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Reviewed for Theatermania.

Catalpa

Reviewed for Theatermania.

Farragut North

Photo/Jacqueline Mia Foster

From the moment Stephen (John Gallagher, Jr.) appears onstage as a successful, 25-year-old press secretary who somehow still has morals, it's obvious that Beau Willimon can't wait to knock him down in Farragut North. Willimon plays politics in the same backrooms as Aaron Sorkin, but rather than pace around, he internalizes the gears, taking the focus off the Democratic primary in Iowa and putting the emphasis on what's underneath all off Stephen's gloss and spin. The result is rather Machiavellian: his enemy, Tom (Isiah Whitlock, Jr.) undoes him with kindness; his friend, Paul (Chris Noth) undoes him with contempt; his lover, Molly (Oliva Thirlby) undoes him with compassion; and he completes the destruction with his own arrogance. Director Doug Hughes is accustomed to dealing with characters having a crisis of faith, as well as with addressing monsters who come clad in good deeds, which results in a well-oiled production that also manages to dip below the surface of politics.

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Dawn

Photo/Joan Marcus

Thomas Bradshaw's latest play, Dawn, is a challenging play. It's not subtle--his dialogue bashes us over the head with its gross exaggerations, and director Jim Simpson works with an empty stage so as to keep things transparent and obvious. However, by setting up his characters to fall--likeable alcoholics, intolerable saviors, abused annoyers--the play challenges our expectations, and aims to make our morals a little more fluid. The lead, Gerry Bamman, really helps on account of his sitcom-level likability, and the disgusting comedy of it all will unsettle you (especially on accounts of the double whammy of pedophilia and incest), whether you like it or not.

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The Footage

Photo/Joan Marcus

There are a lot of nice surprises in Joshua Scher's dark drama, The Footage. By using existing media and making it dark (LonelyGirl15, porn, machinima), Scher gives his plot credibility, which is the whole point in a play that focuses on the narrow line between what's real and not. That he manages to work in comic romances (like the flirting of two online avatars in World of WarCraft) is downright astonishing, especially given the way they enhance other aspects of the theme. Semiotics is often boring: here, it's fascinating, or perhaps that's just Scher's ear for the way people talk. The one unfortunate thing is that the ending compromises the theme: a play like this is ruined by a tidy ending, no matter how stylistically done (director Claudia Zelevansky does nice work).

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My Vaudeville Man

photo: Carol Rosegg

The book of this two-character musical, which charts the relationship between a born-to-dance Irish-American vaudevillian and his disapproving mother who's ashamed of his profession, is disappointingly shallow: the first act doesn't do much more than contrast his wide-eyed naivete with her cold-eyed suspicion, before closing with a stakes-raising conflict that is soon glossed over and made irrelevant in the second act. However, there are at least a few good songs in the score (the title song is especially infectious) and both Karen Murphy and Shonn Wiley are terrific. The show's chief pleasure - for me, a big one - is Wiley's tap-dancing: his extended second act dance number, which has the added twist of also being a drinking contest besides a tap challenge, is breathtaking.