Call it instinct. Call it mentality. Call it a pressure gene.
Whatever it is, Mateo Fuerbringer has it.
“I was born with it,” he says.
When the pressure is on and Mira Costa High’s volleyball team needs someone to step forward and deliver, Fuerbringer doesn’t need to raise his hand or ask for permission.
He just delivers.
“I’m able to be good under pressure in tough moments.”
Maybe it has something to do with being a volleyball player since he could walk, though a basketball was put in his crib. He quickly switched sports favorites.
His mom, Joy, played at Long Beach State and has her own club program. His dad, Matt, played at Stanford and is head coach for the 2028 Olympic Games men’s beach volleyball team. His sister, Charlie, plays at Wisconsin.
“My parents run a volleyball club, so I always came with them to work,” Fuerbringer said. “I’d always be around volleyball and got into it.”
He has grown to 6 feet 5 as a 17-year-old junior and is committed to UCLA, which is No. 1 in the nation with a 21-1 record.
Mateo Fuerbringer (8) of Mira Costa, a UCLA commit, delivered 37 kills in a five-set win over Loyola.
(Steve Galluzzo / For The Times)
Mira Costa is ranked No. 1 in Southern California, and stopping Fuerbringer from rising up and coming through with a kill is always the challenge for opponents. He’s certainly not perfect, but his power and knowledge of the sport puts him on a path for future success at each level he competes.
“I really love playing,” he said. “I really love the sport.”
That kind of passion and commitment combined with talent is reflected during matches. When he smiles, you can see his joy and satisfaction after he or a teammate comes through.
Loyola coach Mike Boehle has been watching Fuerbringer for years.
“It was in his blood since he was born,” Boehle said. “To watch him as a 12-year-old you could see he was special. He was playing up. He’s probably the best outside hitter in his class. The thing I appreciate about him is he’s pretty even keel. It’s not cockiness. He just plays the game. Nothing worries him. Playing against us, he got better as the match went on. He didn’t say a lot but spoke volumes with his play.”
Boehle said he’s looking forward to seeing Fuerbringer play alongside former Loyola star Sean Kelly at UCLA.
“It could be one of the best duos in a long time,” he said.
Mateo Fuerbringer of Mira Costa High tries to deliver a kill against Loyola. He had 37 for the match.
(Steve Galluzzo / For The Times)
He lives walking distance from the sand in Hermosa Beach, which means he’ll be receiving even more lessons when top beach players are training under his father this summer. He’ll be hanging out just like when he was young.
He’s just getting started. He has a jump serve that can be tough to handle. And he’s always looking to improve.
“I’ve been getting in the weight room to get stronger and increase my vertical,” he said.
There used to be two-on-two family volleyball matches, mom and dad vs. Mateo and his sister. Or card games, board games, pickleball games.
“It’s pretty feisty in the family,” Matt said.
So where do things go from here?
“One of Mateo’s big things is he wants to play with friends,” his father said. “He wants to play at the highest level with people he knows and likes.”
When the world is topsy-turvy, the theatergoing public seeks explanations. Arthur Miller provides something better: moral intelligence. He doesn’t tell his audience what to think but challenges them to think harder.
There’s clearly a hunger right now for Miller’s work. His plays are back in high demand in Los Angeles, New York and London.
A new revival of “Death of a Salesman,” starring Nathan Lane and Laurie Metcalf, is in previews on Broadway. And a less starry production of Miller’s masterpiece opened last weekend at Pasadena’s A Noise Within.
“All My Sons,” Miller’s breakthrough play about capitalism’s warped ethics in the guise of a domestic drama, just finished a successful run at Antaeus Theatre Company in Glendale. And National Theatre Live will screen the recent London production, starring Bryan Cranston and Marianne Jean-Baptiste, in April and May courtesy of Boston Court Pasadena and L.A. Theatre Works. (Late last year, I caught a screening at the Wallis of another London revival, the 2019 production starring Bill Pullman and Sally Field.)
Dana Dewes and Scott G. Jackson in “The Price” at Pacific Resident Theatre in Venice.
(Ian Cardamone)
“A View From the Bridge,” a play whose revenge plot hinges on a tip to immigration authorities, could hardly be more timely. The same could just as unnervingly be said about “The Crucible,” Miller’s parable about the McCarthy witch hunts. The play, always front of mind when power is being abused, has given rise to a modern feminist riposte, Kimberly Belflower’s thrilling “John Proctor Is the Villain,” which is coming to the Mark Taper Forum next year.
Not to be missed right now is a small, exquisitely acted production of “The Price” at Pacific Resident Theatre. Miller’s 1968 play, written during the agonizing days of the Vietnam War, concerns the disposition of the remains of a once-illustrious estate. As two estranged brothers working with an 89-year-old appraiser try to put a price on the antiques and personal effects their father — a casualty of the Great Depression — left behind, the family history they both tried to bury explodes.
Miller’s plays compel theatergoers to connect the dots not only between the past and the present but also between the political and the personal. His dramas set domestic conflicts against the backdrop of societal systems that insidiously warp the playing field for their characters.
Miller is often contrasted with Tennessee Williams. And while it’s true that Miller is more of a social realist and Williams is more of a dramatic poet, Miller’s carefully carpentered plays are emotionally supple and Williams’ lyrical dramas are acutely mindful of the power dynamics of our collective life.
The realism of “The Price” is as heavy as the old wooden furniture that the Franz brothers, Victor (Scott G. Jackson) and Walter (Jason Huber), are trying to profitably offload.
(Ian Cardamone)
Director Elia Kazan was drawn to both playwrights because he understood that they were as interested in the stories of individual Americans as they were in the larger tale of America itself. Kazan found in both writers more than enough poetry and grit to satisfy the new breed of realistic actor he was showcasing on stage and screen.
“Death of a Salesman” and “The Price” are vastly different plays. The former, which Miller once considered calling “The Inside of His Head,” is fluidly constructed, playing fast and loose with time as it tracks the disintegrating mental life of down-and-out salesman Willy Loman. “The Price,” by contrast, is set inside what looks at first glance to be a crowded antique shop but turns out to be the apartment once inhabited by the Franz family after the market crash changed everything.
The realism of “The Price” is as heavy as the old wooden furniture (stacked and sorted on Rich Rose’s eye-catching set) that the Franz brothers, Victor (Scott G. Jackson) and Walter (Jason Huber), are trying to profitably offload on a shrewd antique dealer named Gregory Solomon (Richard Fancy). “Salesman” is more limber in its dramaturgy, shifting locations and blurring chronologies. But it too depends on the ability of actors to embody the biographical weight of its finely detailed characters.
Arthur Miller’s 1968 play “The Price,” written during the Vietnam War, concerns the disposition of the remains of a once-illustrious estate.
(Ian Cardamone)
“The Price,” directed by Elina de Santos, thrives in the intimacy of Pacific Resident Theatre’s main stage. There’s not a moment in the play that isn’t deeply inhabited by a cast that understands the value of listening.
The drama builds toward a confrontation between Victor, a cop who dropped out of college to support his dad, and Walter, a wealthy doctor who made no such sacrifices and resents the guilt that he’s spent a lifetime trying to elude. Miller gives both characters some claim on the truth, making the twisting argument that breaks out between the brothers enthralling to follow.
But just as insightfully handled are the complicated emotional dynamics between Victor and his wife, Esther (Dana Dewes), who is frustrated by her husband’s resignation and blunted ambition but loyal to him and prepared to fight for his due. As for Solomon, the scene-stealing appraiser who dispenses old world wisdom while toting up an estimate for the furniture haul in between bites of a hard-boiled egg, is deliciously brought to life by Fancy, who has starred in both “All My Sons” and “Death of a Salesman” at PRT and enlivens this production with his veteran experience.
I saw “The Price” on Sunday after having been dismally disappointed at the Saturday night opening of “Death of a Salesman” at A Noise Within. That production, directed by Julia Rodriguez-Elliott, seems completely deracinated on a set by Frederica Nascimento that registers no Brooklyn ZIP Code or locatable address anywhere.
Deborah Strang, Ian Littleworth, David Nevell and Geoff Elliott in “Death of a Salesman” at A Noise Within.
(Craig Schwartz)
But the bigger problem is that the performances are ungrounded. Geoff Elliott, who shares the title of producing artistic director at A Noise Within with wife Rodriguez-Elliott, doesn’t so much play Willy Loman as try on various accents, none of them remotely convincing to this native Brooklynite. Are the Lomans meant to be Irish immigrants or is that a Boston dialect that is being affected when the cartoonish New Yorkese takes a breather?
The house needn’t be fleshed out to be made to seem real, but since it plays such an important role in the play, its presence onstage ought to at least be palpable to the characters. At one point near the play’s tragic climax, Willy is feverishly planting seeds in the backyard, but Elliott gives no credibility to any of his character’s actions. Willy might as well be delivering newspapers or mopping the kitchen floor, so disconnected are his gestures.
It’s true he’s not in his right mind, but it’s just another instance of the casual disregard of the character’s moment-to-moment reality. Willy’s world never comes into being onstage, and the rest of the cast seems to wander in the limbo that’s left behind.
“Death of a Salesman” is more limber in its dramaturgy, shifting locations and blurring chronologies.
(Craig Schwartz)
As Linda Loman, Deborah Strang, normally so reliable, tries to follow the lead of husband Willy, but that turns out to be a dead end. Ian Littleworth’s Happy, the dissolute son always looking for an easy way out, seems unsettled not only in his bearings but in his command of the script.
David Kepner’s Biff, the prodigal son who rediscovers the reasons he ran off in the first place, delivers the most centered performance. It’s at least possible to believe what his character is supposed to be feeling, but the placelessness of the production doesn’t give him enough to dig into. The emotional combustion of his climactic scenes with Willy fail to reach cathartic levels.
Still, I found myself listening attentively to the warning Miller was issuing about buying into the salesman ethos. Willy’s belief that good connections matter more than skill and that blarney and bluff can substitute for hard work explains a good deal about our current national disorder.
David Kepner, who delivers the most centered performance, and Ian Littleworth in “Death of a Salesman.”
(Craig Schwartz)
But Miller’s dramatic vision requires actors to relive the experiences of their characters, the way they do in De Santos’ production. “The Price” might not be an indisputable masterpiece like “Death of a Salesman,” but its solid construction reveals tremendous complexity when the human story is scrupulously observed and the societal forces shaping our lives are suddenly thrust into view.
