The Pigeoning: theater review by Helen Shaw

Despite their anonymous black fencing masks, the ninja-silent puppeteers in The Pigeoning aren’t the most menacing part of Robin Frohardt’s eerie, hilarious, apocalyptic puppet fable. Nor are the titular puppet pigeons, despite their weird preknowledge of the end-time to come; nor are the rising waters (played by a shiny piece of fabric) that will rise to cover us all. No, the most chilling element of this not-for-kids (but admittedly adorable) puppet nightmare is its evocation of nine-to-five office mindlessness, as portrayed by our bespectacled old hero, Frank, the neat-freak drone who peers out at us from behind Coke-bottle glasses. Frohardt’s beautifully realized work fully absorbs the audience from the start. We enter HERE’s miniature downstairs theater to discover safety manuals on our seats. A harried-looking fellow (Freddi Price) pops a tape into the clackety VCR, and we watch a pitch-perfect re-creation of an ’80s office safety video—part 1 of 27!—complete with a demonstration of how to properly label cords. By the time our A/V helper has retired to a miniature office set stage right, we’re seduced and delighted; Price (also the composer) strikes up the plaintive, inventive keyboard accompaniment for an audience already charmed.