‘The Magic Rainforest: An Amazon Journey’ by Jose Cruz Gonzalez. Director: Mickey Nugent.
Seen- Oct 2018 at the Center of the Arts – West Campus
Jose’s production of The Magic Rainforest: An Amazon Journey captured all the horror and confusion of a young boy that cannot find what is left of his family -who died at hands of the Fire Demon. Gonzalez’s production made me realize that not everyone is willing to change who they are to help others and it made sympathized and reconsider that changing one’s mind is difficult sometimes. Without that reconsideration, in the play would have been even more chaos than there was in the beginning and would have been unsuccessful at portraying change in people. In The Magic Rainforest: An Amazon Journey, Aki a young Amazonian Indian boy who is supposed to a warrior but one day, the fire demon starts destroying his village he goes on an adventure and with the help of his mystical friends he discovers and learns everything about his abilities and about what he is capable of to defeat the fire demon.
Aki the young Amazonian boy and his uncle Wakote were two of the best performers onstage. Aki’s gestures onstage were perfectly executed. There was this moment in the play where he is talking to his uncle Wakote, in the jungle, about becoming a warrior and that he is fearless until when they hear the Jaguar King. I think that Aki’s and uncle Wakote’s gestures and movements were good because before hearing the Jaguar King, Aki was being like every thirteen year old, fearless and careless and was demonstrating his fearlessness to his uncle and Wakote was telling Aki that he was not prepared to be a warrior and had too much to learn ahead of him, I liked this moment of Wakote because he was just being honest with his nephew. Then, when the Jaguar King is heard by them, Aki is filled with horror, this is where his fearlessness is left behind, and his gestures became pure horror; on the other hand, uncle Wakote is showing so much less fear than Aki and tells Aki that he must be quiet and must to learn to listen to the animals in the jungle. The performers’ voice was nice and clear, the movements were executed with precision, and the interpretation of the roles were good. I do think that you can dislike a character but admire the performance. The performers were acting but at the same time they were listening and responding naturally to what they were listening around them.
The Set- the play is set in The Amazon Rainforest. The design of the production was good. The scenery is very helpful to the play and to the performers because it helped crate the mood and the atmosphere during the play. The scenery was not a hindrance nor too distracting, it actually helped a lot to the performers to tell the story they were telling. As said above it contributed to the mood and atmosphere of the play and it was very appropriate for the style of the production; it included rocks, a lake, trees, plants, and all you could find in a jung...
