Glass. Kill. What If If Only. Imp.

Caryl Churchill is not in love with the sound of her own voice. (Many playwrights are, along with many people in every walk of life.) While Churchill has a tremendous amount to say, her writing is spare and suggestive. And with this spare language, practically gossamer, yet incredibly vivid, Churchill is entertaining, insightful, and compassionate. And political. Her brilliance lies lightly on the stage, yet it shines. 

Proof of Churchill's wisdom and skill is currently on display at the Public Theater through an evening of four one-act plays focusing on oh so many things, but mostly the challenges of being human. They are not overtly related to one another but full of echoes and emotional quotes, and the evening coheres into one multi-layered play.

Deidre O'Connell
Photo: Joan Marcus

The Public Theater website has a brief description of the plays:  "A girl made of glass." "Gods and murders." "A pack of ghosts." "And a secret in a bottle." Those descriptions are insufficient yet completely sufficient. The plot is not the point. Life is the point. 

Adelind Horan, Ayana Workman,
Sathya Sridharan, Japhet Balaban
Photo: Joan Marcus

James Macdonald, who frequently directs Churchill's plays, is a full partner in the brilliance of the works. The design elements are perfect for the plays and beautiful and impressive in themselves. Miriam Buether designed the scenery, Enver Chakartash designed the costumes, Isabella Byrd designed the lighting, and Bray Poor designed the sound. 

John Ellison Conlee, Adelind Horan,

Deirdre O’Connell
Photo by Joan Marcus

The cast includes Japhet Balaban, Ruby Blaut (alternating with Cec​ilia Ann Popp), John Ellison Conlee, Adelind Horan, Maddox Morfit-Tighe, Deirdre O'Connell, Sathya Sridharan, Junru Wang, and Ayana Workman. They’re all fabulous.  Special kudos to Deirdre O’Connell for her breathtaking performance as a god who is really annoyed at being blamed for human misbehavior, particularly since she doesn’t even exist. 

How lucky we are that Caryl Churchill is still writing. The first time her work blew me away was in 1979. Over 45 years later, she is still amazing and somehow always new.

Wendy Caster

Blind Injustice

That the American justice system is worse than broken--dangerous, dishonest, racist--is not news. Some innocent people have been coerced into confessing, others have accepted plea bargains rather than risking decades in prison, and still others have been convicted at trials based on corrupted evidence. Witnesses may lie to protect themselves; they may be forced by police to lie; or they may just be wrong. It has been estimated that 6% of the people in prison are innocent. With an estimated 1.8 million people incarcerated in the US, that comes to approximately 108,000 innocent people imprisoned.

Photo: Erin Baiano

As horrifying as those statistics are, they have the weakness of all statistics, which is that they do not contain emotions, or people, or families.

The brilliant opera Blind Injustice, which received its New York premiere last month in an electric MasterVoices production, is full of emotion and people and families. Based partially on the book of the same name and focusing on six innocent people who were exonerated after spending years or even decades in prison, the opera mixes fact and fiction, often using exonerated people's actual quotes in the vivid libretto by David Cote (dramaturgy by Robin Guarino). The exonerated people are Nancy Smith, Derrick Wheatt, Eugene Johnson, Laurese Glover, Clarence Elkins, and Rickey Jackson.

Photo: Erin Baiano

Scott Davenport Richards's extraordinary scores utilizes jazz, blues, and hip-hop to allow the full expression of emotion of the people depicted. There is something particularly satisfying in seeing these characters being able to express themselves full-voice, full-heart, and loud. I can't think of a better medium for telling this story.

Everyone involved with this production was at the top of their game. The volatile combination of feeling pain from the content and sheer pleasure at the artistry gives the audience the sort of emotional cognitive dissonance that may be felt at the very best art.

Photo: Erin Baiano

I found the audience response representative of this experience in a particular way: people gasped twice. The first time was when the 120 MasterVoices singers, seated in the section of the audience behind the stage, stood to sing. I knew that they were there, and I was thrilled. For the people who didn't realize that they were there, it must have felt magical. The second time they gasped was when one of the exonerees was asked how long he had been in prison, and he answered, "thirty-nine years."

I hope that Blind Injustice is picked up by opera companies everywhere. Audiences deserve to experience the artistry and need to hear the stories.

Wendy Caster

 

The Price

I am not a fan of Arthur Miller's. But I like to revisit works to see if I've missed something. Having recently reread Death of a Salesman and seen the The Village Theater Group production of The Price, I haven't changed my mind. In fact, watching The Price reminded me of how grateful I am for the relatively recent model of the 90-minute show, pared down and subtle, sleek and deep.

Janelle Farias Sando, Bill Barry
Photo: Joe Pacifico

Not all shows should be short. Some truly require and fill the time they take. Death of a Salesman is one. Purpose, currently on Broadway (see it!) is another. The Price is not. It is repetitive and blunt and repetitive and, oh yeah, repetitive as it shleps along its two acts. Paring the show down to 90 minutes could only help.

Mike Durkin
Photo: Joe Pacifico

Fitting snugly in the "adult children deal with the past" box, The Price centers around a crowded attic of stuff (nicely designed/assembled by the Village Theater Group). The main question is, how much is this all worth, financially and emotionally. The characters are two brothers--estranged, of course--and one's wife, along with Solomon, an antique/junk dealer who is going to buy everything in the attic. He is a real character, late 80s, Yiddish accent, tremendous presence but physically frail. He is comic relief, voice of reason, and plot device all is one. The four people interact in various combinations, and, yes, secrets are revealed and relationships are tested. Meanwhile, Solomon keeps trying to buy the items as cheaply as possible. 

This is an all-too-familiar play structure, but Miller did write it years before the gazillion other plays in which secrets are revealed and relationships are tested. There's a reason this structure has lasted; dysfunctional families are endlessly interesting to watch when the play is well-written. The Price provides some interesting scenes and interactions; if only there were fewer of them!

The Village Theater Group is a brand-new entity and well-worth watching I think. While I had complaints about this production (the pacing didn't help any), there was much to like and reasons for optimism for future productions. 

The main strength is the cast, in particular Bill Barry as the non-favorite son who has not made much of his life. (Miller's belief that being a police officer is a form of failure is a little offensive, though I buy that this family might feel that way.) Barry is excellent. The role is an emotional roller coaster, and he acts the dips and climbs and twists and turns with total believability. Everything he does is real, and the performance centers the play beautifully.

Mike Durkin is strongly effective as the dealer, as is Janelle Farias Sando as the wife. Cullen Wheeler, as the successful brother, is  miscast. He seems to come from a different reality. 

Other than the pacing, director Noelle McGrath gives the play a fair and thoughtful hearing. The design elements are all good.

It's 2025 and theatre has been "dying" for at least a hundred years. Yet, in a truly weird moment in history and in the midst of a terrible economy for the arts, co-founders Daniel J. Condon and Andrew Beregovoy have added a new theatre group to the mix. I wish them well. 

Wendy Caster

Garside's Career

In Garside's Career, written by Harold Brighouse before the first World War, Peter Garside is a skilled mechanic and avid Union member in 1914 Midlanton, England. He has just completed a university degree, an unusual achievement for a member of the working class. The Union and Garside's friends recruit him to run for Parliament, and why not? In addition to his degree, he possesses excellent oratory skills, prodigious energy, and much charisma. Garside wins, and off he goes to Parliament to fight for unions and the working man. Just one problem: his ambition and ego are every bit as big as his talent and charm.

Daniel Marconi and Amelia White

Photo: Maria Baranova

This is the Mint at its best, finding a worthy forgotten play and bringing it to life with top-notch direction, acting, and production values. In these days of shows being revised, rethought, and adapted (and occasionally destroyed), watching a thoughtful, respectful, excellent production of a smart, interesting, heartfelt play is a special treat. Thanks as always to the Mint for giving us so many of these special treats.

Sara Haider, Avery Whitted, Melissa Maxwell

Photo: Maria Baranova

Interestingly enough, Garside's Career represents a certain set of values in a way that undercuts those values, without, I think, meaning to do so. [here be spoilers] While clearly in favor of unions and fairness and hard work and being true to one's neighbors and friends, the play presents money and status as so seductive that Garside succumbs in about 30 seconds. He ends up in debt and neglects his role in Parliament to chase money. Eventually, the Union and his friends force him to resign from Parliament. He goes into a huge big-boy tantrum, furious at anyone who would interrupt his pity party. After a week of this, his old girlfriend, a solid, hard-working, unimaginative woman, reappears, ready to take him back. First she calls him on his shit, then she sets conditions. All she asks is that he give up everything that makes him him: ambition and ego, yes, but also talent and creativity. She wants him back in the world of mechanics, and, chastened, he agrees. So, he throws away everything he could do and be. Yes, he messed up, big time. But baby with the bathwater! With the support of his wife-to-be and the rest of the community, he might be able to learn to use his talents for good. More to the point, he will never stick to these agreements. Sooner or later, he will explode back into himself. Probably sooner. [end of spoilers]

The fact that I cared enough to argue  with a play that is over a century old shows the value of the Mint's work. Yesterday's plays have much to say to us today. And first-class productions are always welcome.

Wendy Caster

After Endgame

Photo by Josh Goleman. Design: Armistead Booker

When playing chess never move your pawn to F4 since it makes your king vulnerable and, as Kevin James Doyle advises, "If you're playing anyone even decent at chess, they're going to know you don't know what you're doing — and they're going to destroy you."

Doyle, a comedian, actor and chess instructor, starts After Endgame with this anecdote, a 70-minute conversation on chess, comedy and the deceptions present in life and the games we play. While knowledge of chess allows you to engage in a match before or after showtime on the boards that dot the tables surrounding the stage, the performance aims to amuse all, especially the neophytes.

Besides offering basic game strategies, Doyle entertains by interweaving the history of chess with his own experience as a teacher who’s completed more than 6,500 lessons with students as young as 3 and as old as 94. Jokes about why he can’t play a pedophile on “Law & Order” (What parent would hire Mr. Kevin as a chess teacher afterward?) are mixed with stories about master chess players such as American Paul Morphy to the 1956 Game of the Century that established a 13-year-old Bobby Fischer as an emerging presence when he sacrificed his Queen to beat the twice-his-age Donald Byrne.

Photo by Josh Goleman

Along the way, Doyle recounts what happened when a rich investor sponsored his trip to Singapore, where he taught chess to the local elite and their offspring as he sought financing for a chess-inspired business. The basement bar extends the lesson with a Chess Museum of sorts that features images of past games and champions that Doyle curated with director Cory Cavin and set designer Charles Matte.

After Endgame is playing at the SoHo Playhouse’s Huron Room (15 Vandam St., NYC) through March 8, and then on March 30 and 31 at The Lyric Hyperion (2105 Hyperion Ave., Los Angeles). [See the After Endgame trailer]

Cymbeline

The delightful NAATCO-Play on Shakespeare all-femme, all-Asian-American production of Shakespeare's Cymbeline only runs through Feb. 15. If you are a fan of first-class theatre that is beautifully directed, fabulously acted, well-designed, and extremely funny, go. Seriously, Go! Tickets run from $25 to $55. Who says theatre has to be expensive? (Click here for more information or to buy tickets.)

NAATCO's description of the show: 

In a world shattered by tyranny and poisoned by misogyny, Cymbeline tells the story of a young woman's flight from despair to heroism as she rediscovers her lost siblings and brings order to a kingdom ruled by chaos. Performed by an ensemble of eleven women, Cymbeline is a story of hope and rebirth in the unlikeliest of circumstances.

 

I just don't have the time right now to actually review the show, but I wanted this up asap. I hope you get to see it!

Wendy Caster

Mrs. Loman

Mrs. Loman, Barbara Cassady's sequel to Death of a Salesman, starts right after Willy's funeral. Linda Loman, her sons Biff and Happy, and next door neighbor Charley and his son Bernard gather at the Loman home to toast Willy. (The set was designed by Christopher & Justin Swader. The costumes were designed by Patricia Marjorie. Both are evocative and handsome.) They wonder why so few people came to the funeral. They wonder why Willy killed himself (and in that particular way). They wonder, Who was Willy? But while Arthur Miller wrote that attention must be paid to Willy, Cassady thinks that attention must be paid to Linda. It's a great idea, and Mrs. Loman, gracefully directed by Meghan Finn and boasting an excellent cast, mostly does it justice. 

 ​Photo: Mari Eimas-Dietrich

The plot hits a number of familiar points as Linda, with the help of her new friend Esther, has the sort of adventures that one might see in a movie starring Jane Fonda and/or Diane Keaton and/or Lily Tomlin and/or many other actresses over sixty. But Cassady and the terrific Monique Vukovic revitalize these tropes by providing a compelling, three-dimensional Linda, for whom these tropes are true adventures in a true life. And Linda is taking a philosophy course, and enjoying it, as she rethinks her life. 

The plotlines for Biff and Happy seem to me to be reasonable and interesting, if depressing, outgrowths of the characters' earlier lives as shown in Salesman. And Linda's responses underscore how she is growing into her own version of herself.

It is disappointing that Mrs. Loman gets in its own way. (Spoilers in this  paragraph.) Cassady has grafted onto the play an annoying contemporary female character who comments on the action and occasionally becomes involved in weird ways (helping Linda dress; snapping her fingers for lights to come on). She adds nothing that the play doesn't already say. It feels as though Cassady didn't trust her own work to tell the story and/or thought the play needed to be less traditional. But the traditional play is good, insightful, and evocative and doesn't need a gimmick, particularly an annoying one. (End of spoilers.)

I would love to see a rewritten version, with the schtick carved away and the story/play allowed to shine.

Wendy Caster

Gypsy

When the curtain came down on Act 1 of Gypsy, my friend Susan said, "She's so wrong and she's so good." Excellent summation!

I was one of those who greeted Audra's casting with, she's miscast, her voice is miscast. And I was also one of those who said, it's Audra, we gotta go. Having seen the show, I still think she is miscast, and her voice is definitely wrong for the show. But she was amazing. Mesmerizing. Honest, real, raw. In my pantheon of Roses I've seen in person (Angela, Tyne, Sally Mayes, Bernadette, Patti, and now Audra), I'd put her second only to Tyne. Her "Rose's Turn" was scalding, even ugly, and thrilling. 

Photo: Julieta Cervantes

Unfortunately, the rest of the production is mediocre. I don't expect a cast on Audra's level, but better singing and acting would be welcome. The performers are not helped by George C. Wolfe's anti-subtle direction. He has Rose's troupe perform so atrociously that no one would have booked them ever. Nor would T.T. Grantziger see promise in June, as both Junes screeched their way through the show. (After seeing this and Show/Boat: A River close together, I'm beginning to wonder if acting badly well is a lost art.)

In addition to his direction of the acting, I think Wolfe got a lot of the show wrong in tone and timing. And little-but-important moments are missed. For example, having Gypsy face the audience rather than a mirror when she says, "I'm a pretty girl, Mama" dissipates the impact. 

And why would anyone replace Jerome Robbins' choreography in this show (and in West Side Story)? Isn't that just saying that you want choreography that isn't as good, theatrical, or organic? Two of the best choreographed numbers in the history of musical theatre are from Gypsy. When the chorus of dancers grow from kids to young adults while dancing, using a strobe, it's theatricality at its best. Similarly, Robbins' choreography for Gypsy going from shy neophyte to star is smooth and evocative and impressive and meaningful. In this Gypsy, both numbers are, well, okay. (No insult to this choreographer, btw. Trying to replace something perfect is a thankless assignment.)

Interestingly, the mediocrity of this production allows Gypsy's few imperfections to come to the fore. The most important one is, I think, that there is too little opportunity to see Rose's charm in the first act. If there were an earlier song like "Together," it would be easier to see Rose as a person rather than a monster. (Though I must note that a huge chunk of the audience gasped a couple of times at Rose's behavior. I've never seen the show with so many first-timers. It was fun.)

But this production is about Audra! And she's amazing!

Wendy Caster

Show/Boat: A River

Based on both the reviews and word of mouth, I went into Target Margin's "re-envisioning" of Show Boat (here called Show/Boat: A River) with low expectations. Sadly, it lived down to them. 

Whatever the faults of Oscar Hammerstein II, he was a sincere man trying to make the world a better place. Show Boat was sympathetic to a mixed-race couple, depicted and criticized racism, and had an unprecedented cast of Black and White people working together. Remember, this was 1927, almost 100 years ago.

Show Boat can be seen as glass-half-full and it can be seen as glass-half-empty. Show/Boat: A River seems to see it as an empty glass--a broken empty glass. It's fine to re-envision or deconstruct or whatever, but without understanding where the piece comes from, acknowledging its strengths, and having a POV other than "we're better now than they were then," it's just a pointless mess. (One criticism I heard of the original show is that it keeps the Black people in the background of their own story. That's true, but if Hammerstein had put them in the foreground, the show wouldn't get produced--and people now would criticize him for cultural appropriation.) 

The solution of course is equal opportunities for Blacks, women, LGBT+ people, and so on. A friend once said that it doesn't matter if the best of each group finds a place; the goal is for all mediocre people to have the same opportunities as mediocre White men, including second and third chances. Although we've made progress, we still have far to go. 

I should mention that I find most of Hammerstein's depictions of race to be embarrassing, at best. I'm not a fan of his in general. But I still get it that he was ahead of his time. It seems churlish to dismiss him for only being on the first rung of racial consciousness when the vast majority of White people weren't even aware of the ladder! Re-envision, yes, but understand what you're re-envisioning. 

Show/Boat: A River did have moments of insight and legit criticism. But it came across as a high school production. It would have been nice if everyone in the cast could sing. And if the show didn't periodically rely on droning, high, thin, painful notes from guitar (I think) and clarinet. And if it truly had something original to say. (As Hammerstein did, flawed as it was.) 

It's interesting to consider what future generations will think we're doing wrong. We certainly don't have all the answers. 

Wendy Caster

Eureka Day

A built-in weakness in some comedies of ideas is that one side of an argument may simply be right. As someone who believes strongly in vaccines, I thought Eureka Day might have to wrestle with this weakness. But playwright Jonathan Spector, while not supporting the  anti-vax stance per se, does show how someone could legitimately and honestly see vaccines as dangerous and even deadly. He pulls this off in a context of good-hearted, super-woke people trying to keep safe the children of the Eureka Day School. (The illness in question is mumps. The show predates COVID.)

Bill Irwin, Thomas Middleditch, Amber Gray,
Jessica Hecht, Chelsea Yakura-Kurtz
Photo: Jeremy Daniel

While sensitively dealing with woke-ness, inclusivity, accidental racism, and other difficult topics, Eureka Day is also extremely, extremely funny. I've rarely been in an audience that laughed that loud for that long.

The cast is largely excellent, including Jessica Hecht, Amber Gray, Thomas Middleditch, and Chelsea Yakura-Kurtz. Only Bill Irwin disappoints, with a twitchy performance that lacks a specific character. The excellent direction by Anna D. Shapiro keeps the emotions, humor, timing, and characters in balance, while always providing clarity as to where our attention should be. 

Wendy Caster

Women Writing Musicals (book review)

 I reviewed Women Writing Musicals on Talkin' Broadway.

One of the stranger parts of aging is watching time go from "now" to "then" to "retro" to "no one on Jeopardy knows the answer." This is particularly a problem with theatre, where "now" can go to "then" almost instantly. It breaks my heart that few people know about, oh, Colleen Dewhurst, Lynn Thigpen, Michael Jeter, Elizabeth Swados, Myrna Lamb. Time passes so quickly and so much is lost along the way.

In the new book Women Writing Musicals, Jennifer Ashley Tepper and Applause Theatre & Cinema Books rescue one important part of theatre history: women writing musicals. And it is full of juicy info.

Read more