Jinx
Knows Art, and Theater
By Natasha Kassulke
Since she can't have Chicago, she'll take Waterloo.
"Those who think art happens in New York are full of hogwash," says Jinx Davis. "True art comes from the Midwest."
And to be geographically specific, she means true art come from Waterloo east of Madison.
Davis
and her partner. Andy Pizer, bought an abandoned movie house in downtown
waterloo about eight years ago. They scrubbed, painted, polished, pounded
and primed until they had brought the building back to it's 1938 shine.
"The Mode Theatre is the kind of space Davis, 43 says, "but could never afford to open in Chicago," Granted, her taxes are less and the rich chocolate chip cheesecake is cheaper than she could buy it in Chicago {it comes from a west-side Madison store}, but the theatre still has that highbrow Chicago art world ambience.
So do Davis' one-woman weekend shows.
The acting is first
rate.
"I've enjoyed being in ensembles," Davis says, "but I always felt stifled." Davis grew up in Madison, the daughter of University of Wisconsin-Madison professors. After high school, she traveled and acted across the country, including long stints in Hawaii and Texas. She produced radio and television shows. She even worked as a children's librarian. "But I came back, as we all do ," Davis says. She got her master's degree in fine arts from the UW. Now she brings fine art to her audience. In return she expects a little help. during "Jinx," audience participation is a must. "I invite you to be a co-creator," she says at the opening of her show. during the next two hours, Davis loosens up the crowd by getting them to play African instruments while she tells a story. she sits on people laps and seductively wraps a boa around their necks.
She reads a moving account about nearly being raped.
And the opening skit, which is about a mother scolding her children at a
Christmas party, will make you smile. Laugh and Cry. But don't
forget to look. The theatre, with enough wooden floor space and lawn chair
seats to hold about 90 people, is charming. So is the residential gallery
right upstairs where Davis, Pizer and their three children live. In fact,
you will hang your coat in their bedroom before the show.
And you walk through their kitchen where the words, "you cannot not evolve," are scrawled across a chalkboard. "The town supports about 2,700 people," Davis says. "and 500 of them have come to our show. It's great to look out and see farmers sitting right next to lawyers and doctors."