Soldiers: The Desert Stand

PUBLICITY GRUNT Long spritzes Cory Conrad.

This wartime satire began life as a grad-school project for playwright Weinstein in 2004; that it’s still just as relevant (if not more so) four years later justifies its sentiments even further. Twelve-year-old Toma Singerson beats the last level of a combat-fetishizing video game, which turns out to be a stealth military-recruitment tool: The final screen tells her to head to the nearest Army recruitment office with a password. There, she’s signed up, along with a recently dumped pothead and a downsized executive assistant who “slept her way to the bottom.” A belligerent, power-mad recruiting officer packs all three off to The Desert to battle whatever enemies they might find.

All the while, the dubious recruits are monitored, pursued or engaged by a trio of nebulous soldiers, who morph from glory-spouting, Lee Greenwood–style U.S.A. cheerleaders to black-ops soldiers. Everyone’s allegiances seem to shift continually, and it’s difficult to parse which side anyone is on at any given moment, or what the “sides” even are. But that seems to be part of Weinstein’s critique: In the current politics of power, there’s always someone behind the curtain of whatever we think we represent. This remains clear despite Proud’s sometimes messy direction; Weinstein does his best, often hilarious work not with the issues but with the characters, particularly Toma. Madeline Long’s all-in performance as the foul-mouthed, lisping, violence-crazed preteen does her country proud.