Marcel on the Train

 Long before he was a world renown mime, Marcel Marceau practiced silence of a different kind.  At 20 he was given charge of a group of 12 year olds from a French orphanage for Jewish children with the task of taking them by train from Limoges to Rouen.  From there they would hike into Switzerland and freedom from the Nazis who occupied their country.  This journey is portrayed in Marshall Pailet and Ethan Slater’s play Marcel on the Train, presented by Classic Stage Company. 

While this sounds like a fascinating idea for a play, under Pailet’s direction the story never comes to life.  I didn’t feel the least bit of suspense about whether they would get to Switzerland; their eventual safety was made clear as the play went on in segmented glimpses of their futures.  The characters, especially the children (who are played by adults), are so undeveloped I had little interest in them.  The only one who stood out was Berthe (Tedra Millan) and that was because she was a constant complainer. 

Slater plays Marceau but most of the time I didn’t know what he was portraying in his mimes.  I did like the silhouettes of birds he created with his hands to calm the children when their train is stopped and they hear German voices outside.  Studio Luna provides the lighting design.

Scott Davis makes good use of the small rectangular performance space in creating the inside of a train with little more than two rows of benches and tables.  Caitlyn Murphy is the props supervisor.

The show runs an hour and 40 minutes without an intermission. 

'Only Bears,' a new queer romantic comedy

 

I met Adam Willey-Kern in 2005 when I produced Elizabeth Swados' oratorio "Missionaries" about the rape and murder of four American churchwomen in El Salvador on Dec. 2, 1980, and the faith that kept them in that country despite the danger. We performed the choral drama at my church, the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, for the 25th anniversary of that horror, which made front page coverage around the world. Adam played Archbishop Oscar Romero who was slain while preaching at mass in March of that year.

Only Bears, a new queer romantic comedy short conceived as a proof of concept for a larger episodic omantic dramedy, has launched a Seed&Spark crowdfunding campaign following the project’s approval for fiscal sponsorship through Film Independent.

The short stars real-life married actors Adam Kern (Inheritance, One Dollar, I See You) and Jeff Willey as fictionalized versions of themselves—two mid-40s bears attempting to carve out one intentional day of reconnection in Los Angeles, only to have it repeatedly derailed by traffic, screenings, strangers, and the general chaos of queer social life. Written and produced by Kern, Only Bears explores midlife queer partnership, identity, and intimacy with humor and heart. A graduate of the Cornish School of the Arts, Willey previously appeared in director Aaron Jin’s short Gay Jesus.

Logline: Over the course of one wildly unpredictable day, two married bears attempt to rekindle their intimacy—but between traffic, screenings, queer social chaos, and a stranger handing them a gently used pizza, life keeps acting like the pushy “third” in their relationship.

The project will be directed, shot, and edited by David Haverty of Odd Dog Pictures. The screenplay blends grounded realism with heightened fantasy elements—mirroring the way memory, anxiety, and desire interrupt everyday life—which Haverty translates visually through a fluid shift between naturalistic scenes and playful fantasy sequences.

The ensemble cast includes Santana Dempsey (Law & Order: SVU, Kenan, Scandal, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia), Ian Verdun (Siren, The Creator, Outlands, The Rookie), Teri Gamble (Mrs. Davis, Modern Family, Superstore), and Cassandra Capocci (The Goldbergs, Freakier Friday). The original score is composed by singer-songwriter Tom Goss (Bear Soup, Nerdy Bear, Gay Stuff), who also appears in a cameo.

Kern’s producing work spans short film, theatre, and immersive storytelling, including the Harvard/American Repertory Theatre/Moscow Art Theatre–affiliated Pilot Season Survival Guide, projects with Cleveland Play House and The 5th Avenue Theatre, and his role as a partner and former co-owner of Shadow of the Run, an immersive theatre company based in Cleveland. He is currently developing a slate of film projects alongside a large-scale immersive theatrical adaptation, An Awfully Big Adventure: A Wake in Neverland.

Only Bears was developed with guidance from casting director Risa Bramon Garcia, who encouraged Kern to write directly from lived experience. The resulting script balances sharp comedy with emotional specificity, centering queer bodies, bodies of size, and long-term relationships that are rarely afforded narrative complexity or joy onscreen. The team plans to use the short as a creative and tonal blueprint for a scripted episodic expansion currently in development.