In Dinner and Delusion, we follow the travails of Sheldon (a decidedly creepy Demetrios Bonaros), a thirteen-year-old boy ignoring his family’s discussion of the role of Israel during a 1949 Passover while fantasizing about his Aunt Rosie. As soon as that fantasy becomes a reality, by my count roughly 20 minutes into the show, the Dinner portion of the evening ends and the Delusion sets in. For the rest of the opera experience we are left wondering: is what we are seeing a fantasy, or real? Is Sheldon really a drugged-out hippie who eventually settles down and becomes a shrink, without losing his lecherous side even in old age? Are we going to have one of those it-was-all-a-dream moments at the end?
I’m not 100% sure that composer Michael Sahl or lyricist Nancy Manocherian were aware of what kind of monster they were creating, but their resumes certainly imply that they are the perfect types to bring this kind of theater to New York. Sahl was a composer for '70s exploitation picks with names like Hot Circuit, Blood Bath, and The Incredible Torture Show as well as fancy-pants movies like the German film Waiting for the Moon about Gertrude Stein and an Oscar-nominated documentary on Adam Clayton Powell. Manocherian, meanwhile, has spent her entire career poking vortex-sized holes in the upper crust of New York City, and I find it remarkable that rich New Yorkers have grown up enough to be mocked so savagely, but fairly, on stage.
Either way, Sahl and Manocherian have provided a vehicle for Kira Simling to show off her Verhoeven-like approach to theater in full force. No matter what you say about Dinner and Delusion, its production values cannot be questioned, as every actor knows exactly where to be and what to emote, and can pipe out a hell of a song, no matter how preposterous the actual content may be. You couldn't ask for more from the technical design; they even make the impossible space of the cell theatre seem like the only possible way to express the play. During intermission, I went to the bathroom, which was at the end of the horizontal living room space, and a sexually graphic sketch was framed on the wall. There was no way to tell whether the sketch was part of the set, nor did it seem to matter. If Simling did mean to add that level of detail to the show, however, she deserves some kind of award, though I don’t know if it should be a Drama Desk or a theatrical equivalent of a Razzie.
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