Oliver Twist

****
John Jay College

So far this is my favorite scenic design of the year. This hollow, dirty, smoke-filled box was the perfect picture frame for this fascinating Brechtian re-telling of the classic Dickens novel. This tightly directed, rhythmic version almost felt like a musical and I wouldn't have been phased at all had Nancy busted out with "As Long As He Needs Me". Perfomed by an excellent troupe of soot-smeared actors, this production was slick, energetic, very memorable and I highly recommend checking it out.

Also blogged by: [Patrick] [Christopher]

Orestes 2.0

I don't much care for the original Orestes, and this sexed up reboot hasn't really been given the upgrade it needs by Charles L. Mee. This is the type of scattered theater that confuses the mainstream audience about off-Broadway, and although Jose Zayas has found some nice ways of modernizing classical movements (much more violent and visceral here, which makes sense for the Immediate Theater Company), the technical production is still sloppy. Bad night or no, I found much of this show to be a temper tantrum thrown by a confused and confusing cast. The multiple levels never gelled for me, and if that was the point, I can only ask why that was the point. Still: the trial scene is an interesting bit of staging, and the table-spinning, chest-thumping climax has a wicked momentum (set to techno music) that does wonders to liven otherwise dead text, so if you're head over heels for hodgepodge, Orestes 2.0 might be for you.

[Read on]

Go see Neal Medlyn

Something out of control and completely effed up is about to happen and I want you to know about it!

Neal Medlyn's Coming In The Air Tonight

according to his website it features "Phil Collins music and tons of blood!"

Having seen a number of Mr. Medlyn's previous violent comedic outbursts (including Neal Medlyn Will Drink Poison Until He Dies!) I can honestly say that I have never seen a performer who is quite so messy, feral and unbelievably hysterical.

This is really something you should check out if you need a break from well behaved, polite theater.

It's Fridays in April, 7:30pm at Galapagos in Brooklyn (tix). I will be attending on April 13th because his guest star will be the Varsity Interpretive Dance Squad, another comic phenomenon I am currently obsessed with.

xodb

ESDgate?

A post yesterday over at Culturebot references a letter, sent out by Carolyn Cantor of Edge Theatre in promotion of Essential Self-Defense, which uses pullquotes from three reviews by bloggers. As David and I are two of the three, and the Culturebot post might lead you to think we were plied with liquor and free shrimp, I wanted to set the record straight.

I was approached with the offer of complimentary tickets during the first week of previews, in exchange for posting a discount code in advance of seeing the show and for writing about it after I had here, on my own blog, and at New Theater Corps. Although it is always a tacit understanding when approached with comps that I was free to write what I pleased, in this case I was assured, plainly and in writing, that I could write either positively or negatively. I was the only person approached here; David went and got a ticket on his own and wasn't part of any blog promotion.

The Culturebot post is primarily concerned with what it thinks is an unconvincing argument in Cantor's letter which depicts the Times as out of step with the general opinion on the show; I can not speak to any of that. But I am uncomfortable with what seems to be an implication that there's something underhanded that bloggers like myself were invited and that our positive reviews were quoted; should the quotes from the traditional critics also have come with the disclosure that they were comped? The Culturebot post seems to say that the disclosure of blogger comps would have put our opinions in perspective. It's distressing to see a prominent, trusted blog such as Culturebot take a position such as this, that implicitly depicts bloggers as easily dazzled and swayed by freebies. If "the blogosphere needs to make further inroads into theatre" as the post says, the implication that we can be had for cheap ain't nothing but a dead end.

A Lie of the Mind

A strong ensemble cast makes this revival of A Lie of the Mind into an enthralling evening of theater ... but also a maddening midnight. By hour three, the background bluegrass is annoying, the limited staging grows stifling, and we're dying for a climax. Buried Child is more efficient, but Shepard's writing here, particularly when focused on Beth (and the excellent Laura Schwenninger, who plays her), makes one want to linger languorously in the language. I just wish the third act weren't so reliant on theatrical metaphor: Daryl Boling doesn't even fully render the transitions between the two tragic lovers; the leap into "stage-time" is awkward and the lies of the mind don't have enough life to them. I recommend it anyway, for the outstanding performances and the intimate theater, but watch your blood sugar levels for Act 3.

[Read on]

Frost/Nixon

photo: Alastair Muir

Peter Morgan's play, concerning some of the machinations that led to Richard Nixon's confession of guilt while interviewed on television by David Frost, is mostly a comedy about the media and politics. The play is a lot of fun as far as it goes, briskly entertaining and engrossing even at two hours with no intermission, but it's facile, especially to those of us who have serious objections to seeing Richard Nixon depicted as something of an endearing, doddering old man without any trace of craftiness. Nixon's not far from being a Neil Simon character here: funny-thorny but finally tame. (Please understand that it isn't that I object to a sympathetic depiction of Nixon - I hold Secret Honor in a high place, for instance - it's that there's something that feels dishonest here. This Dick as written isn't the least bit Tricky). The play's strongest political statement is less about Nixon and more about the illegalities that are possible in an abuse of Presidential power - several moments in the play can easily be analogized to Bush, and the audience picks up on them hungrily. The play has been directed with savvy and economy and the acting is phenomenal - Michael Sheen doesn't shy away from playing some of Frost's less attractive qualities but manages to keep him likeable in the gladhanding sense of the word, and Frank Langella, given the confines of what the role in this play will and will not allow, is astounding: he seems to have found an emotional reason for every one of Nixon's mannerisms. Our greatest living American stage actor? Very possibly.