In The Chamber, Indeed.

Last Friday our class attended a play that was split into two parts, In The Chamber 2010: Last Men on January 15 at the Rachel Browne Theatre. What can I say about these two plays. For starters, how or why could this play have been sold out two nights in a row? And by play do I mean monologue?

Perhaps it may have something to do with the fact that In The Chamber is in its fifth year, starting back in 2005. It must have many devoted fans, for I couldn't wait to get out of there and am most likely not going to return next year if there will be another one.

There wasn't much to each of these performances, other than a middle aged male going through some sort of mid-life crisis in each hour. For each one, the man would basically stand alone and rant and rave about the goings-on in his current predicament.

I have to admit that beyond the dry, boring content, each monologue provided detailed truths about the world we live in. The first part of the play, Last Man in Krakendorf, written and performed by Gordon Tanner, dealt with animal cruelty due to money hungry corporations.

And the other, Last Man in Puntarenas, written and performed by Steven Ratzlaff, was about our lack of a good health care system and trained doctors which in turn resulted in the fall of his last marriage.

Both performances were surprisingly well done. I imagine it must be quite hard to talk so much and so fast, and expressing that much emotion for an hour straight.

On the down side, I felt the opening scene to be quite in appropriate. I believe that the supposed hooker in his bed would have been enough, and I don't think they needed to detail any more of that. Also, the hour long monologue I felt to be quite boring. Other than the fact that both men acted as if they were going border line crazy, I felt that the swearing and outbursts each men contributed to the story was poorly written in an effort to be funny or in my case, keep the audience from dosing off.