Lisa Buscani connects with listeners by broaching a familiar topic, then fascinates us by turning it over and seeing what wriggles underneath.
In her hands, what at first seems saccharine soon acquires a sharp, unforgettable tang. A childhood visit to a petting zoo, for example, becomes a comic horror of pursuit by ravenous, wild-eyed beasts.
It is this ability to find the extraordinary in the ordinary that first stunned audiences at poetry slams around Chicago, then took Buscani to New York and wider acclaim. Now she is back, for the proverbial limited time, to address life’s turning points in an insightful one-woman show at Live Bait Theater.
Roaming an all-white set accented by subtle changes in lighting, Buscani takes on timeworn topics — a girl’s first period, the breakup of a relationship, quitting one’s job — with her particular blend of sensitivity and brash humor.
As a bride waiting to walk down the aisle, Buscani seems stereotypically tense — fretting over a thread hanging from her maid of honor’s dress, anticipating the look of jealousy on the faces of her unpleasant cousins. Yet she ends the piece with a shocker, a revelation that the young woman’s triumphantly perfect wedding is not only a sham but a Pyrrhic victory.
In the strongest vignette, a woman begins by voicing her frustration — loudly — with the discomforts of late pregnancy in hot weather. Gradually, however, the monologue deepens. We learn she is acting as a surrogate mother for her sister. We hear about her gay friend who is in great demand as a donor of sperm. And, finally, we realize that after a wild early adulthood this woman has found joy, responsibility and a sense of purpose in mothering her three children.
A segment about a car crash gains an additional twinge of recognition from the recent death of Princess Diana, but it is memorable in its own right for the way Buscani puts our fragmented thoughts, the stream of consciousness, into words. Anyone who’s ever uttered a silent, urgent prayer before merging into expressway traffic will smile.