There is a scene in Branden Jacobs-Jenkins’ Gloria that perfectly encapsulates its nihilistic worldview, as we see a group of television executives asking a character what famous actor would play a person he once knew. As the character being interrogated tries to describe the traits that made this person who they were, the puzzled look on the, much younger, executives reveals that they have completely lost the ability to conjure a vision of humanity without the use of media archetypes. Was this person more of a Drake or a Kanye? A Jennifer or an Angelina? A Hillary or a Sarah? It’s in this temporary comfort achieved by the notion that there is such a thing as “narrowed down generalizations”, that Gloria becomes an eerie piece of theatre if there ever was one.
The theme of our failure to empathize and connect with others is replicated in the ingenious way in which the same actors are used to play different parts, often inciting characters to express recognition with “you have one of those faces...” dialogues that often lead to discord. In the very first scene, we meet four young assistants working at a magazine. Feeling like their cubicles are located in the office Syberia, they spend their morning complaining and doing as little work as possible. Dean (Ryan Spahn) dreams of becoming a writer, but his lack of confidence and budding drinking problem often sidetracks him. Kendra (Jennifer Kim) is the office firestarter who spews insults and cruel criticism because she has wealth to fall back on (Dean compares her to the very same “straight white males” she detests). Anika (Catherine Combs) seems to be the most neutral of the group, but in her uninterested approach which she mistakes for tolerance, she shows instead a complete lack of empathy. Sitting next to them is Miles (Kyle Beltran) the idealist intern who just wants to make it through his last day at the magazine, so he will never be close to these people again.
The one thing these four young people have in common is how afraid they are of turning into each other, but they have become so concerned with avoiding this that they have forgotten to develop their own personalities. And if the youngsters seem disenchanted, the older people around them are no better. Dean’s boss Nan doesn’t even bother leaving her office to ask her young assistant to come pick up a plastic bag where she’s vomited, Kendra’s boss Eleanor communicates with her only via email, and a fact-checker called Lorin (Michael Crane) is so frustrated with the lack of respect he’s given by these kids, that he has an emotional breakdown in front of them. Worst of all is Gloria (Jeanine Serralles) who practically drags her body through the office reminding everyone of the misery that awaits them (it’s no coincidence that in his cubicle, Dean has a meme featuring Kathy Bates in Misery as a reminder of what he needs to avoid, a very tongue-in-cheek memento mori).
It seems that Jacobs-Jenkins believes the only point where the emotional needs of both generations converge is in the despair that comes with tragedy, and when it strikes the office, the lives of these characters change forever. And yet, as we learn in the second act (divided into two pithy halves, that make a case for the return of the three-act play) this compassion is only temporary, a fastly learned trait forgotten as easily as it was gained, or perhaps the mind’s last attempt at preserving a trace of the perfection we think we were promised at birth.
Unsentimentally directed by Evan Cabnet, Gloria is truly explosive dramatic work that by ensuring we “react”, tries to save us from becoming as detached as its characters. Surprisingly it does this without being condescending to the people we see onstage, for all their millennial affectations, Dean and Kendra for instance, are much more than cautionary tales, they are human beings in formation, except we are asked to wonder when - if at all - does this formation process end. Perhaps in order to make the play’s twists less aggressive, Jacobs-Jenkins makes sure at all times we are aware we’re seeing a work of fiction, and even the intermission is exemplarily theatrical with a blood-red curtain ominously closing as Bach’s “Mass in B Minor” plays. It plays during several key scenes in the play, yet another reminder that we’re allowed to breathe and relax.
For all its use of meta elements, Gloria remains quite straightforward and evades becoming too cerebral, it’s as if the playwright realized he was in danger of turning the play into one of the very elements it openly criticizes. Instead of dispensing sage advice in quotable form, it openly invites us to stop and think things over, reminding us that sometimes silence is truly the most eloquent form of communication.
