Interesting may make life worth living, but sometimes it also makes me sad

Last night I went to see my friend Jenna perform in her class project, the play Mad Forest: A Play From Romania. She is a friend from my undergrad years at Evansville, and now she is in grad school for theatre here in Denver. She is an outstanding actress, enough so that I would happily watch anything that she's doing, even a play about the Romanian revolution, which I actually knew enough about beforehand (thank you history degree and international studies minor!) to question whether it would be a good subject for a play.

As it turned out, the setting and subject did suit the play, providing good raw material for the energy and vitality that can only be fully expressed in chaos. When used effectively, confusion can be a powerful emotional tool, and the fact that it was difficult to tease out the humor and pathos made those elements more intense.

It was a very interesting play, and it succeeded largely because the performers brought a profound energy to what might have been a sluggish mutant of political satire and surreal theatre. That said, I can't say that I liked the play. It was interesting in the same sense of the word as the old curse "May you live in interesting times" and it makes me sad to think about how so much of the energy of life is the product of confusion and chaos.