Review: All in the Timing

The KTS’s production of David Ives’s play, All in the Timing, directed by John Maize, was a delightful experience to watch. Funny, yet poignant with deeper messages intertwined, the show consisted of four short plays with a variety of actors and characters.
The first play, Sure Thing, told the story of a man and a woman having a conversation in a coffee shop, and shows the several different paths that their conversation could have taken. It’s a humorous look at a series of alternate realities. The actors, Evan Webster and Naomi Froese, worked wonderfully together. Their witty banter was a treat to watch. While it seemed at some points that their conversations were awkwardly timed, their charisma and teamwork more than made up for it. Laura Gallagher-Doucette, who played a waitress who symbolically rang a bell to begin each new reality, had a minor yet crucial role, and played it very well.
The second play, Philip Glass Buys a Loaf of Bread, particularly struck me because of the sheer amount of work that must have gone into perfecting it. This play consisted of a short scene at the beginning in which Philip (played by Thoby King) enters a bakery and has a short exchange with the baker and a pair of women. It then turns into a choreographed routine in which the actors chant a remix of the words used in the introductory scene. This section of the play truly pertained to the name of the show itself; it really was all in the timing. The actors were flawless in their delivery of their lines, and the choreography was very fluid; it seemed as though they were moving together as one. The musical accompaniment was also very good.
The third play, Words, Words, Words, tells the story of three monkeys who live in captivity and are forced to type stories on old typewriters as a sort of experiment conducted by humans. The actors worked well together and the way they moved around the stage and interacted was very convincing of their apeish demeanors. I found Paul Robinson, who played the monkey named Swift, particularly endearing. He was very expressive with everything he said and he moved around like a monkey quite naturally. The set was also well done; it looked exactly like the kind of setting a monkey living in captivity would have.
The final play was about the death of Leon Trotsky, and is aptly named Variations on the Death of Trotsky. King, who played Trotsky, and Anna Dubinski, playing his wife, worked together very well. Their Russian accents were also well done.
The charisma and teamwork of the actors, along with the good choice of sets and music made the KTS’s production of “All in the Timing” a truly enjoyable experience.