The Minutes
Albany Civic Theater
Albany, N.Y.
2/15/24
While attending a production of Tracy Letts’ The Minutes in New York City, capital region theater director Brian Sheldon noticed the crowd becoming “extremely uncomfortable.” That, he said, is when he knew he had to tell the story. And so he brought the stage play about small town politics to the political and surprisingly small town of Albany (or, as local residents often call it, “Smallbany”). Over the course of one solid act, The Minutes depicts a local government assembly meeting which goes awry — humorously at first, and then horrifically by the end.
The action takes place in the fictional American town of Big Cherry. The cast is made of quirky, often exaggerated characters, like pill-popping hypochondriac Miss Matz and the unsubtly-named Mr. Oldfield. The community theater actors deliver maximalist performances. Dianne O’Neill plays Councilwoman Innes as the sort of stodgy dowager one might expect to utter, “Well, I never!” in a Marx Brothers comedy, while Chris Foster imbues his Mayor Superba with a thick layer of Troy McClure smarm.
These larger-than-life figures bounce off of each other, bickering about parking spaces, proposed public fountains, and whether or not to include an event known as Lincoln Smackdown in the annual Big Cherry heritage festival. Though exaggerated, the petty squabbles are grounded enough in the real world of messy small town politics; a sheriff hoarding a cache of ill-gotten bicycles feels like the kind of scandal that might hit the local newspaper (if it hasn’t shut down or been swallowed by Sinclair Broadcasting, that is). But newcomer and desperate people-pleaser Mr. Peel’s quest to uncover what exactly happened at the previous council meeting slowly uncovers something much grimmer in the town of Big Cherry.
The Minutes hints at this darkness in drips and drabs at the beginning: A councilwoman glibly references a sexual assault allegation against Big Cherry’s previous mayor; the town’s cheery pageant about local hero Sergeant Pim contains some decidedly family-unfriendly elements; and an argument about wheelchair-accessible public infrastructure ends with a declaration that “ ‘handicapped’ went out with the sodomy laws!” But the play’s sudden turn into horror, underscored by lurid giallo-style lighting, still astonishes. This isn’t shock value for its own sake. Rather, The Minutes examines how we react when we’re forced to reckon with our nation’s violent past. Do we confront it head on and try to atone? Do we quietly look the other way? Or do we go to even more brutal extremes to maintain our comforting myths?
“We pass false happenings onto our children and never take responsibility for the actions of our forefathers,” director Brian Sheldon said. “Critical Race Theory is a shining example of that. Parents are constantly protesting the teachings of actual history and instead want nothing but the Franklin kite experiment at the front.”
The Minutes runs at the Albany Civic Theater every weekend until March 3.
Where I’m going next: going to hear the dolphins cry with 90s alternative band Live unplugged at The Egg.
