A play about the effects of addiction on a family. It's a strange, dark journey into the depths of... something. This is therapeutic theater - even without the program note from the playwright, John J. Caswell, Jr. to his estranged (or deceased) father, you can tell Caswell was working through some shit here. And the staging is very original, provocative, and well-suited to the material, but it leaves the audience with too many questions and little satisfaction.
The play begins with a man (the father of the family, played by Julio Monge) menacingly lurching in place at the edge of the stage. He is slowly making his way down a dark street, but it feels like he's coming right at the audience in an unsettling and haunting opening scene that sets up an underlying eerie tone. Arturo Luís Soria plays Ricky, the brother who left home to escape the ghosts and confines of his family. He returns when his sister, Angelina (Ceci Fernández) reaches out to tell him that she will be getting an apartment of her own - to start her own life after years of taking care of their ailing father. Their brother Ron, played by Frankie J. Alvarez, is also in and out of the picture. The dynamic between the siblings is strained, but congenial - Ricky and Angelina seem much closer, especially since Ron overcompensates by throwing random homophobic barbs at Ricky. Amidst the children arguing about how to handle the future care of their frighteningly ill alcoholic father, there is something mysterious going on: allusions to dreams and nightmares, times in their childhood spent on the roof of the house, and the creepy family room that everyone avoids. In the pivotal scene, the family is transported from the roof (where the kids have followed a deranged Joe), to the family room... but rotated 90 degrees. We see the room from above with the family nestled into various positions and their mother hanging in the center from the ceiling fan, where she committed suicide years earlier on Christmas Eve. Suddenly Joe is lucid and their mother is revived; the parents answer questions, but little is resolved. Playwrights Horizons This is an excellent choice for a New York City Center Encores! production. A classic musical with beautiful songs, and a richly layered Dickensian plot that is well known to most. For this production, the orchestra was elevated on a platform above most of the action. Especially from our seat in the balcony, this made the musicians front and center - a nice framing for the scenes happening on the stage below.
Benjamin Pajak is perfectly cast as Oliver; his voice is unbelievable, easily reaching the rafters of the cavernous theater. Everyone else is good too, but nothing compares to Pajak singing "Where is Love?" Another standout number is "Who Will Buy?" which is sung beautifully by Pajak and a few members of the Company. I'm a big fan of Lilli Cooper, and she does a great job as Nancy, but it wasn't my favorite role for her; Cooper is a big, strong woman and I imagine Nancy as sleight and fragile with a hidden inner strength. And Raúl Esparza would not have been my first choice for Fagin, but he was fine... the worst part about his performance was his makeup and hair, which was oddly matted to his forehead in streaks, and his beard, which was barely there (at least from where I was sitting). His rendition of "Reviewing The Situation" was also weak and mumbled. I found myself drawn to watching the first violinist (incredible!) for most of the number. The show feels a little like it was on fast forward, and I think they cut some of the book - definitely a portion of Dodger's plot line - but the emphasis (as usual for Encores!) is on the songs. Each scene had just enough set up for the song, and I didn't mind at all. New York City Center An original musical with new arrangements of pop songs from the early 2000s (by the very prolific songwriter/producer Max Martin). The plot takes Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet and changes the ending to turn it into a feminist tale - albeit one that still centers on endless love triangles. This could have all gone horribly wrong, but somehow it doesn't. The show is very clever, taking well-known songs from Britney Spears, The Backstreet Boys, and so many more and changing the meanings to suit the plot in hilarious ways.
The first half of the show is excellent. The pacing is great and the novelty of hearing old songs in new ways is fresh and fun. Lorna Courtney is magnificent as Juliet - her voice is incredible and I found myself disappointed whenever others joined in to sing with her. Betsy Wolfe as Anne Hathaway puts on a wonderfully comedic performance, and so does Paulo Szot as Lance with his booming operatic baritone. The choreography throughout is great and the dancers are extremely talented. But the show falters after intermission. There is a lull in the plot, the songs are not as good, and the novelty has worn a bit thin. And in the end, despite her threats of living independently, Juliet falls back in with Romeo; Anne and William reconcile, and François and May are accepted by Lance for a "happily ever after" that wraps things up neatly. Stephen Sondheim Theatre A new musical based on the 2001 movie of the same name. The movie was not a musical, so all the songs are new in this production at St. Ann's Warehouse. The idea for this show is excellent - what could go wrong in creating a Bollywood-inspired musical about an Indian wedding? Turns out quite a lot.
From the start, the show had the feeling of a community theater production. The sound was off when I saw it, and it was difficult to hear the singers with the live instruments on both sides of the stage. The staging and direction is haphazard and there are way too many story lines intersecting. None of the songs are particularly memorable, and the dance scenes felt like rehearsal, or perhaps on par with an actual dance performance at a real Indian wedding (ie, non-professionals learning a dance for fun). The dialogue throughout is stilted and unnatural, but there are a few heartfelt moments. A few of the performers stood out above and beyond the rest: Sharvari Deshpande as the cousin (Ria Verma) is excellent, and Namit Das as the wedding planner (Dubey) hams its up and has some of the best scenes even though he's a side character. Salena Qureshi as the bride (Aditi Verma) has a beautiful voice, but zero chemistry with her beau. Shows at St. Ann's can be hit or miss, but usually break the mold in some experimental way. Unfortunately, this one missed the mark and also felt very traditional - not at all what I expected from a St. Ann's production. St. Ann's Warehouse Unable to cast her previous play with Native American actors to play the Native American characters, Larissa FastHorse decided to write a play about white people writing a Thanksgiving play (for children) and trying to figure out a way to represent Native Americans without having a white person play the part of a Native American. And so the play highlights the lack of representation in the industry by literally being about creating (or at least attempting to create) a play that lacks Native Americans... very meta.
The play is funny, and the cast has good chemistry overall. Katie Finneran plays the director, Logan, who had every intention of hiring a Native American actor to participate not only as an actor in the play, but also as a participant in the experiment of "devised" theater. She wants to ensure the play gives a voice to and "holds space" for the Native American perspective. Unfortunately, the actor she gets is D'arcy Carden, a white person with many different head shots to accommodate any ethnicity that might get her a role. On top of that, she's a true simpleton. Logan's over zealous desire to create a "woke" play in a safe space is the main joke here. And, of course, they do just the opposite. From a history lesson with the local teacher (played hilariously by Chris Sullivan) on the real stories of Thanksgiving to a scene with prop Native American heads flying around the stage (and an excessive amount of blood), not much is appropriate for children, and ultimately Logan decides that only by highlighting empty space (the space they are holding for the Native American perspective) can a group of white people tell this story on their own. The Hayes Theater |
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