1/26 Friday 5:30-11pm. Magellanica is a new play by E. M. Lewis about 8 people confined at South Pole research station in a 8.5 month winter stay of 1986. The center story is the discovery or confirmation of the hole in the ozone layer, especially in the spring time. It's based on and elaborated from true story (a 1985 British Poler Research expedition) that lead to Montreal Protocol to phase out the use of CFC (Freon used in refrigeration) and later HFC. It weaves in cold war Russian-American conflict, homosexuality, loss, a death, all in a nice package.
The play is enjoyable, simple but efficient set, but a bit too long. 5 acts with three 10-minute intermissions, and a longer dinner break at ~8:10-8:40. It can definitely be shrunk down by an hour without loosing anything. The bird story told in Norwegian, and the Russian song can both be cut in half if not more. I like the made-up Russian-America collaboration, the breakfast table scenes. I think the memory of loss (in the war, or in a car crash) is well played. I dislike the stereotype of the silly Chinese American doctor, and her father's death is a strange interlude, brief and no consequence. The cartographer and his map doesn't make sense to me in the story, or his ghost. The last monologue of the mechanics is too long.
