Room 105: The Highs & Lows of Janis Joplin

Though the life of the real Janis Joplin ended tragically over 40 years ago, the Macha Theatre production of "Room 105: The Highs and Lows of Janis Joplin" is bringing renewed verve to her legacy and spirit. The brilliant and heartfelt performance by Sophie B. Hawkins, who happens to be a Grammy-nominated singer songwriter in her own right, as Joplin guides the audience through the production's unique format.

Impressively written and directed by Gigi Gaston, this hybrid beast is part concert, part monologue, part Powerpoint presentation and even includes some dance numbers. Joplin's episodic anecdotes are often accompanied by original footage and other actors drifting onto stage, forcing her to relive what are all too often very painful memories.

As the (very talented) band struck the first chords of Jimi Hendrix's electric guitar take on our National Anthem, they were accompanied by Woodstock footage and psychedelic videos. As they shifted into the opening notes of "Piece of My Heart," Hawkins emerged as Joplin through a trap door and a billow of stage smoke.

Barefoot and bedecked in an embroidered velvet vest and ballooning sleeves, she shuffled and bounced and tossed her tousled head in iconic Joplin form, and then, also in iconic Joplin form, she sang. While the opening "Piece of My Heart" was not Hawkins' strongest number, she was still indisputably Joplin's vocal doppelganger, making it no small wonder that Hawkins in her own career has been compared to that greatest of white female blues singers. She really blew the audience away with her renditions of "Cry Baby" and "Get it While You Can."

Perhaps even more impressive was the sensitivity with which Hawkins embodied Joplin. She beautifully conveyed the sincerity, insecurity, passion, and loneliness of an artist that constantly struggled with her body image and her sense of self worth, while also fiercely and courageously remaining a free spirit.

In one episode, tucked between "Ball and Chain" and "Kozmic Blues," Joplin's mother, trapped within Joplin's memories, steps on stage, entreating her daughter to put on her nice pink church dress and her clean white gloves. Her strained relationship with her mother is apparent.

The anecdote serves as a stepping stone to then describe her tortured high school and college years in conservative Port Arthur, Texas.

Overweight and pimpled, Joplin was regularly taunted in her provincial Texan schools for both her appearance and for her noncompliance: her outlandish outfits, her atypical musical and artistic tastes, and her lack of racism (something that seems to have truly infuriated some of her peers.) In college, she was deemed "Ugliest Man on Campus."

If the play is to be trusted, it seems that the emotional trauma Joplin suffered from such cruelty -- and subsequent reminders that, though famous, she was too ugly or too "loose" for love -- endured throughout her turbulent life, driving her to addiction and self-destructiveness and, ultimately, leading to her death by heroin overdose at that notorious age of 27.

The other actors and actresses involved in the production were integral to the story's telling, and some particularly noteworthy performances were those of Bonnie McMahan as "Peggy," Joplin's close friend and erstwhile lover, and David Veach as "Dick Cavett," host of "The Dick Cavett Show" on which Joplin appeared on several occasions. (The real-life Peggy wrote a book, "Going Down on Janis," that many consider exploitative.) McMahan also choreographed the dance numbers and did a wonderful job with both creating and performing the movement, especially considering the limitations of the space.

There are but a very few complaints regarding the overall performance: some depth over breadth might have made the performance less of a bio-summary tribute and more of a character study, and the questions of "Why Janis?" and "Why now?" were never adequately addressed.

As for the latter complaint, I grew up belting "Me and Bobby McGee" on family road trips, so I was already favorably predisposed to a Janis Joplin tribute. However, there is a seemingly endless supply of dead cultural icons, so why this one and why now?

The play seems to have briefly considered these questions, as the initial plot contrivance resurrects Joplin in the present day so that she may evaluate her life; occasionally, "Janis" actually interacts with modernity, wondering, for example, if she might not have been so lonely had she had a cellphone. This briefly makes us wonder what a modern-day Joplin might have looked like: Might things have worked out differently? But these fleeting musings were dismissed as quickly as they were introduced; instead of developing a concept, another song was sung.

That being said, as a tribute to Joplin's music and turbulent life, "Room 105: The Highs and Lows of Janis Joplin" was a joy. Sophie B. Hawkins and her supporting cast were indeed able to resurrect the blues singer even if the script was unable to do anything more than further memorialize her.