And
so, the torture of Cleveland Browns’ fans goes on. Just when we think we have a
quick-thinking quarterback with a fast release, Brian Hoyer tears a ligament
and is out for the season. So it’s back to the drawing board.
That
drawing board has been getting some serious abuse over the 49 years since the
Browns last won a league championship. And one of those years is captured in a
very human way in The Kardiac Kid,
written and performed by Eric Schmiedl.
He
and director Bill Hoffman are longtime Clevelanders and Browns fans, and their
passion for our beloved football elves oozes from every pore of this encore
Cleveland Public Theatre production (its world premiere happened a year ago). Now located at Kennedy's Down Under at PlayhouseSquare, the play is running concurrently with a couple weekends of the Browns season
Once
again, Schmiedl spins stories about several fans as the star-crossed 1980
season of the team dubbed the Kardiac Kids wends its way to the tragedy of Red
Right 88. That play ended the Browns’ hopes for a championship and crushed the
spirits of many who have never fully recovered. Even to this day.
Playwright
Schmiedl does a fine job of sketching portraits of these fans, which include a
priest, a love-smitten busboy, a superstitious tool & die man, and a
teenage girl who comes out of her shell thanks to the team she adopts.
These everyday characters are the heart of this play (it's not about Sam Rutigliano and company, aside from a couple brief play diagrams) and Schmiedl clearly has a deep fondness
for all such Browns backers. His larger intent is to reveal the soul of this
much–put-upon city and its hardy, ever-hopeful denizens. Studded with detailed
local references from that year (the Pewter Mug salad! Ponderosa Steak House!)
the memories of that time resonate as these individuals ride the roller-coaster
season as their own lives proceed in various directions.
The
performance by Schmiedl feels as comfortable as a screen pass to Jim Brown: you
just relax, knowing it will turn out fine. As an actor, Schmiedl has an affable
nature and this bathes his character studies in a warm glow. While one might
wish for a bit more variety in the delivery, Schmiedl enfolds the audience in
his own brand of stage magnetism.
However,
there is a visual disconnect that eventually begins to work against the play
itself. The small stage at Kennedy’s is emblazoned with sheets of paper bearing
the numbers of the 1980 team, and the numbers are repeated to create a
wallpaper effect.
Yes,
the numbers are important, especially in a sport where fans can never really
see their helmeted and face-masked heroes. But it is a strangely sterile
black-and-white environment for this quiet yet passionate presentation about
people who bleed brown and orange.
One
yearns, especially in this second viewing of the show, for shelves and tables
loaded with Browns memorabilia—the knit hats, the Sipe jerseys, the bobble-heads
and garden gnomes and Pez dispensers—that fans have clung to through the
death-march of the past five decades.
Would
it look messy and cluttered? Yep. And that is what defines the life of a Browns
fan now, and for oh…so…many days in the past.
Still, a battered sort of hope springs up again every Fall on the lakefront (Weeden will process information in the pocket faster! He will, he will! Won't he?). And Schmiedl and Hoffman’s
play captures a lot of that hope, from a fan's perspective, in arresting and unexpected ways.
The
Kardiac Kid
Through
October 12 at Kennedy’s Theatre, PlayhouseSquare, 1615 Euclid Avenue, 216-241-6000
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