Each year there are dozens of solo performance shows at the Hollywood Fringe Festival. Most are the type where the writer/actor bemoans the trials and tribulations of their life thus far. I prefer a solo show that looks at a historical figure, either at a crisis point in their lives or at their lives in totality. Austrian playwright/novelist Elfriede Jelinek ‘s Jackie, in a translation by Gitta Honegger, would seem to be a perfect show for me. Maybe it is the foreigner’s point of view or maybe something was lost in translation, but Jackie is more like a Leopold Bloom stream of consciousness exercise than a play. Although Jackie’s husband President JFK, Marilyn Monroe and the other Kennedy wives—Ethel and Joan—are occasionally mentioned, they are more like footnotes. This Jackie, who begins the show wearing the iconic pillbox hat and pink suit (with tastefully applied blood and brain matter), often says “she is the clothes” and that more or less seems to be the key theme here. The image of Jackie, rather than the woman.
The stage of the Broadwater’s Second Stage is littered with mannequin parts and features a long rack of outfits, many of which Jackie dons and doffs during the 60-minute show. Everleigh Brenner gives a committed performance, even doing a brief Happy Birthday singing Marilyn impersonation. Director Brian Eckert keeps her in near constant motion, so her speech doesn’t bog down, just lacks reason. Seeing Brenner in that opening costume brought back fond memories of Wendy MacLeod’s play The House of Yes. That play doesn’t deal with the Kennedy family but rather their legacy and influence on future generations. Brenner and Eckert might better use their talents with a sturdier vehicle like that.
https://www.hollywoodfringe.org/projects/9544