Not Too Sweet

Duncan Pflaster’s “Sweeter Dreams” is billed as “a play about movies.” However, after sitting through 90 minutes of bologna film trailers and a makeshift critic program that serves as mere plot device, you’ll consider it more of “a bad play…about bad movies.”

It’s not that the actors don’t get the job done; they do, in one way or another. But with the often-tedious transitions and filler trailers, the heart of the drama is ultimately lost. It gets so tiresome to watch that if it were a television show, you’d fast-forward through certain parts.

That’s not to say the story is all for naught. It can be engaging at times. The central plot revolves around indie film director Luisa (Heather Lee Rogers), her extra-martial affair with muse and budding actor, Brad (Scott Freeman) and how it impacts her relationship with her dependable and doormat of a husband Thomas (Douglas Rossi). The exchanges these three have are sometimes enjoyable and often the strongest parts of the play.

Unfortunately, we see just as much of them as we do the inane bogus film trailers and the ridiculous movie critique show that guides the play from place to place.

As a result, the play’s pace is often predictable and will induce groans.

While the actress who plays critic Roberta le Flay (Clara Barton Green) is solid and adds a witty comedic flair to a production in dire need of it, her role seems unnecessary.

Because of this, “Sweeter Dreams” is essentially a 90-minute performance that spends most of its time filibustering, instead of developing. In the end, it makes little to no sense, especially considering its cookie cutter ending. While its message of getting its audience to look closer at the roles they play in their relationships is worthy of your attention, its execution is simply far too weak to accomplish its real goal- to steal our attention.

A true shame, considering the capable talent on the stage and this production could have been.

Of all the weaker productions at the Planet Connections Theatre Festivity, “Sweeter Dreamers” may be the weakest. It’s topic and theme isn’t the problem, but the haphazard script and direction have it toil in a bucket of mediocrity that is unable to clean the floor at the Gene Frankel theatre.

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About Patrick Hickey Jr. 14230 Articles
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports. Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders. His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023. Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief. Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale. Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.

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