Review: Sock and Buskin’s Dry Swallow is Three Different Plays

MFA playwriting programs are breeding grounds for theatre that pushes boundaries, and the one of the first productions of this year’s Sock and Buskin season, a new work by Lucas Baisch ‘20 MFA, was no exception. Dry Swallow (directed by Shayok Misha Chowdhury), went up this past weekend in Leeds Theatre, and pushed at least one boundary at the outset by being the first play I’ve ever seen to situate itself entirely within a shipping container.

That shipping container, which looked remarkably real and remarkably expensive, was the thread that tied together three storylines in what the playwright describes as a “strange collage”: Pal and Chula (Marcel Mascaro ‘18 MFA and Magnolia Perez) are competing to establish makeshift bodegas on the same street corner. Sik (Sammie Scott ‘21) and Dori (Siena Rafter ‘20) fight to keep their relationship alive when their child is born. Nasir (Aaron Alper ‘23) and Porter (Clare Boyle ‘20) debate the ethics of self-harm as performance art. These stories, the third of which was by far the most concrete, narrative and interesting, barely touched each other. Aside from a few props and motifs that popped up in more than one story, the plotlines seemed disparate. And when the links were noticeable (pills and pill bottles pop up in all three stories), I didn’t know what to make of the connection.

Oh, and the baby was a cement block. And Pal’s suitcase held nothing but a cement block. And Chula monologued while destroying cement blocks. Chowdhury and Baisch, dutiful experimenters that they are, seemed in a rush to poke the audience with as many weird touches as possible, mostly in the form of cement blocks in places where cement blocks ought not be. But this is Brown University, and we’ve all seen our share of weird theatrical flourishes. I found myself taking them for granted (the actors pulling props out of their mouths barely fazed me), and the inclusion of off-kilter moments came across as a rote exercise in making the play suitably modern.

Dry Swallow received a breath of fresh air at the end of its first act with the appearance of Shitstain (Charlie Stewart ‘20) an anxious, rich prep school kid who begs Pal and Chula to sell him some pills. Stewart’s manic energy felt like it came out of another play entirely, and that’s the play I wanted to see. For a brief moment Baisch’s writing crystallized into something pointed and funny; then Stewart disappeared and the energy dissipated again. Rafter, too, was moving as a distressed new mother, but even a few days later a standout performance is hard to visualize in a piece that remained so stubbornly intangible until its very end. 

You know what I do remember, though?

That shipping container looked expensive.

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