'Bash' in Your Head

If you want easy, you don't want Neil LaBute, a man with the guts and gall to present stories and characters that are true representatives of a culture which seeks out and destroys all that is not white, male, and Christian: brutal, narcissistic, and seemingly without remorse. Although best known for films such as the Sundance Festival winner In the Company of Men and the brilliant Your Friends and Neighbors, LaBute began as a playwright, and Austin is about to get its first look at one of his plays, Bash, courtesy of the dirigo group.

If you want easy, you also don't want the dirigo group, which has presented Austin with some of its more challenging productions since its inception three years ago: desire, a reconsideration of Eugene O'Neill's Desire Under the Elms, performed in an unheated barn in the middle of winter; The Gypsy Chain, an original musical about murdered environmental activist David "Gypsy" Chain, performed in an unair-conditioned barn in the middle of summer; and True West, Sam Shepard's oft-performed play about two battling brothers. My kind of theatre, so I felt very comfortable sitting down to talk with dirigo founding member Judson Jones, the director of Bash.

Austin Chronicle: How did LaBute get the idea for the play?

Judson Jones: Plays, actually. He got the idea for one of them while watching this huge flock of geese. He thought, look at these incredible animals -- strong, graceful, a perfect expression of the power and beauty of nature. And he watched them interacting for a long time and eventually noticed that these gorgeous animals were conversing while walking around in their own shit.

AC: What are the plays about?

JJ: They're monologue plays. The first is a father talking about the loss of his baby girl, the second is about a couple going to New York City for a celebration, and the third is about this woman who had an affair with an adult when she was 13 years old.

AC: Do you think they're manipulative?

JJ: No, not really, not purposefully, I think it's just the nature of the plays. No matter how nice you think you are, no matter how perfect you think you are, you are capable of disaster. One of the beauties of the plays is that what we do as people is give our sympathy to others only to find out that they've done something truly horrible. But as horrible as their acts are, these people are not monsters. They're us. As Americans in so many ways we are really great at fooling ourselves. Especially in this kind of religious atmosphere, we think nothing can touch us, nothing can harm us, we have this invincible armor, that we are all generally good people. Not that I don't think that's true, but to say we don't have the capacity for doing the kinds of things these characters do is really scary. Because we all do. I'm constantly reminded of why mortals don't have the powers of gods. Because we would do such horrible things, you know?

AC: So why does dirigo choose the kinds of plays it does and present these very challenging productions?

JJ: Edward Albee said about Sam Shepard -- which we've kind of taken on as a challenge -- that Shepard always dared to fail interestingly. When people come to see one of our shows, we want them to leave altered, whether that be touched or horrified -- we want them to leave feeling like they've just had a real and true experience.

---

Bash runs Nov. 21-Dec. 14 at Hyde Park Theatre, 511 W. 43rd. Call 440-9063 for info.