- BORN ON A BAD DAY
NEW SPECIAL: Premieres Thursday, July 15, at 9 PM (ET/PT) Discovery Health Channel
BORN ON A BAD DAY presents the true and remarkable tales of moms giving birth during natural disasters and other precarious situations. From a woman who delivers a baby during a hostage situation in the maternity ward, to a mom who delivers by flashlight during a tornado, viewers will be amazed by these incredible tales—and by the babies who survived them.
June 8, 2010
Randy Robertson just finished shooting a pilot for The Discovery Health Channel and The Learning Channel. The name of the new drama is "Born on a Bad day" A reenactment drama of the true events of babies being born in horrific situations. Randy Robertson plays Richard Worthington, who on September 20, 1991 armed with a shotgun, a handgun and sticks of dynamite arrived at Alta View Hospital in an attempt to kill Dr. Glade Curtis who had performed a tubal ligation on his wife. Worthington held eight people hostage including 3 new born infants the hostages for eighteen hours. A Nurse was killed by Worthington in the incident. The show premiers on The Discovery Health Channel and The learning Channel in mid July 2010
“Oleanna” and “Edmund” Review
It is my slightly less then humble opinion that of the many phases we naturally go through as actors that a few of the more vague and general are that puppy phase of eagerly wagging at all and sundry involved in the game, the next is having a firm grasp of the holy grail and railing widely and with deep conviction against all others that are not similarly benighted and the third is that of some older statesmen, slower of foot but more forgiving and accepting of everyone’s efforts with a wry if perhaps dotty wisdom. I am firmly ensconced in the last of these three categories but still found myself on two occasions feeling more then the usual misgivings about attending that quixotic nocturnal ritual known as a night out at the theatre.
These two occasions were separated by approximately one year, both required admittance to a humble – and this even by the humble standards of 99 seat theatre in LA – theatre facility, and –
I will interrupt myself here because both evenings touted productions of David Mamet, first “Edmund” and then second “Oleanna.” Familiar with both having seen professional productions of them in NYC and Chicago, and having witnessed many attempts at various shards of the plays in various action classes still I am free of any particular attitude about Mamet productions. So let’s say I went full of the wisdom and open-mindedness of the truly, deeply opinionated and had a wonderful time on both occasions.
In both instances the joy was the result of the work of one Mr. Randy Robertson, and in both cases it was a complete surprise to me. Mr. Robertson has a naturalness on stage and an authenticity and confidence that I usually associate with years of experience and with a certain level of success in the business that the evenings inessentials – the set, costumes, lighting - did not suggest. He displayed an unusual ability to live on stage in present time and to absorb the numerous little surprises of flipped furniture or late entrances or a phone not ringing on cue with not only grace but with creativity and verve absorbing these accidents into the weave of the performance. These are gifts not even all experienced and lauded stage performers have and I was moved to ask Randy after which of these performance I do not now recall if he had started as a comedian.
I do not mean that in the sense of his being funny or facilely inventive but in the deeper sense of being light on his feet in front of an audience. Surprisingly he said he had not. Still it is a talent that only surfaces usually when an actor has spent a certain prodigious number of hours simply doing it and here I did not get the sense that as much as Randy deserves that mixed blessing that he had had that type of opportunity. All the worse for us theatergoers.
As the banal husband who simply cannot take it anymore in “Edmund” Randy captured the character’s bemusement, his stubborn anger brilliantly. His grasp of the flow of the character from confused striking-out to realization and drive for meaning and satisfaction was as excellent as his moment-to-moment life on stage. The twisted finale where Edmund ironically embraces the bars of his real prison and his actual sadomasochistic impulses also had a nuanced and credible impulse behind them. I was looking for the root of rage that propelled and enlivened this journey but the more normal and natural progression of Randy’s interpretation allowed me to see the character as more everyman and less as particular pathology which was as unsettling as it was insightful.
As the genuine, priggish, protected, overbearing yet still well meaning and engaged college professor in “Oleanna” Randy again brought his talents tellingly to bare. Randy accomplished the character traits necessary to drive the conflict of the play, without ever becoming a caricature. I completely believed that this man had no idea of how he was affecting this young girl just as I equally believed that he genuinely wanted to help her. On a strictly technical level, Randy succeeded in satisfying both the extreme physical challenge of Mamet’s dialogue here while at the same time making that effort seem both effortless and organic. No mean feat as most performers manage either one or the other.
Well, to be wise if slightly dotty, most performers manage neither and so I am all the more grateful to Randy Robertson for his achievement. And so will you be if you are fortunate to catch him on the boards.
_Mark Soper
| LASplash.com: Los Angeles Performances Oleanna at the Hollywood Fight Club Review By Manoj Gera Although it lacks the complexity and length of Glengarry Glen Ross, David Mamet's Oleanna is no less worth pondering and no less astonishing. David Mamet's 1992 script receives a fresh Hollywood rendering from Director Del Matthew Bigtree at the Hollywood Fight Club Theater with Randy Robertson playing John, the college professor and Ruby Laurelle Staly playing his challenging pupil Carol.
We first find John, in his office, under intense pressure with regards to his upcoming promotion for college tenure. His new house purchase also lay in the balance, his phone rings incessantly to update him, creating already what is to become a tense environment. We find Carol in his office initially confused by her poor grade from John and then confused with John's insufferable discourse on just about everything and, as they discuss her grade, becoming increasingly confused by his ranting. They spend the opening, and rest of the play, interrupting and ignoring what the other is trying to say. Therein lies the impetus for the fracturing of their misguided, and at times awkward, relationship. The play works on the stage because it concentrates conflict within a small theater to create a menacing, nerve-racked arena that you are forced to engage in. You will be enraged at both parties for being so stubborn and ignorant and yet you will praise both for sticking up for themselves and their lives. This production by Hollywood Fight Club Theater does a fine job of engaging the audience into the highly volatile relationship that is about to explode. The play should be frightening to all in a workplace setting.
Misunderstandings abound. It is difficult to see if the manipulations and transgressions by the characters were intentional, and for that matter, even if they were, is intentionality even relevant with regards to harassment? In other words, do you have to be aware that you are harassing to be held accountable for it? The play, however, is as relevant today as it was when it premiered in May 1992, as one-and- all can debate the nuances of modern-day political correctness. We have all seen the 1970s- style video on workplace sexual harassment when the abuse is carried out so overtly that it leaves you astonished and remarking that there is no way possible that you could be accused of something like that. The abuse in Mamet's play is carried out with such subtleness, over the course of a few scenes, that it is hard to see where it all went wrong. When seemingly the professor perceives that he has done no wrong, it all goes awry.
It becomes more of a power struggle between a professor and student, at the end, than sexual harassment. She wanted to be understood and to understand and he just wanted to be tenured and thought he was helping. Everything the characters say is purposely incomplete and confusing.
The professor seems to have a very condescending opinion, open disgust, for his students and his abuse is more of the pompous-aloof sort. The student wants to him understand his transgression and, in the end, she is more purposeful and intentional in her manipulations and abuse. They both abuse their powers with equal dexterity and subsequently, both pay the consequences. Aristotle wrote, 'It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it." Neither character, in this play, obviously is capable of that, because an educated and capable mind would have been able to sort its way out of this situation. WHERE: Hollywood Fight Club Theater, 6767 W. Sunset Blvd., Suite #6, Hollywood, CA 90028. Free parking onsite.WHEN: February 20 - March 27, 2007. Tuesdays at 8 p.m RESERVATIONS: (323) 465-0800 WEBSITE: www.hollywoodfightclub.com Published Feb 28, 2007 © Copyright 2003-2004 by LA Splash.com |
