Now celebrating its fifth season, Redd Tale Theatre Company launches its “Summer of Creation” with two one-act plays that share a common theme. Pairing the enduring and immortal tale of Frankenstein with an original science fiction drama called Gabriel results in a fascinating juxtaposition for theatergoers.
One of William Shakespeare’s most popular and frequently produced plays, A Midsummer Night’s Dream is also one of the Bard’s most flexible. The four lovers, amateur acting troupe, and supernatural fairies that make up the bulk of its cast are fine fodder for creative teams to stretch their artistic muscles in interpretations far and wide. As part of their Summer of Lust programming, The Hive Theatre Company teams with the cell (a self-described 21st century salon) for a gender-bending Midsummer that gleefully explores the idea of equality in marriage — a timely topic indeed.
Although trimmed and abridged, this version is still a bit too long at almost two hours and forty-five minutes and a bit too reliant on style over substance. But as minimally staged in the elegant Chelsea townhouse that acts as home base for the cell, there is still plenty to recommend in this lively and lusty variation on the classic tale.
Gender and power are at the forefront of Midsummer and as directed by Matthew A.J. Gregory, this Dream is no different. This time, however, Hermia and Lysander are lesbian lovers and Demetrius and Helena are a gay couple. Add to that, the husband and wife duo of Theseus (Duke of Athens) and Hippolyta (Queen of the Amazons) take on the roles of the King and Queen of the Fairies, in reverse, with the man playing Titania and the woman playing Oberon.
If all this sounds confusing, it makes perfect sense on-stage. Credit the enthusiastic cast and inventive director for keeping things moving at a smart clip, although the last thirty minutes (especially the play-within-the-play, Pyramus and Thisbe) would definitely benefit from faster pacing. Hint: Don’t wait for the laughs — keep moving!
Starting off at the posh and proper wedding of Theseus and Hippolyta, things get progressively sexier and more sinister when Titania's fairy servants, played as hard-bodied club kids, enter as if staging an all-night rave. Oberon as a Russell Brand-esque dandy and Titania as a glamorous drag queen up the ante even higher. Samuel T. Gaines and Meghan Grace O’Leary are excellent as both royal couples.
Chris Critelli is also a standout in the production, wholeheartedly embracing his characterization of Oberon’s mischievous jester Puck. Not all of his choices are completely successful, but Critelli is nonetheless compelling as the Cupid-like Robin Goodfellow. Michael Raver is superb as well, bringing multiple shades to the love-struck Helena and exhibiting the most believable chemistry of all the couples with Alan Winner as Demetrius.
While mostly enjoyable and at times quite funny with delightful modern touches and a thoroughly contemporary soundtrack and sound design by Justin Stasiw, this Midsummer tends to rely too much on tricks. Many of the characterizations seem born out of uncorralled improv with a “watch me!” mentality overshadowing the proceedings in a needless hodge-podge.
The members of the acting troupe, in particular, fall prey to much idiosyncrasy instead of meaningful elucidation. Just because something gets a laugh doesn’t necessarily mean it belongs. And the cell’s high-ceilinged interior has terrible acoustics. At times the cast members’ shouts were piercing and almost ear-shattering. Consistent volume of the actors’ voices was also a problem. Some players boomed while others whimpered.
Regardless, this Midsummer Night’s Dream is a sprightly and sensual bit of bare bones theater. As Lysander says to Hermia, “The course of true love never did run smooth.” With an attractive young cast and some intriguing explications of the text, it is easy to at least enjoy the bumpy ride with this clever production.
It’s not often that as a theatergoer you get to traipse around a deserted island, sail across the New York Harbor, or enter a real live fort when watching a play. Actually, make that two forts. New York Classical Theatre partners with the River To River Festival for a unique land-and-sea production of William Shakespeare’s Henry V that includes free ferry rides back and forth to Governors Island.
Most Shakespeare aficionados know the earlier part of King Henry’s story, laid out in Henry IV, Parts 1 and 2, when the ruler was a wayward, affable young lad called Prince Hal. But Henry V is less known, so all attendees are encouraged to read the “If you’re just joining us…” section of the program for a brief synopsis, which sets up the main crux of the story — a war between the English and the French.
Utilizing their signature “panoramic theater” style, NYCT begins the production at the historic Castle Clinton in Battery Park, which stands in for King Henry’s England. Audience members are led from place to place and scene to scene about every five to ten minutes, with ensemble members directing the crowd of up to 500 spectators to the next location. The text has been substantially cut, with about one and half hours of the two-and-half-hour running time devoted to the play itself.
When Henry (called “Harry” at this point in his life) rallies the troops to engage in battle with France, the audience itself becomes his army, led onto an awaiting ferry that whisks cast, crew, and spectators to Governors Island, which stands in for France.
The scale of the production is both challenging and limiting. Utilizing locations in lower Manhattan, the ferry itself, and the former military base in the heart of New York Harbor, the evening is in all honesty a bit exhausting. The many children in the audience loved running to the next bit, but many of the older adults lagged behind, missing the start of many scenes.
The ferry ride transitions were particularly prolonged — calculate how much time it takes to load and unload hundreds of people. The scenes on the ferry each way were mostly lost to all but the few people who sat inside the boat itself. Most of the audience were clamoring for topside views of the downtown skyline.
Astute audience members may ascertain that Henry is actually a warmonger and imperialist, but the early scenes are so fast-paced that it is hard to tell what is going on. The realities of the story are washed over in the spectacle of the presentation, which, though impressive, dilutes the complexity of Shakespeare’s play.
Choosing Henry V is a risky choice that doesn’t really pay off. Many of the characters become lost in a haze of accents. And the accents, for the most part, are pretty awful. It is impossible to sift the Welsh from the English, the Scottish from the Irish. And the raucous trio of British brutes — Pistol, Nym, and Bardolph — are sadly interchangeable and a lot less humorous than the boisterous Falstaff from the middle two plays of the tetralogy (which started with Richard II).
The French accents, in particular, are overdone and cartoon-like, much like the characterizations of the French in general. The Dauphin in particular comes off as a foppish, villainous cross between Pepé le Pew and Inspector Clouseau.
Only Montjoy (the excellent Ian Antal) offers a proper French accent coupled with an honest and sympathetic portrayal of a Frenchmen. His scenes with King Henry (an outstanding Justin Blanchard) are the most memorable in an evening more memorable for the locations than the locution.
The intrigue and political machinations of Henry V may be lost in NYCT’s ambitious production, but audience members young and old eagerly joined in the patriotic spirit on the ferry ride to Governors Island and during the decisive battles.
Overall, Henry V is truly an enjoyable evening from the always clever New York Classical Theatre company. But as Hamlet, the Bard’s most iconic character, would emphasize, “the play’s the thing.” And NYCT’s Henry V is really more about the gorgeous twilight ferry ride to and from Governors Island and the novelty of site specific theater than the play itself.
Now celebrating its 12th season, New York Classical Theatre continues its mission of presenting free productions of classics of the theater in public spaces with their upcoming version of William Shakespeare's Henry V, opening Wednesday, July 6.
Partnering for the first time with the River To River Festival for that organization's 10th anniversary, NYCT will stage Shakespeare's seafaring, swashbuckling history play at Castle Clinton in Battery Park, on a boat ride across the harbor, and at the historic Fort Jay on Governors Island.
NYCT founder and artistic director Stephen Burdman calls Henry V "our most ambitious production ever, with a cast of 40, the company's largest ever," adding that "it's not often that theater artists and audiences get to enjoy a set that encompasses two islands and a waterway."
Previous NYCT programming has made use of Central Park (including the recent School for Husbands by Moliere), the World Financial Center (last spring's The Rover by Aphra Behn), and Battery Park (Friedrich Schiller's Mary Stuart in 2006).
NYCT's signature staging style, called Panoramic Theatre, literally makes "the venue a character in the play, much like an actor. The venue becomes an active member of the ensemble," according to Burdman. If someone or something interrupts or wanders into the staging area, the actors simply integrate them into the scene, bringing them into the play.
Because the audience follows the actors from place to place, the spectators become active participants in the drama itself. Burdman mentioned a particular instance when an audience member's dog barked wildly as Antigonus "exited pursued by a bear" in NYCT's 2002 Central Park production of Twelfth Night.
With Henry V, New York Classical Theatre will have produced 26 free plays in its 12-year history for over well over 100,000 spectators (which does not include those additional folks who watched the rehearsals that also took place in the public venues).
Burdman says that NYCT's hallmark is accessibility, offering open-air theater free of charge to people of all ages, ethnicities, educational backgrounds, and income levels. "We want to make sure everyone is having a good time, but this is not dumbed-down Shakespeare," he adds. "This is a quality theater experience."
"At a recent show," says Burdman, "a young woman introduced herself to me and told me she had been coming to New York Classical Theatre productions since she was in the sixth grade. When I asked her what grade she was in now, she replied 'college.' So she has become a lifelong theatergoer."
Burdman typically cuts the texts of the plays so that NYCT shows run under 2 hours, but this special semi-maritime show will have a running time of 2 hours and 45 minutes, which includes the 10-15 minute ferry ride (each way) back and forth to Governors Island.
Special wristbands (limited to two per person) will be handed out from 5-6:30pm in front of Castle Clinton on the day of each performance. Only 500 will be available and are required for the free transportation to Governors Island, which has been generously donated by Statue Cruises. Performances begin promptly at 7pm.
With Henry V, audience members will journey with King Henry (the now mature young Prince Hal from Henry IV Parts 1 and 2) and his army from 15th century England (Battery Park) across the English Channel (New York Harbor) to France (Governors Island) where the famous Battle of Agincourt will be staged.
In addition, there will be dramatic scenes on both legs of the ferry ride, with the final set of scenes in Battery Park with the King of France traveling to England to deliver the peace treaty.
"I always look to challenge myself as a director and producer -- and to challenge the audience," says Burdman. Staging a classic William Shakespeare play on land and at sea is a challenge indeed.
The one-hundredth anniversary of the birth of Pulitzer Prize-winning American playwright Tennessee Williams has brought a resurgence of his plays back to the New York stage, particularly his lesser-known works. Roundabout Theatre’s The Milk Train Doesn’t Stop Here Anymore starring Olympia Dukakis, The Wooster Group’s Vieux Carré, Mother of Invention’s, Austin Pendleton-directed Small Craft Warnings, and the Hudson Hotel site-specific staging of Green Eyes are but a few of the Williams’ revivals to hit the boards of the Big Apple in 2011.
Add to that list The New Group and Tectonic Theater Project co-production of Tennessee Williams’ One Arm, now playing a limited engagement at The Acorn on Theatre Row.
One Arm is based on a 1948 short story that was turned into an unproduced screenplay in 1967. As adapted for the stage utilizing both sources and directed by Moisés Kaufman (The Laramie Project, 33 Variations, Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo), One Arm is a fascinating curiosity featuring a star-making performance by Claybourne Elder in the lead.
Set in 1967 mostly in Williams’ beloved French Quarter of New Orleans with quick stops in New York, Los Angeles, and other U.S cities, the story centers on Ollie Olsen, a champion boxer from the armed forces described as “lighting in leather” who loses his right arm in a car accident.
After losing the appendage, Ollie also loses his ability to feel emotional connections, becoming bitter and detached. Forced into hustling to survive, the hunky Elder commands the stage as the broken Apollo, possessing a boyish beauty and naivety that belies his smoldering sensuality.
Through a narrator and a series of flashbacks (both well-worn Williams motifs), the audience learns about Ollie pre- and post-tragedy. They also learn of the circumstances that landed him in prison, awaiting the death penalty for the murder of a porn director who pushed the damaged protagonist to violence.
All of the other actors in One Arm play multiple parts, from johns to pimps, prostitutes to porn stars. Larisa Polonsky, in particular, is outstanding in the female roles, jumping from saintly to sultry and back again most convincingly.
The industrial set by Derek McLane, luscious lighting by David Lander, and evocative sound design by Shane Rettig create a decidedly decadent environment for the play’s action, perfectly capturing the barren isolation of a prison cell, the dark shadows of a park late at night, and a hair-raising car ride that ends in catastrophe.
Fluid direction by Kaufman keeps the 90-minute show at a brisk pace, although there are a few moments that seem to drag on, making the short show seem longer than it actually is. And the elegant production, although gorgeous and engaging, unfortunately only accentuates the story’s flaws and faults, especially the role of the narrator.
But Tennessee Williams aficionados and fans of provocative theater alike will find much to savor in this ingenious and exquisite production of One Arm. And be sure to keep an eye on Mr. Claybourne Elder. He’s a talented young performer with a bright future — a true triple threat who made his New York debut at the Public Theater in Stephen Sondheim’s Road Show. He’s definitely a star in the making.
Co-produced by Playwrights Horizons and New York Theatre Workshop, The Shaggs: Philosophy of the World is a new musical based on a true story. Three sisters from Fremont, New Hampshire with no musical expertise were forced by their father to form a rock band and record their debut album in Massachusetts in 1969, which would later become a cult classic. Although there is much to recommend in this quirk-filled show, the sum unfortunately does not equal the individual parts. It’s a sad story about failed dreams and unfulfilled ambition — kind of a downer, to be honest. The Shaggs’ album, Philosophy of the World, faded into obscurity, only to be rediscovered and then rereleased on vinyl in 1980. The dozen songs are best described as “outsider music,” featuring earnest, unpolished, off-tempo, and atonal compositions with deeply accented vocals and simplistic yet existential lyrics.
Nonetheless, the strange innocence and youthful energy of The Shaggs earned them many fans, including Kurt Cobain. Frank Zappa called them “better than the Beatles.” A review of their CD on Amazon.com dubbed it “a Dada masterpiece.”
A lot of folks, however, would disagree with those assessments. “Many people in Fremont thought the band stank,” according to a 1999 profile in The New Yorker written by Orchid Thief author Susan Orlean. The Shaggs are definitely a love ’em or hate ’em kind of band. The Shaggs, the musical, however, offers decidedly more grey area.
Tony Award nominee Peter Friedman (Tateh in the original Ragtime) plays Austin Wiggin, the overbearing father who is a cross between Mama Rose from Gypsy and Joe Jackson — father of Michael, Janet, and the rest of the Jacksons. And make no mistake, Austin is the center of The Shaggs. It’s his mother’s prophecy that the girls will be in band that propels the misguided working-class dad to pull his offspring out of school to become The Shaggs.
But there is something off-putting about watching two-and-a-half hours of a father bullying his untalented daughters into making music when they display no passion or aptitude for it. His haranguing and berating borders on and sometimes crosses over into violence. It’s a harrowing performance by the magnetic Friedman, but it isn’t enjoyable or comfortable to watch.
Annie Golden (last seen in Xanadu and most famous as Jeannie in the film version of Hair) as the sympathetic mother and supportive wife adds a lighter touch. Her spectacular, helium-soaked voice takes flight in the gorgeous “Flyin’” — a highlight of the second act.
Regarding the three sisters, Jamey Hood gives dramatic heft to the role of Dot, lead guitarist/songwriter and the daughter with the fiercest loyalty to her father. Sarah Sokolovic adds both flirtiness and willfulness to vocalist/guitarist Betty.
Emily Watson (from Playwrights Horizons Saved) as the drumming sister Helen charmingly sings the first act showstopper “Impossible You,” but her character is mute (by choice) most of the play. Speechless characters can be problematic onstage, forced into physicality that can come off as clownish, childish, or both.
One problem of The Shaggs lies in making the father, not the girls, the main focus of the narrative. His drive and ambition are obsessively clear, while the trio of daughters seem interchangeably sullen and bored. None of the girls really shine through, although each is given at least one moment in the spotlight.
But the main flaw with The Shaggs is that the show is not true to life. In reality there were six Wiggins kids, many of whom had a hand in the live shows, including another sister, Rachel, who joined the band later and played bass. None of the other siblings exist in the musical-version world of The Shaggs.
The sisters were also all blonds, not brunettes like the wigged cast members. Even the ages of the girls are mixed up. Helen is portrayed as the youngest, when she was actually the oldest. And while the action onstage takes place while the girls are high-school aged, Helen was 22, Dot 21, and Betty 18 when their album was recorded.
Changes like these can be chalked up to artistic license, but they remain somewhat baffling considering the legendary status of The Shaggs story. Why base the musical on a true story if you’re not going to portray its reality?
Aside from these qualms, the most striking moments of the show occur during the recording of the album as we hear the songs performed onstage by the romanticized version of the trio and then also hear the actual output in comparison. The difference is startling. The times the actual Shaggs songs are reworked and turned into beautiful music — complete with sisterly harmonies — as opposed to the discordant originals are also deeply affecting.
A song in Act One called “Show Me the Magic” aptly describes my ambivalence about The Shaggs. A musical about musicians who couldn’t make music; a talented cast playing talentless people; a true story that is actually far from the truth. In the liner notes to Philosophy of the World, Austin Wiggin wrote “The Shaggs are real, pure, unaffected by outside influences.” Sadly, the same cannot be said of The Shaggs: Philosophy of the World.
Named an “Off-Off Broadway Innovator to Watch” by Time Out New York, Brooklyn-based 31 Down continues to strengthen its individual brand of cross media performance with Here At Home, now playing at the intimate and charming non-profit Bushwick Starr. Here At Home strives to be both a real and surreal portrait of how war affects friends and families at home, but the unfocused script by Eric Bland is overshadowed by the show’s dazzling sound and video design.
The show begins provocatively enough. Act One takes place in Anytown, USA behind a Wal-Mart on what can best be described as “the smoking block.” Megastore employees Holly (a stone-faced Hollis Witherspoon) and Frank (an effusively passionate D.J. Mendel) are on break, contemplating their ennui in a scene that resembles a mumblecore update of Eric Bogosian’s subUrbia.
Holly’s soldier boyfriend is stationed overseas and has been sending increasingly disturbing messages back home. Ex-veteran Frank served in the Middle East and knows the atrocities of war firsthand. References to Socrates and Kant are dropped nonchalantly into their conversation to accentuate the existential crises of the characters, although their discontent comes off more like boredom than internal pain. Wherehere their speeches seem disaffected and disinterested, however, the visuals that surround them are anything but.
During the opening voiceover, silhouettes are scratched away behind Holly’s face on the stage’s backdrop. Later, Holly and Frank are synchronized with what I can only describe as their own “pixel shadows.” And in the final scene of Act One, a green horizontal laser beam slowly scans up and down Holly’s body, then transforms into a wide white swath.
In addition to these arresting visuals, at certain points in Act One the theater plunges into darkness and a throbbing, pulsing soundscape takes over. The exploding sounds of war emanate from all directions, creating a palpable sense of fear and panic. It’s a trippy, visceral feeling reverberated in your seat and in the seat of your pants.
Act Two squanders this disturbing and unsettling mood. In a confusing fantasy section more misbegotten than misogynistic, Frank and his loutish friend Mike (energetically played by the sound and video designer Eric Holsopple) traipse through a corpse-filled battlefield dressed as women. Or are they actually supposed to be women? The play then ends with a whimper as opposed to a bang with a diatribe from Frank who seems to be speaking in the voice of Holly’s boyfriend Matt (played by the show’s writer Eric Bland), who appears onstage but does not utter a word.
31 Down co-founders Holsopple and Shannon Sindelar (who directed Here At Home) are veterans of such groundbreaking contemporary companies as Nature Theater of Oklahoma, The Wooster Group, and the Ontological-Hysteric Theater of Richard Foreman. Their recent successes including Red Over Red and The Assembler Dilator have garnered critical acclaim and made them a buzz-worthy group to watch. Meant to build on that reputation, Here At Home unfortunately never ascends to the emotional heights of its visual and aural sensations.
The insecurity of actors, the megalomania of movie directors, and the toll of fame and fortune on artistic integrity are all at the forefront of Christopher Shinn’s newest drama, Picked, now playing at The Vineyard Theatre. There is much to admire in tackling such weighty issues, but ultimately the author of the Pulitzer Prize finalist Dying City and Obie award-winning Where Do We Live fails to address them with the proper gravitas or insight. Picked starts off strong, then quickly loses speed.
Struggling young actor Kevin (Michael Stahl-David) is “picked” by über-successful director John (Mark Blum) as the lead for his newest sci-fi extravaganza. John wants to subject Kevin to a series of fMRIs — or neuroimaging — to track his responses to various questions, resulting in measurable activity in the brain’s areas that coincide with anxiety, anger, sadness, and other emotions.
Using this data, the director hopes to create a script that taps into Kevin’s real feelings, resulting in a more authentic experience for moviegoers. Call it “emotion capture” as opposed to the regularly-used motion capture technique employed in many of today’s effects-laden blockbusters and animated feature films.
This opening-scene salvo launches Picked onto what seems to be an intriguing platform for dramatic exploration. Kevin’s own emotions will help the gonzo director create a part that is literally made for him. And John has an even more intriguing idea up his sleeve as well: Kevin will play both the hero and the villain.
But this part of a lifetime comes with caveats — no other work at all for a specified period of time, a gag order on what the film is about until it has been released, and other restrictive stipulations. With the weight of superstardom hanging over him, Kevin becomes increasingly unhinged and disillusioned with the Hollywood machine.
Like in his other plays, Shinn explores the double nature of man in Picked. This dichotomy is expressed in subtle and not-so-subtle ways: the dual hero and villain parts that Kevin are originally assigned (not so subtle); and the similarly eager young actor Nick (Tom Lipinski) who takes over the evil half of the role (more subtle) at the director’s insistence.
But the seriousness of Kevin as an actor’s actor, one who wants to present truth and honesty in his craft, becomes the downfall of this well-meaning production. Kevin’s earnestness does not translate well to the stage, ending up flat and vacuous, which may or may not be a reflection of the director’s need for a blank-slate cipher on which he can apply his vision. Only when the shallow and callow appear onstage alongside this modern-day brooder does Picked pick up steam.
Veteran character actor Blum (Twelve Angry Men, The Graduate) gleefully attacks his part as the lecherous filmmaker, clearly patterned on Avatar and Titanic “King of the World” James Cameron. In the first act, he comes off as a self-centered windbag who continually cuts off the hopeful young actor mid-sentence to resume his own verbal diarrhea. Eventually he emerges as a bit of a father figure to the increasingly lost Kevin.
As the up-and-coming Nick, Lipinski (from the upcoming Certainty) exudes much more stage presence and charisma than does the dour lead. Even Donna Hanover (the ex-Mrs. Rudy Giuliani) seems to be having fun as both a bewildering casting director and a perky on-air television hostess. But Stahl-David, who starred in J.J. Abrams’ monster movie Cloverfield a few years back, lacks the requisite intensity for the existential crisis of Kevin. He does, however, fare better with the self-questioning and ambiguity in the character.
At two hours, Picked feels much longer than it should. What should be fascinating turns out to be painfully dull, as directed by Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle award-winner Michael Wilson (Horton Foote’s The Orphans’ Home Cycle as well as the recent Roundabout production of Tennessee Williams’ The Milk Train Doesn’t Stop Here Anymore).
Picked trudges along towards its necessarily ambivalent ending, both hopeful and despairing like what has preceded it. Kevin, who had previously turned his back on acting after his long-festering disappointment, is sucked back into the Hollywood machine by an offer he can’t refuse. He has once again been “picked.”
Picked can best be described as a worthy failure, full of interesting ideas not so interestingly fulfilled. Ultimately the play suffers from the same dilemma as its protagonist — weighted down by its own ambitions.
In the summer of 2006, Clifford Chase’s debut novel, Winkie, was published. Chase, who had previously gained acclaim for his 1999 memoir, The Hurry-Up Song, about losing his brother to AIDS, wove a weird and wonderful tale about a sentient 81-year-old teddy bear who is put on trial for being a mad bomber. In the post 9/11 age, Winkie shrewdly depicted the ridiculousness of the knee-jerk reactions prevalent in the War on Terror, when innocent people were rounded up and mistreated simply because of their race or religion. Winkie, a true minority of one, is charged with a laundry list of 9,678 offenses, including witchcraft and sodomy.
The teddy bear at the center of this storm is himself a wise innocent surrounded by cartoon character representations of cruel jailers, showboating prosecutors, corrupt judges, and grandstanding “patriots.” The joke, of course, is that Winkie is the most human of all.
Now playing in the intimate Theater C at 59E59, Winkie as adapted by playwright Matt Pelfrey, successfully captures the ludicrousness of this stuffed animal spectacle. However, unfortunately, the stage version of the story pales in comparison to the mythical and magical original source material.
The Drama Desk-winning Godlight Theatre Company is well-known for bringing theatrical life to both modern and classical literature. Last year’s In the Heat of the Night received heaps of critical praise, including a rave review from offoffonline.
But the Godlight's Winkie makes a few crucial missteps in bringing the tale of teddy bear terrorism to the stage, including a completely different ending from the one in the book. As helmed by Godlight Artistic Director Joe Tantalo, the 90-minute show has an over-the-top energy that sometimes suits, but also sometimes clashes with the skewering satire. The characters and situations are already cartoonish and need little stylistic embellishment to register as such.
The framing of the story as a 48 Hours or 60 Minutes exposé of the trial after the fact is an ingenious way to structure the play. However, a major problem lies in the casting of the show. Hiring an Englishman (Elliot Hill) who does not tamp down his accent to play an American talking head is a mistake — as is naming the character after MSNBC’s real-life legal analyst Dan Abrams. Winkie does not need verisimilitude — it instead lives by its unrealness and sense of the nonsensical.
In addition, changing the character of Françoise Fouad to a New Zealander to accommodate the actress playing her robs the originally Egyptian Françoise of all political, social, and moral relevance (especially considering current events in Northern Africa). Although her performance is one of the standouts in the show, the miscast Geraldine Johns as the Muslim nurse who befriends the hospitalized teddy bear is all wrong for the part. An actor should adapt to the role — not the other way around.
As the stuttering court-appointed lawyer assigned to defend Winkie, Adam Kee comes closest to capturing the spirit of the novel with his spot-on portrayal of the not-so-ironically named Charles Unwin, as does Michael Shimkin as the also cleverly christened Judge Feeble Newman. And Nick Paglino in the dual role of Clifford Chase/Winkie is properly cuddly with his boyish good looks and unshaven scruff.
The largest problem lies with the bear itself. The prop used in the show looks fresh from the shelves — neither ratty nor patched up as a well-used octogenarian toy should be. And where are his open-and-shut, blinking eyes that give not only the bear himself but also the title of the book and play its name?
As a fan of the novel Winkie, perhaps I am being too hard on the play Winkie. There are some genuine laughs and the timeliness of the show in this politically-charged and paranoid era couldn’t be better. But I had hoped for more from a piece based on a source that so masterfully melds social critique with surrealism. Clifford Chase's Winkie plays more like an extended version of The Jerry Springer Show than a scathing retort to the xenophobic times we live in.
Now celebrating its 12th season, New York Classical Theatre has staged peripatetic dramatic productions in Battery Park, Central Park, and, in its indoor debut, the World Financial Center, with last year’s Hamlet. Again partnering with Arts > World Financial Center (who curate a series of free performances, exhibitions, installations and festivals), NYCT’s delightful production of the rarely produced Restoration comedy The Rover makes ingenious use of the soaring downtown structure as audience members follow the show around the 3.5-acre site
Every 10-15 minutes the scene — and thus the scenery — shifts. Random passersby either ignore the proceedings and go on their way or become part of the audience. When this production of The Rover began, there were about 40 people watching. By the end, the number had swollen to at least 120, if not more.
Written by Aphra Behn, the first female playwright in the English language, The Rover is “a timely fit for Women’s History Month this March” (per the press release) for its feminist themes and presaging of women’s rights. Behn served as a spy under King Charles II, and The Rover cleverly plays with the ideas of perception, identity, and disguise.
Set in 17th century Naples during Carnival, the morally murky world of this comedy of manners is filled with dirty jokes and language battles between the masked and masquerading principals. Adopting the structure of William Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing and further upping the ante with an additional couple, The Rover pairs up a trio of jaunty lads with three similarly natured ladies. Trickery is the name of the game for all the lovers-to-be (with a special shout-out to costume designer Oana Botez-Ban for dressing everyone in varying shades of appropriately passionate red).
The main couple, Willmore and Hellena, bear a striking resemblance to the Bard’s Benedick and Beatrice, with their witty banter and constant one-upmanship. The cocksure M. Scott McLean is well-endowed with ample charm and good looks, fitting for the man-about-town Willmore. And April Sweeney as the saucy Hellena, destined for the nunnery yet anxious to sow her own wild oats in the guise of a sexually liberated gypsy, is a fitting foil for the rakish womanizer.
Purists beware: this version of The Rover is substantially cut to a lightening fast 80 minutes. A major subplot in the original text has been completely excised, but the main crux of the story remains the same: a day in the life of a libertine.
The constant motion of the show — including sword fights and live music — adds a ritualistic element to the proceedings, as the actors and audience members go up and down staircases, around pillars, across mezzanines, and through hallways. The action of the play takes place in front of, beside, behind, and around the spectators.
The involvement of the audience and the elimination of the fourth wall is a particularly intriguing aspect of the show. Spectators can even volunteer to be Carnival “revelers.” The brief interludes between scenes, as you walk from place to place, also allow for quick conversation about what has just happened or what is to come, unlike a traditional theater setting, where talking is strictly verboten.
The production ingeniously melts into its decidedly non-classical setting, especially in the Romeo and Juliet-esque balcony scene where we first meet the alluring courtesan Angellica Bianca (Vanessa Morosco) and the wacky and aerobic scene in the dome-ceilinged lobby of One World Financial Center that makes clever use of the staircase and escalators. The polychromatic marble so prevalent in the design of WFC helps differentiate each space into unique locations.
The final scene, staged in the vaulted Winter Garden, is a frantic farce of masks and unmasking, with the audience creating a circle around the action. Unfortunately, because of the enormity of the space, many of the actors’ voices got swallowed up, especially if they were facing away from you.
Likewise, the jovial song-and-dance pageantry that ends the show is somewhat stunted by its surroundings. Where it should be bold and brash, it is subdued and lacking in volume. Perhaps miking the able-voiced McLean as Willmore, who leads the celebration, would correct this problem.
But minor quibbles aside, The Rover is great fun and a one-of-a-kind theatrical experience. Under the tight direction of Karin Coonrod and the expert trimming of the text by artistic director Stephen Burdman, the entire troupe meets the challenge of staging the show in such an unusual space with vim and vigor. Roving around the World Financial Center as a fellow Carnival carouser in The Rover is a true joy.
Wacky and delightful, Room 17B now playing at 59E59 is the most recent conjuring of stage magic from acclaimed comedy troupe Parallel Exit (This Way That Way, Cut to the Chase). At just a hair over an hour, Room 17B provides laughs aplenty with a thoroughly modern blend of physical comedy, dance, mime, and slapstick. The controlled and precisely choreographed chaos creates much merriment. The audience, comprised of a mix of ages (including a number of children at the show I attended), thoroughly enjoyed the frivolity from start to finish.
The intimate, 50-seat Theater C at 59E59 is the perfect venue for the zany antics of this talented quartet of clowns. With an evocatively lit set fitted out by three-time Drama Desk nominated designer Maruti Evans with wall-to-ceiling filing cabinets, the space includes three doors — each marked “Room 17B” — which provide three times the opportunities for comic entrances and exits.
Without giving away the twenty or so scenes that make up the show, suffice it to say that Room 17B is a beguiling blend of music and mayhem in the vein of Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton — influences directly cited by the members of Parallel Exit. With exaggerated movements and little to no dialogue, the fearsome foursome of funnymen act out various personae of office workers (boss, minion, kiss-up) in a variety of glee inducing gags. The office-like setting sets up a show in which power struggles between the players becomes the main conceit.
Some of the bits are more successful than others, but none of them fail to elicit at least a giggle or two. Many of the shticks produce heartfelt guffaws. The opening “dance” number, in particular, is energetic and hilarious as it introduces us to the agile performers: Mike Dobson, Joel Jeske, Danny Gardner, and Brent McBeth.
Like The Three Stooges plus one, each performer creates a distinct personality with little more than a raised eyebrow or a goofy frozen smile. The mock enmity between frenemies Gardner and McBeth generates some gut-busting moments. And the charismatic Jeske (Audience Choice Best Clown Act in 2009) practically steals the show with his wordless tomfoolery.
Special praise should also go out to Dobson’s excellent marimba work and alluring original compositions. His musical accompaniment is like a cross between Lionel Hampton and Danny Elfman, adding a wicked yet playful element to the onstage shenanigans.
Fluid direction by Parallel Exit Artistic Director Mark Lonergan keeps the action at a necessary lightening pace. There are a few moments that could, however, be tightened up, such as the semi-confusing “Blimp Demolition Derby” bit. And the “Peking Opera” joke falls a little flat from an intense build-up that produces little payoff. But the “Pigeon in the Park” and “Rival Ice Cream Truck Drivers” mimes are laugh-out-loud hysterical.
Cackles and chortles also come from improvised audience participation segments. Fearful ticket holders are forewarned that no one is safe from the mock humiliation that awaits. And all attendees should be sure to read the wonderfully designed program very carefully before the show since it provides many clues for the jokes to come.
Hands down, Room 17B is one of the most thoroughly entertaining hours I have spent at the theater in ages. This circus of cut ups, dressed in business suits, act absurd and desperately try to one-up each other. It is no wonder the troupe was nominated for a 2008 Drama Desk for Unique Theatrical Experience. Parallel Exit is simply unparalleled.
ABBIE, now playing at the West End Theater at The Church of St. Paul & St. Andrew on the Upper West Side, is a one-man show about radical 60s and 70s activist Abbie Hoffman. Adapted from Hoffman’s own speeches and writings and starring actor, educator, and native New Yorker Bern Cohen, ABBIE is an interesting tale, not so interestingly told. Subtitled The Personal Story of the Clown Prince of the Sixties Revolution, this 75-minute solo performance describes itself as an intimate portrait of the leader of the Youth International Party (“Yippies”) and author of the counterculture manifesto Steal This Book. Unfortunately, ABBIE drains all the life out of the controversial “Chicago Seven” member. Instead of being energizing, the show is oddly enervating.
Retired school principal and professional film actor Bern Cohen (27 Dresses, Holy Rollers, Brooklyn Rules), whose recent stage credits include The Assistant at the Turtle Shell Theater, boasts an actual connection to Hoffman. In addition to crossing paths with him at a 1971 Columbia University protest, Cohen was mistakenly arrested in 1976 in Ohio because of his physical resemblance to the infamous anarchist when Hoffman was a wanted man on cocaine charges. This incident spurred a lifelong interest in Cohen of all things Hoffman.
ABBIE is presented as a 1987 “sociology lecture” by Hoffman, complete with slides and video from Morgan Paul Freeman, a former Black Eyed Peas and Erykah Badu video projectionist. However, these images are too few and too far between to really add anything to the “lecture.” Mostly they are used as addenda to Hoffman’s talking points (“Here is a picture of my father… my house… my high school…” etc.). Showing the images on a larger screen, or, even better, projecting them on the unused wall space of the theater, might have given them more of an impact, as would smoother transitions.
The main problem with ABBIE, though, lies in the performance. Although Mr. Cohen wrote the script for this, his pet project, he struggled to remember his lines at the show I attended. Whether he was unprepared, under-rehearsed, or both, his Hoffman was unfocused and seemingly uncomfortable on stage. Director Thomas Caruso (Around the World in 80 Days at Penguin Rep, Associate Director of Bombay Dreams and Follies on Broadway) did not help matters by having Cohen in constant motion, repeatedly rearranging the set’s furniture and moving from chair to stool over and over again. As an acting teacher once told me, “There is power in stillness.”
Besides being 15 years too old to play Hoffman (who committed suicide at age 52 in 1989), the 67-year-old Cohen lacks nuance as the social and anti-war activist, never delving the depths of Hoffman’s revolutionary character. This is, after all, a man who suffered beatings by the police and was forced underground into hiding because of his actions. In addition, Hoffman was a slick salesman of guerilla theater tactics and outrageous media stunts, such as dropping cash onto the New York Stock Exchange trading floor. Whatever is being sold in ABBIE by Cohen is simply not being sold hard enough.
This first-person narrative of the life of Abbot Howard Hoffman is too pat and too dull for such an irascible and irrepressibly comic figure. Even an A&E Biography has more edge than ABBIE. Where is the humor? The passion? The outrageousness? The pain? The relatively short show drags on and on without a spark of life, ending unceremoniously with a clip of Hoffman himself talking about death.
Instead of spending their money on $38 tickets to ABBIE, fans of “the clown prince of the 60s revolution” are advised to check out his brilliant autobiography for real insight into the man. Or perhaps wait for the much-anticipated portrayal of Hoffman by Sasha Baron Cohen (Borat, Brüno) in the Aaron Sorkin-scripted film, The Trial of The Chicago Seven, currently in development?
Combine two parts Muppet with one part Mummenschanz. Stir in spoonfuls of the spooky spectacles of the New York City Halloween parade and international Carnival celebrations. Blend with modern-day environmental portents and sprinkle liberally with sci-fi films from the 1950s. Serve immediately to audiences eager for visually and emotionally arresting theater. Written and directed by Kirjan Waage and Gwendolyn Warnock of the ingenious Wakka Wakka Productions, Baby Universe: A Puppet Odyssey is a wild and wacky eco-fable brought to life with over 30 hand-and-rod puppets ranging from nine inches to nine feet. It is a wonder to behold.
Following a September premiere in Norway at the Nordland Visual Theatre in cooperation with Riksteatret, Baby Universe is now playing at the Baruch Performing Arts Center until January 8.
Upon entering the lobby, audience members are greeted by a mini Stephen W. Hawking robot, complete with miniaturized wheelchair and computer-generated voice. This interactive puppet version of the theoretical physicist and cosmologist literally sets the stage for the story to come: a futuristic tale where the Sun is dying, the Earth is on the verge of destruction, and the number of people left has dwindled down to numbers that foretell the end of humankind.
In this world, scientists have been creating so-called “baby universes” in hopes of generating a new planetary system where the surviving population can relocate. Unfortunately, most of these infant cosmos have not survived. The birth of baby universe Number 7,001 is the starting point of this one-hour sci-fi extravaganza.
Number 7,001 grows from a tiny black salamander-esque critter into a boy-like creature increasingly covered in stars. He is nurtured by a loving mother figure crowned with what looks like The Flying Nun’s cowl. 7,001’s formative years, both humorous and touching, make up the first half of the show.
But as Number 7,001 continues to mature against all odds, things turn ugly. He is kidnapped by the stork-like Moon, who resembles a cartoon villain with his beady red eyes and pencil-thin mustache. The Moon, as flunky to the dying Sun (a dazzling and enormous puppet with a shrunken head and headlight eyes), has been instructed to eliminate any threat to the king-like center of the failing universe. The other crusty and cranky planets, including fading diva Earth, burned-out Mercury, and flimflam Mars, are all in cahoots with the Sun as well.
As they demonstrated in the 2008 Drama Desk nominated production of FABRIK: The Legend of M. Rabinowitz, Wakka Wakka pushes the boundaries of the imagination and creates works that are “bold, unique, and unpredictable” (as quoted from their mission statement).
Baby Universe continues this legacy with a stunning assortment of puppets by Mr. Waage and gorgeous costume and mask design by Ms. Warnock. The space-age score by Lars Petter Hagen and eerie lighting by Kate Leahy only enhance the dystopian atmosphere of the production, as does the ingenious script that touches on questions of religion, science, morality, and ecology.
High praise is offered to all five puppeteers (Melissa Creighton, Andrew Manjuck, and Peter Russo along with Waage and Warnock). Prowling the darkened stage dressed in Army-issue coveralls with their faces obscured by end-of-the-world gas masks, the talented quintet creates real emotions and expressions from the inanimate puppets, creating life where none actually exists. Their vocal work, including asides as DJs and interviewees at the acidly-titled Apocalypse Radio, is also superb.
Because of its dark subject matter and sometimes scary imagery, Baby Universe is not recommended for young children. But tweens, teens, and adult theatergoers would be hard-pressed to find a more inventive, engrossing, or striking production currently showing in New York. Baby Universe is a world in and of itself.
Billed as “two plays about men” with all-male casts, BALLS! The Testosterone Plays of Monica Bauer is currently playing a limited run at the WorkShop Theatre Main Stage through December 5. BALLS! is a compelling evening of theater showcasing some wonderful acting and keen writing. The show’s press release describes BALLS! as “two plays about marriage, one gay, and one straight,” but it is really more about the many iterations of what it means to be a man — and a husband — in contemporary society. Various guises of manhood are displayed throughout the show — young, old, gay, straight. This is what makes BALLS! so intriguing. The 30-minute one-act titled Two Men Walked into a Bar that leads off the show starts as three actors enter the stage and literally sound off before the action begins. It is late at night in a seedy bar in Alabama and two Marine veterans (one from Vietnam, the other Iraq) engage in an escalating face off about their respective lives and wives.
The dramatic structure of this piece is very sound, befitting Bauer’s status as a writing fellow at Quinnipiac University in Connecticut and former teaching fellow in the graduate playwriting program at Boston University, where she received her MA in playwriting. Each man slowly reveals his own predicament and the particulars surrounding his situation as the liquor flows and time ticks by.
As the Iraq vet, Aaron Gonzalez has a youthful swagger that acts as a mask to his physical and emotional pain. Nick Ruggeri as the seasoned Vietnam vet seethes with anger and resentment. Both actors bring multiple shades to their portrayals.
But Two Men is the more problematic of the two pieces. It is too overwrought, with sheer physicality taking the place of truer emotion. Perhaps this is meant to represent the “testosterone” section of the play’s title, but it ends up ringing a bit false, as the does the murderous subplot in this section (which I won’t give away to avoid spoiling the ending). However, the cast gives it their all and sells the script regardless of the flaws.
The nearly one-hour solo piece, Made for Each Other, that makes up the second half of the show features a tour de force performance by actor John Fico (A.R. Gurney’s Screen Play at The Flea). Billed as “a boy meets boy love story in the shadow of Alzheimer’s,” it chronicles the fall-out from a marriage proposal on the third date between two middle-aged gay men.
Fico is marvelous and captivating on stage by himself, playing four distinct roles, addressing the audience as each individual character, and revealing the bittersweet romance between the two lovers and their individual struggles with their families and sexualities. Made for Each Other recently appeared in the Planet Connections Theatre Festivity, where it was nominated for Outstanding Solo Show and Best Actor in a Solo Show. The playwright wrote the piece specifically for Fico — and it shows. He is born to play these parts and dives deep into each character with personal touches and tics that add nuance and subtlety to each portrayal.
My only concern with Made for Each Other is the inclusion of the Alzheimer’s suffering mother as one of the roles. Don’t get me wrong — she is a colorful character and Fico does a wonderful job with her. But she seems out of place in a show called BALLS! that focuses primarily on men and what it means to be a man.
As directed by John Fitzgibbon and evocatively lit by lighting designer David S. Goldstein, BALLS! The Testosterone Plays of Monica Bauer will particularly appeal to theater lovers who revel in the black box experience — an intimate space with little to no scenery that produces theatrical magic with a minimum of fuss and maximum talent. And with John Fico's outstanding solo performance as the highlight, there is certainly a lot of talent onstage in BALLS!
Last month, the a cappella musical In Transit opened Off-Broadway at 59E59. Although flawed, I found the show charming and amusing, as I said in my review for offoffonline. This month another a cappella musical, Perfect Harmony, opened at The Acorn on Theatre Row. It seems that the success of Glee has spawned a burgeoning theater subgenre: shows with singing but without instruments. In the case of Perfect Harmony, I’d have to say, unfortunately, without glee too. I’ll admit upfront that I am a huge Glee fan (aka a “Gleek”). And, to be fair, Perfect Harmony actually came before the hit FOX TV show, premiering at the 2006 New York International Fringe Festival, with an extended run as part of the 2006 Fringe Encore Series. It also enjoyed a sold-out run at The Clurman on Theatre Row in 2008 (see earlier offoffonline review) and most recently spent four weeks out-of-town at the Stoneham Theater in Massachusetts.
Glee and Perfect Harmony share many similar plot points and devices: a high school setting; classic character types (jock, nerd, closeted gay guy, slut, virgin); novel vocal arrangements of popular songs from the past; even the road to a national championship for dueling singing groups. In the case of Perfect Harmony, those competitors from an elite private school are the 17-time champs, The Acafellas, and their less successful female counterparts, The Ladies in Red, now going by their new name, Lady Treble.
But where Glee is indeed gleeful in its depiction of high school misfits brought together by their shared love of music, Perfect Harmony is less so. While there are some funny bits and a few moments of genuine musical magic, Perfect Harmony goes overboard by burdening its characters with not-so-subtle quirks that quickly become tiresome, even annoying: the Type A leader of the girl group constantly spouts malapropisms; the backbone of the boy band is essentially mute; the in-the-shadows, pushover manager of Lady Treble suffers from Tourette’s; the squeaky-voiced Serbian spitfire sings the wrong lyrics to all the songs. You get the idea. All the characterizations are excessive. While many in the audience laughed at these forced eccentricities, many others groaned at their obviousness. Put me in the latter category.
That’s not to say that a show like Perfect Harmony needs to be anything more than what it essentially is: a musical mockumentary, and a campy one at that. As conceived and directed by Andrew Grosso, there is a lot of potential in Perfect Harmony. In particular, some of the vocal arrangements by musical directors Ray Bailey and Adam Wachter of cheesy ’80s tunes are fun and fresh. (I won’t list the musical numbers so as not to let the cat out of the bag for those of you who may want to see the show.) And Perfect Harmony is a ripe parody of such recent saccharine Disney hits as High School Musical and Camp Rock.
But casting actors who can sing instead of singers who can act is the biggest problem with Perfect Harmony. Where the songs should soar (think of the resplendent “Don’t Stop Believin’” from Glee), most fall flat. It is hard to believe that the Acafellas, with their corny choreography and only passable vocals, could have actually won a national singing competition. Lady Treble is even less successful in its singing sections.
Furthermore, in a town as rich with talent as New York, it would benefit the show greatly if the cast were closer in age to high schoolers than graduate students (or older). None of them, aside from Jarid Faubel, who plays goofy athlete JB, and Kelly McCreary, as gotta-dance, Jesus-loving Meghan, even embody teenage mannerisms or body language.
The enthusiastic Faubel and McCreary fare best in a cast that is underserved by a chatty script that should spend more time singing and less time talking. Trimming 15 to 20 minutes of dialogue would greatly help quicken the pace. Trimming some of the weak jokes would help too. At close to an hour and 45 minutes, Perfect Harmony, simply goes on too long, fizzling out with a lackluster finale.
According to the press release, the producers are planning to move the show to another space following the run at the Acorn (which ends next weekend on November 13). My advice would be to find an auditorium with better acoustics or mike the performers to add a little more energy to the songs. Right now the 199-seat space swallows up the voices instead of allowing them room to breathe. A smaller venue might be a better choice as well to bring the audience more into the action. And please cut the obscenity at the end of Kerri’s song at nationals — as the Lady Treble manager with hidden talent, Marie-France Arcilla has the best voice in the cast and that unnecessary curse spoiled her one moment in the spotlight. (Arcilla also does double duty as flamboyant vocal couch Tobi McClintoch, one of the best — and funniest — moments in the entire show.)
With the success of Glee, there is obviously an audience out there for a show like this. And Perfect Harmony already has fans as evidenced by their multiple successful runs, popular website, and Facebook page. I’m not sure if the show is still in development, but with some tweaks and some recasting, plus a bigger, bolder final number, Perfect Harmony could inch closer to perfection. As of now, it still has a long way go.
With The Human Scale, foreign correspondent Lawrence Wright has transformed his 12,000-word story entitled “Captives: What really happened during the Israeli attacks” about the Gaza Strip from the November 9, 2009 issue of The New Yorker into a one-man play. Informative, provocative, yet dramatically inert, audiences should expect more lecture than theater with this nonetheless dazzling multimedia presentation. With a gorgeous video design by Aaron Harrow as his backdrop, Wright leads the audience through the history and ongoing impasse between the Israelis and Palestinians. Using the 2006 capture of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, who is still in Hamas custody, as its backbone, The Human Scale, offers an unsparing look at a contentious issue where both sides take the moral high ground and feel they are doing the right thing.
Much like Wright’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11, which was turned into the play My Trip to Al-Qaeda (and recently an HBO Documentary directed by Alex Gibney) and even Al Gore’s Academy Award-winning documentary An Inconvenient Truth, The Human Scale is an amalgam of video, images, interviews, and other sources. Some graphic footage of bloodied bodies produced gasps from the audience. A Palestinian children’s show in which a cartoon-like character is stabbed to death by a Jew was a particularly disturbing example of how both sides dehumanize and demonize the other.
But as directed by The Public Theater’s Artistic Director Oskar Eustis, there is little drama in the way Wright tells the story. His fairness and impartiality somehow drain the life out of what he is presenting. He becomes instead a sort of talking head or narrator, like a 60 Minutes anchor desperately trying to keep his bias and emotions at bay.
What I found most problematic about the piece was the lack of Wright’s own response to what is going on around him. The only personal glimpse the audience gets is when he reenacts fainting from dehydration caused by food poisoning while interviewing members of Hamas. In addition, Wright’s way of showing leather-bound tomes and official-looking binders does not lend as much authority to his lecture as he might want. As the names, places, and dates add up, audience members may find themselves in a fog of information that is as confusing as the disinformation Wright is attempting to admonish. The addition of dramaturgical materials such as a Gaza Strip timeline and map in the program are certainly helpful to those who do not know a whole lot about this ongoing conflict, but these are simply not enough to wrap one’s head around such a complex issue without substantial prior knowledge.
Co-produced by The Public Theater and 3LD Art & Technology Center, this show may bring to mind the controversial play My Name Is Rachel Corrie about the American activist crushed to death by an Israeli bulldozer in the Gaza Strip, but it reminded me more of Masked by Israeli playwright Ilan Hatsor, about three Palestinian brothers who struggle with ideological and personal conflicts about the Israeli-Palestinian issue. The Human Scale shares with that drama a lack of overt moral judgment or political polemics, although The Human Scale seems to conclude that both Hamas and the Israeli government committed war crimes in the Gaza war, which is also the main conclusion of the controversial Goldstone Report which Wright cites in the show.
In a recent interview in the weblog The Gothamist, Wright said he hoped that they could take the play to Israel, Gaza, and Palestine for audiences on both sides of the issue. Another article in The Jewish Week suggested that portions of the play could be rewritten during the show’s run depending on current political developments, making The Human Scale a timely addition to the annals of newspaper theater. It is certainly a provocative piece that will get audiences talking. But the 90-minute show is really more like a glorified PowerPoint presentation than theater in the truest sense.
A musical about the New York subway? Didn’t Lincoln Center do that in 2009 with Happiness, from the creative team (including director/choreographer Susan Stroman) that collaborated on the smash hit Contact? But where Happiness concerned a disparate batch of New Yorkers in an underground limbo who are actually dead, In Transit from Primary Stages has a lot more life in it. Although it’s not always a smooth ride, this new musical has a lot of appeal in its 90 minutes. And did I mention that the whole thing is sung a cappella? Gleeks, buy your tickets now! Seven performers play over 38 roles from aspiring actress and struggling financier to enterprising coffee cart owner and sassy token booth employee. When the individual members of the septet are not singing lead, they are providing backup or creating a cavalcade of sound effects. This is a musical with no instruments but the voices on stage. The cast list in the Playbill and accompanying insert names the performers by both vocal range (Bass, Alto, etc.) and various characters played. Throughout the performance, reggae, hip-hop, rock, and pop are interspersed with dashes of doo-wop and barbershop.
The four composer-lyricists — Kristen Anderson-Lopez, James-Allen Ford, Russ Kaplan, and Sara Wordsworth — have worked on the show for almost a decade, with productions at the 2003 New York International Fringe Festival (where it was called Along the Way) and the 2008 Eugene O’Neill Theater Center. This incarnation, tightly directed and staged by Joe Calarco (Shakespeare’s R&J), who also helmed the terrific Burnt Part Boys at Playwrights Horizons earlier this year, is set on a expertly designed subway platform courtesy of Anna Louizos. The characters of In Transit are trying to get from place to place like all New Yorkers who use the subway as their main form of transportation. Paths cross and lives intersect, with both daily minutiae and extraordinary meltdowns witnessed by an ever-changing parade of nameless, faceless straphangers. The rhythms and sounds of life for urban commuters are always on view on the subway.
Besides the outstanding direction and design, the best thing about In Transit is the flair and forte the seven principals bring to the material. Creating an a cappella musical requires not only acting and singing skills, but also precise timing. It is high praise to say that the cast makes this Herculean task seem effortless. Chesney Snow, one of New York’s premier beatboxers who has actually performed on New York’s subway platforms, deserves a special shout-out for providing the propulsive percussive foundation as Boxman. In addition, Celisse Henderson displays impressive vocal chops and keen comedic timing, especially as the aforementioned, scene-stealing MTA clerk with an attitude. And Steve French, who sings Bass, also gets props for bringing the Bowser (from Sha Na Na) persona into the 21st century with his multiple roles.
As staged in the intimate 196-seat Theater A at 59E59, there is a lot of humor in the show that will appeal to residents of the Big Apple. But because of their esoteric quality, many of the jokes will fall flat on out-of-town theatergoers who may not yet possess an insider’s view of Gotham. And while the characters are presented as New York archetypes, their stories end of being more commonplace than inspiring, more trite than universal. The very talented Denise Summerford as Jane, hopeful thespian, and equally skilled Tommar Wilson as Trent, semi-closeted gay urban professional, seem more than capable of handling roles with more depth. The timing in the middle and the end of the show could use some tightening too. Although the first 20 minutes zip by in a whirl, In Transit is paced more like a local than an express.
These are, however, minor quibbles with a show that can be truthfully called utterly charming. Because of its big city-centric themes and humor, In Transit might not transfer well to regional theater or even Broadway. But it’s a thoroughly enjoyable trip about the noise of New York for lovers of musical theater. And did I mention that the whole thing is sung a cappella?
As a long-time resident of the Italian-American section of Williamsburg (going on 17 years) and a one-time renter on Frost Street off Graham Avenue (two years), I was excited about seeing Belinda McKeon’s new play, Graham & Frost, at PS 122. Presented by The Sullivan Project in partnership with the Third Annual Festival of Irish Theatre (which runs till October 3), this 45-minute one-act centers on an ramshackle Italian restaurant and the trio of neighborhood residents who come together to bring it back to life. Aside from some fleeting moments by the performers, however, this show from the award-winning Irish playwright and novelist simply does not ring true. Perhaps if I didn’t live in the area I would have another opinion of Graham & Frost. But while there are a few genuine laughs and emotions, the characters are too broadly drawn: Benny, the gruff Italian-American butcher from the neighborhood; Sam, the hipster chef; and Luca, the Euro-Italian who bought the restaurant from his great aunt. All have secrets — some shocking, some ho-hum — that are gradually revealed.
Graham & Frost starts promisingly enough. The set design by Tsubasa Kamei and Jennifer Stimple captures the broken-down Brooklyn aesthetic. Sam (Dan Shaked, a recent NYU Tisch grad) enters the dilapidated establishment, strewn with religious iconography and showing signs of DIY improvement, to answer a Craigslist ad for a chef. He certainly looks like a Williamsburgian in his skinny jeans, Converse sneakers, and cardigan. But his costume begs the question: Would someone really wear that outfit to a job interview, even if they were a 20-something hipster?
When Benny the butcher (Steven Randazzo, a SAG/AFTRA/Equity member whose credits include Law & Order) arrives in a blood-spattered apron with a meat cleaver in his hand, one of those few moments of humor I mentioned also arrives as Benny pretends to be enraged at this upstart’s disrespect. But even Benny’s apparel raises the question of why a chef- and menu-less restaurant weeks away from opening would even have a butcher. What exactly is he chopping in a kitchen that doesn’t yet exist?
As the old and new converge in the characters of Sam and Benny, the playwright is clearly trying to examine the tensions between the old and new residents of the rapidly expanding Williamsburg. Benny comments that newcomers expect old-timers to act like The Sopranos. But instead of offering a complex version of Italian-American life like that seminal HBO drama, Graham & Frost indulges in cardboard caricaturization. Benny, in particular, is a goombah stereotype, clueless and useless. And Sam’s smarminess embodies the worst characteristics of the holier-than-thou bohemian that has come to represent the Billyburg hipster.
When the fresh-from-Italy owner Luca (Enrico Ciotti, a Neighborhood Playhouse School of Theater grad) enters, he and Sam strike a rapport due to the budding chef’s knowledge of Italian cuisine and the language itself. As the two young men converse in Italian, Benny becomes enraged that they are mocking him, since he cannot speak the language. This leads to confrontations between the various pairs that highlight the simmering resentments between all three characters. Violence ensues in the most unrealistic ways.
For instance, Luca tells Sam towards the end of the play that Benny is his friend. If so, then why does he not only humiliate the butcher, but also pull a knife on him? And why does Sam seem only to demonstrate arrogance and disrespect when, once again, he’s there to look for a job?
Although the script is problematic, the performers do inject humor in the right moments, especially Mr. Randazzo, who generates the most laughs with the somewhat stale jokes. Mr. Shaked has the hipster looks and attitude, but his character is cliché. At the performance I saw, Mr. Ciotti struggled with his lines. The direction by Thomas G. Waites could use more focus as well with characters many times loitering onstage when the two other actors are otherwise engaged.
In the Author’s Notes to the program, McKeon says that she has lived in the area since 2005 and “even since then, this neighborhood has changed.” The neighborhood has actually been changing over the last 20 years, when artists first moved to North Williamsburg to occupy warehouse loft spaces. That “gentrification” has since spread to surrounding neighborhoods like Bushwick and Greenpoint.
When McKeon asserts “a new community has been making these streets their own,” I think she marginalizes the Italian-American community in East Williamsburg that is still a prominent presence in the neighborhood, including Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church and the Giglio Boys. And ultimately, Graham & Frost oversimplifies the relationship between those residents who have been here for a long time and those who have just arrived.
While attending The Little Foxes at New York Theatre Workshop,, an elderly woman behind me whispered to her companion, “She’s one of the biggest bitches of the theater!” about the lead character in Lillian Hellman’s 1939 drama. In the annals of stage history, few female characters are as evil incarnate at Regina Giddens. The play is a performer’s dream because of its savage dialogue. But although visceral in its physicality, this production of the modern American classic suffers from a lack of any hint of humanity that keeps the action and characters at arm’s length. The powerful performances, however, make the show worth seeing. In a 1939 review of the Broadway premiere, my favorite theater critic, Robert Benchley, called The Little Foxes “a sinister play about sinister people.” The story was based on Hellman’s own Southern family. Set in the spring of 1900, it concerns the psychological and financial warfare of the backstabbing Hubbards. They want to build a cotton mill on their plantation, with the play revolving around the machinations of sister Regina to gain a majority share in the new venture from her venomous brothers, Benjamin and Oscar. She wants to exact revenge for being left out of their father’s will, since only sons were considered legal heirs at that time. Although the siblings each display their own social-climbing ferocity, it is Regina who emerges as the queen bee of avarice.
When The Little Foxes first appeared, Regina was played by the larger-than-life Tallulah Bankhead. The 1941 film version — with a screenplay by Hellman — starred Bette Davis as one of the greatest villains of American cinema, according to the American Film Institute. Subsequent revivals featured Anne Bancroft, Elizabeth Taylor, and, most recently, Stockard Channing.
Acclaimed Flemish director and NYTW go-to guy Ivo van Hove of Toneelgroep Amsterdam once again teams with Obie Award-winning actress Elizabeth Marvel for this radical reworking. Their previous collaborations, Hedda Gabler and A Streetcar Named Desire, were highly praised for their eye-opening new interpretations.
Van Hove strips down a play to its basic elements to get to the core of its meaning. The Little Foxes is stylistically staged. With a plush staircase in the center, the floor-to-ceiling purple-carpeted set has the decadent feel of a nightclub. There are the barest minimum of set pieces and props. No time or place is mentioned in the program in an effort to bring the action into the present day.
In this austere setting, the performances stand alone — and they are worthy of praise, although sometimes bordering on camp. Many times I couldn’t help but think of the cartoon villain who twirls his mustache in delight at the suffering of his victims. The cast alternates between moments of control and rage. Characters are dragged and punched, with hair pulled and faces flush with screaming.
Marvel as Regina has the haughty air of a Southern belle, with a genteel smile that turns on a dime into a viperish snarl. She is manipulative and malicious. New Zealander Marton Csokas (who appeared in The Lord of the Rings) is like a coiled snake as bad-boy bachelor Ben. Csokas plays up Ben’s attachment to his sister as somewhat sexual, which ups the ick factor in his already icky character.
Thomas Jay Ryan, recently of In the Next Room or the Vibrator Play, is the violent family man Oscar, who physically and verbally abuses his wife and son. Nick Westrate (from this year’s revival of Boys in the Band) as Oscar’s offspring Leo shows that the apple never falls far from the tree. And Christopher Evan Welch (currently seen on AMC’s Rubicon) as Regina’s sickly husband Horace spends the last of his strength manhandling his wife, though his intentions are to end the Hubbard family reign of terror.
Even the supposedly innocent characters display hints of malevolence. Regina’s daughter Alexandra, as portrayed by Cristin Milioti (The Lieutenant of Inishmore) and Oscar’s alcoholic wife Birdie, in a standout performance by Tina Benko (Restoration), are not above their own brands of bad behavior.
Which leads to my biggest concern with the play’s direction. Although The Little Foxes has more betrayal and double-crosses in its two hours than an entire season of Dallas, this production completely lacks a humanity that would allow the audience to relate to the characters and understand them beyond their insatiable desire for wealth. There seems to be nothing besides their greed.
Are we suppose to believe these despicable people are continuing a pattern thrust upon them by previous generations? If so, then why the ray of hope at the end as Xan escapes the house of horrors? Van Hove may have stripped the play to its core, but The Little Foxes remains a gripping and unnerving portrait of a family of fiends.
For its seventh season, Redd Tale Theatre Company, in residency at Nicu’s Spoon Theater in Midtown West, has taken on two classics in repertory. Each runs about two hours, with William Shakespeare’s Macbeth a little bit over at 130 minutes and Pierre Carlet de Marivaux’s Triumph of Love a little under at 110 minutes. Seeing two shows in rep allows for interesting contrasts, as sets are used twice, themes reoccur, and many of the actors perform in both plays. While tightly directed by the company’s artistic director Will Le Vasseur, Macbeth and Triumph succeed only intermittently in being completely compelling evenings of theater. There are, however, strong performances in each and some innovative directorial choices in “the Scottish play” in particular. Redd Tale’s “tightly edited version” of Macbeth is the more enjoyable, more engaging of the two. The weird sisters open the play with their supernatural mojo, standing on a black-lit rune resembling the symbol on the cover of the fourth Led Zeppelin album. As the play progresses, the witches retreat to three different corners of the stage where they stand motionless — observing. They also occasionally become minor characters, adding an interesting twist to their manipulation of the action.
But the most important ingredient in Shakespeare’s tragedy of politics and ambition is two lead actors who can inhabit the guile and guilt, might and madness of the characters of Macbeth and his social-climbing wife. While Redd Tale co-artistic director James Stewart, as the doomed regicide, is technically proficient, his performance is unfortunately emotionally deficient. His Macbeth never truly connects to the audience as a man who morphs from an unwilling murderer to a tyrant willing to do anything for the crown. Founding company member Virginia Bartholomew, in contrast, as Lady Macbeth, is like the bloodthirsty star of The Real Housewives of Scotland, egging on her recalcitrant husband and plunging into insanity as her indiscretion gets the best of her. Bartholomew is both devious and delicate, formidable and fragile. Her interpretation of the role is the highlight of both shows.
The remaining characters in Macbeth are fleshed out by actors of varying degrees of skill, with Morgan Auld as Ross/Porter, Brad Lewandowski as Malcolm, and Collin McConnell as Banquo/Menteith faring best with Shakespeare’s poetry. Outfitted in fetching kilts and tartan sashes, the cast moves briskly through this pared down version of the story, which never loses sight of the main narrative thrust and retains most of Shakespeare’s rhythm. It is praiseworthy that Le Vasseur’s cuts seem seamless.
His adaptation of Triumph of Love, however, suffers from an overeager attempt to “throw in a healthy dose of RTTC’s signature sci-fi twist,” according to the company’s press release. While Redd Tale’s previous season’s Maddy: A Modern Day Medea earned acclaim for its audacious reworking of the classic Greek tale, the changes made to Triumph seem like square pegs forced into round holes.
Landing in between Molière and Beaumarchais in the French dramatist timeline, Marivaux wrote some 30 comedies about love, of which Le triomphe de l’amour is the most famous. Working from a new translation by Virginie Maries, Le Vasseur keeps the plot essentially intact. But the play now begins with our cross-dressing heroine Leonide subservient to a sorceress who turns back time so that the disguised princess can bring back her love from an untimely death. It is a device that adds nothing to the charms of the play — and also tacks on an unfortunate and nonsensical ending.
Adaptation aside, this production also suffers from what seems like a concerted attempt at cohesion with its repertory partner, Macbeth. Much like the witches in that play, the cast of Triumph surrounds the stage motionless until their time in the spotlight. But while this blocking makes sense in the context of the previous tragedy, where all eyes are watching, it makes much less sense in this comedy, as the statue-like actors have their eyes closed most of the time. They are neither observers nor manipulators of the story, as the weird sisters are in Macbeth.
In addition, Triumph has the misfortune of having odd costume choices, as everyone but the lead actress is bedecked in grey jersey-cotton togas. Is this meant to be a nod to the Greeks and/or the rationalist views of the holier-than-thou philosopher, Hermocrate, who is one of the main characters of the play? And why is Corine, princess Leonide’s handmaid, dressed in an obviously femininized toga when her character is supposed to be in disguise as a man throughout the play?
Unfortunately, these directorial choices distract from what is overall a well-acted and tightly constructed version of Triumph of Love that shares with Macbeth themes of royal succession, politics, and deception. Founding company member Lynn Kenny is utterly charming as Leonide/Phocion/Aspasie — a true feat since the motives of her character’s deceitfulness are specious to say the least. Brad Lewandowski is also winning as the object of her affection, the young and naïve Agis.
Virginia Bartholomew proves once again that she is a force to be reckoned with in her spot-on performance as the old maid Leontine, seduced by the princess in disguise as a young, beautiful man. Tom Cleary is equally as delightful as the self-righteous thinker Hermocrate, caught off guard by the wiles of Leonide masquerading as the young maiden Aspasie. And James Stewart as the scheming gardener Dimas fares much better in Triumph, in which his Kiwi accent works well with his character instead of against it as in Macbeth. (Stewart hails from New Zealand.)
Redd Tale should be applauded for its courage in doing shows in rep — particularly challenging shows by the likes of Shakespeare, Chekhov, and Marivaux — and for attempting new adaptations of classic works. Their motto is “to provide enlightening, entertaining theatrical experiences that contribute to humanity’s next step forward.” Both Macbeth and Triumph of Love can be considered entertaining and both include a number of charismatic and captivating performers. But a little more enlightenment next time around regarding the original source material would be greatly appreciated, too. Macbeth is the more successful of the two, while sadly Triumph does not live up to its title. I do, however, look forward to seeing Redd Tale’s “next step forward.”
