In the spirit of spooky season, Theatre Knoxville Downtown offers a little fright of their own with their latest production, The Birds. While those of us might be most familiar with Alfred Hitchcock’s 1963 film, playwright Conor McPherson’s The Birds (2009) is yet another adaptation of British author Daphne du Maurier’s popular 1952 short story of the same name. It’s a fresh take on a familiar story, emphasizing the strain that unexpected traumas have on human relationships. Director Shelby Frye, a self-proclaimed birdphobe, notes that this play is not about the creatures of its title—it’s about the fear of loneliness. With a four-person cast, loneliness, skepticism, and jealousy reign in Frye’s production, the dark side of human nature battling against the desire for community, safety, and connection. As a loose adaptation, McPherson’s play presents the familiar frightening event of the bird attacks but with new characters, settings, and plot.
The setting is rural New England, in a recently abandoned country cabin by a lake. Audiences enter to find the interior of the cabin decorated with simple, antique furnishings. A kitchenette is on stage right, with a small dining table and a few chairs, which leads into an open living room with a single sofa flanked by a wood burning stove. It seems cozy enough, except before the show starts, it’s all awash in sinister red lighting. While the set might seem a bit cramped, the cast navigates through the set quite naturally; occasionally, one of the actors knocked over a chair or bumped into a set piece (which could have been scripted, but who knows!) but they played it off smoothly, and the effect is of a group of distressed individuals trying to find some sense of home and family amid the chaos of the bird attacks.
When the play opens, we meet Diane, played by Sarah Campbell, who has just rescued Nat, played by Casey Cain, as she was fleeing to the cabin. Diane is a published author and occasionally logs into her diary the transpiring events, which we hear via voiceover audio. Campbell’s performance could show a bit more fear and shock at times, but she delivers Diane’s cunning and secrecy quite well. Nat has a tormented past that he seems to be running from; he had previously been involuntarily institutionalized by a former lover and is desperate to explain it away. Cain is fantastic in conveying Nat’s emotional outbursts as well as his calmer, more introspective moments.
Eventually, the duo encounters Julia, played by Kelby Cox, a young woman fleeing from a cruel and abusive group of survivors. Cox is pure innocence, pure hope, a stark contrast to both Campbell and Cain’s more cynical characters. The best moments from the whole cast are when they are all together; they play off each other so naturally in both line delivery and physical interactions. Nat’s birthday party scene is particularly noteworthy, and each actor performs drunkenness convincingly, subtly, and emotionally.
And let’s not forget the final actor in the cast, Joseph Johnson, who plays Tierney, the mysterious farmer who lives across the lake. He’s referenced throughout the early play as menacing, toting a shotgun wherever he goes. His first appearance on stage is just as menacing, fully clad in shabby overalls and a spiked bucket on his head, like a villain from so many popular slasher flicks. He’s tall and dominates the stage during the one short scene he appears, attempting to get Diane, who is left home alone, to leave Nat and Julia to join him. His eerie, red-faced delivery adds to the intensity as he alludes to an undesired, potential romantic or sexual relationship with Diane. His movements are jerky, and Diane (and audiences!) are uncertain of what his next move may be or what dangers he conceals. When he leaves, Diane is quick to bar the door behind him, and it’s a major sigh of relief that attests to the small but powerful tense moments that occur throughout this production.
If you’re in for a spooky theatrical experience without the gore and fright of traditional haunted houses or corn mazes, The Birds is the show for you. It runs until November 2nd, with showings on Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays at 7:30pm and matinees on Sunday at 2:30pm. Tickets are available at their box office, located at 800 S. Central Street, or online at https://theatreknoxville.com/the-birds/
