Sex, Grift, and Death

Caryl Churchill is a remarkable playwright. She's smart and funny and political and personal and humane and moving and very very entertaining. Reading her scripts reveals that she is also a great collaborator: for example, for a funeral scene in Here We Go, part of the excellent Sex, Grift, and Death at PTP/NYC, she wrote a bunch of little speeches, unattributed, allowing the director to choose who says them and in what order. (In the fabulous Love and Information, done by NYTW some years ago, Churchill provided only the dialogue--no characters, ages, genders, locations, or situations--for dozens of short pieces.) 

David Barlow, Tara Giordano
Hot Fudge
Photo: Stan Barouh

In another section of the exceptional Here We Go, Churchill provides the mere scaffolding of a play in a way that invites audience members to provide their own storylines and details. The resulting experience becomes extremely personal to each viewer. It is a tour de force of writing that consists of almost no writing. 

Churchill is fortunate to have director Cheryl Faraone as one of the major interpreters of her work in the United States. We in the audience are fortunate as well. Faraone meets Churchill full on, mining her humor and emotion and giving us productions full of texture and clarity, perfectly timed, beautifully acted. 

Danielle Skraastad
Photo: Stan Barouh

There are two Churchill works in Sex, Grift, and Death. The first, Hot Fudge, is a complete pleasure as it depicts a family of grifters whose daughter is discovering that honesty just might be a worthwhile option. Faraone has guided the excellent cast to perfectly calibrated, extremely funny performances. Particularly noteworthy are the fabulous Danielle Skraastad, whose every utterance has the audience hysterical, and Tara Giordano, who anchors the fun in reality. 

The other play, Here We Go, is about illness, dying, and death. It is in three parts; the first and third are discussed above. In the second part, the versatile David Barlow plays a dead man trying to suss out just what death is. It's funny and thought-provoking and amazingly imaginative. It genuinely makes a person think about the meaning of life.

Jackie Sanders, Bill Army
Lunch
Photo: Stan Barouh

There's a third play in Sex, Grift, and Death, called Lunch. Written by Steven Berkoff, it deals with the sex part of the evening's title. A woman sits on a bench near the ocean, seemingly waiting for something/someone. A man appears--is he the one she is waiting for? The rest of the play deals with the answer to that question as they chat and spar and flirt and jockey for position. Their interaction turns sexy, thoughtful, and ugly in turn, and then back again. They are not named in the written script--just Man and Woman--though they are named in the play itself. Are they supposed to represent all men and women? Is the play about the striving of humanity for connection--or just for something to happen? With its occasional references to TS Eliot's The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock," the play clearly has something to say, but it is too wordy for a brief one-act; one would have to read it multiple times to digest what is going on.

Ultimately, Lunch is an interesting and often entertaining show, and it features some impressive writing. But to watch rather than read, it might benefit from some serious pruning. Bill Army and Jackie Sanders are both quite good (although Army could be slower and clearer in his long speeches). 

Overall, Sex, Grift, and Death is a real treat. Welcome back to in-person theatre PTP/NYC. You were missed! 

Wendy Caster

Standing on the Edge of Time

The Potomac Theatre Project's recent streaming play, Standing on the Edge of Time, consists largely of people talking--alone, in pairs, or in groups--about  history, theatre, relationships (romantic and not), and meaning. Each segment is by a different playwright or poet, resulting in a pleasing and thought-provoking verbal kaleidoscope of words and ideas. (I've provided a list of the shows represented below.) With many young people in the cast, the show sometimes feels like groups of college kids got together for slightly buzzed, totally heartfelt, 2-a.m. discussions. I frequently wished I could join them. 

Rather than discussing the individual segments, of which there are almost 20, I offer some of the lines that stood out for me.

• All theatres are haunted.
• Most people are stupid and couldn't tell a play from a pineapple.
• My real sister became a nun to meet men.
• To be or nobody.
• Paranoia transcends politics; it becomes spiritual.
• God wants peacocks, not ravens.
• These are cold days, not to be believed.
• I believe humans will walk on the surface on Mars.
• The flying car will radically alter [making out].
• [There will be] a global epidemic of panic and mass despair.
• Sex will become [boring]; Tupperware will make dildos.
• They fucked up in the 60s. They took away all the values and didn't put anything in its place.
• On this planet one is overwhelmed.

One of my favorite lines comes from "What Do You Believe About the Future?" by David Auburn. After around a dozen people make their predictions, some of which are in the list above, a young man says, "I believe I will get a date."

Two points: (1) I wish I had been able to see this in a theatre. (No shit, huh?) I am much better able to sink into the mood and pacing of a word-driven piece like this in a dark theatre than in my studio apartment. (2) I really wish that the pieces had been identified as they started. I completely get why director Cheryl Faraone would not want to interrupt the flow of discussion with title cards or captions, but not knowing was problematic too. I was sometimes distracted by thinking, for example, "Wait, I've heard that before. Is that Kushner? Churchill?" And then I was distracted by thinking, "Wow, I really should be able to distinguish the voices of such individual playwrights." (The only author I identified with no problem was Ntozake Shange; she truly sounds like no one else.)

Faraone forestalls the inevitable Zoom-ness of streaming plays with an appealing, overtly theatrical opening including atmospheric shots of an old theatre and a ringmaster sort of person discussing exactly what theatre is ("Like the inside of a human heart. Only bigger, and not as empty."). When sections do have the dreaded Zoom-like boxes, Faraone uses interesting angles and various other devices to provide variety, plus a few sections are shot outdoors.

The show is well-acted by Alex Draper, Stephanie Janssen, Christopher Marshall, Tara Giordano, Sheyenne Brown, Aubrey Dube, Wynn McClenahan, Becca Berlind, Gabrielle Martin, Maggie Connolly, Madison Middleton, Francis Price, and Gibson Grimm.

It is unfortunate that this show is already gone, but Potomac has one more show this season. A Small Handful is based on the poetry and life of Anne Sexton and utilizes speech, song, and performance to "discover something about the endurance of Anne Sexton’s complex journey." It runs August 13 to 17; more information can be found here.

***

The plays and poems of Standing on the Edge of Time.

Crowbar by Mac Wellman

Next Time I'll Sing to You by James Saunders

The Enemy by Mike Bartlett

Excerpts from "Strange Days Indeed: The Golden Age of Paranoia" by Francis Wheen

Skeleton Crew by Dominique Morisseau

Tales of the Lost Formicans by Constance Congdon

Red Noses by Peter Barnes

A Bright Room Called Day (Oranges) by Tony Kushner

Roar by Anna Deavere Smith

Spell of Motion by Stacie Cassarino

What Do You Believe About the Future? by David Auburn

Serial Monogamy by Ntozake Shange

Tickets Are Now on Sale by Caryl Churchill

In Perpetuity Throughout the Universe by Eric Overmyer

Mornings at the Lake by Stacie Cassarino

The Internet is Serious Business by Tim Price

Far Away (PTP/NYC)

In the past couple of decades, Caryl Churchill has perfected the oblique and concentrated one-act play, somehow providing the intellectual challenge and emotional punch of the best of full-length plays in less than an hour. Examples include Escaped Alone (55 minutes), a cutting examination of  people maintaining "normality" as the world unravels; A Number (60 minutes), which considers cloning from a clone's point of view; and Drunk Enough to Say I Love You (45 minutes), an evisceration of the United States' treatment of other countries. 

Caitlin Duffy and Ro Boddie

And then there is Far Away, which brilliantly depicts an existence that is just to the right of our current world. (The original New York production, in 2002, came across as a "what if" exercise, with a certain amount of insanity/metaphor/magic realism. In 2020, after many "what ifs" have actually occurred, the world of Far Away feels considerably less far away.)

Nesba Crenshaw and Lilah May Pfeiffer 

It's difficult to describe Far Away without spoilers. In fact, almost any description would tell too much. Suffice to say that it depicts a world where good things happen, horrible things happen, and as regular people go from day to day in their uncontroversial lives they may be more complicit than they would ever guess. 

The excellent PTP/NYC posted an amazingly successful streaming version of Far Away last week. Cheryl Faraone directed with her usual subtle intelligence, and she made simple but effective decisions to utilize the strengths of streaming (everyone in the audience has an excellent seat) and bypass the weaknesses (the use of identical backdrops and choreographed looks between actors make it easy to forget that they were not in the same room). Unfortunately, the current situation made impossible a truly amazing coup de theatre in the play, and I'm not sure that Faraone's replacement was sufficient to let new audiences know exactly what was going on. (In the original NY production at the NYTW, the scene was equal parts thrilling and chilling.)

In a streaming production, the skills of the performers are particularly important, and the cast is terrific: Lilah May Pfeiffer nicely shows that the questioning nature of young people can become dangerous; Nesba Crenshaw believably sinks into paranoia--or does she?--without ever seeming crazy; Ro Boddie charms as he negotiates finding a coworker attractive; and Caitlin Duffy is superbly both guarded and transparent as she struggles to understand what is happening inside and outside of her world and how she should respond.

It may seem strange to review a production that is no longer available and that can't be discussed in any real detail, but here's the thing: the wonderful people at PTP/NYC are already planning their next season, which will likely include other strong and significant shows, beautifully produced. That's what they've been doing for decades. 

Wendy Caster

Dogg's Hamlet, Cahoots Macbeth

Sometimes the plot in Dogg's Hamlet, Cahoots Macbeth by Tom Stoppard, first produced in 1979, runs too close to home. But some background first:

In Dogg's Hamlet, practically everyone speaks in Dogg, a guttural-sounding language that is a mix-up of actual words. A school in England is presenting a 15-minute version of Hamlet, which is spoken in a "foreign" language, English, and emphasizes the play's best-known lines. At its completion, the cast performs another, abbreviated version in a breakneck encore. Lots of hilarity ensues as communication misunderstanding arise and the play's pace quickens. Directed by Cheryl Faraone, PTP's co-artistic director, the first half shows the power of language while ebullient physical comedy displays how easily communication becomes disconnected.

Cahoots Macbeth serves as a companion piece, emphasizing the importance of free expression since the play is part of a forbidden living-room production, where the audience is well, the audience watching, and an Inspector keeps interrupting the unfolding action of Macbeth murdering his way to the Scottish throne--a disturbing parallel to the Communist takeover of Czechoslovakia (where, in 1977, covert theatre acted as a protest since artists could not perform publicly) as well as to modern times where free speech is dismantled by repressive governments more everyday.

Chirstopher Marshall, Christo Grabowski, Tara Giordano in Cahoot's Macbeth.Photographer Stan Barouh.

Stoppard, born in Czechoslovakia, left the country at two and while he never lived under its Communist oppression conveys it perfectly here--making it unnerving and absurd simultaneously. Even as the audience laughs while actors spar with the Inspector there is an acknowledged silent truth that Big Brother could be watching. Ultimately, Dogg becomes the method of protest as Cahoot ends.

Overall, the cast is excellent, with a few stand-outs. Christo Grabowski as Fox Major/Hamlet and Banquo/Cahoot is iron-sharp with his dialogue and a graceful presence cavorting on stage. Matthew Ball as Easy navigates a difficult role, naturally conveying his confusion at a language he doesn't understand as he charmingly becoming an essential participant in the whimsical construction of the school's set--where several nonsensical phrases are spelled out before Dogg's Hamlet appears.

At times the production inventively modernizes the work. The three witches wear hoods that light up eerily around their face. The costumes, a hybrid of period pieces and contemporary clothes like jeans though, seem inconsistent though (Costumes by Chris Romagnoli-Dogg; Rebecca Lalon-Cahoot). There are also opportunities for Faraone to push the piece further into current times. It would be interesting to see a truly contemporary version of Stoppard's play set in our modern world.

For more on the show, see Wendy Caster's excellent review.

Running at PTP/NYC at The Atlantic Stage 2 (330 W. 16th St.) through August 4 in repertory with Havel: The Passion of Thought, five one-act plays by Vaclav Havel, Harold Pinter and Samuel Beckett. For more information, see http:PTPNYC.org To see the 2019 season promo trailer, click here. 

(Press ticket)

Dogg's Hamlet, Cahoot's Macbeth

Tom Stoppard's Dogg's Hamlet, Cahoot's Macbeth plays with language and slapstick, presents fascinating mini-versions of two of Shakespeare's masterpieces, vividly depicts the importance of theatre under repressive government, and messes with your brain. It is both fun and important. In other words, it's Tom Stoppard.

Lucy Van Atta, Peter Schmitz,
Christo Grabowski, Connor Wright
Dogg's Hamlet
photo: Stan Barouh

Dogg's Hamlet takes place at public school (in English parlance) or a private school (in American). The students are rehearsing Hamlet. They speak a strange language that makes no sense until it starts making sense. The highly-truncated version of Hamlet presented is an excellent reminder that Shakespeare pretty much invented idiomatic English. (To thine own self be true. Shuffle off this mortal coil. There's the rub. Though this be madness, yet there is method in't. The lady doth protest too much. I must be cruel only to be kind. The play's the thing. Neither a borrower nor a lender be. I am sick at heart. This too shall pass. Brevity is the soul of wit.) Dogg's Hamlet is a fabulous mental workout.

Cahoot's Macbeth takes place in an LRT, or Living Room Theatre, in 1970s Czechoslovakia. LRTs were developed when the government cracked down on theatre, forbidding public performances and giving the artists jobs as janitors, clerks, and the like. Macbeth is interrupted by a government inspector who is snide, mean, all-knowing, and frightening. (And, since Cahoot's Macbeth is by Stoppard, she is also funny.)

As presented by the invaluable PTP/NYC and directed by the superb Cheryl Faraone, Dogg's Hamlet, Cahoot's Macbeth serves a one-two punch of theatre, full of humor, meaning, provocation, and pathos. (It is running in repertory with Havel: The Passion of Thought which includes works by Harold Pinter, Václav  Havel, and Samuel Beckett. Havel is, in one way or another, the heart of all of these works.)

The cast (Matthew Ball, Denise Cormier, Olivia Christie, Tara Giordano, Christo Grabowski, Will Koch, Emily Ma, Christopher Marshall, Katie Marshall, Madeleine Russell, Peter B. Schmitz, Lior Selve, Lucy Van Atta, Zach Varicchione, Connor Wright) is top-notch, as are the production values (Mark Evancho, set; Rebecca Lafon, costumes, Cahoot’s Macbeth; Ellery Rhodes, sound; Chris Romagnoli, costumes, Dogg's Hamlet; Hallie Zieselman, lighting).

I am so grateful to PTP/NYC for their commitment to meaningful theatre and high standards. I try to see every show they put on. (And I sure would like to see Cheryl Faraone's Cloud Nine. Hint. Hint.)

Wendy Caster
(press ticket, third row)

The Possibilities/The After-Dinner Joke

No theatre is offering more bang for your buck--or return on your time--than PTP/NYC with their evening of one acts: The Possibilities, by Howard Barker, and The After-Dinner Joke, by Caryl Churchill. The first consists of four short plays, the second of 66 brief scenes. The shows are smart, thought-provoking, and often fun, and these productions are terrific. Together, they add up to an amazing evening in the theatre.

The Possibilities, from the late 1980s, includes a total of ten plays. I would be quite interested in seeing the six not included in this PTP/NYC evening.

The first play is The Unforeseen Consequences of A Patriotic Act, in which Judith (she of Holofernes' decapitation) refuses to embrace the role of heroine, despite the pleading of a woman (Eliza Renner) who wants Judith to be an example "to women everywhere." This Judith owns her sexuality, and her rage, and has no interest in censoring the blood and lust from her story. The excellent Kathleen Wise as Judith and the equally excellent Renner go head-to-head with great gusto, but, really, you can't mess with Judith and get away with it. It's a fine piece and bizarrely echoes the way that publicists may try to write a personality for a politician or actor that has little to do with the person and much to do with some goal, be it important or not, moral or not.

The Unforeseen Consequences of A Patriotic Act
Eliza Renner, Kathleen Wise, Marianne Tatum
Photo: Stan Barouh 

Arcadia

Just twice in four decades of theatre have I bought the show's script during
intermission, and Tom Stoppard's Arcadia in 1995 was one of them (Shadowlands by
William Nicholson was the other). The most emotional play in Stoppard's cannon, it
offers a mystery told through two intertwining stories that touch on many topics
before its solution, including academic jockeying, the making of history, landscape
gardening, Byron, Newtonian physics and nonlinear mathematics.

 

Andrew William Smith (Septimus Hodge), Caitlin Duffy (Thomasina Coverly)

Photo credit: Stan Barouh 

PTP/NYC's (Potomac Theatre Project) flawed, but enjoyable, revival of Arcadia captures its comedic intellectualism but not its visceral core. The play's two time frames -1809 and the present - both take place in the same country estate, Sidley Park, inhabited by two sets of characters and occasionally the same props, including a tortoise named Plautus or Lightning, depending on the century. The beginning scenes alternate the two periods until the second act where the separate sections unfold simultaneously on stage. The historical part focuses on Thomasina Coverly (Caitlin Duffy), a young aristocratic genius, and her clever and randy tutor, Septimus Hodge (Andrew William Smith), with the modern-day segment featuring two combative researchers, historical book author Hannah Jarvis (Stephanie Janssen) and Bernard Nightingale (Alex Draper), a grandstanding academic seeking scholastic fame.

Between those plot lines, Thomasina's mother, also is transforming her garden from classical to gothic; Ezra Chater (Jonathan Tindle) tries to make a name as a poet while many bed his wife ... including a never-seen but oft-spoken about Lord Byron; and a postgrad researcher, Valentine Coverly, (Jackson Prince) unearths Thomasina's surprisingly modern mathematical scribblings. Describing Arcadia's plot is as difficult as deciphering the play, which twists and turns through time and topics, with each reading and viewing bringing some new understanding. In this production, the scene between Thomasina and her tutor discussing the loss of the great library of Alexandria, for instance, resonated brightly as Septimus matter-of-factly tells his student, who mourns the disappearance of Aeschylus and Sophocles' plays:

"We shed as we pick up, like travelers who must carry everything in their arms, and what we let fall will be picked up by those behind. The procession is very long and life is very short. We die on the march. But there is nothing outside the march so nothing can be lost to it. The missing plays of Sophocles will turn up piece by piece, or be written again in another language...Mathematical discoveries glimpsed and lost to view will have their time again."

For, ultimately, the unfairness of life's limitations insert a melancholy into Arcadia that characters face mostly with pragmatism and humor.

Stephanie Janssen (Hannah Jarvis), Alex Draper (Bernard Nightingale).

Photo credit: Stan Barouh

Cheryl Faraone's (co-artistic director) direction emphasizes this stoicism and that works well during the 20th century scenes, making the even-tempered Hannah a terrific foil for Bernard. But, in the earlier time, there is a warmth missing between Thomasina and Septimus, and it makes their relationship less intimate and engaging. While Duffy and Smith are capable, neither convey the charisma necessary to enchant. Duffy's Thomasina is also too silly as a girl and her portrayal doesn't change even as the character ages. The simple set (scenic design: Mark Evancho) with its hanging panels looks appropriate for both time periods and the video footage of Thomasina's realized formula showcases the wonder of her genius.

PTP/NYC's 31st repertory season (its 11th consecutive in NYC), runs from July 11 - August 6 in a limited Off-Broadway engagement at The Atlantic Stage 2 (330 West 16 St.). For more info visit http://PTPNYC.org

Arcadia

Tom Stoppard always offers scrumptious meals for the head, but not always for the heart. Arcadia, his brilliant play about literature, history, math, science, gardening, and sex, features his best-ever balance between ideas and emotion. When well done, Arcadia is sheer pleasure start to finish (although audience members have been known to daydream during the math parts). PTP/NYC's current production (running through August 6th) is indeed well done, largely thanks to Cheryl Faraone's smart, clear, well-paced, and compassionate direction.

Arcadia exists in two time frames: the early 19th century and the late 20th. Both take place in the same room in an elegant house in Sidley Park, home to the Coverlys. The earlier period focuses on Thomasina Coverly, 13 years old and a genius, and her tutor Septimus Hodge, a smart and charming man who somehow juggles making a living, writing, and a healthy sex life. This time period features affairs, theorems, brilliance, and heartbreak.