Some Reckless Abandon - Basic Write Up
Gritty, vulnerable, yet full of bravado, Madeleine Cross opens the play in the thrust of an airport good-bye, about to embark on a solo-mission of unparalleled magnitude. After 18 years trapped in a prairie town permanently on the cusp, Madeleine’s only get-away option is Teenage Jesus Camp in Honduras, a country she’s never heard of. Despite her wailing mother, scheming Cowboy and the hundred lies required to get her there, Madeleine arrives at the Honduran Mission unscathed, to spite them all.
At first, her attempts at being “born again” are praised, and despite the constant mental letters to her Cowboy for rescue, she appears to be on the path to salvation. But there is inevitable trouble in Paradise. After a blow-up over the church’s missionary techniques, Madeleine attempts to reject the missionary community only to be alienated by fellow campers. Restricted to the gated compound, Madeleine longs to see the Latin American world humming around her. Her desperation for her absentee Cowboy grows as her disdain for Teenage Jesus smolders. At just 18 years old, Madeleine is faced with intense isolation, loneliness, and fear of a bleak and sinful future.
Her only allies are undependable at best. A virulent preacher, the Teenage Jesus Fanclub, and scolding Utah den-mother all contribute to Madeleine’s unraveling. Her only salvation: the saucy Chicana girl’s manic plan, to attend a dance in the neighbouring community. Madeleine can’t resist, as her desire for escape grows as her fascination with the surrounding culture increases. The dance is everything she’s been missing all this time stuck in bible-landia, and she is swept up in the poetry and magic of night in a foreign culutre.
But in an instant, a dark and sexual encounter sparks Madeleine’s undoing. Her confession to the Den Mother, an attempted “exorcism” by the preacher, and her subsequent plea to Teenage Jesus yield nothing but solitude. The result: a fiery climax of biblical proportions, leaving Madeleine shattered, shaky, yet defiant of all limitations, certain she has finally arrived.
