also with the staging, the props looked great, the cobbled-together radio made of a busted CRT held together with zipties and string was really cool, especially for how prominent it is.

What Lost Me:

The pacing is strange. The formatting of the short segments not lasting more than a few minutes (sometimes only a few seconds) and bouncing back and forth between the past on Mars and present on Jupiter made it feel so much longer than it actually was. Felt like there was more transition music than play, at points.

this is not a knock on the show and more of a me thing, but I went in blind with only the name of the show and a ticket, and I think I was expecting something much different than what it was. At its core it's about two people who fall in love and fracture apart because one wants constantly bigger and better things without considering the costs and dangers that come with and the other wants a simple quiet life away from the influence of the legacy of their parents. It's just that that legacy is, y'know, colonizing Mars, and the bigger better things are reaching other celestial bodies in experimental spacecraft. Admittedly, I like my sci fi a lot less grounded, and this is not the kind of story I would purposely seek out.

With the way the story is laid out, the main conflict of the present timeline got a bit repetitive.

Honestly, it's a very interesting well realized piece that just is not for me. There's a lot you could dig into, in this, especially in piecing the story together. But if I had the choice of seeing it again, I don't think that I would.

red dirt / red storm - A Connection in a Star System By: Krissy Berkholtz While “Living the dream of the future” may sound appealing, what will the cost be and what are you willing to give up? red dirt / red storm unlocks the imagination and teleports you to a sci-fi wonderland space station where we shift back and forth from present day to histories past in the hopes that a couple's thriving love will reach cosmic bounds before it’s crumpled by spaces vacuum before they can answer that question themselves. With back and forth banter that inspires true stage chemistry between co-actors Ashley Victoria Robinson and Zach Counsil, the two on a challenging pursuit to show the jumps from past to present while keeping strong characterization with faithful commitment and convincing performances. Not only did the acting duo perform as a unit, but they designed, wrote, and directed as one as well. The set had multiple uses that explored the spacing of the stage and showed the clever use of how a stage space can be converted into outer space! The lighting design between each jump in the show was clear and gratifying, with swirls of light and iridescent stars on the ceiling of the stage that transported you to a new galaxy, complimented by the sound design that both raises the stakes of the show but comforts everyone sharing the space, sparking new hope between each scene. red dirt explores the hard conversations of what our future may look like. How much of yourself can you give before you’re lost completely? Truly giving everyone that enters this theatre space a new outlook on not only an ideal reality, but what may be holding you back from your current one. Strap on your space suits, and study up on your astronomy, because red dirt / red storm will take you to unknown worlds. red dirt / red storm runs from August 16th-23rd