Every Inch a King

King Lear, with its epic sweep and enormous cast, is hard to get just right, but Michael Grandage’s production at the Brooklyn Academy of Music is overwhelmingly right and a must-see event. In Derek Jacobi, Grandage has a magisterial Lear, speaking the language with clarity and beauty and making sense—emotionally—even of the nonsense in the mad scenes.

The aged Iron Age king, as Shakespeareans know, has determined to divide his kingdom among his three daughters. But first he wants some flattery from them. The two eldest praise their father, while Lear’s favorite, Cordelia, responds that she has nothing to say and loses her third of the kingdom. Lear, of course, has his daughters’ true affections completely backwards. The combination of foolishness, vanity, irascibility, and majesty is hard to get just right, but Grandage and Jacobi have struck a winning balance in the crucial opening scene.

Though Jacobi’s Lear seems prickly and vain, he’s not so excessively overbearing that he seems to have planned to wring claims of affection from his daughters. It’s a thought that strikes Lear suddenly in Jacobi’s interpretation, and the direness of the situation is leavened by some brilliant stage business. Before Gina McKee’s Goneril, as the eldest, speaks, Jacobi holds up his hand to stop her: then he points to his cheek, she kisses it obediently, and he motions for her to continue. The comedy of the moment pays more dividends shortly after: when Justine Mitchell’s Regan is invited to begin, she unhesitatingly kisses Lear’s cheek, and he lets out a satisfied sigh to indicate that she’s just a bit better at knowing her duty than Goneril. These details are early indicators of how deeply Grandage and his actors have examined the text, and their humor helps rein in one’s inclination to outrage at the king’s abuse of Cordelia.

Jacobi’s Lear, while not blameless in his fate, justifies his assessment that he is “more sinned against than sinning.” It’s painful to see his fear that he may go mad, and when he finally becomes a sympathetic human being, he’s transcendent. He’s boosted by fine acting from the two antagonistic daughters. Both McKee’s Goneril and Mitchell’s Regan show unexpected sparks of humanity from time to time. Goneril cries when Lear puts a curse of sterility on her—a curse that Jacobi makes shocking. And even amid Regan’s later cruelties, Mitchell manages to show how painfully she loves Edmund.

There’s been a lot of judicious pruning of the mad scenes, both Lear’s and those of Gwilym Lee’s dashing, protective Edgar, to blend horror and grim comedy without alienating the audience with obscure references. In Act IV the mad Lear says, “There’s hell, there’s darkness.” In Jacobi’s reading, Lear mimics looking into a vagina—it’s very funny and yet draws on a classic Freudian fear.

There are minor quibbles, to be sure. It’s silly for Edgar to tell the blind Gloucester (a fine Paul Jesson, providing a sanguine parental counterpoint to Lear’s ire) to “look up” at the height from which he’s fallen when Gloucester has empty, bloody sockets, and Edgar is supposed to be a sighted passerby who’d notice that. And Alec Newman’s robust Edmund, one of Shakespeare’s juiciest roles, isn’t mesmerizing enough and doesn’t boost the character beyond stock melodramatic villain to something special. Gideon Turner’s Duke of Cornwall is the most disappointing: a 21st-century swaggering bully from a schoolyard playground, his duke lacks any gravitas.

Grandage keeps the action moving swiftly in front of Christopher Oram’s curved set of high plank walls stippled in white, gray and brown. Later on, Neil Austin’s lighting makes the wall look carved in stone, yet even more astonishing is the storm scene; on the heath, lights flash beneath the stage floor and through cracks in the upright planks to simulate a torrent of rain, and the sound design of Adam Cork thunderously complements the effect.

Amid such high-caliber work, Jacobi's performance is still the crown jewel, exhibiting a mastery of timing and intonation. “I do not like the fashion of your garments,” the mad Lear says to Edgar, who’s in a loincloth on the heath. Then, as if anticipating the explanation: “You will say they are Persian.” It’s a very funny leap of imagination and the audience follows easily—never mind that Lear wouldn’t know the way Persians of his time dressed. It’s a measure of the success of the production that one cares about this choleric old man who has brought so much trouble down on his own head.

Tickets are scarce, but if you can score one, this is a King Lear that will stay in your memory a very long time.

Life Is In the Folds

Five lives intersect in Paper Cranes, the new offering by Packawallop Productions. And though Kari Bentley-Quinn’s script might initially appear to follow a familiar path involving interconnected characters, there is plenty of interesting fodder in this sturdy work. The thru line in Cranes is pretty easy to grasp. Mona (Cynthia Silver) is a widowed mother of a nineteen-year-old girl, Maddie (Sarah Lord). Maddie, a young lesbian who has yet to come out, hooks up with the more sensitive, older Julie (Melissa Hammans), whose best friend is Amy (Susan Louise O’Connor). Amy, meanwhile, has begun a semi-anonymous relationship with David (Eric T. Miller), who is in the same grief counseling group as…Mona.

Yet as cut-and-dried as this description might be, Bentley-Quinn’s play is anything but. Director Scott Ebersold has collected a winning ensemble of actors who provide plenty of substance to Cranes. This show could have been a mawkish look at lonely hearts, but wisely sidesteps such a choice. It is actually savvy reflection of modern life and mating rituals. These characters all know how to find people. Meeting someone – even sleeping with someone – is facile to them.

It’s how to reconcile with what comes next that each member of this quintet must grapple with in their own way. They are all masking their own private hurt. Maddie, for instance, longs for her late father, who was her confidante. David has yet to begin recovering from his girlfriend’s untimely death. Even Amy, who at first might seem to be the most in-control of this group, has her own demons to keep at bay.

It almost seems unnecessary to mention how convincing the marvelous O’Connor is as Amy, but it should be said. The actress mines all sorts of depth to imbue the character with a sultry yet sad vibe. Amy knows she has a lot going for her, but there’s still something missing, and she doesn’t know how to fill that void. It’s a gorgeously calibrated performance.

Equally well-staged by both Ebersold and the team of Hammans and Lord is the budding romance between Julie and Maddie. Both actresses are certainly impressive physically. Their love scenes are a convincing look at a couple in the early stage of their relationship, when the body rush takes over and just a hint of awkwardness persists. But the emotional link between the two is equally accurate, demonstrating that despite a fifteen-year age gap between the two, they really might have a deep bond.

Miller, too, does an admirable job of channeling David’s dark side and slowly revealing just what might be motivating his actions. He is arresting in his scenes with O’Connor, but shares even more chemistry in his tender scenes with Silver, who melds weary and worry with dry humor marvelously. It is to the credit of Ebersold and his cast that they never manipulate the audience’s emotions. Our sympathy with each of these characters always remains organic.

Bentley-Quinn clearly has great affection for each of these characters. Even when they feel like familiar types, something we have seen before, she has drawn them so sharply that we soon learn they are all worth caring about and paying attention to. The same can be said for this smart production – and the playwright as well.

Brothers Brawl, Everyone Bawls

I do not have a great deal to say about Barefoot Theater Company's Teeth of the Sons , written by Joseph Sousa and performed at the Cherry Lane Theater, mainly because it does not have a great deal to offer. By cramming a series of melodramatic tropes into the storyline and presenting these tropes relatively solidly, it held my attention for its duration, but no more than an episode of General Hospital might. The biggest difference here is that General Hospital knows what it is and where it stands in pop culture today. Teeth of the Sons is mid-grade melodrama posing as high art, taking itself far too seriously to be stomached. The play begins with a reunion between estranged brothers Sam (steadily performed by Will Allen), who has been incommunicado for years, and Jacob, (played by Sousa) a mild-mannered Hasidic scholar. Sam has returned to their hometown, Brooklyn, because his girlfriend, Maddy, (Casandera M.J. Lollar) is pregnant, her family has kicked her out, and the two need a place to stay.

This lays the groundwork for a plethora of arguments between Jacob and Sam, Sam and Maddy, Maddy and Jacob, even Jacob and his long-time ex girlfriend Evelyn, who shows up as a bangled, beaded, long-skirted deus-ex machina near the play’s end. Arguments center on religious doctrine, familial duties, morality, and abortion. One would think that so much arguing would produce interesting insights into these subjects: one would be wrong. Little is said that hasn't been heard on an after school special. When characters aren't arguing, they are calming themselves down, or crying, or trying not to cry, on the phone to their estranged parents who come across as heartless, unfeeling, terrible people.

It is clear that Sousa and director Nicole Haron spent much more time thinking about plot than character development, which is problematic in a one-room play with three main characters. Inconsistencies abound: for example, we are supposed to believe that Jacob once was a carbon-copy of his brother, an irresponsible, care-free partier with no regard for anyone but himself. But Sousa's Jacob is so mild-mannered, so reserved and sweet that it's impossible to believe this is true.

At one point, Sam gets Jacob to take a shot of whiskey with him, and as Jacob does so, he cringes and grimaces like a boy who's never tasted it before. This is comical, but it makes no sense if he was once as big a drinker as Sam. Sam and Jacob are completely different in every way, from the way they carry themselves to speech patterns to complexion. There is nothing to indicate that they are brothers, that they share an upbringing and a past.

Near the end of the play, Jacob's high school girlfriend, Evelyn, shows up, and through an impassioned speech, Evelyn reveals to the audience that Jacob was not the nicest of guys at sixteen: he dumped her and then turned her away when she came sobbing at his doorstep. Evelyn tears into Jacob, and Jacob takes full blame for his former self. He confesses to taking cold showers to repent his behavior to her. No one ever brings up the fact that Jacob and Evelyn were kids when they dated, and likely made major mistakes due in large part to their immaturity. It’s an odd omission that suggests none of these characters (or the playwright) have gained much perspective over time.

The technical elements do not add much shine to this dull script. The set is realistically rendered, and would have worked fine if the director and designers hadn’t felt the need to emphasize the fact. There are many practical lights on the set. I have never seen lights turned on and off so often and so unnecessarily in one play before. Perhaps director Nicole Haran was trying to break some kind of record. I can see no other reason for making such a choice.

In conclusion, I would not recommend this play to most. Perhaps if you are particularly interested in Hasidic Judaism, the Holocaust, abortion, and soap operas, and there's nothing good on TV, and you live in the West Village already, and aren't interested in any movies playing...maybe then, you might consider Teeth of the Sons, but otherwise, I'd say pass.

Lean Green Satire Machine

If you have no anxiety whatsoever about the future, then go see Future Anxiety . If you worry about the future of humans and this planet already, this play is still for you. The Flea Theater’s new sharp satire features a talented cast, a dynamic set, and plenty of jokes that will make you want to laugh and recycle, simultaneously. From Patrick Metzger’s well placed animalistic noises to Kyle Chepulis’s stream-lined, multi-level set, Future Anxiety immediately sets up an environment. It is the future, and it is not quite what we expected. We are never told the exact year, but we explore this new era through a variety of interconnected storylines. The large cast is excellently directed by Jim Simpson. It is the ensemble’s character development, choreographed movement, and sense of timing that keeps the play moving. Each and every one of the twenty-three person ensemble is like a gear on a fine watch: each individual part is strong, and when you put them together you get a solid piece of work. The actors of The Bats, the resident acting company at The Flea, have an obvious comfort with each other, adding to the coherence of the world on stage.

As I said, there are no weak actors, but I particularly enjoyed Sonia’s (Katherine Folk-Sullivan) storyline. In a place where we often laugh at the absurdity of things, Sonia keeps us grounded in the reality of the human condition, without killing the joke. This delicate balance is well executed by Folk-Sullivan, and I especially enjoyed the easy friendship between Sonia and Mae (Maren Langdon). These scenes bridged the gap between the two major ways of coping with the new world, and I appreciated both actresses for their honesty and connection. The other storylines each have their own memorable characters and moments, which you will just have to see to discover for yourself.

Laurel Haines’s script can seem didactic at times, but weaker moments in the script are enlivened by the actors’ dynamic use of the stage and their bodies. In a script that is so over the top, the movement is clean and streamlined, without being overly stylized. I never felt that actors were moving unnecessarily, or that the overall visual balance of the actors’ placement on the set was off. This embodied energy is especially useful to less developed characters, like Vince (Alex Herrald). Vince is an obviously ruthless business executive, who we first meet as he climbs around the various platforms and wires. We learn he is descending from a tree, which we believe immediately. This decently funny moment of the script is brought to another level through the clever use of space and physical acting. Such moments occur throughout the production.

This unity of visual aesthetics extends beyond the stage at The Flea. The theater has gone green in more than just their theatrical season. They now feature online programs, biodegradable cups for drinks, and recycling options. This commitment is another example of their attention to detail on a grand scale. As the two actors giving the curtain speech explained this paperless process, I thought again of how fitting it is to introduce the new system in this way. The cohesiveness of each element of this production was striking.

Future Anxiety is a decent play, but The Flea’s production goes above and beyond its script. This production manages to create a funny, aesthetically engaging play, which also has an important message. Jim Simpson’s precise direction, The Bats’ solid acting, and the wonderful design make Future Anxiety a great night at the theater. So see it soon, because you never know what the future holds.

Thrills, Chills and Interpretive Dance

After leaving the Mckittrick Hotel, I found myself with various souvenirs, including a creepy white mask, a saliva-covered ring, and a (fake) bloodstain on my shirt. I also had to contain the urge to run after interesting-looking individuals on the street - not an urge I usually have after an evening of theater-going. But there was nothing usual about this particular theater piece. Punchdrunk’s Sleep No More offers audiences full immersion into its heightened world of dark corridors and dastardly deeds, a night of escapism like no other. The night unfolds something like this: after "checking in" (getting your tickets), you head up a flight of stairs and through a series of disorienting dark hallways, emerging into a jazz-era bar complete with specialty cocktails and dimly lit little tables. You are called away from the bar in small groups, given masks, told not to speak, and herded into an elevator, which spits you out into a series of rooms: fully realized replicas of abandoned hospital wards, offices, bedrooms, eerie forests and graveyards, shops, banquet halls and bars, all dimly lit and constantly filled with moody music.

You are free to explore any way you choose: props are meant to be handled and picked through. The space is littered with texts, including books, clippings on the walls, ledgers, and letters, that invite you to open and read them and discover what you may. Entries are constantly being locked and un-locked and lighting and moveable set pieces change the look of a space so significantly that you could enter a floor three times and experience it in three completely unique ways.

After wandering around for a bit, you begin to run into actors, perhaps mid-action, or running from point A to point B. The latter was most exciting to me: after wandering around aimlessly, running into an actor felt like an important discovery. Something was going to happen, and if I kept up, I would see it happen, and others wouldn’t. I’ll admit I was often disappointed by the happening itself: scenes are primarily movement-based, and while interesting and well-executed, they never satisfied my expectations. When walking around, I could, from time to time, feel completely immersed in the world of Sleep No More , as though I had stepped into a noir film myself. But the dances took me out of the reality of the space, reminding me that I was watching a performance. The characters and plot are taken from Macbeth, and if you are familiar with the Scottish King’s tale, you can make meaning out of characters’ actions and interactions, but one’s experience is so fractured and incomplete that it is difficult to connect to these elements so as to care what happens to them.

If you’re lucky, you’ll have some sort of one-on-one experience with an actor. From time to time, actors will pull audience members into small rooms, locking the door behind them. I couldn’t tell you what goes on in these rooms, but I can tell you I ached to be pulled into one of them. I did, however, have an intriguing public interaction with a woman in a red dress. As she slowly, thoughtfully ate a chicken coated in a deep red blood-like sauce, she locked eyes with me, and continued to stare into my eyes for several minutes. Her gaze was penetrating, searching, intense. Eventually, she spit out a ring, motioned me over, and, without breaking her stare, put the ring on my finger. I am not sure if I could have participated in this interaction if it wasn’t for the mask I was wearing: it protected me, kept me anonymous, less vulnerable. Though it was thrilling to be brought into this woman’s world, it was a safe thrill, a comfortable thrill.

The designers, Felix Barret, Livi Vaughan and Beatrice Minns, cannot be praised enough for the renovation of the McKittrick Hotel. Rooms are detailed and specific, sometimes realistic, sometimes terrifying strange or surprising, but never dull. Lighting, designed by Felix Barrett and Euan Maybank and sound, designed by Stephen Dobbie, adds a sense of magic and suspense, the constant feeling that ‘something is about to happen’ that is perhaps the most thrilling aspect of Sleep No More . And everything, everything is beautiful. Just stunningly gorgeous. It is a thrilling world to live in for a few hours.

In the end, the experience is what you make of it. It reminds me of a quintessential post-modern novel, most strikingly of House of Leaves by Mark Danielewski, which presents multiple possible ways of reading, offers puzzles in the text and invites you to dig deeper to solve them, making it easy to explore but difficult to come away with a full, unified understanding of the experience. However, the novel is filled with questions and musings that one can chew on for ages.

Sleep No More gives one puzzles to solve and choices to make, the thrill of potentiality and the chance to escape into a world much more beautiful than one’s own. But I came away wanting more: more connection to the characters and the narrative, more discomfort, more challenge, more fear. Sleep No More comes close to offering audiences a transformative experience but stops just shy of delivering. It is excellently produced and absolutely worth seeing, but not the end-all and be-all of theater experiences. See it, and dream on.

The Hollywood Machine

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.

The Shadow (Puppet) of War

Even in the darkest of times, there is always a place for a man with a little imagination. Mr. M is just such a man in his namesake play, created by The Czechoslovak-American Marionette Theatre. The play tackles painful material, but does so in a unique way, utilizing shadow puppetry, marionettes, dancing, and singing. The play offers delightful entertainment while at the same time packing a powerful emotional punch. Set during the Second World War, at a time when Jews were being sent away on transport trains to the concentration camps, the play contemplates what the individual should do while waiting for his inevitable fate to occur. Unlike Beckett’s tramps, these lost souls know that that for which they wait is certain to come; others have already begun to disappear. The dreaded signal: a white envelope through the mail slot. When we meet Mr. M, such an envelope has just slipped into his door. Luckily for him, it is a false lead; it is only a letter from some old friends asking him to visit. In light of this recent scare, Mr. M decides to prepare himself for the inevitable and “practices” certain tasks that he deems will be necessary when his letter comes.

Mr. M slips between being a realistic play about Mr. M’s encounters with the fellow members of his small Jewish community and an expressionistic tale told from the perspective of Mr. M’s overactive mind. These two threads are balanced ingeniously. Every element of the play works to keep the line between reality and fiction blurred, but only just enough to make clear how the two worlds rely on each other for their existence.

The highlight of the play is the use of performing objects on stage. The use of the puppets is a clever way to allow the audience entry into Mr. M’s mind. The world of the play is evoked with very few props and only a couple of on-stage locations, yet it is easy to feel as though one has traveled throughout the village with Mr. M, meeting all its inhabitants along the way. The costumes work well with the set design to highlight the time period and the social situation of these individuals. Everything is specific enough to ground the work in the realm of reality, but accented with just the right of amount of the abstract to remind the audience that we have never left the skewed vantage point of our protagonist.

As Mr. M, Ronny Wasserstrom is charming and entirely sympathetic. It is easy to laugh along with his hijinks and, at the same time, feel great empathy for his strife. The company of actors around him does a phenomenal job of creating believable entities for all of the personae of his day-to-day life as well as his more fanciful friends. Theresa Linnahan does a superb job of making the character of Mr. M’s pet pigeon Chickie one for whom we feel great love. Her movements on stage create the illusion of an animal body but also suggest the countenance of a loyal companion.

The ambiance is rounded out with the use of Jewish music to accompany the show. Both the singer and the accordion player become like characters within the world of this play. Even though they are both positioned far stage left and perform as separate entities from the rest of the company, they seem to be integral elements within the tale. Even if one does not understand the words of the songs, their tones and tempi suggest specific moods for each of the scenes, helping to move the action forward at a crisp pace.

How do we portray suffering? Mr. M offers us one model. Rather than dwelling on the pain and suffering, find some of the light and use that to illuminate the situation. All in all, this is an incredibly special piece of theater. It takes the subject matter of the Holocaust, a topic that is often still difficult to discuss, and places it in an atmosphere that is at turns both somber and playful. The piece is thereby able to highlight just how much was lost during those terrible years: funny, warm, imaginative people, people with friends and pets and minds and hopes and dreams. This play, with all its use of elements that are often labeled as “alienating,” puts a very human face on the experience of the Holocaust. Mr. M performs for us, begging us to bear witness, and we should.

History as Dessert Course

The making of a successful musical comedy seems to require the following: A catchy title, a good mix of ballads, chorus numbers that lend themselves to snappy choreography, and some pop music, easily modifiable with hints of country, rock and a little blues thrown in for flavor. The story should be short and reduced to a few essentials, with just one or two easily overcome obstacles, and, of course, some heartfelt moments with hints at tragedy to give the piece heft. Honestly, Abe follows these instructions, and the result, I am happy to report, is utterly inoffensive. We follow young Abe Lincoln through several episodes of his formative teenage years, spent mostly reading, splitting logs (well, so we are told on many occasions, though not to worry: no logs are split here), in school learning spelling rules (a bit late at 17, but hairs shall not be split here either), and finally on his way to Indiana, where his father and stepmother move in search of better farming. All this and the death of his beloved sister in childbirth are told with lovingly choreographed song and dance numbers.

I cannot fault a young, enthusiastic cast of able singer/actor/dancers, the fluid direction (Joshua A. Kashinsky) nor the competent, sometimes even inspired choreography by Amy Klewitz. A handsome, suitably simple unit set by Joseph C. Heitman is nicely lit by Duane Pagano. So why, with so much good will and talent at hand, is the result so irritatingly saccharine, a most superficial portrait of a person who we would not take another look at if he were not named Abe Lincoln? Robert L. Hecker, who here signs for book, lyrics and music, has made it his business to pile cliché upon cliché; every song has a “dream”, “rainbow,” "hope" and “tomorrow” in it, words that should be banned from the (musical) stage for the next ten years.

There is a certain irony in the presentation of such an empty-headed piece of feel-good, anodyne theatre at a time when Lincoln’s party has perverted so much of what it stood for when he was at the helm. But never mind, Honestly, Abe springs right out of the naïve, innocent heart that makes America such an optimistic, positive country. Abe Lincoln is a trademark; the name will sell tickets, whether it is a grantor of anything worth considering or not. After all, who, in these harsh political times, cannot use some uplift.

Long Island Longings

“This play is weird,” announces Bernard, a playwright (Brian Hutchison), in the first few minutes of David Greenspan’s Go Back to Where You Are, and he’s right. Greenspan’s melancholy meditation on love, loss, and second chances finds the author himself playing Passalus, a demon in torment, who is sent by God (Tim Hopper) to earth on a mission that doesn’t go as they’d planned. Whether that idea is drawn from Ben Jonson’s The Devil Is an Ass is unclear, but Greenspan’s complex, rueful new work owes obvious debts to Chekhov and Pirandello. Gathering for dinner at the beach house owned by Claire, a renowned actress (as Arkadina is in The Seagull), are Claire’s brother, Bernard; her son, Wally (Michael Izquierdo); her old friend and soon-to-be director after a 15-year absence, Tom (Stephen Bogardus), and his lover, Malcolm (also Hopper); and an old family friend, Charlotte (Mariann Mayberry), a talented actress with a bundle of insecurities who never made it big the way Claire did. Also invited is a septuagenarian named Mrs. Simmons.

As in Chekhov’s Three Sisters, the action begins on a birthday—that of Carolyn, Claire’s daughter—and the anniversary of a death—it is a year to the day since Mark, Wally’s lover, died of prostate cancer. It is also 20 years to the day since Claire’s own husband, Robert, died. But the nods to Chekhov are occasionally of a more light-hearted cast, as when Izquierdo’s sensitive Wally, recalling his sterile creative life as a TV writer in Los Angeles, blurts out, “Oh please don’t let me shoot my brains out at the end of Act 4.” (At the same time, the abundant theater humor can become too insiderish.)

The narration hops around from Bernard to Passalus, and other characters briefly speak their thoughts about the play, often interjected into the midst of dialogue with one another. The unsettled Charlotte notices repeatedly that “there’s no chronology.” Scenes occur out of order, and astute listening is required to pick up and assemble the dramatic mosaic.

But Greenspan leavens what sounds effortful (but really isn’t, thanks to the sensitive direction of Leigh Silverman) with a number of comic Pirandellian moments, as in an exchange between Claire and Tom:

Claire: I must be getting Alzheimer’s. I didn’t tell Charlotte that you and Malcolm were coming and didn’t tell you and Malcolm that Bernard was coming. What’s going on with me?

Tom: Maybe it’s a problem with the writing.

As the story progresses, one realizes that Lisa Banes’s Claire is a charming but duplicitous monster sacré, and that her offspring really do need to escape from her, as does Bernard, whose work she belittles. (Tom, however, says he likes Bernard’s plays, though he doesn’t always “get” them—a sly nod to Greenspan’s own work.)

Go Back encompasses a day, a week, and millennia—the feelings it deals with are universal and timeless. Passalus relates his own history of being an actor in ancient Greece, in love with a chorus boy, Daeas—and most of the characters are struggling not only with the agony of having lost a lover, but with the messiness of those relationships. “He could be a monster, Patrick,” confesses Hutchison’s emotionally bewildered Bernard about his late partner. “We weren’t well suited. Maybe we were… He was angry. AIDS made him angrier. We would have split up, but then he got sick.” Or Wally speaking in his mind to Mark: “Your drinking—that didn’t help.”

Although Passalus’s mission is to help the unseen Carolyn break free of Claire, and the human guise he assumes is that of the elderly Mrs. Simmons, he cannot help but violate the promise that he has made to God to avoid interfering in anyone else’s life.

Rachel Hauck’s simple set—a sand fence, a plank deck, and a few summer chairs—and Matt Frey’s delicate lighting help keep the focus on the words and the actors while evoking both the place and the wistful mood. For all its leaps in time and interruptions of thought, the bits coalesce into a fascinating whole.

At the end of this humane, hopeful work, Greenspan departs from Chekhovian despair with redemption and forgiveness for those who deserve second chances. It’s a weird play, yes, but it’s also deeply touching.

Staging the Revolution

"Revolution is love." This comment, made by a poet in La Muse Venale's playLa Revolución, written and directed by M. Stefan Strozier, appears to be the work's metaphorical premise. Rather than being an exploration of this theme, however, the play, depicting major events of the 1910 Mexican Revolution, remains deeply embedded in the realm of historical reenactment. The play's creator claims that much of the dialogue is culled from what the real-life figures on stage actually spoke or wrote into the historical record. Beyond being an impressive collection of historical text and songs, the piece delivers little else.

The biggest problem with the play is its lack of focus. There are many figures depicted who seem to be vying for the position of central character, and it is never clear with which character we are meant to sympathize most. Because there is no single story arc to latch on to, it can be difficult to follow the narrative. Scenes appear to jump around significantly in time and place but there are no clear indicators as to where or when any particular sequence occurs. In fact, without the use of blackouts (which are used excessively throughout) the progression of time and the change of location might be virtually indistinguishable.

In addition, it is hard to isolate which character is which, although there is only minor doubling of roles. The characters seem to lack definition. The actors are portraying famous historical figures and it would appear that the playwright is relying on audience members' outside knowledge of these people and their contributions to history in order to flesh out their identities. No character seems fully human on stage; rather, they all operate as stand-ins for some aspect of a revolutionary ideal. This concept is compelling, but it prevents any real identification with the figures presented. There is nothing to draw the audience in on an emotional level. The individuals on stage often declaim to the audience but rarely make significant interpersonal connections with their fellow actors on stage. This creates a disjointed quality to the performance.

The fragmentation is accentuated by having many important events occur offstage as well as by the inclusion of moments in which the performers break the fourth wall purposefully. Towards the play's end, in order to speed through remaining historical narration, there are long, descriptive passages telling what is occurring as opposed to showing it. Some of these speeches are in English and some in Spanish, which, if you are unfamiliar with either language, can be alienating. The text is also spoken over extensive wartime sound effects, making it even more difficult to hear and understand. In general, the mixing of languages seems arbitrary; only the word “revolución” is consistently spoken in Spanish throughout. Most of the actors use accents, but the accents are inconsistent and often make what they are saying hard to understand.

The one element that plays nicely in La Revolución is the use of music and historically accurate songs. The musical numbers are, for the most part, well-performed, and add interest to an at-times dull stage scene. It is hard not to wish that the songs were better integrated into the piece, however. They are often sung by a singer who does not participate in the dramatic action of the scene and can appear to occur randomly as opposed to being logical outgrowths of the scenes in which they are embedded. This creates a kind of alienation effect, but it is hard to know if this was the director's intent or an accidental happenstance.

All in all, this play comes across as an important first step toward creating a theater work based on this material. The piece, at this juncture, is still quite rough, but, with some polishing, it could develop into an important historical piece. Like all revolutions, it seems, it just may take time to derive the desired outcome.

A Labyrinth of One's Own

Make no mistake, Epona’s Labyrinth is ruled by neither Pan nor David Bowie. It is instead presided over by a group of physically agile actors, innovative set and costume designs, and well-integrated technology. The plot is complex, but the overall aesthetic qualities of the play are what drive the production forward. I do not pretend to understand every nuance of the narrative, but I do know that this did not (and indeed does not) bother me. The unity of the production as a whole is beautiful to behold, and I greatly appreciate the attention to detail obvious in each moment of the action. HERE’s wonderful space is well utilized by The South Wing and Nibroll art collective, as technology and highly trained actors transform it into a variety of different environments. The basic plot is that Husband (Andrew Shulman) goes to the hospital to search for his wife after she is suddenly taken away in a green ambulance. He immediately begins to have strange experiences, and he is soon deeply imbedded in the strange hospital’s inner workings, which follow the pattern of many a classic myth. The various locations are all established by means of the actors’ bodies and the ingeniously versatile set pieces conceived by designer Shige Moriya. Mitsushi Yanaihara’s surreal costume designs add to the mystery, and the combination of the technical elements achieves an excellent balance with the acting.

As someone who has had a good deal of Suzuki actor training, and who has recently become familiar with Butoh, it is obvious to me that these actors, and Director Kameron Steele, are very familiar with both Suzuki and Butoh. This is evident in the actors’ physical control of their bodies, as well as in the character of the movement itself. Suzuki technique teaches you a great deal about the connection between breathing and motion by teaching you to move from your core. This training, also evident in Butoh, allows actors to achieve fluid motion at a slow pace, and also to execute quick, strong, extreme motions accurately and safely, which is obvious in this production. The set changes often show this slow, controlled movement, while the first scene in the hospital is a perfect example of the crisp, energetic, and highly choreographed chaos possible with physically trained actors.

Mikuni Yanaihara’s choreography is an excellent tool throughout the production, though I must say that the large group scenes are superior to the one-on-one fight moments. Girl (Ximena Garnica), Teen (Kate Villanova), and Head Nurse (Sophia Remolde) are the standout performers in terms of this movement, though Epona (Gillian Chadsey) has a stage presence full of power and authority, even though her choreography is not as involved. All the while Shulman alternates between providing a bodily contrast with the stylization around him, and joining in on it. This precise direction is mirrored in the ways in which props and set changes are handled: a plate slides in under a lifted screen, Garnica is carried in hanging gracefully from a set piece, and each set piece moves easily in the capable hands of the actors.

Another major strength of this production is the integration of technology. The projections, videos, and sounds are characters in the play. From symbolic graphics that seem to subliminally highlight the themes of the scene, to video replays of what we have just seen, the audiovisual elements insert themselves into the scenes in a surprisingly natural way. By “natural” I mean to say that there is no question that these elements belong here, in this world. This also allows the actors to interact with these technical aspects. There is one scene in particular where Villanova’s Teen interacts with the entire stage as she plays a “video game” in which she attacks a certain symbol with a broom.

Now I should also mention that there is a certain amount of adult content in this show, so it is not for children. But if you and your adult friends would like to go see something very creative, aesthetically exciting, and artistically solid, then go ahead and enter the labyrinth. Just remember (as Epona reminds us): from the middle of the labyrinth, every path looks like the exit to freedom.

Poetry in Motion

“When did they sow this grass – yesterday? / today? –” So begins Oleh Lysheha’s poem Raven, as well as Yara Arts Group’s play of the same name. The poem rises and falls through the experiences, and indeed the imagination, of its speaker. On stage, this is realized through a protagonist/narrator who guides the audience through his life-changing experience of encountering a dying raven outside his window and the journey it leads him on or of which it is a part. The poem resonates with a dark beauty, using language to evoke vivid images. When these images are realized on the stage, however, something of the power of the text is lost. The tale becomes too literal, losing its metaphorical beauty. The difficulty for this piece is caused by the fact that it is trying to take the poetic and stage it in a literal fashion. Some of the magic of the original poem, included in the program, is diminished in this staging of it. The text still rings through as meaningful and poignant, highlighted by Aurelia Shrenker and Eva Salina Primack’s songs and Alla Zagaykevych's electronic music, but the physical actions on stage often leave much to be desired. These physical actions can seem random or as though they are trying too hard, making their meanings obscure.

Much of the movement-based performance comes across as rough and as though it does not necessarily belong in the piece. In addition, the upstage projections, captured either by a small makeshift screen center stage or a larger white curtain against the back wall of the playing space, seem superfluous and even at times distracting. The narration states where the characters are meant to be; there is no need to depict the settings in so much detail. This seems a direct counterpoint to the minimalist use of props, in which three buckets, a broom, and a desk stand in for myriad items in the world of the play. There is a disconnect between the realistic atmosphere suggested by the projections and the world of the imagination evoked by the text and the props.

The play is not traditional narrative drama, nor is it meant to be, but the work does tell some sort of a story. The piece continually feels as though it is going to reach some sort of a climax, but when it seems to, during an extended sequence in a forest, the moment seems disappointing. The strongest parts of Raven are its simplest; when people on stage just talk to the audience or to one another. Heightening the “action” of the play does nothing to make it more piercing.

Both the music and the use of the Ukrainian voice to highlight important words and phrases are elements which are used well. The latter is included sparingly, but something about the speaker’s tone, particularly when paired with this particular musical soundtrack, acts to enhance the melancholy tone of the overall piece. The performances are all fine, though one wishes that there was more of a sense of exploration with these words. Why is this man narrating this seemingly insignificant moment of his life? What is his feeling toward the painter he sees and with whom he attempts to connect? What is Ivan searching for in the dead of the forest? I believe seeds for answers to these questions are available in the original poem but have yet to be translated fully on to the stage.

Despite these issues, there is great symbolic value to what is seen on stage. It is a compelling experiment as to how theater can attempt to encompass the poetic. Perhaps finding a verse of the body and of the stage setting is not the only solution. When Raven highlights the poetry of words it is at its finest. In these moments, it is touching. When the narrator speaks of the actual raven’s suffering, for example, it can nearly move a spectator to tears. It is for these moments that the piece is worth seeing–or, perhaps more precisely, worth listening to.

Shaping Up

Watching Neil LaBute’s The Shape of Things is an interesting experience if you are currently in a graduate program for the arts. I chose to see this play because it is one that I have seen several times in production, and each time I feel differently about the play as a whole. As MFA art student Evelyn manipulates the seemingly innocent Adam, the audience member is left to wonder about the relationship between art and emotional investment. Sometimes I feel like LaBute has no respect for any of the characters in his plays, especially the women (I am not the first person to think this). Other times I feel like he is just testing us, trying to find the limit of human compassion. In Jump for Joy Productions’ debut show, it is obvious that things are shaping up. Though there are some technical issues with the production, the actors gain momentum as the play progresses, ending up with a decent production. Workshop Theater Company’s Jewel Box Theater is decorated with a simple poster of a painting. We are in a museum. This simplicity of design is perfectly suited to the intimate space, and director Renee Rodriguez allows her actors to use the space well, at first. Unfortunately, as the production continues, the set changes and costume changes become too involved for the tiny space, overwhelming it with half-light or blackout periods that are too long. One lone stagehand moves everything, occasionally assisted by an actor. I much prefer the moments where the poster, held to the wall by a single tack, is changed. New picture, new space - it is that simple. The disconnect between the expensive costumes (I saw the J. Crew label on Adam’s jacket) and the understaffed, clunky set changes strikes me as the major weakness in this production.

Yet, at its heart, The Shape of Things is about the people. I have to say that the acting improved considerably throughout the show. I appreciated Adam (Michael Wetherbee) for his awkwardness, and I think he did a nice job transforming throughout the piece. Evelyn (Samantha Payne Garland) handled the final moments of the play better than the actresses in other productions I’ve seen, though I still have not seen anyone play this character believably. Garland still seems to lack the purely cold affect that lurks in the lines. Likewise, Jenny (Mallory Campbell) is initially played as a pure stereotype of a neurotic, pearl-wearing college student.

I agree that the somewhat two dimensional natures of these characters are partially due to LaBute’s lines, but there are ways of overcoming that. This is proven first by the portrayal of Phillip (Nathan Atkinson). Atkinson’s charm is perfect for Phillip, the college student who wears his sunglasses on his head, even at night. Phillip is a stereotype, to be sure, but Atkinson is able to convince us that it is easy to both love and hate Phillip simultaneously. Atkinson and Wetherbee have a wonderful dynamic in Scene 7, where they do homework on the campus lawn. The energy, listening, and interactions in this scene make it the most engaging moment in the production.

Though I think that the men have more consistently strong performances, this is not to say that the women are left in the dust. Campbell’s Jenny has a very strong moment during a speech she gives in Scene 8. Her honest attempt to communicate with Evelyn is emotionally charged without being over the top. In fact, this is a general theme in the production: each emotional outburst seems motivated and has a natural arc. Characters take the time to get angry and cool down, creating a textured unity in the piece as a whole.

I am still unsure as to whether or not I “like” The Shape of Things , and I feel that it is only fair to warn potential viewers about the dark depths of human nature that it explores. I can say that I appreciate a production that considers both sides of this complicated puzzle of emotionality. If the cast starts every performance with the energy they had at the end of the performance tonight, things will keep shaping up for them.

States of Mind

One of the great challenges, as well as triumphs, of live theater is the ability to communicate what a character is thinking without overtly saying so. A performer must be so in tune with his or her character that they are able to use every physical nuance and vocal intonation to make an audience experience the interior. How, then, can a performer communicate what is going on inside the mind of a character suffering from mental illness? That’s the challenge playwright Sharr White sets up for himself in the MCC Theater’s production of The Other Place. And despite stalwart Joe Mantello’s sensitive direction, this is also the problem in this wobbly and, ultimately, gimmicky play.

There is a saving grace to this production, however. Place is blessed to have its lead protagonist embodied by the phenomenal Laurie Metcalf, who gives one of the greatest performances of the year.

Metcalf is Juliana Smithton, a renowned, no-nonsense scientist. In her fifties, she has taken her pharmaceutical research and hit the road, speaking at conferences about a new protein therapy that fights mental decay. During one such presentation in St. Thomas, the improbable sight of a young woman in a yellow bikini distracts Juliana to the point of a breakdown.

Once back in the states, Juliana tells us that due to a family history, she believes she is suffering from brain cancer. She’s also facing other turmoil in her private life: her daughter, Laurel, ran away with Juliana’s assistant a decade earlier and has only begun to reemerge. And Juliana has filed for divorce from her husband, Ian (Dennis Boutsikaris, who was also Metcalf’s husband in last season’s glorious but short-lived Brighton Beach Memoirs revival), an oncologist who is cheating on Juliana with her neurologist, Dr. Teller (both Laurel and Dr. Teller, in addition to other roles, are portrayed by Aya Cash in a series of well-defined and distinctive performances).

However, the more we learn about Juliana, the less we feel we actually know about her. Is she right to think her husband is having an affair? Is her self-diagnosis of brain cancer at all accurate? What is to be made of the young woman in the bathing suit, or Juliana’s horribly awkward conversations with the estranged Laurel?

Taken linearly, there isn’t much to the central mystery in Place: what’s eating Juliana Smithton? That’s probably why White tells his story in such jagged terms, flashing back and forth from past to present, from St. Thomas to Juliana’s home and doctors’ office to her second house in Cape Cod (the “other place’ of the title). White offers many revolutions but few revelations, and the explanations he does hint at finally feel a little pat and disappointing. Plenty of style can never compensate for lack of substance, and Mantello cannot save Place, at a slight 80 minutes, from feeling both exhausting and alienating.

There is glory to be had, though, in the style of Eugene Lee’s smart set, a background wall of interlocking empty picture frames that also begin to resemble a DNA double helix, and Justin Townsend’s lighting, which smartly accents Juliana’s suffering, even when the source is undetermined. And Boutsikaris is able to construct a baffled but supportive husband, even when his motivations remain enigmatic.

Despite the written play's flaws, the marvelous Metcalf is what makes Place a can’t-miss event. The actress is able to overcome its organizational deficiencies and pull from a deep place of inner fury, fear and sorrow as she commands the stage. She’s equally moving when bellowing with rage at Dr. Teller and when sitting still, silently longing for the right words to say to Laurel. And she doesn’t fight to be likable, either, which only wins us over even more. As White’s compromised puzzle of a play comes together, the one image that becomes clearest of all is of this transcendent actress making hurt look so good.

Sixth Night – Getting Shakespeare Half Right

Twelfth Night, one of Shakespeare’s most beloved comedies, gets a middling reading by The Seeing Place Theatre. The cast, under the direction of Brandon Walker (who also plays Malvolio), has internalized the story of this play well through long improvisational study of the script. As a result, the actors are comfortable with most of their scenes and present the text intelligently in a conversational tone and with an easy manner. However, as promising as this seemed in the first moments of the presentation, the lack of conceptual clarity and purpose, and of a directorial vision, paired with a glacial pace (the play took three hours, with a ten-minute intermission), soon defeated the good beginning.

Twelfth Night is one of the identity-confusing, sibling-lost-at-sea, misdirected affection plays of Shakespeare’s that seem to have been the Renaissance equivalent of the soap-opera. Here these tropes are conjugated in two main plots: 1. Count Orsino (David Sedgwick) loves Olivia (Anna Marie Sell) who loves Cesario, who is really Viola (Lindsay Teed) in disguise. Viola loves Orsino but serves him disguised as a man so she has to conceal her affection; 2. Olivia’s steward Malvolio loves her, and she is also pursued by Andrew Aguecheek (Nathan Ramos), a minor nobleman recruited as a suitor by Sir Toby Belch (Jorge Hoyos), Olivia’s relative who loves and eventually marries Maria (Erin Cronican), Olivia’s maid. The free agent in this brew is Feste (David Arthur Bacharach), Olivia’s clown, who provides comic by-play, songs, and the occasional stirring of the pot for our and his own amusement. Oh, and did I mention that Viola and her identical twin-brother Sebastian were shipwrecked and think each other drowned?

A further subplot concerns the dislike and disapproval of Sir Toby Belch by Olivia’s Stewart Malvolio, and the cruel practical joke Belch, Aguecheek, Maria and Feste play on Malvolio.

As is often the case with shoestring Shakespeare, the setting and historical timeframe is left vague in this production, in a kind of near-contemporary eclecticism. This is too bad, because a more stringent adherence to a historical time might have forced more specific choices of design and behavior. The play unfolds on a cluttered stage, in lighting that in many scenes is murky, leaving actors in unintended shadows.

The actors' behavior is sometimes as murky as the lighting. For instance, Olivia, deep in mourning, is presented on a deck chair showing much leg and cleavage (through under black lacy undergarments) and pulls the money she gives to Cesario out of her bra. Malvolio struts about with his hand in his pocket, more cock-of-the-walk than stern butler. Aguecheek seems to be in an entirely different play and sounds as if he has memorized a foreign language phonetically, and the drunk Toby Belch moves in and out of drunkenness at will. Feste, a role difficult to make truly humorous in a modern setting, has a pleasant voice, and the final song particularly (he also accompanies himself ably on an electric keyboard) is affecting. But the song (and music) choices do nothing to locate the play either historically or culturally.

The most satisfying scenes are those involving the main players: Orsino, Viola (who delivers the confusions and pain of her longings well), and Olivia, who, once past her sluttish phase, gives her character dignity and strength. Here the mostly psychological approach works because the scenes do not rely on outdated comedic conventions and stock characters, as is the case in the secondary plot.

Brandon Walker, as Malvolio, shows talent as an actor, but as a director he may have been handicapped by the split focus, and by choosing a rehearsal method that works against a strong conceptualization. Shakespeare, I find, often seems accessible enough but turns out to be difficult both in his structural complexities and in the challenge of bringing his work into a present-day form that is compelling. This production would be helped greatly by a more energetic delivery and by a rethinking of the power and class structure of the play.

Leave the Nazis Alone

Contessa’s brother Dexel suddenly reappears after an absence of twenty-one years. “I’m SO Sorry,” he says with pained sincerity – for raping and impregnating her at their last adolescent encounter. A noise is heard from the bathroom, where Contessa’s wife, Jackie, has been locked up, prompting Dexel’s next line: “Does Jackie have a big pussy?” The Amoralists' newest work, now playing at PS 122, provides a curious journey. It jolts back and forth from melodrama to farce, from high-brow political nuance to low racist jokes. Bring Us the Head of Your Daughter keeps you repeatedly asking yourself the same question – Is this for real? Whether they are or not, The Amoralists have put together a fine, stimulating evening of theater.

It begins with a sentimental mulatto, Contessa, (Mara Lileas) crying in an entirely naturalistic apartment set to the tune of an old Afro-American blues song. “My hair is wooly,” wails Nina Simone, weep weep weep goes Contessa. Both are cut off by a message on the answering machine, a stranger threatening to kill the “lesbian whores.” Alarm bells go off – self-important issue play, yikes! Shortly after, however, Jackie enters, and the tone of the play is sharply reconstructed. She’s drunk, and keeps yelling things about their daughter, the cannibal. Anna Stromberg is hysterical as Jackie, both in the funny sense and the loud sense, and the story line seems to follow her lead toward the outrageous.

But it isn’t until the next “dramatic” interlude between Contessa and (half) brother Dexel, described above, that a mock drama begins to take form. Perhaps it is the continuous references to Streetcar - Contessa’s strong southern accent and her riff on whether “Polak” is a racial epithet, Jackie’s over-the-top alcoholism, the presence of rape and bizarre sibling relationships – that make the play seem like a comment on American drama more than anything else. Adding to that are writer/director Derek Ahonen’s bold strokes, juxtaposing cartoon-like clowniness with quiet attempts at naturalism.

The result is mixed. While eliciting stellar performances from his cast (Jordan Tisdale especially is a delight from the moment he enters the stage), Ahonen stumbles directorially at some key moments, straining to reach emotions this frenetic piece cannot sustain. But Ahonen and the cast do succeed in holding our attention for nearly two intermission-less hours. They also leave us brimming with thoughts, questions and memories of many funny moments. Here’s one good image: A plastered, weirdo-clown-faced Lesbian Jew mumbling “Leave the Nazis alone. They’ve suffered enough.”

Bring Us the Head is a play of substance (abuse?), that, while over-shooting at times, is not afraid to engage deeply with the moral, political and theatrical landscape of our time.

Frankenstein Comes to Church

Many of Off Off Broadway’s most successful companies present their work in a heightened theatrical acting style, which seems to be poking fun at the entire dramatic enterprise from the Greeks to Law and Order. It has become a rarity to see a play in which high dramatic acting is performed in earnest. As if calling on the spirits of the ancient actors who first got on a stage to perform, or on the practitioners in far corners of the globe who still perform their ancient methods today, Rabbit Hole Ensemble valiantly goes there. In so doing the company sheds some light on why that kind of acting is shied away from by virtually every living western theater director. One of the best moments in Doctor Frankenstein's Magical Creature is entering the space. A large room inside the Old First Reformed Church on Carroll Street in Park Slope is sparsely, elegantly set up. One long, curved row of chairs is book-ended by an actor on each side. In front of them sits a cloth with several objects sitting on it: a drum, a pistol, and more. When the lights go down on the audience the only light in the room is that coming in from the decorated church windows high above the stage. One of the two actors who were sitting with us picks up a light fixture and flashes it on the narrator’s face. These simple, hand held lights are the only ones we will encounter all evening.

In that spooky bottom lighting, as if we’re all seated around a bonfire, Emily Hartford begins telling the story of Frankenstein, through the voice of the (female in this production) creature, not the (female) doctor. The story-telling is enhanced by effective work from the ensemble, which surrounds the audience with sound, physically acts out the narration, and handles the seamless motion of the simple and pretty lighting design (by director Edward Elefterion). The haunting story, however, quickly becomes something akin to a Greek tragedy, in which we watch the creature (Jocelyn O'Neil) grow from a sad but hopeful, peaceful being into a vengeful murderer.

The production works with Rabbit Hole’s signature minimalist aesthetic, focusing the piece on the physical abilities of the actors. Director Elefterion handles the ensemble well, but his insistence on relating the acting style to a more grandiose form of drama, such as Japenese Noh, is the play’s downfall. While some of the actors seem uncomfortable sustaining this heightened style, perhaps the main reason it turns flat less than halfway through the (under an hour) evening is the seriousness with which the production seems to take itself. It is a gravity which does not translate into an emotional experience for the audience. Instead it comes across as self-conscious and slight, and leaves the spectators disconnected.

The script has strong moments, especially early on as writer Stanton Wood connects us with the emotional landscape of the creature. However, the play tries to be something akin to a classical tragedy with very little of the tool classical plays utilize most, dialogue. Adding to this is the way in which this rather intellectual piece occasionally slips into tiring cliché, as when the creature despairs: “I just want to be accepted.”

It’s refreshing to see a company be straightforward about the drama it is creating. But the dramatic has already been abducted by bad television, leaving theater artists with a burning need to re-invent it. Successfully plowing ahead with “drama” as if it hasn’t changed in 3000 years, even if you are adding some contemporary touches, would require an act of genius. Even the Greeks are performed small these days.

Familial Variations

If you’re looking for a romantic or traditional portrayal of a relationship, look elsewhere: KIN is about as unromantic as they come. Not only is it honest and without sentimentality, the main romance is all but absent from the equation. As it turns out, this is the genius of the piece: a relationship study that studies the relationships surrounding the couple instead of the couple itself. And it certainly helps that the writing is excellent and the cast superb. KIN is an honest exploration of the joys and burdens of being connected to people, a near pitch-perfect evening. KIN follows Anna, an Ivy League poetry scholar, and Sean, an Irish physical trainer, from before their first date to their wedding day, focusing not on the couple but their family and friends, the ties formed by their romance. Almost all scenes are between two people, and each gives us a portrait of the characters’ relationship. Some are longstanding, between brother and sister, best friends from boarding school, a man and his mistress. Others are formed only through Anna and Sean’s partnership, like that of Sean and Anna’s best friend, or Anna and Sean’s mother. Some are easy, some tense, many comical, and often revealing of the troubled nature of bonds between people.

Almost the entire cast should be praised for their nuanced work, supported greatly by Bathsheba Doran’s script and Sam Gold’s direction. Stand outs include Cotter Smith, who plays Adam, Anna’s father. Adam is an army man: stoic, reserved, speaking quickly in clipped sentences, as though still on duty. He seems unused to socializing with civilians, uncomfortable, which makes his desire and inability to connect with his daughter all the more painful to watch. Laura Heisler (Helena) and Suzanne Bertish (Linda) also give standout performances: Heisler is hilarious as a modern-day bohemian, waddling around the stage on 3 inch wedge sandals, yet forcing us to take her seriously at key moments. Bertish takes material that could be deemed melodramatic and keeps it truthful, drawing us in with dry wit that barely conceals real grief and trauma. I am least impressed with Kate Bush, who plays Anna: she makes the character cold and disinterested, impossible to empathize with and unconvincing in vulnerable moments.

Gold does a beautiful job emphasizing the central theme of KIN through staging. Actors change the set between scenes, and, more interestingly, are onstage from time to time, watching scenes seemingly unconnected to them. The first time this happens, Sean's mother and Uncle watch an interaction between Anna's father and his long-time lover. All of a sudden, four characters who have never met, who would have no connection to one another if not for Anna and Sean, are sharing the stage, one group taking interest in the others' lives. Gold is using theatrical tools only here, creating an experience that cannot be reproduced on film: the experience of seeing bodies in space together, bleeding into one anothers' worlds. We see that the characters both are and are not present in the scene; they are and are not watching. The actors become spectral in a way that is all the more eerie due to our knowledge of their actual, physical presence.

The penultimate scene in KIN brings this staging technique to an exquisite conclusion. Everyone assembles in Ireland for Sean and Anna's outdoor wedding, despite an overwhelmingly intense storm. As Helena attempts to officiate, screaming over the rain, fog fills the stage until we can't see a thing. As it begins to clear, a structure is rolled on downstage, a three dimensional frame that acts as various rooms throughout the performance, and Sean and Anna enter. Costumes and some vocal reverb tell us we're in a memory, what seems to be one of Sean and Anna's first dates. We listen as they learn about each other, their families, their ghosts. It is the first time the two are in a scene alone together, but we soon realize even now this isn't the case: as the fog clears further, we see the wedding party, still on stage. In the moment, without knowing it, Sean and Anna are beginning to bring all of these people together, and the family gets to watch it happen.

Anna says, "It's awful, isn't it?" Sean: What is? Anna: Getting to know someone.

It's a beautiful way to end the play: a perfect confluence of text, image and thematic material. But the play does not end. Instead, we are pulled back to the wedding day, to Anna and Sean laughing at their flooded ceremony, a confession from Sean that he's afraid to die, and a reassurance from Anna that they won't for a long time. To go from something so profound to something so obvious and cliche, and end there, is disappointing, to put it mildly. Fear of death permeates the play. It does not need to be stated. At this moment, and a couple of others, I wish Ms. Doran had had the guts to cut. Fingers crossed for future incarnations.

Still, no question, KIN is an astute portrait of the troubled ties that enfold and ensnare us, and it is beautifully rendered by the entire company.

Long Live the Queen!

It’s time to celebrate Purim! And should you be in search of an appropriate play to see in honor of the holiday, head down to UNDER St. Marks and check out Jewqueen, Little Lord’s current production. The piece is a raucous, irreverently reverent manifestation of the Biblical story of the Book of Esther. The play is a worthwhile delight at this festive time of the year. Rather than having a traditional presentation of the tale, with one actress to play Esther and others to play Mordecai, the King, etc., Little Lord chooses to have their whole company both narrate the tale and perform multiple roles. Michael Levinton, the show's director, sporting a sassy white party dress, red and black checkerboard robe, and green paper crown, acts as the principle narrator and the ancient King, bringing the company together to perform the story and keeping the action moving along. The remaining six performers all take turns in the other principal roles, as well as in the position of narrator. They both enact and present the story, even at times analyzing some of the more complex elements of the tale.

The entire company is hilarious and charming in their multiple roles, making everyone in the audience want to join in with the fun. And join in they can–there are places for audience participation: reading aloud a short section of text, using noisemakers, and in general cheering, booing, and clapping when appropriate. This relaxed actor-audience divide intensifies the sense that this is a celebration, not just a performance. This production is being put on for the enjoyment of all in the playhouse, not just the performers. The performers all appear to be having a joyous time up on stage and the feeling is infectious in the audience.

This sense of a party in place of a performance is set from the moment the audience is allowed into the theater space. The performers are all singing and dancing along to some classic karaoke hits and wearing crazy party dresses in bright colors with lots of fluff. This tone is maintained throughout, even in the moments where the story becomes heavy. For instance, when narrating the attempted poisoning of the King and the subsequent execution of the would-be assassins, one of the performers narrates the tale while holding up illustrations on poster board. This technique, one of many like it, prevents this evening’s fare from becoming too dark or too didactic.

At times, the humor is a bit much and there are moments where the silliness could perhaps be toned down. Some of the gags are a tad obvious or go on for a bit too long. It seems, however, that the company is aware of these potential pitfalls and hopes to embrace them rather than attempting to gloss over them or sweep them under the rug.

The most impressive thing about the piece is that, within all of its silliness, its use of drag, and endless humor, there is a genuine quality that rings through. It is easy to believe that the performers care about this story and truly wish to share it with their audiences. They approach the material in a loving way, making it seem like a gift that they are sharing with their spectators. The wrapping is all of the kitschy charm; the real present is the story itself.

There is a charming unprofessional professionalism to the way Jewqueen plays on stage. In pretending to be amateurish, this company has created a sophisticatedly campy take on a meaningful, important Old Testament tale. For anyone in need of a little music, a lot of laughs, and an ancient tale that stands the test of time, this is the show to see.

Waist Not, Want Not

I have gone to school around the corner from the former Triangle Shirtwaist Factory for almost a year now, completely unaware of its proximity. After seeing Birds on Fire I walked over from Theater for the New City to what is now the Brown Science building on New York University’s campus, observing it with new eyes. Almost 100 years ago, on March 25, 1911 to be exact, a terrible fire claimed the lives of 146 people. The locked doors, lack of fire escapes, and crowded conditions ended up being the rallying cries for labor reform, causing the fire to be regarded as both a terrible tragedy and an important turning point in New York.

All of this history provides the haunted backdrop for writer and director Barbara Kahn’s Birds on Fire , which creatively imagines the lost stories of four unidentified victims of the fire. The idea is incredibly innovative, and despite some flaws in the structure, the actors’ performances and Allison Tartalia’s songs convincingly draw you into this historical fiction.

I walked into the space with several very clear images of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire, having seen a great many pictures of the tragedy in school. In terms of period, Alice J. Garland’s costumes are just the right balance of individuality and historical style. Each character is dressed uniquely, yet there is a high degree of unity when they all appear together.

Mark Marcante’s set is also well suited to the play’s various locations, yet its spatial versatility is not utilized to its fullest potential. The most aesthetically beautiful tableaus are the well choreographed factory scenes, which Robert Gonzalez, Jr. successfully conceived with nothing but six chairs and the precise movements of the actors. Too often the set is cluttered by poorly rendered props, which scenes like this prove are completely unnecessary.

My general critique of the production is its tendency to send itself in several directions simultaneously, when its greatest strengths are in the moments of extreme focus. We are initially introduced to the Guide, who alternates between showing us the story of the four future fire victims and a heavily stylized (and rather propagandistic) account of the oversights that led to the fire itself. The characters of the Factory Owner, Superintendent of Buildings, Architect, and Alderman are all played by large puppets, which provides a stark contrast to the easily relatable factory workers. I understand this choice, yet I was alienated by the didactic tone of these segments.

This one-sided commentary and lack of character development unfortunately describes Robert Gonzalex, Jr.’s Guide as well. Throughout the play he cannot quite master the ease of storytelling so vital to a character created as an audience go-between. The Guide seems extraneous and clichéd in comparison to the other (human) characters populating the play.

The characters of Nell, Maddie, Rose, and Renzo are far more compelling in their human complexity. We are interested in their relationships, their lives, and their potential futures. The history of Triangle Shirtwaist Factory is still being taught, and if one had not learned about it, there are numerous ways to access its historical information. What excited me about the concept of this play was not its educational value, but rather the creative possibilities of rewriting four lives lost to history. I want to hear more about recent immigrants Renzo (Tommy Kearney), and Rose (Amanda Yachechak), whose emotional monologues about their pasts contain a great deal of historical information mingled with human interest.

Kearney and Yachechak have beautiful singing voices, great chemistry, and much emotional honesty. The strength of these performances meets its match in Birds on Fire ’s other couple: Nell (Anna Podolak) and Maddie (Gusta Johnson). Their natural chemistry, and the solid scene work behind and around it, nicely encapsulates the nuanced relationship of a couple who has been together for a number of years.

Throughout the play, the human connections prove to be the most striking, like the smiles exchanged between a factory seamstress (Sarah Shankman) and a presser (Brian F. Waite), who are unaware of their imminent fate. They remind us of the missed opportunities, the potential happiness, and the unpredictability of life. It is these moments that make the strongest political case against those who were responsible for the fire.

Birds on Fire ends up being heavy handed in certain moments, but the finesse of the romantic plots is enough to make this show worth seeing. Like Romeo and Juliet, the star-crossed lovers can never be together. But we can take solace in the knowledge that these four unknown victims have been reincarnated and given a chance to experience some love and happiness on the stage of Theater for the New City.