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Monday, June 26, 2006

East Bay Newspapers

THEATER REVIEW: One-man show holds Perishable Theatre audience captive

By Marilyn Bellmore

"Mankind must put an end to war or war will put an end to mankind," sound the words of Pres. John F. Kennedy. It is a fitting beginning to "Pieces of War" — a solo performance by Kenny Carnes — now on stage at Perishable Theatre in Providence.

Carnes, a Rhode Island native and former RI Army National Guard captain, uses poetry and prose to convey the complexities of war through one soldier's perspective. In different voices he's a New Jersey soldier in Iraq who's pregnant girlfriend has died at the World Trade Center. He's a homeless veteran. He's a platoon leader.

How many people are capable of capturing and holding your attention for 65 minutes? That being on a tiny stage in a theater that seats about 42 people. With a set that consists of little more than a table and two chairs, a duffle bag and some camouflage netting. Carnes does it and he does it all too well.

"Every soldier that tells a war story says a lie," said Carnes in character. "And a soldier that tells no story says the truth. He doesn't want to lie. He doesn't know he does. He does just because he plain forgets. It makes no matter. It's stories that a soldier tells when he comes home that keep him in tact."

Each word of the play is well thought out. There is rhyming, description and great use of body language to create well defined characters. You almost want to cry when Carnes recites the telephone message left by the girlfriend about to die. She's sorry for all the times she and her boyfriend argued about who should wash the dishes or that the toilet seat was left up or with whose family they should eat Christmas dinner.

He gives graphic descriptions of the wounded, dying and dead. It is powerful and horrific and you really don't want to listen but you do as he talks about a heart missing a body, a severed head and a single leg left standing in a boot on the ground. Which might lead to comparisons with "Boots On the Ground" that had a success run at Trinity Repertory Company. That play was about the effects of the war in Iraq on Rhode Islanders. Both productions are entirely different and hopefully "Pieces of War" will not be ignored because of it.

Carnes was in active military service from 1994 to 1998. Since that time he has pursued a career in film, television and on stage. His first play, now titled Last Words, debuted in 2002. "Pieces of War" debuted in October 2005 under the working title "War/Peace & the Anatomy of Being Human" at Providence College. Carnes is closing his 18 city nationwide tour of the play at Perishable Theater, which according to artistic director Vanessa Gilbert is the perfect venue for new and experimental work."

Carnes opens his performance stating, "I am not an American. I'm the American. I'm an American veteran." That's something everyone should think about.