Theater Review: Russian Troll Farm Makes Us All A Little Trumpy
Playing at The Vineyard Theater, until February 25th, Russian Troll Farm will be either beloved or hated, in part, because it hammers into a subject we have all discussed, but do not exactly say anything new: Russia hacked the election, and social media is a cesspool of triggers and traumas with a few cat videos in between. While some uproariously laughed, and others did not, the play played exactly like news does today, you either immerse yourself in or completely avoid it…. which I think was its purpose.
Written by Sarah Gancher and directed Darko Tresnjak, the 100 minute play takes place in a Russian Internet Service agency that is pretty much run by the KGB with the purpose of influencing American politics. They hire social media trolls to take on the face of America’s many communities and their governmental gripes to make sure Trump 2016 wins the election. Egor (Haskell King) is in charge of running the Black Lives Matter posts, and is getting a little too into it for Ljuba (Christine Lahti) , who relishes the strict, social confines of the Old Russia. Meanwhile, Masha (Renata Friedman) is going full Ariana Grande with how she loves a taken man, and the ¨married to a Russian oligarch´s daughter Nikolai (Hadi Tabbal) has no problem with that. The latter two characters, out of all of them, felt like the ¨weakest¨ in interest, in part, because they were so shrouded by the prior two characters/ performances and Steve (John Lavelle), whose big, loud gregarious nature will either endear you or annoy you, which, again, is the purpose.
These are not redeemable characters, even if they try to be. Ljuba´s tragic, personal history, played magnificently by Lahti, and Masha´s lingering guilt, played with heartbreaking fragility by Friedman, still does not take away they are ending the very world that they, or others like them, are trying to escape to: The Western World. If anything, King´s Egor and Lavelle´s Steve steal the show because they feel so anchored in their malice and self-centeredness, while the other characters feel a sense of altruism remains in them, even though they never choose to act on it without some emotional need or grandiosity as their under-belly. Yet, despite the argument of unnecessary storylines, you cannot argue that the play is very well-acted and touches upon, but does not add anything new or deeper to what we know: maybe, people do want to be angry?
In the same way Russian Troll Farm completely admits Russia and its hired trolls felt absolutely no guilt and pure vitriol for America´s demise, it also shows that ….. so do we. The tragedy of the Trump Run was not just that it revealed the American Dream is like a reality show: a tv production with a dramatic cast and a solid crew. The real tragedy is that, like Russia, a lot of Americans want America to end, as well, and it did not matter where they lied in matters of race, gender, class, and overall politics. The reasons may have varied but the shared goal was destruction. Characters like Egor, Ljuba, and Steve totally reflect upon how Americans behave like a batch of trauma victims still living under the roof of the very founding fathers that traumatized them: so much so, that they have no hope of moving on and forward. In essence, Trump won not simply because Russia endorsed him but…. we became him: bitter, loud, anxious, and even a little orange under certain lighting.
