Review: “Joyland” with Open Door Playhouse

“Joyland” is a ten-minute play written by Karen Saari and directed by Bernadette Armstrong. It follows Laura (Ayla Rose Barreau), as she interviews for a job at a theme park called Joyland with rather strict rules (not unlike some real theme parks with a certain mouse running around). She’s being interviewed by an AI interview system named Princess (Joanna Ferbrache) and as the interview progresses, is asked increasingly personal and leading questions.

I loved the choice to have the entire play take place over an interview for the theme park. While I went into this play expecting to get a story taking place in the park itself and perhaps about the goings on of the park, the interview was the perfect storyline for a ten minute audio play: focused, contained, yet full of tension.

The play depicted the race related biases of interviews very effectively. We were constantly reminded that even though this artificial interview program is intended to be bias free, it was still programed and made by humans and therefore will still have the prejudices of the humans that made it. Some of these are subtle and some are more overt, like the program whispering the words “African-American” like it was a secret.

It’s a worrisome, yet not surprising, idea that the machines we design to escape our own personal prejudices would actually maintain them. It speaks very strongly to the idea that this isn’t just a problem that we can slap a band aid over, it’s something that’s going to require everyone to dig a lot deeper. “Joyland” also captures the strict and often ridiculous rules of certain theme parks and how they can affect those who work there.

“Joyland” somehow achieved all of this in a ten minute job interview for an amusement park in a way that made the message clear and precise. It only had ten minutes so there wasn’t time to trail off into one direction or another. Nothing felt derailed or halted for a message or idea. Everything flowed brilliantly and naturally until the final minute.

Once again, like most of the Open Door Playhouse productions, the voice acting was top notch. This play required a careful hand to get all of the subtle touches and moments of frustration in audio alone and this play delivers. Both Barreau and Ferbrache are extremely entertaining to listen to and the calculated speech of the AI contrasts perfectly with the nuanced human speech of Laura.

Overall, this was, yet another, very well done play by Open Door  Playhouse. A great concept, great acting, and smart and poignant writing make this piece something that you will not want to miss.

“Joyland” was written by Karen Saari and directed by Bernadette Armstrong.

It stars Ayla Rose Barreau and Joanna Ferbrache.

With sound editing by Hall Cantrell

It was produced by Open Door Playhouse and can be found here: https://www.opendoorplayhouse.org/plays/theater5-akkcx-z9ttj-n8ebp-2mea4-ef46w-5nyca-d7x92-e7gcg-a9rdx-3rf66-3frrx-495k6-h4mjj-42n6d-pbcrw-tekwc-mz7x4-5cn7l-d9ckj-8r3kz-9hz7f-xclnb-f3cxp-4fesw