Ye Are the Salt of the Earth

Early on in Evanston Salt Costs Climbing the two male characters, Basil (Hugo Armstrong) and Peter (Michael Redfield), engage in lots of bawdy banter. Amidst the witty, salty repartee, the “F word” flew fast and furious, and I started to lose interest, fearing that I was in for a live stage version of a buddy movie geared for popcorn munchers at the multi-plex. But never fear, Dear Reader, this spitfire word-slinging took place on the boards of the Rogue Machine, one of L.A.’s top theater companies, where searing exhumations and exaltations of the human condition are de rigueur. As Pulitzer Prize finalist Will Arbery’s one-act play pressed on, it became clearer that theatergoers were in for a night not of Hangover frivolity but of hang-ups, where being mortal is just one big drama after another, intermittently leavened and relieved by humor.

This doesn’t mean that Rogue Machine productions don’t have a sense of humor; the company has mounted its fair share of funny plays—Human Error, the musical Come Get Maggie, and David Dean Bottrell Makes Love: A One-Man Show all come to mind. Yes, the West Coast premiere of Evanston Salt Costs Climbing has its quotient of comedy (including a cunning cunnilingus scene), but it is also a tragedy in the Eugene O’Neill mode.

One could jest that O’Neill’s drama The Iceman Cometh (particularly its title) is most relevant to Evanston Salt Costs Climbing, especially as the story takes place during three Januarys from 2014-2016. Basil and Peter are co-workers at the eponymous Evanston, an actual suburb of Chicago in Cook County, Illinois, alongside Lake Michigan. In other words, they are located where weather conditions are often extremely frigid. As such, these hazmat-clad proletarians have what is an essential if dangerous job: They spread the titular salt on snow and ice atop roadways in an effort to make driving safer.

The truck-driving duo are overseen by a municipal government functionary, Jane Maiworm (Lesley Fera, who like her male co-stars, is a theater veteran). She is anxiety-ridden and subject to panic attacks, and as it turns out, Maiworm’s (as she’s usually called) interest is more than merely professional, which explains her propensity for dropping by their stationhouse unannounced to visit Peter and especially the bearded Basil, who is a Greek immigrant.

(For what it’s worth, according to TidalFish: “May worms are polychaete worms that live in the mud and oyster bar debris on the bottom of the Bay and are usually called clamworms. They are only called May worms when they swarm during spawning in the month of May during the dark of the moon.”)

The final character in Arbery’s four-hander is the tall, slender Jane Jr., the (as it turns out) adopted daughter of the widowed Jane Maiworm, portrayed by newcomer to live theater Kaia Gerber. Like her adoptive mother, Jane Jr. suffers from acute anxiety—not only because she’s apparently a social misfit, but from dread of the looming climate crisis that is an underlying theme of Evanston Salt Costs Climbing.

The existential angst that pervades Arbery’s play is not restricted to the impending environmental emergency alone. Peter expresses suicidal impulses, as does Jane Jr. Fear that a new method of high-tech de-icing will replace the use of salt to cover roads—which, according to the play, is eco-hazardous—and therefore force our dynamic driving duo Peter and Basil out of their jobs is another source of deep apprehension. (Note to self: Can A.I. review plays it actually doesn’t see???)

The thesps have lots to chew on, and with tour de force acting the quartet delivers bravura performances, among the best this critic has experienced in a while. As the Grecian Basil, with his long, flowing beard, Hugo Armstrong could be mistaken for an ancient Greek philosopher—although I’m not so sure how stoic Basil, who has a penchant for storytelling, is. Armstrong has a receding hairline, and I could swear that the veins in the forehead/skull of this actor, who has big/little screen credits galore, were doing Method acting in some of his more manic scenes.

Rogue Machine founding member Michael Redfield likewise is a stage and screen stalwart, and winner of LA Drama Critics Circle, Ovation, and LA Weekly accolades for Small Engine Repair. His depiction of Peter, with his “to be or not to be?” musings on melting his too solid flesh is poignant, even as his salt-laying job fails when it is needed most.

Lesley Fera, too, is a familiar face on stage and the big and little screen. She won an LADCC award for playing the title role in Lady Chatterley’s Lover and as Maiworm Fera also has a very sexy scene in Evanston that’s drolly rendered, as the audience wonders, “Say, who’s up that skirt?” (Leave the kiddies at home for this very adult drama.) In addition to enjoying sex, Maiworm also loves to read, and throughout the one-acter she urges her daughter to read Jane Jacobs’ The Death and Life of Great American Cities, which, through deep research I confirmed is an actual book (translation: I Googled it).

The revelation of Evanston’s ensemble is Kaia Gerber, daughter of supermodel/actress Cindy Crawford and businessman Rande Gerber, who both attended the play’s opening and afterparty. A runway model (hey, it’s the family business!) who has had recurring roles on FX’s American Horror Story series and plays Mitzi on Apple TV+’s Palm Royale, Kaia has acted in movies such as 2023’s Bottoms and 2022’s Babylon. During the reception, Kaia told me Evanston was the first time she had professionally acted on a live stage and expressed trepidation at acting alongside her co-stars, who she called “legendary” theater thesps.

But Kaia needn’t have been nervous, as she acquitted herself admirably in her live theater debut. Evanston marks an auspicious premiere on the boards for the willowy, beautiful 23-year-old, who delivers a moving, memorable performance as a young woman coping with life’s difficulties and the environmental catastrophe, while resisting suicidal impulses. In doing so, I suspect that, alas, Jane Jr. expresses the widespread fears of her generation, confronted by the ever-louder crescendo of climate change. Although it’s a heavy drama, Evanston provides lots of laughs, some of them courtesy of Kaia, who proves with her finely etched portrait of Jane Jr. that she’s much more than merely a preternaturally pretty face.

More than any other production I recall being mounted in Rogue Machine’s intimate theater, Evanston has Special FX. Kudos to Mark Mendelson’s imaginative scenic design that redesigned the theater space, projection designer Michelle Hanzelova-Bierbauer and prop designer Jenine MacDonald. I figure that technical director Grant Gerrard also had his hands full (as did, no pun intended, intimacy coordinator Myrna Gawryn).

I don’t know if this was deliberate or not or if I just imagined it, but the venue seemed colder than I ever remember Rogue Machine being (and as this is among my favorite theater companies, I try to never miss a premiere there, so I’ve been fortunate to experience many Roguish productions). Perhaps I was colder because it rained opening night—or maybe director Guillermo Cienfuegos slyly lowered the thermostat so we’d feel the play’s frigid blasts of cold air off of the Great Lakes and the blizzard conditions? In any case, the venerable Cienfuegos, who has just been elevated to Rogue Machine’s Artistic Director, helms his cast and crew with his usual feverish verve and panache.

Evanston’s playwright, Will Arbery, was a Pulitzer Prize finalist for Heroes of the Fourth Turning, which Rogue Machine also presented, as well as a writer/producer for HBO’s hit series Succession and Irma Vep. He has won two Writers Guild of America, Whiting, Obie, Lucille Lortel, and New York Drama Critics’ Circle awards.

Arbery’s edgy Evanston poses many problems for its characters, ranging from looming eco-pocalypse, automation/technology replacing workers on the job and that age-old predicament of simply trying to figure out: What’s it all about and what does it mean, anyway? But does this O’Neill-esque, existential drama offer any solutions? There is a note of grace in the characters reaching out to one another for human connection and consolation. And at least two of the dramatis personae take great pride in their work. Maiworm rejects being considered a mere government bureaucrat, insisting that being an administrator is how she serves her community, which she cherishes. And Peter is proud of his often-risky work, making the roads safer to traverse during icy/snowy weather.

In this, these public servants are literally the salt of the Earth. And with its season opener, Evanston Salt Costs Climbing, the award-winning Rogue Machine on Melrose is off to the races with another exciting, promising start in 2025.

Evanston Salt Costs Climbing is being performed Fridays, Saturdays, and Mondays at 8:00 p.m. and Sundays at 3:00 p.m. through March 9 (dark Feb. 10) at the Matrix Theatre, 7657 Melrose Avenue, L.A., California, 90048. For reservations, call ​(855)585-5185 or box office.