The Cradle Will Rock

Marc Blitzstein’s The Cradle Will Rock originally premiered in 1936, when America was in a devastating economic decline, arguing with overseas investors over the value of domestic goods, and facing pressure from labor unions over the cost of manufacturing those commodities. In this riveting, riotous revival, Theater Ten Ten keeps Blitzstein’s spirit alive with a shrewd yet vivid production, keeping in mind the show’s significance to a modern audience.


Photo by David Fuller

Reviewed by Amanda Halkiotis

Steeltown USA has had a tumultuous past few years, as the dirty outside world of war, money, outsourcing and gentrification have infiltrated its sleepy existence. What was once a self-sustaining town with respectable and polite law enforcement, friendly neighbors, and caring, conscientious politicians, now threatens civilians with arbitrary new laws and issues layoffs to anyone unwilling or unable to bend to the new demands of labor production. As the worldwide demand for steel rises and falls, money goes in and out of Steeltown, but only for a select minority, while women, immigrants, and artists must all find ways to survive. As the title song goes, if things stay this way, The Cradle Will Rock.

This whirlwind musical drama touches several serious and thought-provoking social and political issues all with sensitivity and intelligence. A high-spirited Eric Thomas Johnson provides piano accompaniment, with a passionate commitment to Blitzstein’s score. The witty, idiosyncratic lyrics help create conflict and depict roles, similar to a Stephen Sondheim musical where stories and conversations often show through the music just as much as the action. When Moll (Bellavio Mauro), an impoverished prostitute enters in the opening scene, the music slows down and stretches out while her sorrow and frustration swell and her strong alto timbre wavers, struggling to make a dollar. She soon gets whisked away to jail by an aggressive, egocentric detective named Dick, played with a bullying, boisterous energy by Michael Baxter.

The energy changes instantly when the Liberty Committee enters, unsure of their role but eager to please the man who appointed them, wealthy business man Mr. Mister. A burst of harmony explodes, delving into another layer of Steeltown. Nothing ever slows down for more than a minute—a pause in the music here or a flash of a fadeout there—before Johnson’s skilled and upbeat piano playing resurfaces and the action resumes.

And there’s plenty of action. In the first act alone, a crooked reverend accepts donations from Mrs. Mister (Tessa Faye, a shrewd businesswoman in socialite’s clothing) in return for brainwashing parishioners, the Liberty Committee gets detained for hours in jail, and labor riots take place outside the steel factory. The second act adds themes of unionization, to say nothing of the heroic Larry Foreman (Josh Powell), who at last appears with a rebel attitude and Elvis Presley croon, handing out leaflets and advocating workers’ rights. Things continue to heat up throughout the play until it all bubbles to the surface, and that’s the fun—and the point—of The Cradle Will Rock.

Viviane Galloway’s charming, nearly comically conservative costumes (nothing is cut above the knee or below the collarbone) tie into the show’s theme with superb accuracy, as does David Fuller’s directing. Under Fuller, the characters are inflated enough to take full advantage of the script’s tongue-in-cheek remarks. Mr. Mister (Bill Newhall), for example, swaggers around stage as a bloated, ruddy-faced corporate hog who can still talk the talk when necessary to appease investors, all in a faultless three-piece suit and unwavering, soothing tone. Judith Jarosz’s sprite choreography completes this period revival, with a stunning homage to classic 1940s Broadway, performed with perfection by each cast member. A sobering yet inspiring story of proletariat idealism striving to exist in a society run with strings attached by money-grubbing moguls, The Cradle Will Rock couldn’t have come at a better time, nor could it have been produced by a better team.

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The Cradle Will Rock (2 hours; one 10-minute intermission)
Location: Theater Ten Ten (1010 Park Avenue)
Tickets: $25
Performances (through 3/14): Mon., Fri.-Sat. @ 8pm; Sun. @ 3pm

Give and Go: Learning from Losing to the Harlem Globetrotters

Investment banking and basketball usually don’t mix together as the foundation of a one-man show, but for Brandt Johnson, it’s just one of many life experiences he’s willing to share in his semi-autobiographical piece Give and Go: Learning from Losing to the Harlem Globetrotters.


Brandt Johnson/photo by Debby Goldman

Reviewed by Amanda Halkiotis

Most people with lifelong obsessions remember where it all started: Brandt Johnson’s love of basketball started as a child with a Nerf ball and removable plastic hoop that could be reattached to any spare surface. In his one-man show, Give and Go: Learning from Losing to the Harlem Globetrotters, Johnson tells the story of Billy Tyler, a goofy, hopeful athlete who practices hoops nonstop on his homemade blacktop and carries his basketball to class. In the process, he plays a variety of characters, from the sheepish grins and baggy nylons of Tyler’s awkward teens to the touchy-feely empathy of a guidance counselor or the boot-camp freshman coach, Krinko. This high-speed performance (he rapidly changes clothes and character onstage) complements the ways in which Billy’s passion for the game propels him past each roadblock.

It also sets a nice contrast with Billy’s decision to forgo the slim chances of making the NBA, choosing to apply his work ethic and competitive streak to Wall Street. The designer suits and growing commissions only keep him away from his first love for so long, however: one day on his way to lunch he sees a game of pickup across the street, unbuttons his suit to reveal a jersey underneath and shouts, “Hey, fellas! I got next!”

It’s a delightful performance, brimming with bright-eyed optimism, and Johnson’s writing has just as much heart. Even a simple memory of the time he started in a varsity game while still on the JV team, brings a sense of warmth and modesty that is not overdone. The tough life lessons never get preachy and the soul-searching always serves a purpose, from the direction Billy’s life took after college to realizing (five years later) the wrong decision he made.

Director Ron Stetson helps Johnson create space in a small black-box theater through crafty blocking and strategic props, turning the stage into a full-court gymnasium so deftly the audience doesn’t pick up on the illusion. Original music by Keith “Wild Child” Middleton completes the sports atmosphere with thumping electronic bass lines when the going gets tough and trailing, high-pitched flourishes that bring Billy back to his childhood idealism. Give and Go: Learning from Losing to the Harlem Globetrotters, may be about losing, but the story and writer/actor behind it wins over audiences.

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Give and Go: Learning from Losing to the Harlem Globetrotters
Location: Metropolitan Playhouse (220 East 4th Street)
Tickets (http://www.metropolitanplayhouse.org/ticketsgiveandgo): $25; students and seniors $15; children 18 and under $10
Performances (through 2/27): Fri.-Sat. @ 8pm

Caroline, Or Change

Park Slope's Gallery Players pick the perfect time to revive Tony Kushner's show about the pain of change and progress.

Photo by Bella Muccari.

Reviewed by Ryan Max

Caroline, or Change is a musical about the Civil Rights Movement that isn't really about the Civil Rights Movement. True, it is set in 1963 Louisiana and centers on a white family's miserable black maid. But Caroline lacks the obvious villains, segregationists and fire hoses that have come to signify the fight for civil rights. In place of a Good vs. Evil battle for men’s souls, the script (by Tony Kushner) provides an ever-shifting balance of allegiances and emotions. Can we blame petulant Noah for manipulating Caroline, or is he just a lonely young boy that lost his mother? Or is stubborn, prickly Caroline the source of her own ills, even though her stubbornness is inseparable from the stability that shields her family from the worst of Southern racism? Park Slope's Gallery Players chose a perfect time for this alluring revival which shows how painful change can be, even for those it is intended to help.

Caroline is the maid to a left-leaning family of Jewish transplants from New York City. The family consists of a young boy, Noah, his clarinet-obsessed father, and his father's new wife (Noah’s mother recently died of cancer). The new wife’s attempts to ingratiate herself to Noah and Caroline ignite much of the play’s conflict, demonstrating the show’s ability to distill tension even from banal or well-intentioned attempts at change. All the while Noah's father sits idly playing his clarinet, and Caroline—Noah's preferred replacement for his mother—grows ever more bitter as she toils away for too little pay.

Mr. Kushner brilliantly uses the unfolding conflict to open our eyes to an unexpected victim of change: those who have found a way to survive in lousy circumstances. And Caroline, played gloriously by Teisha Duncan, is the perfect example. She works for a sympathetic but unhelpful family (Noah starts getting an allowance even after they say they can’t raise her $30 a week salary). She can't afford to take her kids to the dentist, and she left her husband long ago. But people around her are ready for change. Her joyful teenage daughter is intoxicated by the messages of the burgeoning Civil Rights Movement. But her daughter's anger, however just, seems to Caroline like a dangerous waste of time. A fellow maid who goes to college and wears fancy shoes strikes the white-clad Caroline as too flashy. To her, change is not necessarily synonymous with progress; change can just as easily mean forgetting who you are or needlessly risking your way of life—it may not be ideal, but at least it's surviving.

Despite being deeply contradictory, facets of character like Caroline's stubborn dignity, her daughter's fiery idealism, and Noah's callow machinations each command our sympathy at one time or another. And Caroline, marvelous Caroline, stands at the crux of these codependent and competing attitudes. Her daughter would not have the luxury of idealism without her mother's hard work (something she realizes in a beautiful moment when she affirms "My mother is a maid" with palpable pride), but if Caroline stands up to her employers’ condescension, she could imperil her own family’s well being. The puzzle of these shifting allegiances and irreconcilable views makes for a viewing experience endlessly more rewarding than the black and white dramas we reasonably expect from stories about the segregationist South. When Caroline finally snaps under the pressure of these competing aims, its makes for a visceral, mesmerizing solo performance by Ms. Duncan, the sort rarely matched in theater today.

The format of the play, performed on Edward T. Morris’ three-tiered stage, blends the action organically, and the lighting is skillfully handled by Mike Billings. The music, by Jeanine Tesori, makes many strong moments even stronger by bypassing the intellect and cutting straight to the gut. Use the restroom during the intermission and you're sure to hear someone humming the tune that closes out the first half.

Caroline is very good—great, even—but falls just short of perfect. Though the acting and writing sidestep many of the pitfalls that stud the path of such an iconic period and its cliché-heavy characters, it is not a play that is concerned with illuminating its specific circumstances. It is a story about "Change" in the wider sense almost more than it is about "Caroline," but it is Caroline that gets the more skillful rendering; the stock characters still have a hard time transcending their circumstances and by show’s end, change, and how we are supposed to feel about its wonderful and frightening effects, is still just a vague notion.

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Caroline, or Change (2 hours; One Intermission)
The Gallery Players Theatre (199 W. 14th St., Brooklyn, NY)
TICKETS: $18; $14 Seniors and Children Under 12 (www.ovationtix.com)
PERFORMANCES: Through Feb. 21; Thu-Fri 8 PM, Sat 2 and 8 PM, and Sun 3 PM

Daddy

Writer and actor Dan Via raises new questions about age disparity in homosexual relationships in Daddy. The play is simple, yet leaves a lasting impact. The audience will be left questioning what they know and arguing about it for days after.

l-r: Gerald McCullough and Dan Via
Photo: Eduardo Placer

Reviewed by Nicole C. Lee

“[Greek] stories never end well,” says Stew (Dan Via). It’s true that the Greeks may have “been onto something” with their age-gapped relationships, but Stew worries that his best friend, Colin (Gerald McCullough), might be blurring the boyfriend and father-figured line by dating Tee (Bjorn DuPaty), a biracial 21-year-old. While a daddy is generally understood to be a term of endearment for one’s father, in homosexual relationships, a daddy is the much older man in the relationship. Using this setting, Dan Via challenges the audience to question our notions of fatherhood, love, age, friendship, sex, and identity.

What does it mean to be a ”daddy”? This is just one of the many questions asked by Dan Via’s Daddy. This new play, directed by David Hilder, centers on two gay men: Colin (Gerald McCullouch), a white man in his 40s who enjoys casual sexual exploits, and Colin’s best friend Stew (Via), a law professor with an acerbic wit. Though they are not officially a couple, Colin and Stew were at one point sexually intimate. And the two men live very much like an old married couple. Indeed, Via paints a picture of domesticity between the pair; Stew customarily makes Sunday breakfast for Colin, Stew relies on Colin’s career advice, and the two men order Chinese take-out and watch baseball games at Colin’s apartment.

When Tee (Bjorn DuPaty) enters their lives, the issue of age disparity in homosexual relationships comes to light. Colin is flattered by Tee’s fanaticism over his work as a columnist, eventually feeling a strong sexual attraction for him. When their relationship becomes sexual, Stew teases Colin for dating someone so young. Meanwhile, Tee is keeping a secret from Colin that, once revealed, leaves the audience contemplating the age dynamic in homosexual relationships between men of disparate ages. Again, what does it mean to be a daddy?

In another career, Dan Via would have made a good lawyer: his playwriting is careful to avoid taking a stance or delivering answers. Instead, he slyly presents us with balanced arguments—like that of the legalization of gay marriage—and allows the audience to judge. At the same time, by keeping the focus on human interests, he keeps the show emotional, approaching the “morality” of homosexuality in a new and provocative way. With solid performances and clever writing, Daddy inspires thought without overwhelming the audience and surprises us without a hint of banality.

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Daddy (95 minutes without intermission)
TBG Arts Center Mainstage Theater (312 West 36th Street, 3rd fl.)
Tickets: $18 (http://www.smarttix.com or 212-868-4444)
Performances: Through February 13, 2010

A Doll's House

Anthony Castellano writes, directs and produces a flawed production of Henrik Ibsen’s “A Doll’s House.” Although this modern adaptation is promising, it suffers from poor writing and direction, failing to leave the kind of impact Castellano intends.


Reviewed by Nicole C. Lee

A modern adaptation of Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House sounds like a good idea. Anthony Castellano sets his in a 1958 New England town, in an attempt to contextualize the setting for a contemporary American audience.

By setting the play on the cusp of the Feminist Revolution, Castellano makes A Doll’s House speak more directly toward the constrictive nature of marriage on women. Nora (Jessica Cermak) is the ideal 1950s housewife and mother to husband Torvald (Perri Yaniv). Cermak’s portrayal of Nora is complicated, and at times, annoying. Throughout the first act, Nora is whimsical, bubbly, and materialistic. She hides the macaroons that she likes to indulge in when Torvald isn’t looking. She seeks his love and affection, sweetening him up to ask for money and favors. All of this paints a picture of Nora as a cheerful and obsequious child. But things are about as subtle and sudden as on a soap opera. In the second act, Nora suddenly shifts from seeking her husband’s love and approval to vehemently hating him.

Castellano has kept the essential moments and plot points of Ibsen’s original (Nora has borrowed money from Nils Krogstad to save Torvald’s life; widowed friend Christine seeks a job from Torvald; and Dr. Rank secretly loves Nora). He even tries to colloquialize the language in his script to naturalize and contemporize the dialogue. But what ends up happening is a feeling of distance by the actors from their lines; we never feel like the actors are committed to the things they are saying. Again, like a soap opera it’s just a conveyance from plot point A to plot point B, and it’s made worse by the lack of chemistry, their poor timing, and constant line flubbing. At least a soap opera can reshoot a scene; live, it turns realism into farce. The show also drags, making one wish for a comfy couch and a fast-forward button.

Thankfully, the second act is much more exciting than the first. The best moment in the show is when Nora confronts Torvald about treating her like a doll in his perfect house. It’s the perfect time for Cermak to come alive: at last she’s realistic and believable. All of the ridiculousness and annoyance that surrounded her in the first act is ameliorated by this new, fully conscious and socially aware Nora. Castellano’s plan connects, too, as the gender construct of marriage in the 1950s comes to light! It justifies, if only slightly, Cermak’s earlier portrayal of Nora. Even if Cermak chose to portray Nora with the intent of highlighting her transformation, this decision—and the audience’s realization of it—arrives a little too late. By this time, the audience is ready to high-tail it right out of the theater with Nora.

A Doll’s House has its moments; particularly during lines that bring the motifs of Ibsen’s work to life. At one point, Nora says, “It is much easier to be a man than a woman.” During their argument, Torvald tells his wife, “Appearance is everything,” to which Nora responds with the line, “I must think for myself.” These lines clearly reflect Hip Obscurity’s mission to explore modern, relevant issues.

The original play condemns the traditional gender roles in 19th-century marriage. This production seeks to make the play more relevant by setting it in the equally rigid environment of The United States in the 1950s. But this amendment isn’t enough. With further development and writing revisions, A Doll’s House could be a wonderfully provocative production that confronts issues of gender we still face today. As it stands, Castellano’s poor direction is only further hindered by a lackluster cast.


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A Doll’s House (approximately 2 hours, including one 10-minute intermission)
American Theatre of Actors (314 W54th Street, between 8th and 9th Avenues)
Tickets: $18; $15 for students (http://www.brownpapertickets.com)
Performances concluded on January 24, 2010

Rough Sketch

Shawn Nacol’s new play Rough Sketch takes place in a cartoon studio over Christmas break where two coworkers strive to complete segments for an overdue, over-budget film. Shocked to find the other had the same idea to forgo holiday celebrations and come into the office instead, the characters alternate between ignoring each other, guarding their assignments to prevent plagiarism, and reaching out in tender moments for companionship.

Reviewed by Amanda Halkiotis

It’s Christmas Eve and the work studio at Doodle Ranch productions has officially closed its doors for the week-long break, including dimming the lights and turning off the heat. This doesn’t stop two of its employees however. One wants to get a head start on finishing the animated film Coffee Beanies, and the other just didn’t have anywhere to go for the holidays. Barbara (Tina Benko) enters the office with a bag full of necessary provisions for a working bender: bottled water, vitamins, instant hot soup, and meal replacement bars. Dex (Matthew Lawler), on the other hand, hears Barbara’s actions and crawls out from under his workspace where he has been asleep, a wasteland of empty soda cans and junk food wrappers.

Nacol’s script relies mostly on insider knowledge of the animation industry, such as computer graphics and technology, or the reel-editing machinery referred to only as “the tank”, which often loses audiences and creates long, anticlimactic scenes. What brings it back are the passionate performances of Lawler and Benko, whose frenetic chemistry of worrying about their personal lives one minute and arguing over Walt Disney’s rose-colored worldview the next, maintains the play’s overall momentum.

As Barbara, a tall, no-nonsense blonde, Benko has an air of confidence and authority with a monotone and factual line delivery, rivaling Julianne Moore in The Big Lebowski. As the token computer geek to Dex’s old-school approach of hand sketches, Nacol gives Barbara the brunt of the script’s technical jargon. Nacol has also made her the straight woman to play off Dex’s unobtrusive optimism. After hurried and rough sex Barbara retreats from the encounter (and Dex’s embrace) with detached perspective; she complains the endorphin release caused by orgasm will now make her sleepy and unable to work, and comments on hers and Dex’s pheromone reaction.

Lawler’s character, Dex, in turn is underdeveloped. As a pudgy, middle-aged divorcee who lives off the working vending machine onstage, he mainly putters around stage looking for distractions and ways to procrastinate. He spreads out on the floor and lies on his belly to doodle, for example, or plays with one of the many toys nearby. Despite such a simple character, Lawler brings everything he can to the table, from spontaneous, stuttering outrage when he can’t stand Barbara’s obnoxious behavior anymore to a vulnerable near-breakdown when discussing his relationship with his daughter.

Director Ian Morgan uses the tiny stage in a black box theater to implement the lack of privacy between Dex and Barbara, an all-too-relatable feeling for anyone familiar with cubicle life. Amith A. Chandrashaker’s lighting design also plays well off the black box framework, using the darkness and shadows to give a sense of time passing and midnight oil burning away through chronic fade-ins and fade-outs. Brightening up the stage is set designer Peter R. Feuchtwanger, whose whimsical and inventive approach litters it with action figures, stuffed animals, and posters of big goofy cartoons. A stunning and sobering behind-the-scenes portrayal of the cartoon industry with a heartfelt undercurrent that looks into the life of lonely workaholics and single dads, Rough Sketch makes the final cut.

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Rough Sketch (Two hours; one 10-minute intermission)
59E59 Theaters (59 East 59th Street)
Tickets (www.ticketcentral.com): $18
Performances (through 1/31): Fri-Sat. @ 8:30pm; Sun. @ 3:30pm.

Radio Star

The year is 1941 and weekly radio suspense detective narratives have their listeners hooked. Written in classic style with schlocky, self-aware flair, Tanya O’Debra’s Radio Star is a thrilling throwback that lets modern audiences see a one-woman radio show.

Reviewed by Amanda Halkiotis

Though Tanya O’Debra merely sits on a barstool placed center stage, she winningly brings all the characters of this riotous, original show to life. Radio Star is a playful spoof on classic radio-drama noirs, so her fun-loving and colorful performance complements the witty and fast-paced script, glamorizing and dramatizing the genre without taking it too seriously. O’Debra slips in and out of characters with deftness and ease, playing all the characters with equal accuracy and devotion, creating voices, vocabularies, and overall oddities for each of them, bringing a contagious energy to each role.

The plot follows the basic hard-boiled detective formula: a woman hires a private eye to find her husband’s murderer. While this premise never sways from boilerplate predictability, O’Debra’s knack for comedic writing and timing keeps audiences entertained. Littering the script with period slang like kitten, angel, and doll, O’Debra also pushes the envelope with offbeat analogies and puns. When the story’s hero, Detective McKittrick, meets his client Fanny LaRue for the first time, he tells her “You have the face of an angel. Or an exotic prostitute.” Later on, after McKittrick comes up short from a dead-end tip, he laments that the informer “was about as useful as a fishnet condom.” With each character, she makes full use of the sharp, fearless writing, resulting in a candid, eye-catching performance.

The entire production is set up to be a radio recording, and O’Debra does nothing to hide this. She reads the script from a music stand in front of her, but not because she needs it; the stand helps set the ambience of a 1940s radio studio, and validates O’Debra’s radio star status. She keeps her focus on the script instead of the audience, and captivates the entire house from the first line. This sheer involvement in her own narrative makes her a true radio star and master storyteller, who knows both comedy and acting, and performs it all on her terms and in her words.

This is not a live tape recording or otherwise listless staged reading of a script, but a vivid reenactment of a thrilling detective story brought to life through a classic, pre-television form of entertainment that many modern audiences have never had the privilege of witnessing. There is no awkward hesitation when turning a page or switching characters, and she does a great job of projecting past the music stand, even when talking out of the side of her mouth as Lucifer, an oozing, Igor-esque manservant, or lowering her voice to a suspicious whisper as McKittrick tries to put all his clues together. A plugged nose gives away a prudish, cautious secretary character, for example, and whenever anyone smokes they receive a full-body miming of the action, including a bent inward elbow, puckered lips, and an extension of the index and forefinger.

In addition to O’Debra’s stunning array of offbeat characters, physical idiosyncracies, and corresponding voices, there’s also a Foley artist, J. Lincoln Hallowell, Jr. Among his many prop-based sound effects are a wooden box to simulate an opening or closing door, scrap cardstock which he rips every time a character strikes a match to light a cigarette (they only smoke Iron Lung, the radio show’s corporate sponsor), and has a pair of tap shoes which he clicks in heel-toe syncopation as our hero walks his beat or heads home, or provides a lighter tread as LaRue enters and leaves McKittrick’s office. Also adding to the noir affect is an original score by Andrew Mauriello, a perfect final appeal to our auditory senses. A blearing, smoky saxophone helps set up a scene on a rain-soaked street, for example, or a soft brush against cymbals create a subtle fadeout as McKittrick calls it a night and heads home. With its innovative concept and visual, descriptive script, Radio Star is a goofy take on the classic detective tale, brimming with vulgar tongue-in-cheek humor and colorful characters.

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Radio Star (one hour; no intermission)
The Red Room (85 East Fourth Street)
Tickets(www.smarttix.com or 212-868-4444): $15; Students and Seniors $12
Performances (through 2/20): 2/13 @ 8pm; 2/18-2/20 @ 8pm

This Fable is Intended for You: A Work-Energy Principle

The World Financial Center Winter Garden has been invaded with volunteers interconnected by handmade rope from secondhand fabric. This Fable is Intended for You: A Work-Energy Principle, a conceptual movement piece by the mixed-media artist MK Guth, strives to depict the relationship between exertion and productivity in New York City. Not unlike hard work itself, the intention has been lost in the execution, leaving little representation of the original effort or idea.



Reviewed by Amanda Halkiotis

For most of this past fall, MK Guth could be seen with her assistant through the display window of a vacant flower shop in the Financial District accepting used clothing from nearby residents and commuters, and unraveling the fabric to store as threads later to be braided into rope. This was the first phase of a three-piece modern art exhibit, This Fable is Intended for You: A Work-Energy Principle. Since the fall, the braided rope has been transported into the mezzanine level of the World Financial Center Winter Garden, counting as phase two of the art exhibit. Here, visitors can see the ropes on display in various forms and settings, as well as watch a five-minute “making of” video at the entrance to the exhibit.

For the final phase of the exhibit, Guth has choreographed a conceptual movement performed by 24 volunteers wearing backpacks that hold sixty-six feet of rope each, allowing them to expand and contract within the space, and each other. The performance is done in real time, with slow, methodical movement cued by monotone trumpet blasts by musician Gus Baum from atop the Garden’s marble staircase. Guth designed the concept around the architecture of the Winter Garden, a large, glass-walled atrium supported by marble pillars with a cylindrical, low staircase in the center.

Entertaining at first, the slowness of the pace soon settles in, and the lagging, apathetic volunteers never change their demeanor. The highlight here is more the concept and less the movement, as Guth’s recreation of the Garden’s geometric shapes works well and has interesting affects. At one point the volunteers stand in a semicircle curve along the perimeter of the lower staircase before expanding in opposite directions to close the gap and form an entire circle. From there they move onto the giant palm trees in the center of the foyer; they lay their ropes down in straight lines to create a grid between each tree.

For the most part, however, these movements shift very slowly and do not blend into each other. It looks more like a live-action stop-motion piece than a modern art conceptual movement. While doing a good job of imitating the space’s silence and elegance, it does little to translate the long hours spent to create the rope or design the piece. For a fast-paced city that never sleeps, the metaphor created in This Fable Is Intended For You: A Work Energy Principle to reflect its cycle of productivity just doesn’t work hard enough.

Little Gem

Buried family secrets and revelations bubble to the surface in this inter generational family drama.

Reviewed by Ilana Novick

Little Gem is the story of three generations of women in the Neville family in Dublin, Ireland, each at a different turning point in their lives—Amber, a suddenly pregnant 19-year-old; Amber’s mother, Lorraine, who is trying to cope with being left by her husband (eight years ago); and Amber’s grandmother, Kay, whose husband is slowly dying. Though they occupy the same set—a living room that doubles as a things like nightclubs, pubs, and cemeteries—there is no dialogue. Instead, a spotlight illuminates each woman and her chair, allowing quick snaps between the 18 intertwined monologues of the show. But Little Gem is far more just a series of speeches, and the actresses still have plenty of chemistry, with each scene domino-effecting the next. Reactions, not interactions, are what provide the stakes, suspense, and our emotional investment.

These actresses are great storytellers, too: oh, to have been a fly on the wall at the holiday party where Lorraine (Hilda Fay) attempts to keep herself together after a very public battle with a customer. Fay is touching and hilarious, and she carries a lot of history in her body, from those tense shoulders to her wide eyes, which show the strength to blink back tears or the glimmer of hope as her fortunes turn.
As Amber, Sarah Greene provides substance to the tan surface, displaying both the bravado and fear of a girl suddenly swamped with responsibility. Though Amber tries to simply coast through her days as a receptionist (in order to fund her vodka, cocaine, and deadbeat boyfriend habits), and gossips frivolously, Greene reveals the fear and the longing underneath the posturing.

However, Anita Reeves, who plays Kay, turns out to be the most heartbreaking and hilarious, speaking with stark clarity about the uncomfortable itch she’s had since her husband’s stroke and subsequent lack of physical attention. Seeing her reenactment of shopping for her first vibrator is embarrassing (to her), but given Reeves’s strength, also strangely liberating. Meanwhile, her dedication to small moments, like hugging the bedsheets on her first night after her husband’s funeral, is simply heart-wrenching.

Little Gem’s greatest strength is in the way that the lives of these three individual women seem universal for all women. Don’t all families, women in particular, engage in a kind of reverse backstabbing ? Being much more loving towards women may not be able to communicate with one another, but in working out how to cope with life in the aftermath of death, birth, and new romance, these women reveal plenty about themselves and nature of female relationships to the audience.


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Little Gem (70 minutes, no intermission)
Flea Theater
Closed.

A British Subject

As part of the Brits Off Broadway Festival at 59E59 Theaters, a beautifully produced play shines a harsh light on how effortlessly modern politics can wreck the lives of those that it finds inconvenient.



Reviewed by Ryan Max

The great irony of international politics is how effortlessly it can destroy the people it is, in theory anyway, intended to protect. Lives are wrecked between all those press conferences and handshakes and in A British Subject, the multi-talented Nichola McAuliffe has written and acted in a gripping (and true) portrayal of one man's fight to stop the geopolitical gears from grinding yet another person into dust.

The man at risk of being lost here is Mirza Tahir Hussain, a dual British and Pakistani citizen. In 1988, the then 18 year old Hussain was jailed for killing a cab driver in self-defense while visiting family in Pakistan. By the time any Western press outlets notice Hussain's plight, he has been on death row for 18 years. Don Mackay, a journalist for England's The Daily Mirror (and husband of McAuliffe), flies to Pakistan out of professional obligation but becomes obesessed with telling Hussain's story and winning his freedom.

Maybe it's a given that Don Mackay would be painted as a sympathetic character, seeing as his wife wrote the play, but Tom Cotcher's portrayal still works perfectly to get the audience behind his quest to free Hussain from prison. He is easily identifiable for a Western audience as a stand in for the average apathetic observer: glib, sarcastic, and numb to the horror stories that flood the media.

It is only when he meets Hussain face to face, in the play's riveting centerpiece, that Mackay's feelings shift. After he artfully gains access to interview Hussain--the first journalist to even attempt the feat in his 18 years on death row--Kulvinder Ghir, the actor who plays Hussain, gives a performance of languid motions and whispers that cut straight to Mackay's heart.

What allows the play to be engrossing, funny, and heartbreaking all at once is the near-perfect production. Lighting and sound are crafted for maximum effect, but restrained enough to skitter on the edge of melodrama without surrendering to it. A striated square of harsh light with a background of faintly buzzing flies transports the audience seamlessly from, say, the stuffy British ministry offices to Hussain's Pakistani prison cell.

In Hussain’s cell, the background sounds of traffic and honking that washed over the stage when Mackay was outside on the street fade, and the low buzzing of flies in the prison slowly gives way to a crushing silence. Hussain's words are so soft and slow, and the absence of any other sound so striking, that the audience becomes painfully aware of its own noise. Coughs and wheezes (it's winter in New York) become deafening as Hussain details the horrors of his life in prison. The effective restraint in tech and performance also extends to the dialogue: Hussain doesn't speak in easy prison cliches such as the stench, or beatings, or boredom. Instead, he explains how they can't even play chess anymore, because "with nothing else to do, people cannot bear to lose."

The second half of the play, dominated by Mackay's passionate campaign to publicize Hussain's plight, struggles to match the first half's breathless pace and palpable tension. At times it does, like when Mackay's wife (a role which has McAuliffe playing herself) shouts at someone explaining that “at least” Hussain’s execution isn’t until New Year's Eve: "While you're singing Auld Lang Syne, he'll be evacuating his bowels at the end of a rope."

That the play fails to wring any real drama out of the quest to free Hussain can be partially attributed to the facts of the story: the efforts took place mostly in Britain, mostly between people who weren’t in as desperate (or interesting) situations as Hussain himself. Transitions between scenes may still be seamless, but the locations to which they transport the audience are hardly worth visiting. Absent the tension of the first half, focus is drawn to the play's weaker themes, such as the relative merits of faith and reason, prayer and action as a means to spring Hussain. When these limp themes take center stage, it’s akin to the background sounds becoming the main dialogue, and it’s an odd position that the second half puts you in: wishing you were back in prison with Hussain.


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A British Subject (75 minutes; no intermission)
59E59 Theaters (59 East 59th Street)
TICKETS: $35
PERFORMANCES (through Jan. 3; no performances Jan 1): Tue 7:15, Wed-Fri 8:15 (except 12/31 @ 7:15), Sat 2:15 & 8:15, Sun 3:15 & 7:15

The Great Recession

The recession has affected everyone differently, and each outcome gives way to a story to be shared. Almost ironically, the Flea Theater has seized this as an opportunity to commission six playwrights to write short plays about the recession so far. Running from surreal and silly to schlocky and safe, the evening is half successful, with only three playwrights taking a big enough risk.


Ronald Washington and Amy Jackson in "Severed"

Reviewed by Amanda Halkiotis

The Flea Theater has commissioned six playwrights to create individual shorts on their take on the economic crisis, entitled The Great Recession. The evening consists of lots of silence, a few laughs, but mostly awkward moments where the playwrights’ try too hard to be witty or relatable, only to make no connection with the audience at all. The exception lies when the playwright and director work together to create identify conflict and struggle in which to override any generic thematic structure. This only accounts for half of the production, however, and the back-and-forth of stark, memorable drama to predictable setups make the evening imbalanced. The anthology lacks coherence and tie-ins from piece to piece, losing something a little each time, and not quite ever gaining it back.

Starting the lineup is “Classic Kitchen Timer” written and directed by Adam Rapp, in which a young woman, Sarah Ellen Stephens (Lucy Norwood,) leaves her hometown to take part in a “social experiment” which, if completed, results in a grand prize of $25,000. Sarah begins to reveal the underlying conditions as she gets interviewed by the evening’s Host (Nick Maccarone). Her subdued responses and ensuing serious, lingering beats imply her concerns about the arrangement go beyond monetary reward. Norwood portrays Sarah with steely eye contact and a trembling, fearful delivery that leaves chills and builds tension and Maccarone, an eerie clown in white powder, red lips, and suspenders, engages the audience with the same congenial-yet-creepy demeanor he later extends to Sarah, generating both anticipation and fear. Rapp’s thirst for drama shows in his writing, and the situation he constructs here does a great job of combining personal ethics with financial constraints.

In the next play, “Fucked”, written by Itamar Moses and directed by Michelle Tattenbaum, a young couple, Cindy (Jessica Pohly) and Reed (Dorien Makhloghi,) squabble over a vacation funded by Reed’s father. This premise never gets off the ground, however: Pohly’s performance remains stuck in whiny melodramatic girlfriend gear and Makloghi, as Reed, remains apathetic and unresponsive, with halted, detached line delivery. “New York Living” by Thomas Bradshaw follows closely to Moses’ lead with even less success. Bradshaw’s characters lament about the recession in another modern New York setting, but again do not react as if truly affected. Jeff (Raúl Sigmund Julia,) an actor with a trust fund has had relationship trouble with his fiancée Jen (Morgan Reis,) and he redirects his emotions towards his costar Adrian (Anna Greenfield) in a play directed by David (Andy Gershenzon). This clunky and poorly-coordinated love rectangle never develops depth or dimension, relying instead on pulp dialogue and outlandish quick fixes to the problems at hand.

Erin Courtney balances out such a shaky intro with her play “Severed”. Under Davis McCallum’s direction, young, optimistic job-seekers perform interview-style monologues in the hopes of scoring a new gig. McCallum’s sincerity for her subject shows through and through, and never crosses the line to become preachy or moralistic (the characters don’t mention the recession at all). In addition, “Severed” has an amusing subplot that allows actress Amy Jackson to shine as a hungover daycare supervisor on her morning commute. Out of the fifty-something actors in The Great Recession, Jackson by far proves the most delightful with her smiley, giddy, and goofy performance. She knows how to cast it out for big laughs, but also how to reel it in and replace it with just as entertaining sass and sarcasm.

Also notable is Sheila Callaghan’s “Recess” in which eleven people share a one-room apartment refugee-style, relying on government authorization for everything from food rations to basic utilities, living without walls, telephones, internet or even proper clothing. Out of desperation and frustration these characters retreat and isolate themselves and then reach a point of hysteria before turning on each other. With its stark, terse writing and Kip Fagan’s brilliant staging and directing, Recess resonates with extreme drama and shock factor, surpassing all the other shorts.

“Recess” proves a tough act to follow, and “Unum” by Will Eno with director Jim Simpson leaves the entire evening on a low note. Set in an obscure American town where mortgage interest rates soar and money keeps getting printed by mint factory workers, the drama Eno tries to set up never catches. Instead, each dialogue exchange sags by unmotivated, unconvincing actors, and the generic complaints of tough economic times pile on, from job losses to the rise in healthcare costs. This effect of echoed, regurgitated jargon about unemployment and poverty feels strained and rehashed, and doesn’t do much to entertain and enlighten. While it does have its moments, The Great Recession by the Flea Theater plays it too safe to really hit home and resonate with the audience.

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The Great Recession (2 hours; one 5-minute intermission)
The Flea Theater (41 White Street)
Tickets: $25
Performances (through 12/30): Mons.-Weds. @ 7pm, 10pm; Sats. @ 3pm, 7pm, 10pm; Suns. @ 3pm.

She Like Girls

‘Tis the season for cheery performances but if you are looking for something different these holidays, She Like Girls is about as far from The Rockettes as you can get. Inspired by a true story, Chisa Hutchinson’s play about a teenage girl and her first… girlfriend is honest, emotional, and – quite simply – well written.

Reviewed by Amanda Cooper

The fact that the main character – Kia Clark – is killed at the end of the play is no secret. On the playbill is an abstract image of a young woman getting shot (plus all the publicity makes mention of the true story that inspired this production). The drama here is not from the element of surprise, but from the inevitable.

She Like Girls is told from the perspective of a teenage girl who finds that she has fallen for a classmate. Whether watching scenes from her inner-city high school or getting glimpses of her hormonally driven dreams, we are made to sympathize with her struggle. Ironically, throughout the play it is Kia who seems to have it easy – we watch others deal with sickness, abuse, and even hate crimes – but in the end it will be Kia who will be hit the hardest.

The performers all come across as age-appropriate, and admirably embody their roles. They’re not “polished” performers, but that roughness jibes with the production’s content and aesthetic—urban teenagers struggling with their sexual identities. Special mention must go to Karen Eilbacher as Kia, who has clearly brought her character’s inner struggle to the outside.

What stays with the audience, however, is Hutchinson’s writing. She may still be growing as a playwright- similar to the actors—but her modest writing stirs up emotions and doesn’t patronize. What, I wonder, will transpire from her inspirations in the future.

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She Like Girls
Working Man's Clothes
Ohio Theatre (66 Wooster Street)
www.theatermania.com ($25)
Through December 30
photo by Michael Mallard

Seven in One Blow

With Seven in One Blow, Axis Theater Company has rewritten a classic Brothers Grimm tale (of a boy who kills seven flies in one swat and goes on to perform fearless feats) for a modern, child-friendly audience. In doing so, however, they’ve traded satire and irony for a watered-down, happy-go-lucky version.


Jim Sterling, Lynn Mancinelli, Brian Barnhart in Seven in One Blow / Photo by Dixie Sheridan

Reviewed by Amanda Halkiotis

In the Brothers Grimm version of “Seven in One Blow,” a young boy kills seven food-stealing flies in a single blow. He makes a belt to boast of this accomplishment and seeks his fortune with his newfound bravery and cunning, unaware that everyone he meets assumes he has killed seven men. In the Axis Theater Company’s annual production, they have traded in all the satire and irony for a sappy version marketed to young children right before Christmas.

Randy Sharp’s new script and lively, cheerful direction, now features an androgynous female heroine, Kid (Lynn Mancinelli), who sports a cropped pixie haircut and a rough-and-tumble costume of work boots, navy khakis, and suspenders. After fashioning her belt, she leaves home— not to seek her fortune so much as to flee her workaholic, inattentive parents. What follows grows increasingly cheesy: the conversion of a materialistic king, QK (David Crabb), and his daughter, Princess Fartina the Beautiful (Britt Genelin), into thoughtful and considerate rulers; the calming of an angry Pea (Laurie Kilmartin) thanks to the children in the audience shouting out their love for the vegetable.

The script’s attempt to engage a young audience with its goofy cast of characters and simplified storyline emphasized by small sentences (most of which start with gee and end in gosh) comes across as a cop out—worse, as something purely commercial. The most audience-grabbing part of the play has nothing to do with the story, but with what the actors do with their one-dimensional characters, and the masterful crew behind all the bells and whistles.

In true children’s story fashion, the principal villains outshine the protagonist in personality and presence, and here the first to do so is Ogre (Jim Sterling). Stomping onstage with a bellow and a growl, Sterling terrifies and amuses at the same time, and like most ogres, makes up for his overwhelming brawn by being gleefully outsmarted. The Witch (Spencer Aste), serves the same purpose from an entirely different angle. Perfecting a falsetto screech and bob-and-weave leer all over the stage, Aste epitomizes a creepy old woman with his hunched-over demeanor and all-black ensemble. The Scarlet Pimpernell (producing director Brian Barnhart), though not a villain, is also a delight. Fretting and flitting about with a proper British accent, the Scarlet Pimpernell yearns for unconditional friendship despite his shaky personality, and Barnhart’s genuine, passionate performance warms up the entire production. The narrator (Marc Palmieri) also smooths out the play’s choppiness. His old-school Brooklyn accent gets so animated—as does Palmieri, always playing to the curious young audience—that plot holes are ignored in favor of audience participation.

Costume designer Elisa Santiago provides most of the play’s childlike wonder, with archetypal choices that help the audience recognize a Witch or an Ogre while still giving these images a creative twist, such as linebacker shoulder pads, bald wigs, and bucktoothed gap teeth. This works especially well with the traditional fairytale garb of capes, sashes, vests and boots, creating comical, cartoonish costumes without going overboard. Lighting and sound designers David Zeffren and Steve Fontaine work together with marvelous results, such as the blazing red and white light show when Ogre tries to kill Kid or the goofy gunshots QK fires into the air. Seven in One Blow isn’t the most memorable bit of children’s theater, but it does serve the purpose of a perfect holiday treat: sugary and colorful enough to be enjoyed in the moment.

Snow White

Snow White is a dance-theater show, part of Company XIV’s Apple Trilogy. A baroque-infused mix of opera, dance, and theater, adults and children alike will be delighted with this interpretation of a classic fairytale. Director and choreographer Austin McCormack presents this stunning production, which showcases the talent of Company XIV’s repertory performers.




Reviewed by Nicole C. Lee


We often forget the dark nature of many classic fairytales. The Big Bad Wolf wants to eat Little Red Riding Hood, and is later hacked to death by a hunter. Hansel and Gretel encounter a witch who wants to eat them, and they escape by trapping her in her own oven. In Snow White’s case, her wicked stepmother finds new ways to try and kill her, so that she can be the fairest woman in the land. Company XIV’s production of Snow White is no different: creator, director, and choreographer Austin McCormack has turned from the darkness to the visually stunning, using a delightful collection of dance, opera, puppetry. and theater to do so. The show is guided by Nick Fesette, who doubles as the show’s narrator and huntsman. Influenced by McCormack’s baroque dance training, Snow White showcases both classic ballet and modern dance.


The eclectic mix of music becomes an important character, too. (Ella Fitzgerald, Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Louis Armstrong, and Alexander Glazunov are just some of the artists and composers that inspire the dances.) For instance, Charites, a baroque opera trio, provides the voice—a mellifluous and penetrating three-part harmony—of the Queen’s magic mirror, a fantastic choice for a fantastical object. A remixed version of the “Immigrant Song” enhances the guise of the Queen as a Russian seamstress—one of several ruses she uses to kill Snow White. Fun and invigorating, this range of styles showcases the immense talent of Company XIV. At times, the music drowns out some lines, but it’s hard to criticize that: it’s such an essential part of the show.


303 Bond Street looks to have been a garage converted into a performance space, and yet Company XIV has made it into an intimate black box. A translucent curtain provides a cleverly designed set that illuminates the puppetry of the seven dwarves and dance movement.


It is easy to be swept away by the dances in Snow White. In one scene, Snow White is wandering in the forest, lost and subjected to heavy snowfall. What follows is an elaborate dance featuring Snow White and three performers dressed in white—personifying the snow—intermingling and pushing Snow White around. It would be enough of a compliment to say that Company XIV’s production feels like a Disney movie being played out on stage, but it’s worth going further with praise: McCormack’s Snow White is a vivid and unique interpretation of a classic fairy tale.



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Snow White, part of The Apple Trilogy (60 minutes, no intermission)
303 Bond Street (between Sackett and Union Streets in Brooklyn, NY)
Tickets: $20 for adults, $15 for children and seniors (www.smarttix.com)
Performances: December 19, 20, 27 and January 2, 3, 9, 10, 16, 17 @ 3PM

No Exit

Turtle Shell Theater’s revival of No Exit by Jean-Paul Sartre is a refreshing take on a classic existential piece. Maintaining the play’s core essence with a period setting, director Robert Haufrecht nevertheless captivates a modern audience by establishing blood-curdling conflict between characters. The resulting effect is a haunting portrayal of how our thoughts and actions have the potential to seal our fate, with little hope of escape.

Geraldine Johns, Richard Hymes Esposito and Mihaela Mihut in No Exit

Reviewed by Amanda Halkiotis

Jean-Paul Sartre’s No Exit, originally performed in Paris in 1944 just before France’s release from German occupation, continues to chill audiences with its nihilistic exploration of eternal confinement. Three characters, all aware of their mortal ends and prepared to enter whatever comes next, are led into a drawing room with no windows, doors, and permanent electric lighting. Waited on by a man known only as Valet (Etienne Navarre), these characters soon realize the futility of their situation, causing panic and desperation. For these three, past transgressions have all led them to a similar fate, together with no chance of escape.

Once a political journalist disliked and ill-respected by his colleagues, Joseph Garcin (Richard Hymes Esposito) enters the room first. At first impressed by the living arrangement and then disappointed by the lack of torture devices or dingy furnishings, he poses petty complaints to the Valet. While noticing Garcin’s obvious ploy to both retrieve additional information and also request another man’s company, the Valet nevertheless responds only with glib absolutes that neither inform nor reassure before promptly leaving. In these exchanges Navarre embodies the seasoned, smug servant, and his stone-cold presence creates comic contrast against Garcin’s increasing concern.

Inez (Mihaela Mihut) arrives second, a postal worker who “doesn’t care much for men.” An Eastern European native, Mihut has no problem easing into a French accent with precise pronunciation and syllable emphasis. Her slow, raspy line delivery makes the entire production all the more demonic. Often adhering to stage blocking that gives the audience a right-side profile, the sharp lines of her face, messy-on-purpose chignon, and angular body language all add to her character’s strong, direct dialogue.

With a roommate like Inez, Garcin’s faltering masculinity has little room to hide, and Inez notices this trembling fear despite his barking denial. A brash, aggressive woman in riding boots, dark trousers, and ruffled blouse, Inez stomps across the stage eager to take in every detail and establish a sense of all-knowing and extreme preparedness. Garcin at first tries to assume authority by explaining the room’s layout and boasting of his early arrival, but Inez soon takes over as alpha dog. Matched against Mihut’s strong performance, Esposito’s whiny, nasal tone and shrinking stage presence gives homage to Garcin’s complex insecurities. No drop of Sartre’s infamous realism has been neglected among these two, who match wits, scream, and then retreat in silence to opposite ends of the stage.

The final guest arrives soon after. A slim, attractive woman who married well to provide for her younger siblings after being orphaned at a young age, Estelle (Geraldine Johns) trots onto the stage with an erect posture and a proper British accent. Her snobbish pride and icy body language are the only barriers between her two roommates in such closed quarters. Coveted by both Garcin and Inez, Johns’s portrayal of Inez evokes sympathy with her taut, thin red lips and trembling blue eyes. In an instant she composes herself and transitions into a somber monologue concerning her loveless marriage. With Estelle onstage to compound the social and behavioral clashes once more, questions concerning sin, dignity, courage, and sex soon unravel, spiking drama and causing the plot to climax.

In a play that renders sin with sin, Sartre has constructed an intricate and fascinating world of suffering with No Exit. Director Robert Haufrecht plays up character conflict and pushes the envelope further with a brutal focus on sexual subtext, from Inez’s orientation to Estelle’s and Garcin’s infidelity. Scene designer Craig M. Napoliello sets the tone with convincing Second Empire duvets and a warm salmon-pink room that gives a primary sense of comfort before trapping its inhabitants with a locked door. Eric Nightengale provides the perpetual brightness as the light and sound designer, incorporating a bleached starkness for confrontational scenes. This, along with soft music during flashbacks, creates a sense of vulnerability and longing among the despairing characters. A stunning social commentary on war, social status, and sexuality, No Exit is our ticket to hell. Enjoy the ride.

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No Exit (90 minutes; no intermission)
Turtle Shell Theater, Times Square Arts Center (300 West 43rd Street, 4th Floor)
Tickets (http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/85116): $20
Performances (through 12/6): Performances through 12/5 @ 8pm; Sunday 12/6 @ 6pm

Over the Line

Does anyone ever really study in study hall? The sharp, unabashed dialogue of P. Seth Bauer’s Over the Line makes you glad they don’t, and the strong, competent cast draws a clear picture of six teenagers struggling with adolescence in the New Millennium. However, the show’s second act is a disappointing derailment: all heavy-handed political subtext.

Amanda Dillard, Darren Lipari, Anwen Darcy, and Ivory Aquino in P.Seth Bauer's

OVER THE LINE at The Drilling Company.

Reviewed by Amanda Halkiotis

Anyone who remembers being (or raising) a teenager can relate to the characters in P. Seth Bauer’s new play, Over the Line. In a mainstream middle-class American suburb, these kids are given mindless chores, pointless homework assignments, and a slew of warnings from parents and teachers that include “don’t ask questions” and “wait until college.” Their resulting apathy and frustration get expressed through alcohol abuse in friends’ basements or sexual experiments in the backseats of cars.

Bauer’s ruthless writing keeps these characters gritty and real. They swear as a means of shocking one another, for example, and add cigarettes and condoms to an R-rated game of Spin the Bottle. The show revolves around Becky (Amanda Dillard), a sassy blonde who uses her own sex appeal as a weapon before it can be used back against her, and Noah (David Holmes), her pensive, intellectual sometimes-boyfriend. These actors impressively channel these manic, vulnerable teenagers, especially the expert and cunning Dillard, whose character never knows what she wants and so blames others for her agitated state. (Watch her blaze across stage fueled by high-powered angst or even just slumped in a chair, dripping with apathetic ennui.)

As Noah, Holmes plays off of Dillard with patient energy, adding a quiet depth to each scene. Often sitting or standing along the edge of the stage and speaking in soft, slow sentences, Holmes truly embodies the shy, smart boy in high school who thinks too much. Despite their differences, Becky and Noah gravitate towards each other through a mutual need for acceptance and understanding, exposing a tender underlying love story and offsetting the rest of the play’s screaming and profanity.

It’s actually too much drama to resolve, and that leads to an unbalanced second act full of improbable decisions and lame resolutions. The first act crafts relatable characters with true-life crises and believable, if destructive, coping methods; the second act makes them trite. Toward the end of the play, what was real is now bizarre, such as a valedictorian’s choice to join the army—in the middle of her commencement speech. To say nothing of Noah’s reaction to landing in juvenile prison: he takes delightful refuge in his solitude and discovers Kafka at the communal library.

With the loss of these genuine, touching lives, Bauer is no longer able to captivate the audience. Director Hamilton Clancy keeps the drama up, pushing the actors to retain the energy of disgruntled teenagers (who skip from of angst to glee in a heartbeat). The skilled supporting cast includes Anwen Darcy, Darren Lipari, Brendan Reilly and Ivory Aquino, all who make each scene count, be it their great comic timing or the so-real-it’s-chilling funk of a moody teenager.

Set designer Jen Varbalow completes the suburban Americana theme with an inventive take on the manicured green lawn and white picket fence, all painted directly onto the stage with harsh white lines pointing outwards from all four sides of the black box. She also uses wooden classroom chairs for all the scenes whether or not they take place in school, giving an impression of overbearing authority and the limited amount of escape allowed in such a small town. While not winning the audience over completely, when Over the Line sticks to what works and keeps from trying too hard, it does manage to strike a chord with all of us who survived high school and lived to tell the tale.

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Over the Line (2 hours; one 10-minute intermission)
The Drilling Company (236 West 78th Street)
Tickets (www.theatermania.com): $18
Performances (through December 6th): Thurs.-Sats. @ 8pm; Suns. @ 3pm; Final performance December 6th @ 6pm

New Theater Corps Hiatus

Everybody takes a vacation--for the next few weeks, like the last few, posting will be exceedingly light as staff takes some time off and prepares for the upcoming months.

Cross That River

Allan Harris’s new musical, Cross That River, sheds new light on the old story of the Wild West.

Reviewed by Ilana Novick

This isn’t your average pop-culture rendition, in which John Wayne and the Marlboro Man fight off Native Americans in the pursuit of the self-sufficient American way. But it’s also not an in-your-face rebuttal of those days; instead, it’s a gentle (perhaps too gentle) reminder—ranging songs from country to gospel—that there were other American heroes in that day.

In this case, the hero is Blue (Davis ), a Louisiana slave turned Texas cowboy. Encouraged by his surrogate mother, he flees the plantation and its stereotypically grim abuses (scenes that seem ripped right out of American History textbooks). Predictability doesn’t make it any easier to watch , nor do comic preachers, like Dat der Preacher (Tony Perry, who alternates well between high minded religiosity and outright lecher y). Effective performers—like Soara Joye Ross, who plays Blue’s surrogate mother—get us where it hurts, and her weary eyes and pursed lips sum up the pain of slavery far more than mere words on a page.

Like the basic plot, the songs are a bit stretched, too, milking that river-crossing metaphor for all its worth. (Yes, we get it; it’s the line between slavery and freedom.) However, the quick changes in musical styles, the molasses sweet accents, terrific dancing, and Davis’s rich baritone keep the first act lively. Harris also uses the space well: though the musicians take up most of the small stage, Harris’s narration (as the grown-up Blue) makes it seem more expansive.

Fewer tricks are needed once the story concentrates on Blue’s post-escape life. His childhood skill with horses helps him sign on at the Circle T Ranch of Old Sam Eye (an appropriately tough but loving Timothy Warmen), where, in exchange for food and shelter, he becomes an accomplished cowboy. Blue’s observations and songs about free life are fascinating. For instance, he talks about the irony of chasing and fighting Native Americans, when he too, not so long ago, was once considered just as second-class. Blue’s adult self’s interactions with his younger self (conveniently staged with the adult Blue as narrator) also add a touch of humor. When it’s finally time to ask for a salary for all of the tough physical labor, he glares at pushes his younger self (a sweet yet sly Brandon Gill ) towards his employer.

Rounding out the plot is the inevitable love interest. Annie Hutchinson (Wendy Lynette Fox), an orphan whom Blue meets while he’s cowboy-ing, is taking refuge from her job as a barmaid/whore. Hutchinson answered a personal ad that, following her parent’s death, that took her to a husband in Abilene Texas. She seeks freedom in the west, but women sadly, had more opportunities as barmaids and prostitutes than they did as cowgirls. Where Blue was able to escape slavery through his new life in the Wild West, Hutchinson comes all the way from Philadelphia to Texas, only to bondage in marriage.

Fox hints at this conflict, but the play could have been stronger if the irony was more explicitly mentioned . A few songs could be cut, too expository to be enjoyable, and maybe more exploration of the differences in opportunities for Annie and Blue as Blacks in the Wild West. Overall though, energetic cast, fun songs, and a new window into oft-explored period of American history.

The Traveling Players

The opening show of La Mama's 48th season, a play-within-a-play modern adaptation of Euripides' The Trojan Women by puppet savant Theodora Skipitares, makes for a visually impressive, if uneven, production.



Reviewed by Ryan Max

One by one, four enormous, gorgeous puppets rumble onto the stage. As each emerges at intervals throughout they play, she delivers a monologue detailing cruelties she has suffered, and then gives birth to a life-size puppet (strapped to an actor) that performs scenes from Euripides's The Trojan Women. The four giant puppets each represent a modern-day feminist: three from Africa and one, a young girl named Shamsia, from the Middle East. Shamsia's tale, which appeared in The New York Times earlier this year, is a harrowing one: on her way to school one day, bandits on motorcycles stop her and ask her if she is on her way to school and then spray her in the face with acid. Coming from a 13-foot-tall puppet, the monologue has an arresting and surreal sense of doom.

But her story also illuminates the serious pitfalls of hastily tying an ancient play with ripped-from-the-headlines vignettes. The Traveling Players, in its highly incongruous halves, fails to make a good case for its appropriation of Trojan Women. The monologues from the giant puppets and Euripides' tale are connected only very loosely: they are both about women being treated like dirt. With few other complementary aspects in the two pieces, little is gained from uniting the two in such an intimate theatrical space.

Deficiencies aside, the delights of the play—and there are many—are mostly visual. The lighting, alternating between stark, cold tones and warmer hues, is a gorgeous compliment to Theodora Skipitares’ hypnotic puppets. The life-sized puppets acting out The Trojan Women, affixed to actors wearing dark, full-body suits, are manipulated so gracefully they take on lives of their own. Hecuba, in particular, is entrancing as the fallen queen of Troy. And then there are Ms. Skipitares’ 13-feet-tall puppets, the stunning giants that sermonize about modern horrors faced by women. Their large, unwieldy nature relegates them to the background, but their looming presence is inescapable.

The play also attempts to integrate some more scattershot elements with varied success. The musical score, best described as "electro-tribal," provides a perfect atmosphere. An entertaining mini-play, acted out with small wooden puppets on sticks, tells the tale of a group of African women doing battle with the Chevron oil company. But a carnival barker that introduces each of the giant puppets before they roll out from backstage clashes with the solemn tone of the stories he sets up.

In the end the lack of purpose overwhelms the obvious skill and craftsmanship of the production. The very lyrical, deliberate cadences of the Greek play do not rest well alongside the more visceral, modern stories of the mistreatment of women in Africa and Afghanistan. When each monologue ends—by far the stronger half of The Traveling Players—and another sequence from The Trojan Women commences, it grows more and more difficult not to feel disappointed by the unnecessary and unimaginative portrayal of Euripides’ play. The friction between the play’s dual parts is exacerbated by its increasingly didactic scenes, like the one in which a woman in police custody cannot distinguish the stench of her own menstrual blood from that of a nearby animal carcass. But when the play ends and you just can’t shake those true-to-life monologues, it becomes clear that it is a rare case in which the facts outshine the legend.

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The Traveling Players (1 hour; no intermission)

The Annex at La MaMa ETC (66 East 4th Street)
Performances: Concluded October 25

23 Coins

23 Coins is a provocative and intense play about the lies blind faith allows - but the fire and brimstone themes are no easy fit for the cheery song and dance structure. Come with an open-mind, and be prepared to leave unsettled. Just don't expect to be humming any tunes on your way out.

Isaac Thigpen (played by Oliver Conant) and Gin Walker (played by Rebecca Lee Lerman) practice what they’ll preach in 23 Coins.

Reviewed by Cait Weiss

Take Dora the Explorer, place her in the Baptist south, introduce an evil pastor. Add music.

23 Coins is a bizarre, provocative and deeply unsettling new musical about religious corruption and mutated genomes. As you may guess, this is an ambitious show. The title refers to the idea that each of the 23 genes in our DNA is decided by the flip of a coin; it’s a 50-50 chance whether we inherit the chromosome from our mother or our father, and that chance can dramatically alter our entire life and the lives of those around us.

Set in New Orleans during Katrina (this is never explicitly stated, but we seem in the 21^st century and one character is killed in a storm’s flood), the show takes an unflinching approach to some very strong themes. We witness an admitted homosexual being sodomized by the preacher’s baton. We watch our preacher, Isaac Thigpen (compellingly played with both charisma and sadism by Oliver Conant) copulate with a clergyman’s disabled wife (played by Katie Labahn). We see our here-to-fore moral compass, Magic Parks (played by a deeply likeable Peter Quinones), let a woman die in the storm. These scenes are presenting without coddling and, often, without much warning. This is a rough world, and as the audience, we are compelled to witness this brutality. It is eye opening, but the view’s painful. Some things we’d rather not see.

We’re along for the ride, though, thanks to playwright and composer Mark Abrahams. He knows this isn’t the easiest material to digest, and so he sprinkles oddly gleeful songs throughout the action. Most songs function like the music on a Nikelodean kids’ show – introducing characters, blooming into ridiculous dance parties, and then, poof, disappearing back the real action at hand. While the lyrics can be compelling and evocative, the melodies are simplistic and uninteresting – and only the best singers in the cast even begin to justify the inclusion of music in this play. Rebecca Lee Lerman, playing the lead child, Gin Walker, has a voice that could stop any show – unfortunately, the song stopped the show first, grinding the action, character development, and audience engagement to a dead halt.

Still, 23 Coins is a show worth seeing. The musical numbers are few and far between, thank goodness, and the unsung dialogue is very strong. Much to its merit, 23 Coins takes a tired cliché (the old corrupted religious hypocrite leads his flock astray) and infuses the topic with such specific evil that the concept has fresh blood. For better or for worse, as we sit passively absorbing this action, watching trusted characters make questionable decisions and sing emotionally misplaced songs, that blood nearly ends up on our hands.

Mark Abrahams and directors Stephanie Barton-Farcas and Michelle Kuchuk sense our growing anxiety – as the end of the show approaches, the audience and the characters alike are asking, “How can this possibly end up alright?” Sadly, the answer lies in some extreme deus ex machina tricks. It turns out Gin Walker, at 9, knows all the secrets. It turns out she has contacts in universities working with DNA and genome therapy. It turns out the scientist ran a genetic test from the mother’s strand of hair. It turns out she doesn’t have the disease after all. It turns out the mother has been suffering from pseudo-seizures all along. It turns out the preacher is an extortionist caught – just at the right minute – by the law. It all turns out all right in the end. Abrahams seems to be saying, “See guys! This musical can too have a happy ending!”

Ridiculous, impossible, but better than having to believe that happiness itself is a coin toss. Better than having to believe that the adorable Gin Walker will be orphaned, abused and forgotten. Better than having to believe that homophobia, brutality, exploitation, and, yes, genetically inherited diseases not only exist but also thrive. 23 Coins takes the bad with the good – but I do wish the good were as full-blooded, as believable, and as compelling, as the bad. Without the unbelievable plot twists that end this otherwise insightful and compelling musical, the odds wouldn’t look too good for little Gin Walker. Dora the Explorer, though, might still do okay.

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23 Coins (2½ hours; 1 intermission)

The Spoon Theater, 38 West 28 Street, 5 Floor

Tickets [www.ovationtix.com/trs/cal/545 or 866-811-4111]

Performances [through 10/25]: Wed-Sat at 8pm; Sun at 2:30pm