‘Frida’ Is Brilliant Bio of Mexican Artist

Milwaukee Repertory Theater presents Frida…A Self Portrait in the Herro-Franke Studio Theater April 3 – May 17, 2026 featuring Vanessa Severo. Photo by Michael Brosilow.

Milwaukee Rep patrons have the privilege right now of seeing the full flowering of a style of theater that first emerged strongly in the 1970s — “solo performance art.” Back then it emphasized monologists and even a stage actor incorporating video screens.

Today there is nothing distant or weird about it — not in the hands of Vanessa Severo, both solo performer and playwright for Frida . . . A Self Portrait. With movement, costumes and internal vision even more than words, she elevates the term “performance art” into hypnotic brilliance.

Patrons here may think of this as an acting piece — and certainly much of the impact is how vividly her physical imagination can conjure up people to talk to, or how her face and looks can command us into obedience or laughter.

Severo, in this well-traveled work lavished with care and perception yet still feeling fresh, plays herself in a journey to self-discovery and also embodies the deceased, pain-ridden Mexican artist Frida Kahlo, a “magical realist” painter, as she was often termed by critics.

At first glance, the stage seems a giant bed riddled with clothing, which makes sense if you know Frida’s polio as a child and debilitating crash injuries as a teen. But this stage setting morphs into multiple clotheslines — covering decades of styles, just as the music also spans decades. These are all opportunities for Severo as performer to convert the clothes or a traveling spotlight into different people and moments in the journey – along with meaningful echoes of Frida’s self-portraits. She relies a touch too much on the fierce nature of pain, but it fits the purpose and the meaning.

She is aided by imported director Joanie Schultz and formidable technicians of scenery, clothing and music (in a performance piece that must be adapted to many stages — and has been).

But the vision is hers, and the piece, much like Frida’s life, is intimate about body parts and physical pain, mainly English with some Spanish exclamations (rarely do those of us who don’t know Spanish feel lost). In case I am making this sound too serious, it is vibrant with humor and humanity.

It is also as much a dance as acting due to Severo’s liquid grace and dexterity with props. The clothes become characters — not just Frida. The suits, like the spotlight, become the men invading her life. The rage is extreme and the sudden bursts of pain make our stomachs tighten. Just when we long for a painkiller, Severo’s writing and presence pull us into a new insight. We are held by her imaginative choices and interior journey, feeling we are learning who Frida was because of who Severo is.

If you haven’t encountered Frida’s personal and political evolution, and the power of her paintings (mainly in the 1930s and 1940s), this work will haunt you into research. It more than fulfills the author’s purpose while opening new vistas into what one-person theater can accomplish.

For Frida . . . A Self Portrait, through May 17 at the Herro-Franke Studio Theater (formerly the Stiemke), has been rearranged. It is not the three-sided perspective used in the theater’s opening show, but more a proscenium-style arrangement where nine tiers of seats face the stage. Visit https://www.milwaukeerep.com/shows/show/frida-a-self-portrait/ for more information.

Frida . . . A Self Portrait Gallery

Dominique Paul Noth served for decades as film and drama critic, later senior editor for features at the Milwaukee Journal. You’ll find his blog here and here. For his Dom’s Snippets, an unusual family history and memoir, go to domnoth.substack.com.