For those about to rock invisibly, Forward’s ‘Airness’ salutes you | The Cap Times

By Lindsay Christians | February 3, 2023

Listening to someone describe competitive air guitar is like being pitched on an obscure religion, or a pyramid scheme.

Performative air guitar is, to its adherents, “the truest art form. The only pure art form left.” It prizes charisma, feeling and originality. This is where a player might “touch the divine,” in a rock show that aims to heal the world 60 seconds at a time.

It sounds goofy. But by the end of Forward Theater’s “Airness” — easily, the most fun to be had on a Madison stage so far this season — you might believe all of it.

Chelsea Marcantel’s 2017 comedy rocks the Overture Center Playhouse through Feb. 12, directed by Molly Rhode. It runs just under two hours without an intermission, which flies by under neon lights and clouds of glitter confetti.

Our introduction to the joyfully obsessive world of instrument-free riff-offs in dingy dive bars comes courtesy of Nina (Nadja Simmonds), a real guitarist whose ability to play may not be an asset. Her first time out, she freezes and bombs, hard.

“You need to risk everything,” says Shreddy Eddy (Josh Krause), a loveable nerd with his nom d’air on his jacket and Mario Brothers Converses.

Eddy and his pals aren’t messing around with this air guitar thing. It’s a serious passion. Facebender, a (former?) deadbeat dad from San Diego played by Marcus Truschinski, affects a wig and a regal accent. His bleeding-heart performances are his legacy, an escape from a depressing job.

“Life is a slow march off a cliff into nothingness,” Facebender says in a rare moment of levity. “Why not be as silly as you want?”

Aiming for world peace with his mashups, Golden Thunder is a role James Carrington was born to play. Quick, funny and full of heart, Golden comes through in a red athletic headband and a shimmery gold jacket emblazoned with a lightning bolt.

Golden tosses an invisible wig and says things like “mockery is the enemy of airness.” No one ask me to judge air guitar! I’d declare this man the winner every night.

Rounding out Nina’s new compatriots are a friend who looks like a villain — Cannibal Queen (Ashley Oviedo), icy cold and technically perfect — and a villain who looks like a friend. D Vicious (Joe Picchetti) won nationals the previous year, and fame (one YouTube commercial) went straight to his head.

Simmonds’ Nina, incredulous but game, takes copious notes from the pros, though it seems at first like she’s not here to make friends and/or not in it for the right reasons. It’s heartening and a little thrilling to see her stick with it. The play takes “The Nina” from a deeply awkward minute of Journey to a final face-melting dance with Joan Jett, and the energy never dips.  

Set designer Neil Mills plasters a mildly gritty downstage dive bar facsimile with stickers and graffiti. Greg Hoffmann’s lighting design does bold, essential work with time and place shifts, while Shannon Heibler’s costume design — gold boots! metallic epaulets! capes! — emphasizes how much fun everyone’s having.

So far as I can tell, “airness” is like the yogic concept of “ether,” a feeling that’s hard to describe and harder to pin down. It’s like a flow state, maybe. Whatever it is, it works. Forward’s production of “Airness” hits us with its best shot, and the result is nothing but a good time.

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