REVIEW: Fembots Dream of Romance in "Last of the Red Hot Robots"
For their follow-up production, the new theatre troupe Latine Theater Lab’s production of Last of the Red Hot Robots is a sci-fi anthology loaded with stellar gags and a cosmic cast.
Sex robots. Neanderthal influencers. Intergalactic homicide. Alien on alien romance. No, it’s not a new episode of Futurama, but the play Last of the Red Hot Robots. The campy, theatrical piece by Brian Harris sizzles with a level of absurdism and sexiness that sets a course veering between both objectives with reckless abandon. Presented by Latiné Theater Lab, the show plays the Wilton Manors black box Empire Stage now until September 27.
Last of the Red Hot Robots is told episodically through four seemingly disparate sci-fi vignettes in its 90-minute run time, existing in their own contained universes. Based around six actors, each vignette is performed by three primary casts in each segment, allowing for costume changes backstage but also for each story to unfold in its own unique way. The episodic format carries over a tradition from “The Twilight Zone” that has endured with anthology series like “Love, Death and Robots.”
We meet two men in a modern zoo enclosure in “The Uplifting.” Clad in bright, frat bro-esque attire, there’s something off as the two converse in an overly-enunciated manner, anachronistic to their clothing and waxing scientific about the nature of Okapis and Malayan tapirs. Suddenly, and without warning, their conversation is interrupted by a bawdy, scantily clad humanoid that straddles the stage in a seductive burlesque dance as she tries to seduce and educate Jack and Kyle about “The Uplifting.” She reveals humans were never indigenous to Earth, but only “uplifted” to reproduce by her species. Donning a purple bob and a Barbarella space costume beneath a sheer robe, Miranda allures the two with mystery and a sexual energy that is gripping even when undercut with an air of humor.
A dance break set to RuPaul’s “Rock It (To The Moon)” (now available on iTunes), underscores a set change as the actors gyrate about in the aisles before a screen introduces us to The Wrong Stuff. The first murder in space takes hold and the three surviving astronauts deal with how to cover up the homicide. There’s some delightful slapstick in this scene with Andrew Rodriguez-Triana’s holodeck door scenic design that truly transforms the intimate Empire Stage space into a full-blown glittery starcruiser. The Wrong Stuff has some absolutely brilliant puppetry gags that hide in plain sight that make the sketch an absolute marvel from start to finish.
A video introduces "Last of the Red Hot Robots" with a black-and-white opening sequence a lá “All My Children.” The titular scene is the strongest moment in the anthology, with a plot that increasingly ramps up the stakes with a burning sensuality. Tonally, it pulls from a lineage of 60s and 70s sci-fi meets a daytime soap opera to absolutely side splitting results. Nicole Perry, the show’s intimacy and burlesque director allows for the actors to get quite close in their choreography and the scene heightens with an intensity that’s undercut with physical humor. There’s a particularly delicious visual gag where the Robot
A needledrop of the classic “Ain’t We Got Fun” gets to show off a level of musicality with this cast.
The final Hitchcock-ian twist subverts the “Stepford Wives” commentary on free will and 1950s romance.
The closing vignette Your DNA and You is carried by its stellar trio. Multimedia Supervisor has had some fantastic moments of screen-based comedy for an influencer who discovers she is mostly a neanderthal through a DNA kit. Yet, the much needed tie-in to the opening scene feels like a gracious way to justify what is a rather thin premise for this vignette. The premises of each of these one-acts range in quality, but thankfully the 90-minute run time allows the stronger sketches to luxuriate in absurdity and the weaker moments to mercifully bow out with a dance break. Ultimately, what gives these Red Hot Robots energy is an out-of-this-world cast of local actors.
Having previously seen Samuel Krogh as a corpse in “The Play That Goes Wrong,” it’s fantastic to see the actor get a chance to have a bit more life in the roles of Kyle and Hector. His resolve in the “straight man” parts in both his roles keep the show rooted in a level of realism. Paired with Ryan Townsend, who plays both a friend and robot butler, shows a formidable range in the wackier bits of the show, even when his face is concealed as the robot. Yet, Wendy Chamorro, who plays both Miranda and Elizabeth gets the most gratuitous roles in both of her scenes. While yes, camp is at the forefront of his production, Chamorro plays a seductive alien and a lonely housewife with a Lucille Ball fervor and Jane Fonda sensuality.
Tackling the second and final vignettes of the show, a trio of Brian Shaer, Quinn Colón and Susanna Ninomiya. Shaer gets two madcap character roles as the murderous spaceman Pablo and the scheming DNA industrialist Max. While Pablo is performed with a “Hank Azaria as Agador Spartacus” flair as he taunts “Greensleeves” back at his fellow astronauts, Max has a delightful spectacle as “Orson Welles meets Dr. Evil” delighting in even the more tenuous moments of Harris’ script. With the show’s dedication to flexible casting, Nonbinary performer Quinn Colón is both a steadfast NASA commander and the director of the Human Genome Project with an absolutely camp Russian accent. Yet, Susanna Ninomiya gets to delight in playing the scene’s wackier bits. Having previously seen her in Charles Busch’s over-the-top murder mystery “Die! Mommie! Die!” as a “daddy’s girl” she similarly delivers a chaotic, wide-eyed aplomb in dual roles as a frantic, sexy astronaut and especially leading the show’s fourth act as a neanderthal influencer.
For their follow-up production, the new theatre troupe Latine Theater Lab’s production of Last of the Red Hot Robots is a sci-fi anthology loaded with stellar gags and a cosmic cast. Director Alex Gonzalez manages to finagle a certified camp comedy from Brian Harris’ text. Working with a creative team that is clearly literate in their references to Star Trek and Doctor Who, the crew manages to heighten the play into a full theatrical experience. Last of the Red Hot Robots runs at Empire Stage in Fort Lauderdale now until Sep 27.