Force of Nature Productions presents Tales from Tomorrow: Origins Review

The Brickhouse Theater, North Hollywood, CA

It's been... a while since we've had a chance to take in a Force of Nature Productions show. Like three years ago a while. That was a whole pandemic ago! In that time, the theater industry has obviously been hit hard by COVID-related closures and live event challenges, and it's taken a while for many productions to get back to some sense of normalcy. That is a reality that FoN Productions knows very well, as it too was slow to recover after it had to shut down when the Coronavirus effectively cancelled all live events.

(Image courtesy of Force of Nature Productions.)

Fortunately, three years later, some sense of normalcy has returned to the world, and that was reinforced this past weekend when Force of Nature put on its first live haunt season show in three years with its presentation of Tales from Tomorrow: Origins. This six part show, which opened last Friday and concludes its short run with three more performances tomorrow, Saturday, and Sunday at 8:00pm, 8:00pm, and 2:00 respectively, is another chapter in FoN's Tales from Tomorrow series, which first debuted in 2017 to sold out houses and also manifested in short film form on YouTube in 2019. The first two iterations blended elements of Black Mirror and The Twilight Zone to create eerie, unnerving portrayals of life as an almost purgatory-like existence that was horrific enough to be fiction but plausible enough to be a potential outlook.

This year, Tales from Tomorrow returns with a Universal monsters infusion, imagining stories that draw from Frankenstein, Dracula, the Wolf Man, the Mummy, Creature from the Black Lagoon, and the Invisible Man, but set in the timeline of today or an undetermined future, and mixed with themes of societal struggles that could be horrors of their own. The whole show is north of an hour and a half long, with each tale clocking in at roughly 10-15 minutes (we didn't exactly check the times), plus a 15 minute intermission halfway through.

(Photo by **Carlos R. Hernandez** and courtesy of Force of Nature Productions.)

In "The Wolf Man: 2092," Jennifer Novak Chun and Anne Westcott play a pair of astronauts on a mission to Mars who have been injected with animal DNA to enhance their durability and physical abilities in order to be able to more ruggedly adapt to the tribulations of establishing the first Martian settlement. Backed by a mysterious corporation, their partnership and their very humanity is tested as they struggle with the ramifications of this experimentation on such momentous an operation.

"Cross to Bear" dives into temptation and addiction, using one young man's (Carlos Chavez) fascination with a vampiric neighbor, played by Kenny Fierro, as an allegory for these themes while Tom Jones' Evangelical reverend tries to save him from damnation. But all is not what it seems in this story.

"A Helping Hand" is this play's twisted take on the Mummy, while also covering topics of homelessness, self harm, a corrupt justice system, and practice of the dark arts... you know, the usual American affair! A transient played by Lacey Rae, disabled by an accident caused indirectly by her own substance abuse, is remanded by a shady judge (Jerry Chappell) to a unique and experimental wellness program headed by a nurse (Melissa Muñoz) who prefers medical work outside the traditional system and isn't afraid to be complicit in less than wholesome schemes. This program promises to shape its patients into a new, reborn life, but perhaps they mean this a little too literally!

The second half of Tales from Tomorrow: Origins starts with "His Name Is Frankenstein," which is perhaps the most literal and most direct translation from its source material. Kyle Felts plays Frankenstein's monster, who has been in hunt for his abandoning and tormenting creator, when he comes upon the mad doctor's latest settlement and must confront the local lawman, played by Randy Marquis, to try to extract information that can help the creature find his vengeance. Much like the original Mary Shelley classic, however, the story rearranges our perceptions on who the real monster is.

"Pa (Piscine Amphibious)" might be the most raucous and satirical tale of the program, setting a San Francisco tourist played by Robert J. Watson in the marshy dirge of the Florida Everglades, led by a local tour guide (Phillip Wheeler) who brings him to a local diner for an end-of-day respite. But are the two being followed by some inhuman swamp fiend in the shadows? Or is that just part of the lore that the waitress, played by Cassandra Moselle, is sprinkling to have some fun and tease the ignorant city boy?

Finally, "Invisible" features Helena Geraci and Michael Guthrie as two scientists conducting an experiment on breeding humans that can refract light off of them, rendering them invisible. Only Helena Geraci's character has volunteered to be the live guinea pig. This story wrings deeply into anxious, existential struggle, tracing uncomfortable lines around issues like bodily autonomy, abortion, and the rights of the unborn. Carlos Chavez pulls double duty portraying the consciousness of the in vitro experimental subject, delivering a deeply emotional and passionate performance that is both distressing and captivating at the same time.

The most chilling aspect of Tales from Tomorrow: Origins isn't how it reimagines the classic Universal Monsters into new settings and contemporary portrayals. It's how it takes basic struggles and hot button topics of modern societal life and weaves them into yarns of horror. "The Wolfman: 2092" touches upon fears of corporate manipulation of science and invasive control of privacy--all the way down to altering the very essence of a human being. "A Helping Hand" commentates on the forgotten and downtrodden members of society and how they can be abused by those in power. "Pa" lathers on plenty of sarcasm and irony incorporates environmental destruction triggered by corporate greed along with spoofs on political stereotyping and mashes it all into a hilariously absurd climax where a swamp creature--representing Mother Nature--can have its revenge. "Cross to Bear" wrestles with the personal torment of someone struggling with addiction, wrenching the emotional seesaw of personal battles in spite of attempts by the well-intentioned but potentially misunderstanding to help. But it also is not afraid to show the sensual appeal of such cravings, even if it might come off a little primal. "His Name Is Frankenstein" grapples with the trauma of abandonment and unacceptance. And "Invisible" strikes a poignant and potentially unpleasant chord in its analogy of the struggle between pro-life and pro-choice ideologies. In each of the plays, one can discern deeper complexity within each topic, as the stories seek to show that these polarizing issues are far more than the superficial talking points slung back and forth by various pundits. Each issue features a struggle and an plausible pathway toward how a character came to where they are. And that reflects life--an existence that is far more complicated and multi-layered than what modern, often low attention span discourse makes it out to be.

That said, if we must be frank and pick favorites, "A Helping Hand" and "Pa (Piscine Amphibious)" were the most entertaining, specifically because of their incorporation of wry, cutting humor, sometimes bordering on the absurd. A silhouetted operation scene is carried out with such casual disregard to the horrific act being committed that it becomes laughable to those with a dark sense of humor. The facial expressions of a scoffing, desperate patient shout a not-so-subtle body language of sardonic disbelief. The actual way a monstrous creature is portrayed vacillates between smartly indirect and suggestive and ludicrously graphic and unabashed. The fish out of water dynamic is entertainingly played up to great energy and near parody--especially when the fish out of water becomes frightened by a fish of sorts in the water.

Force of Nature Productions once again carries out a tantalizing and disquieting play that feels uniquely and creatively right at home for Halloween season. The mix of classic creature folklore with very real societal struggles reinforces a visceral sense of dread, crafting an intriguing series of tales that are thought-provoking even as they are entertaining. The only shame is that Tales from Tomorrow: Origins only runs for two total weekends within a fairly small capacity theater space, limiting the number of guests and fans who will be able to enjoy and appreciate this production. But there's still time, and tickets can still be purchased online or in person at the door. Bravo to producers Sebastian Muñoz and Randy Marquis and the entire cast and crew of this show. In a Halloween environment where most go for overt, intense, in-your-face scares, Tales from Tomorrow: Origins manipulates a different type of terror--one that incubates in the mind, making it much more likely to follow folks home!