The Night Watcher
written and performed by
Charlayne Woodard
directed by
Daniel Sullivan
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One of the major difficulties faced by one-woman shows is the potential for what's presented on-stage to be motivated not by a sense of conflict inherent in the teller's story but by some superficial desire to vent anger or frustration.
Thankfully, actress Charlayne Woodard's latest solo play, The Night Watcher, currently playing at 59E59 Theaters, is full of dramatic push-and-pull, resulting in a stunning, fiercely-acted two hours of theatre.
Woodard is a woman who follows her conscience; when she doesn't feel she and her husband are ready to be parents, she politely refuses her friend's suggestion that she adopt a child.
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Instead, she embarks on a series of adventures as "auntie" to a variety of close family friends and relatives, children in need of her time and effort in ways that only a non-mother could provide, as one who - as godmother or otherwise - takes a special interest in a child due to her own impetus rather than out of a sense of obligation.
Throughout The Night Watcher, Woodard inhabits a series of characters, playing not only herself but the children in question, her husband, some of her own aunts, and the African man whom, at the play's conclusion, ends up reaffirming her belief that her role as aunt and godmother is as important as the role of mother from which she has abstained.
Woodard's acting has a luminescent quality about it. Her facial expressions are full of openness and attention to character. When she's taking on the child roles in her play, she refuses to slip into easy, patronizing portrayals and ends up with a series of fully-realized character studies.
Aided by simple paneled sets by Charlie Corcoran and Thomas Lynch, as well as well-chosen projections by Tal Yarden that help set the scene and spectacular lighting by Geoff Korf, Woodard's show maintains a glow throughout as she moves from uncertainty to self-acceptance. There are moments within the play, as when Woodard describes her own aunties, that seem like diversions from the play's central drive, but with such an expert actress at the helm, even these moments still feel motivated by Woodard's inner conflict as she grapples with the concept of motherhood.
At the play's conclusion, as Woodard describes a subway ride - during which she was confronted by a stern older African man exclaiming, in regards to her abstention from parenthood, "What a waste!" - the play seems to wrap up with a bit too much ease. Still, throughout, there's a level of complication not only within Woodard's writing but within her layered performance, that keeps our eyes and ears glued to the story she has to tell.
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