STAGE WEST: CCAE Theatricals' "Every Brilliant Thing"

Allison Spratt Pearce in "Every Brilliant Thing."                                                      Photo by Michael Pearce

            The way CCAE Theatricals’ production of “Every Brilliant Thing” works, four different actors will alternate performances over the course of its run as the narrator of the 70-minute show: Steven Lone, Bethany Slomka, DeAndre Simmons and, on opening night, Allison Spratt Pearce. This dynamic, coupled with the fact that the interactive “Every Brilliant Thing” employs “guest actors” from the audience each night, means that to some extent every performance is different too.
            This makes reviewing CCAE’s production of the work written by Duncan Macmillan with Jonny Donahoe a bit awkward. I’m only reviewing a performance I saw, one with Spratt Pearce starring. To faithfully review “Every Brilliant Thing” I’d have to also catch performances with the other three as narrator.
            So I’m getting that out there at the start. I’m writing about the Allison Spratt Pearce “Every Brilliant Thing,” and of course about the format and underlying narrative foundation of the play.
            Forgive the lengthy preamble.
            I saw “Every Brilliant Thing” for the first time a few years ago when it was produced by Cygnet Theatre with Ro Boddie as narrator – sole narrator. Going in and having read about the interactive nature of the show I was dubious. Amateurs from the audience brought into the action and in some cases asked to improvise lines? Others in the house holding slips of paper with words to call out when cued? Recipes for disaster!
            But at least on the night I was at Cygnet, it worked. The tireless energy and quick wit of Ro Boddie mitigated any awkward audience issues.
            Happily, Allison Spratt Pearce does the same in Escondido. She’s already enjoying a banner year on the stage, this performance having been preceded by wonderful turns in CCAE Theatricals’ “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time” and Moonlight Stage Productions’ “Into the Woods.” The role of the narrator in “Every Brilliant Thing,” which requires that the actor evolve from 7 years old into married adulthood, more than that demands emotional flexibility as well. This is someone, as written by Macmillan, with a mother who keeps attempting suicide, someone who strives to give that parent a reason to live by making up a list of all the wonderful (brilliant as the British would say -- this is a British creation) things, even the simple ones, that make life worth living. Ice cream (that’s No. 1 on the list). Winning something. Hammocks. Coffee. The list goes on. And on. And on.
            Spratt Pearce’s narrator runs the gamut not only from childhood to adulthood but from tears to laughter and back again. Equally gifted as a dramatic and comedic actor as she is, this comes as no surprise. This role also mandates that the narrator be athletic – constantly moving, dashing to and from locations among the seated. Not to be underestimated is the acuity to memorize complex numbers, who is seated where, prompts and cues.
            “Every Brilliant Thing” was in brilliant hands on opening night.
            As the script prescribes, the house lights are on during the performance and the show is staged in the round. CCAE Theatricals has created a compact space for this purpose, with three aisles of seats forming a square. It’s almost like the narrator is in the center of a rectangular boxing ring.
            These logistics have the effect of easing the movement from place to place for Spratt Pearce but more so allowing her – and audience members – to make eye contact. It’s interesting, as I did, to observe the faces of those sitting around or across from me during “Every Brilliant Thing,” to recognize how the most poignant passages of the narrative click with them.
            The beginning of the show, when the narrator re-enacts the merciful but heartbreaking putting down of a beloved pet, was personally hard to watch. I’ll leave it that. But this is a work about loss, about the tragic, inscrutable act of suicide. Unless you’re a stone, you’ll find moments in the telling that burrow beneath your skin.
            Emblematic of “Every Brilliant Thing” is a sequence in which Spratt Pearce, playing the narrator’s father, tries to explain to the 7 year old (an audience member fills in) why the child’s mother is in the hospital and, in a veiled way, why she doesn’t want to live.
            The volunteer from the crowd is asked to repeat only one word over and over during the conversation: “Why?”
            That is this play’s essential inquiry.
            Because improvisation is built into “Every Brilliant Thing,” its performances will change as the audiences change and the narrator builds the arc of the story with them. Whatever one you attend, be prepared to participate, if only by shouting out a brilliant thing yourself. You may on the way home, as I did, begin making your own list.
            “Every Brilliant Thing” runs through July 21 at the Center Theatre at the California Center for the Arts, Escondido.