"Spirits to Enforce" is frenzied fun

The Midnight Company opened Mickle Maher’s "Spirits to Enforce" at the Kranzberg Black Box Theater over this past weekend. In "Spirits to Enforce" a dozen superheroes with secret identities desperately attempt to raise money using a minimally effective telemarketing scheme. The audience is plopped smack in the middle of their raucous phone bank as each makes outbound phone calls using a secret pseudonym to conceal their superhero identity. But, when desperate times call for desperate measures, the members of "The Fathom Town Enforcers" begin to reveal their superhero identities as they beg for cash.

Maher’s "Spirits to Enforce" recontextualizes the characters from Shakespeare’s "The Tempest" to create a kooky risible comedy. His absurd writing has characters talking over one another in short snippets from each of their phone conversations. The entire script, except for about two dozen lines, consists exclusively of one-sided phone conversations where complete sentences are a rarity. It is a complex wordy script, filled with rapid babble that requires the audience to piece together the story.

Director Lucy Cashion immediately immerses her audience into the world of "The Fathom Town Enforcers." As the audience traverses the hall into the theater, they’re met by an eerie and silent dimly lit set illuminated by Jason Lawshee’s occult lighting design and Joey Taylor’s Batcave-like mood music to create an unexpected entrance for her actors. Once the lead enforcer takes his seat on the phone bank the action ensues as quickly as the New York Stock Exhange floor when the opening bell rings. For the next 80-minutes, the superheroes attempt to raise capital with the urgency of a distressed stock exchange floor trader during a market crash.

Cashion’s choreographed blocking creates frenzied and highly amusing movement. The task-oriented characters frantically move about the performance space dodging one another and the hazards they create for each other with vintage coiled phone cords that get stretched across the stage. The phone bank table is littered with props that get knocked about as actors climb on, over and under the table. Cashion’s manic blocking is acrobatic, balletic, energetic, and comical.

Cashion collaborated with each of her twelve actors to profile, develop, and create quirky and eccentric characters. Each member of this magnificent cast handled the rapid-fire drivel with ease while incorporating the unique physical idiosyncrasies, tics, and habits of their wacky characters. The accomplished actors portraying the Fathom Town Enforcers included Ash Aroura, Will Bonfiglio, Kayla Bush, Miranda Jagels Felix, Cassidy Flynn, Celeste Gardner, Joe Hanrahan, Spencer Lawton, Alicen Moser, Ross Rubright, Rachel Tibbets, and Joey Taylor.

Costume designers Liz Henning and Eric Widner added to the peculiarity of the characters with their whimsical costume creations. Flynn’s red striped military jacket, Hanrahan’s Indiana Jones inspired hat and jacket, and Gardner’s floral adorned sweater all added to the levity and the comic book feel of the production.

The Midnight Company’s "Spirits to Enforce" is a magnificent collaboration between director, actors, and designers to create an outlandish fantasy world. "Spirits to Enforce" plays at the Kranzberg Black Box Theater, Thursdays – Saturdays, through May 18, 2024. Tickets are available at MetroTix.