No debate, this one’s a winner

There isn’t a traditional way to write about the latest Artists Repertory Theatre production, Speech and Debate, without doing the show an injustice. The synopsis will be dull and is likely to seem trite and stale: Three alienated teens form a Speech and Debate Club where they learn about identity, each other and how to belong.

That’s terrible. And it doesn’t begin to hint at the numerous George Michael references that pepper the action.

Speech and Debate succeeds in the small moments. Playwright Stephen Karam belongs to that school of writers for whom character development and dialogue manifest in magical ways, but plot construction feels forced.

Teenagers Howie, Diwata and Solomon find themselves the only members of their high school’s Speech and Debate Club through a tense negotiation of secrets. Ultimately, it is Diwata’s desire to garner attention, a need not met by the school’s theater teacher, which drives her to manipulate the other two.

Solomon, a student reporter, seeks information from Howie, while hiding a secret of his own. Howie is blackmailed by both Diwata and Solomon because of an online chat he had with the drama teacher. And both boys discover, through Diwata’s drunken podcast, that she may be pregnant.

Those ideas imply a web of hypocrisy and deceit, and the play does maintain a melancholy undertone (think Muriel’s Wedding) while presenting moments of unrestrained laughter. But really, it’s all about the laughter.

Drama Queen Diwata pens a script for a speech competition in which she melds her idea for a musical version of The Crucible (titled simply Crucible) with stories written by Howie and Solomon in fifth grade about a teenage Abe Lincoln and a time-traveling “queeny” gay kid–indicated by childlike drawings of a boy in a crown.

A mixture of these ideas manifests in Arthur Miller’s character Mary Warren, played by Diwata, traveling through time to meet a teenaged Abe Lincoln and counseling him, through song, to keep his homosexuality a secret and, “just hold it in.”

Jennifer Rowe, recent graduate of PSU, makes her Artists Repertory Theatre debut in the role of Diwata. It is a role that is both loud and unabashed, features that could overpower in such a small venue, but Rowe plays the character with a sensitivity that allows the audience to laugh at her antics while acknowledging her inherent pain.

Solomon, on the other hand, is a character who functions on the other end of the spectrum. A serious student with seemingly puritan views, the audience feels safe mocking the conservative inheritance of his family, until a transition midway through the production when his earnestness gives way. Adrian de Forest manages to invite laughter and illicit tears while essentially playing the straight man to the antics of the more flamboyant characters.

But the standout star of the production is Derek Herman as Howie. Herman, a high schooler himself, is student body president at Parkrose High School and a Portland theater regular. Howie, a character who is in many ways the most self-actualized of the three, has little of the inner conflict housed in the other characters.

As such, he could simply be played as the gay guy. But, Herman inhabits him with sly awareness, getting every ounce of humor from the script without falling victim to playing “gay.”

Setting the play in Salem, Ore. obviously gives it a local appeal. Audience members find themselves thinking, “Hey, I’ve been to Salem,” but, ultimately, the city is used as a clever cultural backdrop rather than a cutesy in-joke.

Press for the production focuses on the use of technology in the lives of the modern teenager. A portion of the program is designated to decoding text messaging. And the transitions between scenes are indicated by a flat screen television that occupies a dominant position in the set. However, the technology ultimately ends up being yet another gimmicky plot point.

Although the initial encounter that brings the three students together is an online chat, followed by a vlog, technology functions in a purely expository fashion. The subsequent moments of tension and conflict each occur via phone call or in person. It is in those moments that the play is most affecting.

Artists Repertory Theatre chose to stage this production in an unused administrative space, blurring the boundaries between stage and performer. But, at times, as parts of my body went numb from continuously remaining perched on a folding chair, I would have been happy to be separated from the performance.

Additionally, the staging feels as if the entire production is taking place in a portable classroom or “multi-purpose room.” This lends realism to the high school setting, but also makes the production as much of an outsider as the characters within it. Speech and Debate being relegated to a meeting room while the professional stage sits unused feels just as miscast and angry as Diwata.

But, sitting mere feet from the performers is a true treat when they present a dance number choreographed to George Michaels’ “Freedom ’90,” replete with flesh tone body stockings. The song will be in your head for days, as will the performance from this cast of truly extraordinary talent.

Speech and DebateArtists Repertory TheatreThrough Nov. 23Student Tickets, $20