One of several short comedy sketches performed during Cheeky Monkey Theater's "ShiFen Theater Festival." Photo: Paul Morris

By Robert Powers

It can be incredibly easy to criticize what Elyse Ribbons does. In 2006, the "American playwright who lives and works in Beijing" (so goes her Wikipedia page) founded Cheeky Monkey Theater to support the launch of her first based-on-Beijing theater production, I Heart Beijing, which cutely dealt with a handful of pleasantly crazy expat characters getting into mon-keyshines in China. And she's been at it ever since, producing five more shows, including her second iteration of the "ShiFen Theater Festival" on Saturday night at Penghao Theater.

By 7:30 pm, the theater had filled to capacity, and a good number of onlookers were left standing cheek by jowl in the aisles.

The concept for the "ShiFen Theater Festival" as it was advertised—a collection of 10-minute stage works centered on a theme of "Green Energy"—gave the impression of an incredibly promising and refreshingly new way for audiences in Beijing to enjoy a night out at the theater. What resulted, however, turned out to be nearly three hours of cobbled-together recitals, presentations and skits ranging in execution from otiose all the way to visually arresting, coming together as some sort of unrehearsed mixed grab bag of playlets.

Ribbons, playing the part of a pollyannaish emcee, made sure the evening was a lighthearted affair, quickly leaping from her seat in the audience to step into the shoes of various roles; at one point, she broke character during a skit while playing a baby-obsessed wannabe mom to chastise a member of the audience chatting on a cell phone.

By the show's first intermission, and as the night wore on, many ultimately decided to depart for the evening. And by the third lucky draw, attendance had shrunk considerably from its original size and a number of winning tickets went unclaimed.

Concerning the evening's purported "Green" theme, a majority of the skits seemed to turn a pur-blind eye to the potentially cataclysmic environmental issues one typically associates with "Green" anything, but some standout performances, including a skillful interpretive dance piece pitting nature versus pollution, did the theme justice.

Curiously enough, a majority of the show's more sapid and workmanlike offerings were relegated towards the end, leaving bits like monkey-see-monkey-do improv games, a snippet of a play written for children (no children were in the audience) and a rather odd performance of a mermaid struggling to breathe—seeming more of a nod to abject absurdity than anything else—to keep people in their seats.

As the dying-mermaid skit ("Hypoxia") came to its apparent end, a member of the audience shouted out a rather common reaction when it comes to appreciating ultramodern art: "I can do that!" Is this what Ribbons is asking her audiences to consider? Whether or not we can do what she can do? It can be incredibly easy to criticize the way is something is done from the sidelines—"I can do that…"—but did you?