There's Laughter Amid the Suspense in Titan Arum,
Blue Box Theatre Company's "Something New"

According to Kew Royal Botanical Gardens, "Titan arum is one of the smelliest plants on Earth. Nicknamed the corpse flower, it has an incredibly foul smell of rotten flesh when in bloom. This nauseating odour is produced to attract pollinators that love to feed and breed on flesh."

Is there a give-and-take in the act of creativity? Is "putting your soul into your work" enough? Or does one need more? If so, where does "more" come from? And what is the cost?

Blue Box Theatre Company's current offering -- Titan Arum, written and directed by Blue Box co-founder Chella Anderson -- introduces us to an artist and a writer, both of whom are struggling to create. We also meet a florist who just happens to have, in her custody, a titan arum. The writer is mother to the artist and the florist.

The Play:

Novelist Josephine Devland (Rosanne Wagger) had once been famous for her horror novels; in an attempt to revive her now-diminished writing career, she has turned to writing a nonfiction investigative piece addressing the disappearance of two women in the town.

Katla (Missy Sullivan), her daughter, is an artist who is struggling to establish herself, to become recognized, to achieve perfection.

Dora (Katie Jo Fulks), Katla's sister, is a florist whose husband died in a motorcycle accident a while back.

The play begins with the trio searching the attic for a pen that Josephine feels she needs in order to write her book. While searching, Katla stumbles across one of her early paintings, which seems to have an eerie effect on her.

From there, we move to an art exhibit, where Katla is seriously disappointed by the lack of attention to her work. In a soliloquy, Katla describes her technique and makes known her drive for recognition and her need to create.

Next, we hear Josephine in soliloquy, telling about her writing career, about her successful horror novels, about how she is not nearly as successful as before, and about her new project -- writing the book about the women who disappeared.

Dora does her best to be supportive to both her sister and her mother.

Early on, it becomes clear that, in the lives of these two artists, "something awful" is needed to spark their creativity and to spur it on to the desired heights.

Are there secrets in the attic? In their past?

Has Katla's early painting taken possession of her?

Is Josephine somehow captive to the pen?

Is there some kind of malevolent, diabolical force housed in the attic?

Is there a significance to the presence of the titan arum? Or to the death of Dora's husband?

Where will the story go from here?

The Acting:

Rosanne Wagger imbues the character of Josephine with the necessary motherly instincts as well as the eccentricity one might expect of a horror novelist. This character's interactions with her daughters, as well as her solo chats with the audience, are relaxed and interesting. Josephine recognizes (and good-naturedly points out) the ironies in their lives.

Missy Sullivan creates a Katla that immediately made me feel as though I already know her (and the feeling grew). Her soliloquies are as natural as one would expect from one-on-one conversations with her. Katla is obsessed with achieving her goals, and Sullivan makes sure that we are always aware that there is more to her than that.

Katie Jo Fulks succeeds at the difficult task of making Dora interesting while establishing that she is the "most normal" member of this family. Fulks' Dora is haunted by divided loyalties (to her mother, to her sister, to the memory of her late husband, and to her own self). Significantly (and appropriately), Fulks plays this lower-keyed character with less volume and less flair than the others.

The Tech:

Sound design by Cameron Waters and props design by David Gilmore and Penny Williams work nicely.

Art by Lucian Silver and Grace Fox are integral to the story.

Nice Touches:

• The soliloquies. Always well-timed and well-delivered.
• Beginning the play in an attic. Especially, searching for something and unexpectedly finding something.
• The use of the easel. At times, it's an actual easel in the world of the play; at other times, it's a place to show the audience what the characters are looking at in a book; at still others, it simply establishes that a certain "thing" is dominating a scene.
• Josephine's books -- authentic-looking and intricately detailed.
• The nonverbal communication among the characters, especially between the sisters.
• Katla takes a very "feisty," "defiant" bite of an apple.
• The delivery of a line: "Thank you for asking."
• The changes and the growth of the titan arum.
• The use of locally created art.

Memorable Lines:

• "I begin to sound like an anti-motorcycle advertisement."
• "Perhaps, the lost do not wish to be found."
• "Every non-broken bone in my body was telling me to rat on you."
• "... like a cocklebur from your sock ...."
• "Masks are the only things tht separate us from animals."
• "If the door rattles, I install more locks."

From the Department of Picky-Picky:

• The titan arum on stage is represented by a drawing that is placed on an easel. Because paintings and drawings are at other times also displayed on the same easel, I was unclear (at first) whether, in the world of the play, it was supposed to be an actual plant or a drawing.
• The venue's lighting plot has a couple of dead spots. The actors managed to avoid them most of the time, but it was a bit distracting the few times that a character spent a beat in one of them.
• Josephine's "wine" could stand to be tinted. (Even the "whitest" white wine is easily distinguished from water).

The Bottom Line:

Catch it if you can!

Blue Box Theatre Company has established a tradition of offering (in each season) "something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue."

Titan Arum is this season's (their second) "something new." (It follows last season's equally interesting and entertaining Milk & Honey Whiskey.)

Titan Arum is full of laughs and suspense. And, while its "examination of some of the human condition" concentrates on some of the darkest corners, it is quite enlightening and instructive.

We are fortunate to have a company in our area that offers world premieres of locally created full-length plays.

TITAN ARUM (In Person at 7 p.m. Friday-Sunday, May 17-19), a new play written and directed by Chella Anderson and starring Katie Jo Fulks as Dora, Missy Sullivan as Katla, and Rosanne Wagger as Josephine (Blue Box Theatre Company at Moonlight Stage Company in Raleigh). PRESENTER: https://www.blueboxtheatrecompany.org/, https://www.facebook.com/bbxtheatre, https://www.instagram.com/theblueboxtheatre/, and https://twitter.com/BBXTheatre. 2024 SEASON: https://www.blueboxtheatrecompany.org/season. VENUE: https://www.moonlightstageco.com/, https://www.facebook.com/MoonlightStageCo/, https://www.instagram.com/explore/locations/472078808/moonlight-stage-company/, https://twitter.com/moonlight_stage, and https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCELuhDtx7VmtnE3Js9TBfBQ. DIRECTIONS: https://www.google.com/maps/. CAUTION: Blue Box notes that this play is "Not recommended for audiences under 16. Content Warnings: [This play contains] Foul Language, Descriptions of Violence, Verbal Abuse, Depictions of Disassociation, [and] Smoking." TICKETS: $25, plus taxes and fees. Click here to buy tickets. INFORMATION: theblueboxtheatre@gmail.com. PLEASE DONATE TO: Blue Box Theatre Company and Moonlight Stage Company.

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