A Good Guy (Rogue Machine’s 2024 Production) Theatre Review

production photo by Jeff Lorch

I can’t recall the first time I heard someone express the notion that the only thing that can stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. It sounds like that tag line for an action film, but those people seem to be in earnest when they say it. They really believe arming teachers to be the solution to the problem of school shootings. Both my parents were teachers, and I can promise you arming them is not the answer. Playwright David Rambo also comes from a family of teachers and his powerful new play A Good Guy addresses both the problem and that dubious solution in an intimate and engaging and captivating way. It’s a phenomenal piece of work that looks at the life of a teacher who did possess a gun during a school shooting, and how her actions changed her life. It is directed by John Perrin Flynn.

A Good Guy stars Evangeline Edwards as Anna Pope, a woman who knew she wanted to be a teacher from her time in pre-school. She tells us as much in the play’s opening moments, that she loves teaching and never wanted to do anything else. A single spot is on her in an otherwise dark room, and it seems that she is speaking directly to the audience. But as the rest of the lights go up, we learn she is speaking to a detective, played by Wayne T. Carr, who gave us a remarkable Caliban in last year’s production of The Tempest at the Shakespeare Center of Los Angeles. And from then, the play picks up momentum and does not let up. There is no intermission to break up the pace, to release the tension. The action begins in the moments following a school shooting, and we learn that Anna used her own gun to stop the shooter. She repeatedly asks if she is being considered a criminal, and while the officer assures her she isn’t, the question lingers in our minds. Evangeline Edwards delivers an outstanding and riveting performance right from those first moments, and immediately the audience empathizes with her. As she is on the edge of tears, so too are those in the audience.

From there, the action moves back in time by two years, and Wayne T. Carr and Suzen Baraka, who played the other detective, are now teachers in the school’s faculty lounge. During the police questioning in that first scene, we learned that Anna purchased her firearm two years ago, and that detail remains in our minds as Suzen Baraka praises the writing of an otherwise poor and troublesome student, Logan Marshall. Her excitement at reaching this student is wonderful and true. Growing up with both parents as teachers, I heard just this sort of talk. It is what makes the job rewarding. However, the subject of this student’s well-written essay is the Columbine school shooting, and that raises some red flags among the faculty, particularly with Anna, who is tasked by the principal with tutoring him in math during what would otherwise be her free periods. By the way, Wayne T. Carr also plays the principal. He does an absolutely fantastic job at differentiating the various characters he performs throughout the play, each character having his own voice, his own movements, and feeling fully fleshed out. And it’s done with minimal changes in costume. And remember, the actors don’t really have an opportunity to make changes and adjustments off stage. As Wayne T. Carr and Suzen Baraka become different people, the momentum is never broken.

The play moves forward in time by increments until we are back at the beginning, with Anna being questioned by the detectives. But the play does not end there. It moves forward in time from that moment, and we learn how the events of that day change Anna’s life. One moment that stands out is when a lawyer representing the unnamed NRA offers her help. Suzen Baraka is particularly good as the lawyer. It is strangely, and perhaps disturbingly, cathartic when Anna turns the tables on that lawyer, leading those in the audience to consider their own possible desires and actions. While the play has a perspective, it manages to keep from preaching that point of view, and, even though it’s about teaching, also manages to keep from presenting a lesson to its audience. It’s an incredibly powerful play, never allowing us to forget its subject, in part through an over-sized white outline of a body that stretches the length and breadth of the performance space. Yet the play does manage to provide laughs at certain moments too, mainly through the teachers’ dialogue about their students and their jobs. And there is hope at the end. It is only then that we get to see Anna in her own natural element, when she is allowed to slow down and focus on helping a student (Logan Leonardo Arditty). That is, after all, what it’s all about.

This production is the world premiere of A Good Guy, and I hope it tours so that people in places outside of Los Angeles will not only get a chance to see this play, but also to see this particular cast. Yes, these folks are that good. For those in Los Angeles, this production runs through October 28th at the Henry Murray Stage at The Matrix, which is located at 7657 Melrose Avenue. While parking on Melrose Ave. can be difficult, I had no trouble finding a spot on the cross street of Stanley Avenue.