Review: Winsome Brown in 'Energetic Mashup' of Classic Lit and 'Jail Tales'

Winsome Brown as Lucifer in "Hit the Body Alarm," playing at The Performing Garage. Photo: Theo Cote

Winsome Brown’s new show Hit the Body Alarm, playing at the The Performing Garage in Soho until Oct.2, is an energetic mash-up of classic literature and what she calls “jail tales,” stories from contemporary prison. What is unexpected and refreshing is just how modern Milton’s “Paradise Lost“ feels when paired in this way and just how versatile Brown is as a performer.

The Tribeca resident was recently seen on the New York stage in  “Mary Brown,” her heart-warming, one-woman show about her alcoholic but loving mother. Now she reveals both her writing and acting range with this show in which she plays multiple roles: Lucifer, a male prisoner, Eve, and a mother guilty of the ultimate crime.

“Milton acts as a cradle for the piece,” Brown told me after a recent performance. The show opens and closes with excerpts from “Paradise Lost.” Brown fell in love with Milton’s extended poem at Harvard and here brings the story of Adam and Eve’s fall from grace orchestrated by Lucifer, the vengeful fallen angel, to dramatic life.   

But even before she makes her first appearance as a sort of glam rock Lucifer in elegant black feather wings, she dashes off a little pre-show of apparently random phrases that are recorded and woven into the show’s soundtrack, with some compelling music composed by John Zorn.The pre-show confirms that not only is Brown a chameleon, she’s also a polyglot, rattling off phrases in German, Russian, Spanish and an array of accents. Sound designer Sean Hagerty sits stage left with his mixing deck and violin and instantly plays the recordings. The audience may be slightly unsettled: Has the show started or have they blundered in on a rehearsal or sound check?

“There’s no backstage here,” Brown explained to me. “So we wanted to find a way to bridge the gap without me appearing out of nowhere.” The device also sets the stage for the unexpected juxtapositions that follow. It all unfolds on a spare set, with a backdrop of draped white plastic sheeting onto which projections of lightning create an underworld.

Even if you know nothing about Milton’s 1667 poem, Brown’s delivery shows that it is surprisingly accessible and proves to be the perfect set-up for the second act of the show:

“The mind is its own place, and in itself,

Can make a heav’n of hell, a hell of heav’n.”

Brown takes us into the living hell of a men’s prison in a piece written by Brad Rouse who also co-directs. It is his work that gives the show its title. The phrase “Hit the body alarm” is the culmination of this powerful vignette. The writing is as horrific and graphic as Milton’s vision of the underworld. Later in the show, we hear Brown’s own writing in a piece about a mother pushed to a hideous crime by jealousy and despair. The suspense is taut as the jail tale moves from matter-of-fact to tragedy.

The final scene is Eve’s temptation in the Garden of Eden and here Brown quite literally bares all. Her own nakedness is distracting for a moment but soon seems to move the focus to the bare text and the lyricism of the language. It’s a fitting end to a truly original piece of theater.

“Hit the Body Alarm” is at The Performing Garage, 33 Wooster St. through Oct. 2. Run time is one hour.

Created and performed by Winsome Brown. Texts by John Milton, Brad Rouse, Winsome Brown. Music by John Zorn. Sound Design by Sean Hagerty. Lighting by Michael O'Connor. Directed by Winsome Brown and Brad Rouse.

Tickets here.