Tragedy Tomorrow...AND...Tonight! Hamlet on Staten Island

SI Shakespearean Theatre Company presents Hamlet by William Shakespeare.

Set in “Denmark, mid 1990s,” this gender bending production is slightly anachronistic with the use of they, them, their pronouns for a Hamlet played valiantly as a young nonbinary individual by the capable Anna Glenn Sparks. At one point when Polonius (Frank Duffy) counsels Claudius the King (Jack Dabdoub) he deftly makes use of all three pronouns in succession. The use of the pronouns may sometimes be confusing. In this case though, it was hilarious. Kudos to actors able to adjust archaic language of a venerated old text and adapt it to a modern ear. A fantastic Claudius, Horatio (Gary Bradley), Ophelia (Victoria Gullo), Gertrude (Brandon Thomas), and many parts played by the ensemble including the Grave Digger (Mitch Maglio) especially popped with both dramatic and comedic fireworks. Then there was the fantastic Laertes portrayed by Andre Sguerra. His long locks and Van Dyke style facial hair gave him the perfect look and bearing for the orphaned son and brother bereft of family by Hamlet’s hand.

It was as much fun to follow Hamlet’s tragic arc as it was to watch capable and fine renditions of Rosencrantz (Rina Sklar), Osric (Amanda Rose Benjamin), Guildenstern (Meredith Sladek) and Fortinbras (Courtney Emerson). The play with-in the play was a fantastic spectacle with costumes and histrionics to match. Player King Rit Mahoney and Queen Barbara Scalici were exceptional.

The vacant lot in a former wasteland along Front Street, which even the Navy could not permanently gentrify, was magically transformed with lights by Nick Diaz and sets by Keri Sheheen with Graphic design by Chris J. Sorrentino. 1990’s music is holding up well with sound by Ally Popick. The set was festooned with cartoon skulls and the artwork of so many creates a safe space where you should be comfortable in your seat since you bring it yourself.

Hamlet is a bear of a part for seasoned professionals. The young Sparks began appropriately sullen for a youth not at all thrilled with circumstances. With angst filled ease they deliver their first speech after a passionate embrace with the ebullient Ophelia which director Frank Williams uses to establish the love affair between the two. It was a great start. The Ghost scene was an innovative interplay of visual effects and the live action of Charles Sullivan vacillating between the two. Our beach chairs were low to the ground, so the stage vapor emitted from a smoke machine had an eerie effect as it enveloped us.

This Hamlet, like many, fully embodies the emotionally tortured prince with a witty, curious, and passionate (if confused) mind. With so many brilliant actors deserving of their moment in the spotlight, Director Williams understandably was hard pressed to cut the script into soul-of-wit brevity. That said, all the acting shines brightly into the night with Tom Shcherbenko as Voltimand, Alex Acerra as Bernardo and Vera Mahoney rounding out the ensemble.

Staten Island Shakespearean Theatre Company presented Hamlet, 9/17 - 9/18 and 9/24 - 9/25 at Maker Space which is adjacent to 450 Front Street in the Stapleton section of Staten Island. Contact: www.sishakespeare.org

Not Forgotten. But…Never Forget? 9/11 20 Years On Pt 2.

So, it has been a self-indulgent couple of days when it comes to searching my mind on the significance of this, the twenty-year mark after 9/11. Now that the day is here, I have foregone all discussion and remembrance…so far…its only 3:43 pm. See what happened there? I looked at the clock on the computer and it gave me the number of fallen FDNY members lost that day. It occurs for me just how much the day defines me, how it shaped my life and the lives of millions…and yet I struggle to comprehend it all.

Since 9/11 I have worked to cope. I published a book of poems about my experience entitled “After September.” The title inspired by the late Tommy Zurica, one of my mentors and co-workers from that time. Tommy was a big man and the only time he ever raised his voice was in laughter. He would speak constantly about how things had changed “after September,” and we all knew what he meant. He meant after September 11th, 2001. Tommy suffered personal loss as his brother-in-law, a New Yor City fire fighter, was killed in the collapse. He lost his own battle with cancer two years ago.

Prompted by my sister Pat’s query posted on her Face Book page, I recount in full my experience of that day. Simply, and as well as recollection can serve, what follows here is my latest catharsis on the matter. As I wrote, a presence to the sensations in my body let me know I was re-living the experience. I felt the fear and the anticipation of doom, I could hear the eerie quiet, and the subdued panic, I felt the rush of wind created by the collapsing south tower, I tasted the acrid stench of burning plastic, rubber, and a thousand other different substances released in ways nature did not intend.

I was in my office on the 14th floor at 60 Hudson Street writing an email. I heard the roar of the first plane and the explosion. A co-worker commented that some Navy fighter pilot was going to get in trouble for flying so low. This had a temporary calming effect. Then…

My boss came out of his office...his window had a view of the north elevation of the north tower. I was a facade inspector back then. He said "You wanna talk about facades, look at this!" I joined him in his office and saw the gaping hole high up on the building that was the north tower of the World Trade Center. Before smoke was even billowing out, I went to call Jen to tell her what had happened. I told her a jet hit the World Trade Center and I didn't think it was an accident. I had to go back to my car which was parked on Greenwich Street to get my binoculars. The streets were silent except for the growing sounds of sirens. I got back up to the 14th floor and went out onto a setback to start surveying the damage. As I was counting the number of columns the plane destroyed a sense of dread washed over me. I had learned from the previous attack on the Trade Center in 1993 that the exterior walls of the building were structural. I feared that the building might collapse. Then I began to witness the human tragedy. I began to see faces of people above the impact zone at the windows. They couldn't get out. My binoculars trained on a young, stout man with black hair wearing a chef’s coat. He was leaning out the broken window a thousand feet above the sidewalk. I prayed for him to sit tight. That help was on the way. I had no idea the plane had destroyed the stair wells below him. The second plane hit the south tower from the south. I didn't see it, but I heard the explosion. People began to panic. I went back to my car a second time and people were out of their buildings now looking up at the twin towers. I stopped to call Jen from a payphone this time in Yaffa's, a bistro on Greenwich Street. There was a line of people waiting to use the phone. It moved quickly as everyone felt the urgency to reach their loved ones. I told Jen I was alright and to stay inside. We had no TV back then; she didn't know what was happening. On my way back upstairs, my boss came out of the elevator and said the commissioner wants him to take a couple of inspectors and go down to the Trade Center. I was behind him and another inspector who wanted to drive, but my boss said we probably wouldn't get through. So we began to walk. Most everybody was going in the other direction. I looked up and saw people jumping out windows. Then I saw the top of the south tower wrack to the left. Everything seemed to happen in silence and slow motion and then there was dust everywhere. I couldn't see my boss or the other inspectors. I headed for the bridge. People were leaving Manhattan on foot in an orderly way. I helped a woman over a fence and onto Brooklyn Bridge. After I got over the bridge a man was sitting in his car listening to the radio. He said there was another plane that hit the Pentagon and one maybe was going to hit the White House or the Capitol. When Jen heard me out in the hallway, she flung the door open and hugged me, dust, and all. She was beside herself crying. Our friend Steven was there.

The rallying cry of “Never Forget” is etched in our minds…but just what are we remembering?

What I remember is grief. I have read that grieving never stops, that we adapt and learn to integrate it into our daily lives. But the pain is always there. It resurfaces as we empathize with others. What happens with those for whom empathy is not possible? When people cannot feel as others grieving feel?

Perhaps it is time to forget some things. Such as ethnicity, and skin color. It’s time to forget gender and sexuality. Time to forget political parties and affiliations. Time…long past time to forget divisions. Half the world looks to America as a shining beacon of hope for mankind. An example of what is possible when equal rights for all is the cherished norm. Half the world wants to tear that thing down and ensure mankind suffers a second dark age.

One of the most profound moments for me on September 12th, 2001, at Ground Zero was seeing a note scrawled in the pink dust clinging to a store front window which read: “I have seen war today.” People conflate destruction with war. Hurricanes and earthquakes can cause destruction, but no one admits Nature is at war with us. Is it because Nature has no political ideology, no religion, knows no border or bound? War is a state of mind. A state it seems so many who care little for its consequences are flocking to in droves.

Perhaps it is time to forget war as means to an end. The problems of this planet are complex and interconnected. People around the globe look to us, a fledgling society with a problematic past, to light its way into the future. Many think we did not ask for this responsibility, yet the words of our founders have outlived them. They have grown beyond their vision to become greater than the sum-total of all human history.

We…the people…hold these truths to be self-evident…

You may wonder where my anti-war stance comes from. I will tell you. I grew up during the Viet Nam era. The war was ramping up when I was in grade school and would not end until just before I graduated high school. My sixth-grade teacher was an imposing figure of a man. (Quite different from the young and idealistic teacher from fifth grade who read to us from the Hobbit on late spring afternoons.) This man had a military style about him. He would randomly handout “Patriot of the Day” awards and constantly defend what was happening in Viet Nam with pride and conviction. The memory of him seared on my soul is the human one where he broke down and cried in front of us while relaying the news of his own son’s death in the war.

Evidence compounded upon itself for me with nightly news broadcasts and eyewitness accounts from those who returned from the conflict, and the accounts from those whose brothers had not returned, combined with the growing anti-war demonstrations from those burning their draft cards to Muhammed Ali being stripped of his championship title for refusing to serve. And then there was John Lennon. Give Peace a Chance, War is Over…if you want it…

One can’t help but wonder about what all those who have died at war were fighting for. Wasn’t it a better future? Is this it yet? I for one will never disrespect a person in uniform who has the best interest of our society at heart. Yet I will ever seek, expose and decry hypocrisy behind the misuse and abuse of power.

I have not survived this thing called 9/11 to sit idly by while hate wrapped in the flag of the United States is allowed to flourish. The least I can do is speak my mind. Thank you for journeying with me thus far.

Not Forgotten. But…Never Forget? 9/11 Twenty Years On...Pt 1

People mean well when they say, “Never forget,” but do they take into account those of us who cannot forget? We who live with the trauma of that morning every day.

Perhaps all my childhood trauma helped prepare me for 9/11. Every year further away from the actual event has been different. A year later it was all still happening. Two years. Five years. Ten years. My mind and soul still lived in a swirling dust cloud of collapsing buildings. I was serving New York City. Doing what I thought I could do to help heal open wounds as well as those deeply buried under tons of steel and rubble.

2008, we lost our father. 2014 our mother. I slowly began to wake up and wonder where my life had gone. It’s like I have forgotten everything that ever occured prior to September of 2001. Like my past all happened to someone else. But then I started to look ahead to the future. My future. What did I want? Where would I go? Who would I be? I had no answers. I did not think I deserved to see the future when so many could not.

I feel guilty wanting anything remotely resembling happiness. I feel guilty about surviving that day. I've gotten to know this as survivors’ guilt. And that I am fortunate to be alive to have it. And that some people can’t understand what this is. And it’s difficult to explain because it sounds like whining. But I have it. It kills the joy of loving life. And if there is one triumphant thing I can say twenty years on is that I love my life. I’m glad I did not die that day. I curse the malaise I was in for so long afterward that had me crippled to present moments with my family, friends and all the people, the amazingly good people, I was so fortunate to meet and love alongside these many years. Yet, for all my stress and pain, I see and know there are those who have it both physically and mentally so much worse.

For those of you who cannot understand what I am ranting about, I envy you. To those who know all too well the ravings of a tortured mind, bless you. I wish you and everyone peace.... Dealing with PTSD is a lifelong battle. The temptation to succumb to despair looms over everything like a vast emptiness that swallows all light. There is strange comfort in knowing I am not alone in facing that darkness.

Those who suffer along with me and those who may empathize with that conundrum...thank you all...and stay strong. Life is worth living.