Rightly named so, the "Jolly Roger" is the name of a boat, the name of a pirate insignia, and a British euphemism for sex. Taking place in present day San Francisco, on the night of Vince’s divorce settlement. In celebration, he proposes to the woman he has been seeing, Sarah. Unfortunately for Vince, Sarah is not the only man she is seeing. In fact, her other lover just happens to be their close friend, Carter.
Before the play turns into a love battle, Jerry Calhoun, enters the scene. Playing good cop gone bad, Calhoun is involved with a setup and money hoax involving Vince and the rest of the characters, strewing everyone into a questioning battle of right and wrong. The story takes off from there, thrusting the audience in one direction and tricking them into another. "Jolly Roger" contains all the makings of a drama.
Sex, love, lust, deceit, treachery, crime, and death can all be found in the "Jolly Roger," and that’s not even the half of it. If Jolly Roger was a movie, the play’s vision might have come across a little better. A winding plot leaves the audience slightly confused. Anabella Casanova is a brilliant, beautiful actress whose innocence casts over the sultry Brit she is attempting to portray. Marco Greco has great theatre presence as Vince, but Todd Barry Schoonover’s mumbles oddities, leaves room to play up his character, Carter, a bit more.
"Jolly Roger" is a play of mainly dialogue, leaving a phenomenal character dynamic. Jolly Roger presents a full range of characters for the actors to play around with. Each actor possesses such variation in their character, capturing fully rounded, stereotyped people present in real life. The characters are so different, yet each of them is linked together in this affair of love and deceit.
For a fun, hip theatre experience, head to the MET Theatre, downstairs in the Great Scott theatre, 1089 N. Oxford Ave, Hollywood, 90029. The play runs Thursday – Saturday at 8 p.m. until December 8th. Admission is $15. Students, seniors, and Actor Union members $10.
