Soon to be 12 year old Jonas lives in a drab gray world. Literally. Everyone is mechanically polite, eerily agreeable, and although nobody seems to experience any pain, they don't seem to genuinely experience pleasure, either. Utopian society anyone? Actually, the environment in this provocative play is more dystopian than anything else. Dystopian… Cool word, right? I learned it reading online about the book…
Anyhoo, THE GIVER, originally an award winning sci-fi book for young readers written by Lois Lowry and adapted for the stage by Eric Coble, is what's on offer at Metro Theater Company.
Jonas (Christian Probst & Mitchell List) along with his friends Fiona (Berklea Going & Anna Nielsen) and Asher (Ian Miller & Elijah Brown), are looking forward to "the ceremony" where "the twelves" get their assignments. When kids turn twelve, they are given these jobs -- jobs they must carry out for the rest of their lives. Jonas is assigned "Receiver of Memory". This responsibility means that he will be the reservoir for the community's memories of things past -- before their society was converted to "sameness". These memories are transmitted to Jonas by "The Giver" (Nicholas Kryah). Everything from the memories of color, war and grandparents to music, pain and love must be handed over to their new keeper. The play gets darker when Jonas learns about the more sinister goings on -- like how those who are deemed not acceptable are "released". You can just imagine what that's about. It's a well-trod concept, but one that I enjoyed here.
