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Here and Now (Stephen Near)

Stephen Near

Jul 27, 2024

**Pick of the Fringe**

From the moment playwright and performer David M. Proctor steps onstage to tell the broken story of a father and son relationship, he is completely enthralling. A searing and unflinching story about how ghosts from the past repeatedly rear their head, despite best efforts to avoid or overcome them, Grabbing the Hammer Lane – a Trucker Narrative is just an amazing one-person show and easily one of the best things at this year’s Fringe Festival.


Proctor portrays Matt, an actor-turned-truck driver, speaking with an unseen therapist about unresolved trauma in his life. It soon becomes apparent this unresolved trauma stems from Matt’s hard-edged father, also played by Proctor. Existing in two separate scene locations for the majority of the play, the two men are depicted by Proctor as the scarred halves of the same coin and the degree to which both men’s trauma stems from one another is one of the play’s most compelling aspects. What’s more, Proctor’s naturalism onstage is uncanny. He inhabits the vocal qualities and idiosyncratic turns of phrase of each man as to subsume himself as a performer within the role. This is especially true when depicting the father who, in an astounding monologue half-way through the play, transforms from a rough hewn elder to a vicious and abusive tyrant. It’s a mesmerizing performance made all the more powerful because Proctor, and co-director Marlon Burnley, know when to reign the characters in from their emotional tides and when to allow the dam to burst open. It all builds to a moving finale that is earned and lands with a quiet yet powerful denouement.


Separating Proctor’s transformations from one character to the other in blackout are CB dispatches from Matt’s time on the road and, in these, the show affords the audience a glimpse into his lonely life as well as glimpses of highway wisdom. Though blackouts within a show often slow the pacing of a show, here they serve to focus the audience on the moment-by-moment stories being traded back and forth over the radio. Understated yet devastating, Grabbing the Hammer Lane – a Trucker Narrative has received international acclaim as a solo show and it’s easy to see why. It’s a MUST SEE for this year’s Hamilton Fringe.

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