If the food wasn’t so worth savoring, the cocktails so intriguing, it might feel even more like sacrilege to continue eating during the short and evocative performances in the elegant dinner theater that is “FEED: Dry.” But then, the eats and libations are integral to the ritual that the Boulder-based Catamounts creates during its signature gatherings of culinary and theatrical sustenance.
The show’s menu combines four courses with four performances. This installment, directed by Catamounts company member Joan Bruemmer-Holden, features a dash of the Persian poet Jalaluddin Rumi; a splash of Brazilian treasure Antonio Carlos Jobim; original playlets by Ellen K. Graham and Chelsea Frye; and a piece from playwright Charles Mee’s open-source theater endeavor, (re)making project.
The offerings in last winter’s “FEED: Après” were full of tart, post-pandemic uncertainty and wit. “Dry” is a more solemn — dare we say sacred? — offering. Think of it as an act of and meditation on hospitality in its lived and metaphysical guises. Actor Jason Maxwell kicks the evening off with an excerpt of Rumi’s “Tavern.”
While “Dry” is a collective undertaking, two of the pieces have playwrights attached. Graham’s “Oasis” finds Asha (Maggie Tisdale) and Vetta (Maxwell) meeting at the watering hole of the title. He’s dying of thirst, or so he fears. Acting as steward of the water, she refuses him.
The negotiation that follows can be tense and perhaps symbolic. Is this duet of power real? It shifts like sand and shimmers at times like the heat off the desert floor. And as the final tableaux leaves us wondering about the fate and choices of the character, guitarist Bill Kopper and singer Nika Garcia (the Catamounts associate producer) begin singing America’s “Horse with No Name” followed by a touching rendition of “These Days,” the Jackson Browne song first made famous by Nico of the Velvet Underground.
Patrons are seated at four large wooden tables. A round, rattan mat sits in the center of the Dairy Arts Center’s Carsen Theatre, encircled by sand. Linda Lea’s botanical designs and props — and her “tablescapes” — add beautifully to the night’s themes of the arid and the fluid.
And in the space between plays, director Bruemmer-Holden and sous chef Sakina Mwandani introduce the vittles (courtesy of executive chef Bob Sargent’s Savory Cuisines) and the evocative cocktails (by Kelly Dressman of Longmont’s Dry Land Distillers). A savory collard green, kale and potato caldo verde floats in on a performance of Jobim’s “Aquas de Marco/Song of March.” Among the most moving list poems ever, it is spoken in English by Simone St. John and sung in its original Portuguese by Garcia.
In a bit of gastronomic punning, for the third course, Maxwell enters singing “Dem Bones” and the cordial wait staff (the actors as well as artistic director Amanda Berg Wilson) arrive with plates of balsamic glazed spareribs and carrot-zucchini flan. (There is a vegetarian option, and each drink is served as a mocktail that guests can spike accordingly.)
In Frye’s “Them Bones,” Maxwell is the playfully carnal Eleu (“Too much of a good thing can be … wonderful,” he says like a Cat in the Hat for grownups). St. John is Anima, a differently sensuous soul. “Why Eleu, you didn’t tell me our guests had arrived,” she says with a slyness full of knowing. He looks like his buzz is about to be killed, but Anima calms him and offers a lovely dissertation on dryness and a lesson on movement. There are many ways to lubricate dem bones.
In the fourth course, Tisdale captures the perhaps melancholy yet luxuriating elan reflected in the title of “The Life I Had in Mind.” It was rich and mildly indulgent — not unlike the dessert, a tiramisu.
Indeed, the night’s portions were ample. The performances served up the thought-provoking and the poetic. (The after-dinner epilogue comes from none other than the poet Mary Oliver.) Will your belly be full? I can’t imagine otherwise. Will your mind-heart be digesting long after you’ve pushed back from the table? That is Catamounts’ aim.
IF YOU GO
“FEED, Dry”: Created by Amanda Berg Wilson, Joan Bruemmer-Holden, Chelsea Frye, Nika Garcia, Ellen K. Graham, Bill Kopper, Linda Lea, Jason Maxwell, Simone St. John, Maggie Tisdale and Wessie Simmons. Directed by Bruemmer-Holden. Featuring Maxwell, St. John, Tisdale, Garcia and Kopper. At the Dairy Arts Center, 2590 Walnut St., Boulder. Through Feb. 10. For tickets and info: thecatamounts.org or thedairy.org
