Canyon Couples in the Wake of the Wildfires

THE PEOPLE OF POMPEII: Theater Review

Multi-talented playwright Bernardo Cubria’s topical The People of Pompeii is among the best original plays I’ve soon in quite a while. The action takes place in 2025 after the Palisades Fire almost wiped-out Topanga Canyon, just like Mount Vesuvius did to the eponymous, ancient Roman city of Pompeii, when that volcano blew its top in 79 AD. Cubria’s one-act comedy-drama was all the more of the moment and moving in that it was staged at Will Geer Theatricum Botanicum, an amphitheater perched right in the beating heart of Topanga, so it literally hit home being performed in this Canyon outpost of artistry.

In The People of Pompeii, weeks after they’ve survived the raging wildfires, their house miraculously spared, Chicano Carlos Cabrera (played by Cubria himself) and his Jewish partner Vera Schein (Lauren Saffa) invite four of their best sparring partners – uh, I mean “friends” – over for a feast to celebrate surviving the catastrophe that had befallen their beloved, beleaguered region. Notice that I did not say “community,” because that is a key theme of Cubria’s alternately hilarious, hard-hitting tragicomedy of ill manners (to coin an idiotic phrase).

WGTB stalwart Aaron Hendry essays the role of Evan Wood, who is coupled up with Juniper Williams, portrayed by another WGTB luminary, Willow Geer. This is especially delicious casting because in 2013, Willow played Kate opposite Hendry’s Petruchio in The Taming of the Shrew, and the older but not much wiser Evan and Juniper have their own Shakespearean schtick to work through. Unlike the two other couples, Evan and Juniper were born and raised in Topanga (as, I believe, Willow was), growing up when it was, as dialogue in the play indicates, a bohemian enclave of hippies and Blacklisted artists (does the name Will Geer ring a bell?), seeking refuge from the rueful ravages of urban existence, or as Freud called it “civilization and its discontents.” But now, especially in the wake of the wildfires, Evan and Juniper have hit upon hard times.

On the other hand, Blake Callaghan (Jon Sprik) and Mel Rose (Amber Luallen) are among those newly arrived arrivistes who are yuppifying and gentrifying Topanga, driving up the real estate rates and making it unaffordable for the old timers like Evan and Juniper to continue to live in their beloved homeland, where they’re forced to scrounge out a living by cleaning up the homes of richer residents or subsisting in service jobs. Out-of-work Evan seems a step away from applying for a Walmart’s greeter job as he tries to cope with his apparent fall from a sort of state of grace.

The supercilious Blake lords it over the others that he “courageously” stayed behind to fight the flames while his neighbors evacuated. To compound matters, he’s not so surreptitiously a MAGA maggot, whereas Carlos has openly expressed a wish for Trump and Stephen Miller (you know, that guy who’s filled with existential angst because he wanted to be a Nazi but, alas, had the “misfortune” to be born Jewish) to contract cancer. Mel has just given birth and erupts when she finds out her husband donated – unbeknownst to her – a small fortune to the 2024 Trump campaign.

The only other thing I’ll add about the dramatis personae is that as the only nonwhite character, Carlos feels a sense of loss living in predominantly Caucasoid Topanga, where he and Vera were able to afford purchasing a house because of her unspecified “generational wealth.” Yet, having no other Hispanics nearby to relate to has created a void in Carlos’ life. (Now in case you’re keeping score, here’s a juicy tidbit: Offstage, Lauren Saffa and Bernardo Cubria are actually a married couple living in Topanga, and the thesps appear to be playing thinly-veiled versions of themselves.)

In any case, the Canyon couples are on a collision course. They all suffer from the malady and malaise I call PTSD: You know, Pompeii-Traumatic Stress Disorder. (The contemporary play contains sly references to Mt. Vesuvius’ cataclysmic eruption and its aftermath.) For me, The People of Pompeii has the sensibility of Edward Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? as if it was directed by Paul Mazursky, helmer of then-contemporary counterculture morality tales, such as 1969’s Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice. As uncomfortable truths are revealed and blows exchanged, will their relationships survive – and a true sense of community arise out of the ruins?

Ellen Geer, WGTB’s Co-Producing Artistic Director expertly co-directs The People of Pompeii with Xochitl Romero, who in 2024 had starred in Cubria’s political satire at the Theatricum. The co-directors adroitly use WGTB’s multi-level space and lighting (designed by Hayden Kirschbaum) to tell their story, which is often intercut in a cinematic way. The costuming designed by Beth Eslick also expresses the vibe,

The acting is top notch, in particular Willow Geer and Aaron Hendry as lost souls trying to keep things together. But the real standout is the bard-cum-thespian Bernardo Cubria, who has written a stellar role for himself. (To paraphrase Mel Brooks: “It’s good to be the scribe!”) Not only that, but this multihyphenate can also bust a move in a scene stealing romp across the boards. All aboard!

I have only one “criticism” of this otherwise first-rate work of art: The term “EDM” is repeatedly used throughout the play and it’s never clear that this refers to “Electronic Dance Music.” But this is, but of course, a mere quibble. The People of Pompeii is for grown up theatergoers who relish high-quality writing, alternately droll and gripping acting, all brought together with adept, deft direction. And there’s no better place on Earth to see this moving mosaic about Topanga Canyon than in this Topanga amphitheater. Where else can you watch a love owl enter stage right and majestically swoop across the stage, as if on cue (which gives a whole other meaning to Waiting in the Wings)? Bravo!

Will Geer Theatricum Botanicum is presenting The People of Pompeii through October 4 in repertory with Romeo & Juliet, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Treasure Island and Waiting in the Wings at 1419 North Topanga Canyon Blvd., Topanga, California 90290. For info and tickets: (310)455-3723 and here.

And speaking of amphitheaters in that neck of the woods, on July 28 the Getty Villa held a reception to introduce the play marking the 20th anniversary of that Malibu museum’s “Outdoor Classical Theater” productions. These annual open-air spectacles feature ancient Mediterranean theatrical works in the Villa’s Outdoor Classical Theater, which according to its website is a “unique venue modeled after ancient Greek and Roman prototypes, continuing an 8,000-year-old architectural tradition.” This year, from September10-October 3, Getty Villa is presenting a version of Sophocles’ Antigone.

At the lovely reception, Mexican – not Greek or Italian – cuisine was served under the stars. Why? Because the Latino Theater Company is adapting Antigone: In the Language of Kings, setting Sophocles’ timeless story in pre-conquest Tenochtitlan, Mexico, weaving in pre-Hispanic music and poetry and bringing Aztec mythology to this saga that originally took place in fifth-century B.C. Greece. Antigone: In the Language of Kings is being directed by the venerable Jose Luis Valenzuela, artistic director of Latino Theater Company, and adapted by gifted playwright Evelina Fernández, associate artistic director of Latino Theater Company.

I can’t wait to see Antigone: In the Language of Kings in September! But in the meanwhile, nearby Topanga Canyon’s amphitheater beckons…

The fourth book co-authored by Ed Rampell and Luis Reyes about filmmaking in Hawaii drops in August.