‘Brownsville Bred’ is a stunning show at The Schoolhouse Theater

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By

David Begelman , Theater Critic

 

This must be the year of memorable one-person shows. Tina Fabrique is currently wowing them in “Ella the Musical” at Long Wharf in New Haven, Miche Braden will be reprising her bravura performance in “The Devil’s Music: The Life and Blues of Bessie Smith,” while Elizabeth Aspenlieder starred in a revival of “Bad Dates” at Shakespeare & Company in Lenox, Mass.

Elaine Del Valle, a Latina actress with a smile that can literally brighten up a theater, provides a poignant autobiographical monologue about life in the barrio.

“Brownsville Bred,” the opening show of the 2010 season at the Schoolhouse Theater, is set in “the projects,” a section of east Brooklyn in which the actress was raised. Her monologue is a taut emotional journey through a half-life that will have you on the edge of your seat.

Unlike other celebratory monologues, this show takes poetic allusions to “the unconquerable soul” out of literary moth balls and into real life. Dell Valle’s account of her life experiences is not only theatrically riveting, it tells the story of a woman who is able to emerge from disappointment and trauma with her humanity not only intact, but triumphant, to boot.

But make no mistake about it. Dell Valle’s commanding performance is not only a product of what she has to say about her life. It is just as much an outcome of an impressive set of acting skills in delivering the theatrical goods. Those techniques, ripened in such training venues as Wynn Handman’s acting studio, have equipped the actress to portray her coming of age narrative compellingly.

Director Pamela Moller Kareman, in collaboration with the actress, makes the most of the staging. Whether collapsing on stage after having to assist as a “birthing coach” for her mother, going into paroxysms of delight after being accepted into specialty schools in New York City like The High School of Performing Arts, taking a shine to the fullback captain of her high school, Skippy Gonzales, surviving the trauma of attempted rape and a gang initiation at Madison Square Garden, or news of her father’s contracting AIDS in Puerto Rico, the actress has the audience in the palm of her hand.

Whether squatting comfortably on the plastic-covered couch in the living room of her tenement apartment, careening across the stage, or doing the “rhumba,” a Latino version of mambo-like dance movement with only a distant relationship to how the preppies used to cut a rug at Roseland, Dell Valle’s physical aptitude is everywhere apparent.

She is also forgiving. She subsequently marries a man from the Bronx, and remarks generously that, “I don’t hold that against him.” The play’s setting is 301 Sutter Avenue, a section of the city where the average household is more than six persons. Jason Bolen’s set is dotted with graffiti, while David Pentz’s lighting design highlights the action. Matt Stine’s sound design pipes in noises of the barrio, and on a positive note, the optimistic Debbie Boone ditty, “You Light Up My , Life.” Could as well be a tribute to the actress herself.

“Brownsville Bred” runs until Oct. 17 at The Schoolhouse Theater, 3 Owens Road, Croton Falls, NY. Performances on Thursday, Friday and Saturday are 8 p.m., Sunday at 4 p.m. Tickets are $30 on Thursday and Friday and $32 on Saturday and Sunday, and may be purchased by calling the box office at 914-277-8477 or contacting www.schoolhousetheater.org.