SoLow Fest 2018: Greenfield Collective's 'Potts' with 'Table on Table on Table'

Robinson performs the 30-minute monologue, alternately playing the wisely philosophical teapot and a somewhat heightened version of herself. As Mrs. Potts, she wryly recounts not only the complicated story of Belle and her unlikely paramour, but how she and the other servants found themselves marginalized within the narrative. I bet you didn’t know Mrs. Potts has a first name. It’s Beatrice.

Of beasts and beauty

As Amanda, Robinson recalls her struggles with conformity and self-doubt. She details her awakening to matters of sexual identity and gender presentation; a section on her hesitancy to cut her hair feels particularly raw and moving. As someone trying to make a career in the arts, she reflects with welcome candor on the possibility of losing roles by not meeting certain gender-related expectations.

Outing, a talented set designer, supplies handmade silhouettes evoking Disney’s fantasy world. When Robinson has enough of the fairytale, she grabs a pair of scissors and starts cutting. It reminds the audience that canonical stories are always in flux, ready to be revised in light of new revelations or changing worldviews.

The dual narratives don’t always coalesce. At times, the Mrs. Potts strand hews too close to its source; I wanted more of Robinson’s individual stamp. Some of Robinson’s personal history, while interesting, seems disconnected from the piece’s larger themes. (A memory of her brother being startled by a squirrel in a campground Porta Potty falls flat). And Outing, who plays Beast behind a crisply lit curtain, could be used to better effect.

But the overall mood Potts creates is wonderfully appealing. Robinson finishes by grabbing her guitar and offering a folksy spin on Alan Menken and Howard Ashman’s “Beauty and the Beast.” Just like the story the Greenfield Collective tells, it feels familiar and excitingly new all at once.

Absence, fondness, and fear

Potts shares a program with Table on Table on Table, a poignant piece of movement theater devised by writer Shreshth Khilani and choreographer Sarah Marks Mininsohn. Performed by an impressive quartet of dancer/actors — Jeremy Cohen, Talia Mason, Minou Pourshariati, and Khilani — it shows how spoken word and physical expression can come together to chronicle separation and loss.

Khilani’s text is not delivered live; a recording is projected as the performers execute Mininsohn’s elegantly intimate choreography. The script captures the anxiety felt by a son as his mother prepares for cancer surgery. His fear is compounded by geographical distance (he lives in the United States, she in India) and personal betrayal (she has kept her diagnosis a secret until the last moment).

The dialogue occasionally slips into banality, but in a way that feels frighteningly authentic. A boyfriend describes cooking breakfast on a lazy Saturday morning, and a man remembers a restaurant from his youth.

Mininsohn dances communicate how people can be physically close but emotionally distant. All four performers excel, although Khilani possesses an especial skill: he seems just as expressive in stillness as he does in motion.

The performance I attended also featured a musical interlude by Gracie Martin, lead singer of the local alt-folk band Gracie & the So Beautifuls. Martin flaunts a beautifully expressive voice, with a pleasingly pliant upper register. She sang four original compositions, all of which made me want to hear more.