Home  Entertainment Reviews Billy the Mime
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Written by Barry Gaines
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last updated Wednesday, February 28, 2007, at 13:44:12
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A featured performer in Tricklock’s Revolutions Theatre Festival is Billy the Mime whose show I caught at UNM’s Theatre X. Billy is classically trained, earning his whiteface in Master Classes with Mr. Mime, Marcel Marceau, and others. Billy the Mime’s gestures are crisp and his facial expressions vivid and sensitive, and besides standards like running in place, climbing stairs, and pulling ropes, he adds social commentary to his wordless repertory.
The titles of some of the pieces he performed -- “The Abortion,” The Priest and the Altar Boy,” and “Terry Schiavo, Adieu”--tell you that this is no ordinary mime. Yet in almost every work, Billy the Mime simply acted out a narrative, often a raunchy narrative. In “Thomas & Sally--A Night At Monticello,” Billy presents the aristocratic, accomplished Jefferson elegantly entertaining at home and then slipping out to the slave quarters to have sex with Sally Hemings. His sexual encounter is graphically enacted but fully expected. He also effectively uses music to reinforce his presentations. “Van Gogh’s Starry Night” is performed to Don McLean’s “Starry, Starry Night.” “Abortion” is acted out to the haunting melody of “The Swan” from Saint-Saens’s “Carnival of Animals.” No topic is too large for Billy to mime. He presents “World War II” in under five minutes, and enacts “A Day Called 9/11” from both the Arab and American points of view. His work reminds me of the silent films of Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton, both influences on Marcel Marceau. Billy even mouths occasional words of dialogue. I enjoyed “A Night in San Francisco: 1979” where the casual gay sex and the onset of AIDS are wittily and vulgarly represented. But my favorite was the opening piece, “A Romance.” While lying on his back, Billy lifted his arms and gracefully turned his hands into two beings. They met, found attraction and repulsion, and finally embraced. One hand donned a rubber glove before they became intimate. The display was clever and subtle, the only abstract mime of the evening. I wish there had been more.
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About Reviewers D.S. Crafts (Website) Composer Daniel Steven Crafts came to New Mexico from San Francisco where he had hosted a classical music radio program on KPFA. His first commission from opera star Jerry Hadley, "The Song & the Slogan" based on texts by Carl Sandburg, was made into a TV program for the PBS network and aired nationally in 2004 and won an Emmy for Best Music. His latest opera La Llorona is a collaboration with novelist Rudolfo Anaya based on his play "The Season of La Llorona." Mr. Crafts is currently working on another commission from Jerry Hadley for a piece about the American Southwest which includes texts by Rudolfo Anaya and V.B. Price. Two CDs of his music, Contemporaries (short, satirical keyboard works) and ARIAS (excerpts from his various operas) have been released on the BACAT label in San Francisco.
David Steinberg David Steinberg has covered state government, the courts, city and county government in Santa Fe for the Albuquerque Journal. He's been an arts writer for the past 20 years, and serves as the book editor, for the Journal. Over the years, he's also acted in plays, sung in choruses and played trumpet.
Jennifer Noyer Jennifer Noyer has been writing dance reviews for the Albuquerque Journal for 17 years, as well as contributing articles for Dance Magazine and other art journals. She trained in dance with Hanya Holm in New York City and Colorado Springs, and studied several dance techniques at the graduate level at the University of Michigan. After teaching dance at Wayne State University she entered and completed a Masters Degree in Humanities there. In New Mexico Ms. Noyer has taught, directed, and choreographed contemporary dance for several years. Her writing on dance includes a monograph accompanying the video of choreographer Bill Evens’ ballet “The Legacy.” An overview of Evans’s world wide career, it was written and published during his tenure at the University of New Mexico. Ms. Noyer’s studies in the humanities, and her studio dance work influence her approach to dance as an integrative art form in the United States.
Barry Gaines Barry Gaines has taught Shakespeare in the University of New Mexico English Department for over twenty-five years and has received two outstanding teaching awards. He has written theater reviews for the Journal since 2000. He has attended theater all over the world including Shakespeare productions in Russia, South Africa, Denmark, and Poland. He has also served as literary advisor for two professional theater companies and written performance reviews for Shakespeare Quarterly. Gaines has taken two years of acting with Paul Ford and appeared in small parts in three plays at the Albuquerque Little Theater. He believes that he is probably a better reviewer than actor.
Joanne Sheehy Hoover Joanne Sheehy Hoover, music critic emeritus of the Albuquerque Journal, has written for NPR, PBS, the Lyric Opera of Chicago, the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Symphony, among others. She has also been a music lecturer for the Smithsonian Associates and a music critic and arts writer for The Washington Post. She was director of the Levine School of Music, one of the country’s largest community music schools, in Washington, D. C. 1980-1993. She and her husband moved to Corrales, New Mexico in July 1993. Also a poet, her fifth collection, “Einstein in New Mexico,” was published in 2002.
Marissa Greenberg Marissa Greenberg is a member of the faculty of the University of New Mexico English Department, where she teaches Shakespeare and early English literature. A prior guest reviewer for the Albuquerque Journal, Greenberg will be reviewing theater while Barry Gaines is out of town. She also composed and edited the program notes for last year’s Albuquerque Shakespeare Festival and has written performance reviews for Shakespeare Bulletin. A graduate of Columbia University and the University of Pennsylvania, Greenberg has been performing and studying drama for most of her life. She is thrilled to have this opportunity to review for the Journal.
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