By DAVID DUPONT
BG Independent News
“This is a game, not therapy.”
That admonishment comes early in “She Kills Monsters.”
What follows is proof that game of Dungeons & Dragons can indeed be therapeutic. In doing so the drama-comedy proves highly entertaining.
Qui Nguyen’s “She Kills Monsters,” directed by Mahmoud Abusultan assisted by Story Moosa, is being staged at BGSU’s Donnell Theatre tonight (Nov. 17), Friday Nov. 18, and Saturday Nov. 19 at 8 p.m. with matinees Saturday and Sunday at 2 p.m. Click for tickets.
The narrator (Darla Arnett) grandly sets the scene – our adventure will unfold in Athens, Ohio.
Agnes Evans (Haley Wright) wished that her life was less boring. Then her parents and younger sister, Tilly, died in a car accident.
Now Agnes is on the verge of moving in with her boyfriend Miles (Syd Atkins). But she’s stalling. She’s still rooted to the family home, especially her sister’s room.
Tilly (Claire Oliver) was about six years younger than Agnes, enough for a generation gap, it seems. Agnes felt she never got to know her sister, a nerd and role-playing gamer. Agnes, who now teaches in the local high school was by her own admission more conventional, bland by design.
But in Tilly’s room, she finds a notebook that spells out a Dungeons & Dragons adventure. She decides to take this adventure even though she knows nothing about the game and has no interest in it beyond seeing it as a way to connect with her dead sibling.
This quest takes her into another world, but one that was really just around the corner, and down the school hallway from the one she inhabits.
Agnes reaches out to Chuck (Nick Adams), who works in a local game store. He is socially awkward, especially around women, and intensely involved in Dungeons & Dragons. He also knew Tillus the Paladin, Tilly’s D&D character. He takes on the role of Dungeon Master and helps brings the module to life.
Soon we meet the other adventurer conjured up by Tilly – Lilith (Nykera Gardner), Kaliope (Ruby Brandon), and Orcus (Alejandro Alverez). She also encounters various monsters intent on stopping the adventurers on their quest.
They include a fairy, Farrah (Ella Sidder) with a nasty streak, and the vicious cheerleader duo, Evil Gabbi (Regina Wolf) and Evil Tina (Liv Lutz).
These last seem to be the only creatures that faze the Paladin. She shrinks before them and lets them bully her. This reveals game as a projection on Tilly’s life as a nerdy, gay girl in a conventional school.
Agnes toggles between the two settings – the land of her sister’s imagination and the place of her dread. (Credit the expertise of costume designer Margaret McCubbin, scenic designer Kelly Mangan, who also designed the puppets, lighting designer Steve Boone and fight and movement director James Stover for bringing this imaginary world to life.)
We meet her friends who are reflected in the characters.
The central figure in the school setting is Vera (Alexis Reinbolt Tucker), who seems to pride herself on being the worst guidance counselor in the world. She’s dismissive of the students and their problems. She’s hardly more empathetic with her friend Agnes. And openly dislikes Miles.
This comes out in a comic scene where Vera discusses Miles and Agnes’ relationship with a student Steve (Trey Kratz).
We’ve met Steve before inside the D&D game where he always shows up and gets zapped by whatever monster is on hand.
And when Chuck tries to describe the game he and Agnes are playing, Miles takes everything Chuck says as a sexual innuendo, and imagines they are involved in some kind of kinky affair.
The script gently pokes fun at Dungeons & Dragons where an amiable goofball like Chuck can be in charge. But Chuck turns out to be a hero as he plays a central role in connecting Agnes with the small-town milieu that inspired her sister’s fantastic realm, and introduces her to a place that is not boring, and where she can connect to her sister.
