The Good Word
Brian Osborne's new Live Arts show sings the praises of a character of questionable character.
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It helps if you look the part.
Tall and lanky with a mop of curly red hair and a broad smile, Brian Osborne bears strong physical resemblance to a Marjoe Gortner, the former child evangelist, wannabe musician turned B-movie actor who is the inspiration behind The Word, Osborne's entry in this year's Live Arts Festival. And while the striking likeness was not the primary impetus for staging this show, it was a compelling factor.
Osborne recalls watching a DVD of the 1972 documentary Marjoe and thinking, "Hey, I kinda look like this guy, and there're similarities with the path of his life and the way I look at theater and characters. ... His history is interesting and his energy is amazing."
Gortner was a charismatic preacher who stomped, sweated, jumped around and shook hands while feverishly instigating allegiance to Jesus and the Almighty. His power to rivet an audience instantly grabbed Osborne's attention. "The first thing that really drew me to Marjoe was his ability to rile a crowd, his skill as a performer."
Likewise, Osborne — who has been working out "trying to get back in prizefighter shape" in order to maintain the stamina required for this kinetic one-hour production — has the capacity to juice a crowd. Gentle, warm and soft-spoken outside the theater, when the lights go up, Osborne has a commanding presence. That's one reason he caught the attention of 1812 Productions, "Philadelphia's All-Comedy Theatre Company," which recently honored Osborne with a 2007 Jilline Ringle Solo Performance Award.
"His style strikes me as visceral and athletic and ebullient. ... It's aggressive in the most positive way," asserts 1812's artistic director, Jennifer Childs, who adds that the award judges were impressed by Osborne's proposal for The Word. "There's something special about taking what looks to have only kitsch value and delving deeper and finding a kind of story and humanity behind it," she says.
If there is anything the characters that Osborne has created and portrayed for his Elastic Theater Co. have in common, it's that they're all damaged individuals with obvious flaws. They're not entirely ethical, not always kind, and yet they're able to evoke, if not sympathy, at least a certain level of empathy or interest. Take, for example, the character Osborne played in Bitch on Wheels, a riotous show he directed and presented at last year's Fringe Festival about the declining days of roller derby. In it he plays the unsavory owner of a derby team who, while perfectly ambulatory, is so lazy that he uses a wheelchair to get around. Creepy to the core, this character nevertheless imbues a transfixing presence.
Osborne claims his interest in characters of questionable character stems in part from a fondness for his late Uncle Frank, "who never really worked an honest day in his life; he was a bookie. He was a huge influence. ... He did card tricks and told incredible jokes and would always hold court. There was something about it all that I found remarkable."
Uncle Frank helped young Brian see how humor and the ability to spin a good yarn could draw people's attention. An interest in theater happened almost by accident when Osborne tried out for a play on a whim while at Marquette University and got the lead. Osborne was soon creating and presenting original work for friends in the basement of his college apartment house. After graduating, Osborne moved to New York, where he continued to create original, highly physical, often clown-based pieces, while also appearing in experimental and Off-Broadway productions. Through assorted jobs and connections he met a number of Philadelphia-based theater folks, including members of Pig Iron Theatre Co. and Headlong Dance Theater. Sensing a kinship with the work of these ensembles, Osborne moved to the city in 2005. "It was a no-brainer for me," he says. "I could see there were no walls between dance and theater here. I could see how physical and unpredictable the work was."
Osborne's fascination with the unpredictable runs full-tilt in The Word, where his antics take many seemingly capricious turns. The scrambled plot zigs and zags in wacky ways so as to externalize the distorted psyche of the title character.
"There's nothing straightforward about how this guy [Marjoe] thinks. Once you think you know where it's going it will turn a corner and you have to catch up with him," says Suli Holum, the show's director and text consultant, who raves about the intensity of Osborne's portrayal. "He is 100 percent this character, it's a transformation. ... You get the feeling that this is a person who puts himself out there in such a way that's a little bit uncomfortable at times — it's not always successful, but he can't really tell the difference. That's where this guy lives."
Though Gortner's life story was a springboard for The Word, the show is not true biography. Osborne portrays the title character in an imagined scenario where Gortner is looking into mounting a solo confessional-type theater piece based on his life. Osborne embraces sundry states of mind throughout the presentation. These include wildly careening through eight-minute sermons of religious ecstasy, breaking into fits of paranoia and singing off-the-wall songs while playing a Yamaha synthesizer. "It's all him sorting himself out," Osborne explains. "It's sad and hilarious and it walks that fine line where you hate him, but you love how well-intentioned he is."
The sentiment is not that far-fetched, assures Osborne. "I think Marjoe was dealt a really shit hand, but he made so much of it. ... It's the idea that imperfections are to be celebrated. I think we all have the capacity to do what is deep down a dream of ours, and even if we fail, the fact that you even went at it is what matters."
The Word, Sept. 7-8, 10 p.m.; Sept. 9, 7 p.m., $15, Christ Church Neighborhood House, 20 N. American St.
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