Three of Britain’s leading comedians of the 20th century are the focus of Paul Hendy’s The Last Laugh, a play that harks back to Sutton Vane’s Outward Bound (1923) and Trevor Griffiths’ Comedians (1975). As the trio meets in a shabby dressing area of an uncertain venue for some kind of benefit performance, issues of what makes something funny and who steals jokes from whom, along with plenty of comic insults, arise.
Mona Pirnot’s new play, I’m Assuming You Know David Greenspan, concerns the hardscrabble existence of aspiring playwrights and the passion that keeps them writing for an industry in which, as playwright Robert Anderson ostensibly said, it’s possible to make a killing but never a living. David Greenspan is the very model of a theater artist who has persevered despite dire fiscal odds. Greenspan is pretty well-known Off-Broadway and, especially, Off-Off Broadway, but he’s certainly not a household name.
In 1969 the two-year-old Negro Ensemble Company mounted the off-Broadway premiere of Lonne Elder III’s Ceremonies in Dark Old Men. “A remarkable play,” raved Clive Barnes in the New York Times. Now, in a joint presentation with the Peccadillo Theater Company and producer Eric Falkenstein, the NEC revisits this gut-punch period piece, offering a rock-solid production that hums along toward inevitable tragedy, chronicling the socioeconomic plight of Harlem in the 1950s through the deeds and decisions of one troubled family.
English dramatist Caryl Churchill is turning 87 this September. In advance of that landmark, the Public Theater is presenting Glass. Kill. What If If Only. Imp., a quadruple bill of Churchill one-acts new to New York. Like Albee on this side of the Atlantic, Churchill has always had a penchant for depicting humanity in rather abstract terms. Directed by Churchill specialist James Macdonald, these shorts are supplemented with entr’acte circus feats by a juggler (Maddox Morfit-Tighe) and an acrobat (Junru Wang). The evening’s fare may seem, at first blush, a random assortment but, upon reflection, common themes emerge.
Eliya Smith has chosen the title of her play Grief Camp cannily. The name nails down the setting and the situation, and it allows her to start the proceedings at a low key, with two of her six young people, Brad and Luna, talking in the dark after lights out. It scarcely matters that the audience can’t yet identify who is who, because the chitchat is innocuous: “Are you awake?” “I’m debating if I want to pee.” “I’m sorry about the stuff at the lake.”
Johnny G. Lloyd’s birthday birthday birthday follows a group of friends throughout the years as they celebrate milestone birthdays that two in their group share. The play begins as Marissa (Portland Thomas) and Clark (Justin Ahdoot) gather for their 21st-birthday party with their friends amid conversations about class, race, sexuality, hopes and dreams—with a helping of drugs, fights, cheating and gossip.
The welcoming speech at a Tank production usually stresses the reach of the organization. The audience is typically informed that the Tank produced more than 1,000 productions last year. It’s impossible that all of them would be home runs, of course, and yet even those with modest virtues may be worth noting. Such is the case with Johnny G. Lloyd’s Or, An Astronaut Play, an amusing sketch of a play enhanced by very good performances, as well as the author’s intelligence and sly wit.
