StageGrade (Website Review)

StageGrade provides an important public service for New York theatre-goers: it assembles reviews of Broadway, Off-Broadway, and Off-Off-Broadway shows, providing a synopsis, an average grade, and links to the reviews themselves. The site is attractive and easy to navigate.

One of StageGrade's most interesting features is the way it pairs reviewer and community ratings. Some are identical--for example, Mary Poppins received C+'s from both groups. Some differ in predictable ways--for example, Wicked received a C+ from critics but a B+ from audience members. Some differ in surprising ways--for example, Through the Night received a B+ from reviewers but only a C from the community. And some I think could be (should be?) of particular use to producers--for example, while the critics gave Phantom of the Opera a B, community response is down to C+. Perhaps it's time for some extra rehearsals or a visit from director Harold Prince.

StageGrade carries advertising and links to Telecharge. I have no idea if the site makes enough money to pay its staff of four (Rob Weinert-Kendt, Isaac Butler, Karl Miller, and Linda Buchwald) even minimum wage. However, I hope StageGrade does very well--the staff members obviously work hard keeping up this comprehensive site.

StageGrade's most important contribution to the theatre world? It provides a wonderful and vivid reminder that reviews are ultimately just opinions--ideally, knowledgeable and educated opinions, but opinions nevertheless.

(Disclosure: my reviews are often included on StageGrade.)

Dog Act

Photo: Isaiah Tanenbaum

In Liz Duffy Adams' amazing new play Dog Act, presented by the Flux Ensemble Theatre, the apocalypse has come and gone, and various tribes scramble to survive in a barren, unfriendly landscape. Zetta Stone, of the Vaudevillian Tribe, and her companion Dog (a young man undergoing a voluntary species demotion) are on their way to China for an important gig. This description, part of which is directly from the Flux Theatre's website, does as good a job describing Dog Act as "it's about Russia" does describing War and Peace. Dog Act is a meditation on religion, civilization, responsibility, morals, the implacability of the life force, and how the arts/media bring meaning to people's lives. It's also extremely entertaining, breathtakingly imaginative, and quite funny (especially in the second act).

Adams and director Kelly O'Donnell, with the help of a wonderful cast and a superb creative team, bring to life an entire world, fascinating and frightening, on a small stage with limited scenery. The different patois Adams has created for the different tribes are totally convincing as future forms of English (and not difficult to understand). Members of the Scavenger Tribe talk in a combination of Shakespearean English and obscenities, including the perfectly delightful phrase "for-fuckin-sooth." The Vaudevillians use mangled versions of sayings from TV shows that went off the air before their grandparents were born.

Each cast member makes a strong, important contribution. I was particularly impressed by Lori E. Parquet's subtlety, Liz Douglas's intensity, and Becky Byers perfectly calibrated insanity.

As a reviewer, I sometimes feel tired and jaded. It can seem as though everything has been said and all that's left for theatre is different combinations of tired tropes and creaky cliches. But then I see something like Dog Act (although there really isn't anything like Dog Act) and I am reminded of theatre's power and beauty. Dog Act only runs through February 20th. Here's the website. Go!

(Reviewer's comp; second row center.)

Black Tie

Photo: James Leynse

In A.R. Gurney's stilted, unconvincing play Black Tie, middle-aged Curtis is thrilled at the prospect of wearing dinner clothes and giving a traditional speech at the rehearsal dinner for his son's wedding; however, his future daughter-in-law Maya has other ideas. Through this not-particularly-compelling conflict, Black Tie ostensibly explores changing contemporary mores, but Curtis's cluelessness and bellowing are straight out of a late-20th-century sitcom. Even worse, we never see Maya, so there is a gaping hole where the play might be. The characters we do see are thinly drawn--when a ghost is the most complex character, something is off-balance. The occasional political references seem random and make Black Tie neither more meaningful nor more interesting. Mark Lamos directs the show with big takes and overdone business. Of the performers, only Ari Brand as the son manages to sound like an actual human being. Gregg Edelman as Curtis gives a one-note performance and his inverted-S posture is annoying and wrong for the role.

(Reviewer's comp; eighth row on the aisle.)

Lysistrata

Theodora Skipitares has directed a new version of Aristophanes' Lysistrata, featuring performers wearing Skipitares' masks or life-sized puppets. (The other puppet designers are Jane Catherine Shaw and Cecilia Schiller.) Her adaptation is true to Aristophanes' version, with the storyline (women withholding sex to convince their menfolk to give up war) and bawdy humor intact. Skipitares also includes recent footage about real women using Lysistratan techniques, including a sex strike by girlfriends of gang lords in Colombia. There is much creativity in this production, but, sad to say, the show is on the dull side and runs too long, even at an hour. Part of the problem is that Lysistrata itself is a one-joke, one-theme show. While it is interesting historically, it is not that interesting theatrically. Penis jokes wear thin. Skipitares' puppets and masks bring a sense of ceremony and period, but they are distancing, and it is hard to care about anything happening on stage for more than a few minutes. The video footage, while compelling, is difficult to see and the narration is difficult to hear. Lysistrata is blessed, however, by a fascinating score, composed, played, and sung by Sxip Shirey on/with a wonderful array of digital, plastic, and wooden devices.

(Reviewers comps, 4th row.)

Road to Qatar

Theatrical satires of theatrical performances have many things in common: enthusiastic but oblivious participants, extreme versions of theatrical clichés, and happy endings where the final product is kind of terrible yet kind of wonderful. The Road to Qatar (book and lyrics by Stephen Cole; music by David Krane) is the latest in this long and honored tradition, and it faces a difficult challenge: there have been so many satires of theatre clichés that the take-offs themselves are now clichés. While The Road to Qatar, a mix of [title of show] and the Bing Crosby-Bob Hope road movies, is amiable and pleasant, it is little more than a greatest hits collection of Jewish jokes, gay jokes, annoying mother jokes, foreigner jokes, and other extremely-well-worn categories of humor. The music is listener-friendly but undistinguished; the lyrics are occasionally clever but not often enough.

If The Road to Qatar focused on its unique (and true!) story of two strangers thrown together to write a musical in Dubai and less on the usual theatrical jokes, it might be stronger. Cole and Krane decided to go the broad-humor route, but more reality might have served them well--in particular more focus on how the men coped, became friends, dealt with the travel, and how they perhaps grew from the experience.

James Beaman and Keith Gerchak play the leads; the jokes about their being mirror images would work better if they actually looked alike (as the authors definitely do). Sarah Stiles and Bruce Warren bring much life to the show with their wide range of talents and deep senses of humor. Michael Bottari and Ronald Case's puppets are delightful, and Bob Richard's choreography is fun.

(Reviewer's comp; 4th row)

David Parsons Dance

Photo: B. Docktor

Years ago I took a friend to see his first evening of dance. Afterward, I asked him what he thought. He said, "Beautiful people doing beautiful things with their beautiful bodies. What's not to like?" He could have been talking about Parsons Dance, at the Joyce theatre through February 6th.

World premiere Portinari, choreographed by Parsons, was inspired by Brazilian painter, muralist and political activist Candido Portinari and is a duet between the artist (the brilliant and seemingly indefatigable Miguel Quinones) and his muse. I (deliberately) did not read the explanation before seeing the piece, and I perceived it as a heartbreaking meditation on grief.

Another premiere, Love, oh Love, choreographed by Monica Bill Barnes to music by Kenny Rogers, Lionel Richie and Diana Ross, explores the push-pull of relationships (including same-gender relationships, a welcome touch) with verve and humor.

From the established repertory, Bachiana, set to Bach's Orchestral Suites and Air on a G String, represents the best of David Parsons: joy and exuberance unfolding like sinuous machinery, each movement leading to the next with graceful inevitability.

And if you haven't seen Parson's signature piece Caught, you really, really, really must. You'll believe a man can fly.

(Seat N1, reviewer comps)