MARISOL

I can’t fault the talent that’s gone into bringing Open Fist Theatre’s revival of José Rivera’s Obie-winning Marisol to nightmarish life, but I found the Puerto Rican playwright’s vision of a dystopian New York City under siege almost as torturous to sit through as the unrelenting, apocalyptic horrors its titular heroine has to endure in scene after excruciating scene.

Eschewing a realistic depiction of life in the Big Apple, Rivera starts things off with his titular heroine, Puerto Rican copy editor Marisol Perez (Jade Santana), emerging physically unscathed but spiritually scarred by an unsettling encounter with with a golf-club swinging stranger (Jack Sharpe stepping into the role of Man With Golf Club at the performance reviewed) when who should intervene but an actual wings-sporting Angel (Taylor Scott).

And if this weren’t already weird enough, things only get weirder and weirder as the evening progresses.

Marisol’s roommate June (Grace Soens) shows her front-page newspaper headlines reporting the subway killing of … Marisol Perez, upon which the aforementioned Angel returns bearing tidings of great misery, specifically that (among other horrors) the moon has disappeared, food has lost its substance, and suffering has become rampant, which is why the Angel and her celestial comrades have banded together to (get this) overthrow and kill God.

And we haven’t even gotten to Marisol’s unnerving encounter with June’s decidedly disturbed (and disturbing) brother Lenny (Sharpe), and when Lenny turns violent, Marisol finds herself forced to survive one peril after another on the streets of New York as news reports describe a rapidly deteriorating Earth.

Still, as tough as Act One is to get through, it pales in comparison to a second act that serves up an unrelenting succession of burning bodies, violent attacks, and angels carrying automatic weapons, along with a trio of grotesque encounters with 1) Man With Ice Cream (Chima Rok), 2) Woman With Furs (Barbara Lee Bragg), and most horrific of all, 3) Man With Scar Tissue (Hutchins Foster).

Those who don’t mind being trapped in a prolonged bad dream may find Marisol right up their pitch black alley and share director Amanda Weier’s love for Rivera’s play, and on the plus side, Weier has elicited some stunning performances from a cast completed by Mara Michelle (Young Woman) and Carmella Jenkins (Sandy), with major shout-outs to Santana’s stunning Marisol, Sharpe’s scarily unhinged Lenny, and a virtually unrecognizable Foster’s dangerously unstable Man With Scars.

Also in the plus column, Brad Bentz (set), Matt Richter (lighting), Christopher Moscatiello (sound), Mylette Nora (costumes), Bruce Dickinson and Anna Krause (props), Yusuf Nasir (choreography), and Tambrie Allsup (fight choreography) have combined their considerable talents to bring playwright Rivera and director Weier’s macabre dreamscape to nightmarish life.

April Star-Collins is ensemble swing. Saskia Young is associate producer. John Dimitry is stage manager. Lucy Pollak is publicist.

In the 34 years since its off-Broadway debut, more than a few critics have used phrases like “an exhilarating theatrical assault” and “audacious theatrical imagination” to describe José Rivera’s Marisol, and if your reaction to Open Fist Theatre’s latest matches these heady words, more power to you. I, on the other hand, couldn’t wait for Marisol to end.

Open Fist Theatre Company @ Atwater Village Theatre, 3269 Casitas Ave., Atwater Village. Through October 24. Fridays and Saturdays at 8:00. Sundays at 4:00 except October 3. Also Monday October 5 at 8:00.
www.openfist.org

–Steven Stanley
September 18, 2026
Photos: John Dlugolecki

Visit www.theatreinla.com/nowplayingrs.php for a review roundup of what’s now playing in theaters around Los Angeles.

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