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By Robert Johnson
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Published on May 5, 2025
Tony Bordonaro and Ingrid Kapteyn. Photo courtesy of the artists
Creators, Directors & Writers: Tony Bordonaro and Ingrid Kapteyn
Choreographers: Tony Bordonaro and Ingrid Kapteyn
Performers: Elizabeth Romanski as Memredux Spokesperson | Tony Bordonaro as Subject M | Ingrid Kapteyn as Subject P | Lia Menaker as Dr. Sena
Producers: Welcome to Campfire and 3AM Theatre
Production Designer: Kyle Driggs
Original Sound Score: Lia Menaker
Mixing: Elaine Rasnake/Daughterboard Audio
Additional Sound Editing: Marc Cardarelli
Costume detailing: Caitlin Taylor
Stage Management: Kyle Driggs
April 17 - 26, 2025
That sentimental favorite “As Time Goes By” wafts from the radio, the theme song from Casablanca injecting a drop of bitter irony into the opening of Subject, the intense, hourlong duet that choreographers and performers Tony Bordonaro and Ingrid Kapteyn performed at the 3AM Theatre in Astoria on April 19, 2025.
Created in 2021, Subject is the product of a heartless age. It depicts a medical experiment whose victims can no longer experience sentimental pangs, because these one-time lovers have had their memories erased. The procedure leaves their bodies mutely struggling to reclaim a connection that still feels desperately important, for reasons the two may only vaguely understand. When human beings become lab rats, the “fundamental things” no longer apply — or do they?
As the radio surfs stations that mysteriously all play golden oldies, a scratchy advertisement touts the benefits of “memory customization.” Presumably this is the spiel that lured Bordonaro’s character, “Subject M,” and then Kapteyn, as “Subject P,” down the path to the antiseptic room where we now find them. A chair stands in the center of this blank space, half hospital room and half dungeon bleached with fluorescent lighting. Here a seductive female voice, which may or may not belong to a real person, welcomes us. The voice invites us to witness a demonstration of a new pharmaceutical called Memredux. We are all prospective guinea pigs; and our host assures us that “the future could be glorious, if only we could ditch our troublesome past.” Yet the demonstration isn’t going well.
Another voice, this one belonging to a medical supervisor, peppers Bordonaro with questions testing his recall. (“Did you do it for the money?”). He remains silent, however, and then swoons to the floor. The doctor, who must have traded her own soul for direct deposit long ago, is at a loss. She can only instruct Kapteyn to give the patient water, yet as Kapteyn folds Bordonaro’s limbs and guides him back to his seat, her presence and her touch bring him to a shaky semblance of life. Unexpectedly, they come face to face pausing for an instant that might or might not imply recognition.
As the demonstration continues, the two test subjects become increasingly entangled. The off-stage doctor persists in asking questions. Kapteyn remembers something — or did. When Bordonaro left her, she dreamed of escaping to Mars. She’d like to keep one last picture of the two of them nestling together, but that isn’t allowed. Instead, Bordonaro and Kapteyn worm their way around the empty room, restlessly stretching and contracting. They catch and cradle each other, Bordonaro holding tight while Kapteyn flails hysterically. Pressed together in a nightmare version of their former intimacy, do they detect a partner’s familiar scent? At times, their lips seem to search for a half-remembered kiss. Bordonaro cries out in wordless anguish.
The duet builds in intensity, and then wanes, the dancers’ movements growing looser. They prop themselves against the upstage wall, standing on their hands, and one clambers over the other. At one point, we hear the lyrics to a love ballad (“Sailing”): “Can you hear me through the dark night, far away…” Though their bodies ache to remember, and on some dim, subconscious level they remain connected, it’s only a matter of time before a final blackout concludes this tragic experiment.
Subject doesn’t end happily, but we can take some comfort from the fact that, in troubled times, some artists step forward to defend humanity. Things weren’t so hot in the days of Casablanca,either.
