Author: Joe

Theater critic based in New York City. This website contains reviews "from my seat" to share my experiences and thoughts to hopefully inspire you to see a play, musical or theater company you may not have known about.
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The Underlying Chris (Second Stage Theater)

There are playwrights who create new works that I feel compelled to see because their previous efforts has been so good and original.  Will Eno is one of them.  I’ve already encountered Thom Pain (based on nothing), Middletown, The Realistic Joneses and Wakey, Wakey.  The Underlying Chris is a terrific addition to that recommended list.

Mr. Eno seems to be an acquired taste.  Critics and audiences are not all on board.  I find his sense of humor to be the perfect kind of sarcastic observation.  Here is a line from this new play.  It shows up randomly and means nothing other than to elicit a laugh.  “We all know HOW aromatic candles are made but do we know WHY?”

The Underlying Chris is a play about a person who travels from birth to death.  In the first scene, a baby is in a crib.  The gender is not quite established.  (Oh no, is this going to be that sort of play?  Not to worry.)  Its mother is going to die in a car accident shortly.  This play is about the “moment that shapes a life and the people who shape a moment.”

Chris will age from a teenager to an old person in an assisted living facility.  “I’m dying of cake,” he states.  In an astonishing series of vignettes, all of the Chris incarnations will appear to show an unremarkable – and yet remarkable – life.  In one such segment, a young woman switches her sport of choice from diving to tennis.  Earth shattering?  No.  Real life?  Yes.

Throughout this play, Chris changes gender and race in each and every scene.  Names will vary such as Khris, Christine and Krista.  The clever conceit is clearly meant to show that our stories of life are universal.  This play takes the occasionally successful idea of colorblind and gender fluid casting and expands it to the writing itself.  Another layer of interest to enjoy.

Under Kenny Leon’s direction, the uniformly excellent (and beautifully modulated) cast flows through life’s largely familiar events.  The body is “a non-stop surprise party.”  As the underlying Chris ages, however, feelings seem to deepen as wisdom emerges.  An appreciation for the gift that is life emerges.  Chris realizes it is “quite an honor to be born.”  This is a tiny little play about slices of life that are as big as the concept of human existence.  Fantastic would be the adjective I would use to describe its impact when the final scene ends.

Unfortunately the play is being performed in the Off-Broadway house of Second Stage.  Regular readers might remember the obstructed view seating at Linda Vista earlier this season.  Unbelievably this theater company has done it again!  In the opening scene – and others – people sitting near me could not see the actors on stage.  How can one theater company with multiple stages and directors not notice this?

The scenic design by Arnulfo Maldonado was clever as the time periods flew by.  Side panels were not wide enough to consider everyone’s seat in the audience.  Scenes would roll off stage to the left and right.  While the actors on stage were performing, the noise level backstage was horrendous.  My notes included the words crashing and banging.  If you go to see this excellent play, sit farther back.  Maybe you won’t notice the blatant distractions.

Those avoidable missteps did not hinder my ability to love this play.  There is something inherently wonderful about pausing and considering the miracle of life.  Mr. Eno writes:  “Be glad you have a body.  Be glad you were there when the universe was handing them out.”  To that I would add:  Be glad, theatergoers, that you are alive while Will Eno is writing.

The Underlying Chris is running at Second Stage’s Tony Kiser Theater until December 15, 2019.

www.2st.com

theaterreviewsfrommyseat/lindavista

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Broadbend, Arkansas (Transport Group)

There seems to be an endless stream of theater in New York about racial issues prior to the Civil Rights Act and beyond.  Many of them are musicals and quite a number I’ve seen focus on the Freedom Riders.  Broadbend, Arkansas is another one.  This one aims for chamber piece.  The show is baffling, incoherent, poorly staged and seems to lack a reason to exist.

Act I takes place in 1961.  Benny (Justin Cunningham) is an orderly in a nursing home.  He takes care of “ornery white women.”  There is a lot of time spent on a story of two of them.  One is a patient.  The other is Julynne, the woman who runs the facility.  There is a bizarre storyline about the two women fighting over the love of a dead man.  Benny tells and sings about all of this.

Benny has twin daughters but hears the calling of a movement gathering momentum.  He decides to meet up with the Freedom Riders who are riding interstate buses to protest the non-enforcement of civil rights laws.  He is killed by a white police officer for no reason during a traffic stop.  None of this has any dramatic tension whatsoever.  The spoken theme is obvious:  “when you are after justice, you do what it takes.”

His daughters were raised by Julynne who ran the nursing home.  In the second act, his daughter Ruby travels to a cemetery where Benny and Julynne are buried next to each other.  The time is 1988.  Ruby is grieving because her teenage son is in the hospital.  He was brutally beaten by police officers who apparently were “forced” to subdue him.  This act is far better than the first but it also drags on and on.

Danyel Fulton has a lovely voice and came much closer to conveying the emotional heft required of this material.  To be fair, her half was clearly better written.  The libretto was by Ellen Fitzhugh and Harrison David Rivers with music by Ted Shen.

There is no set, just a couple of chairs.  There is not a set designer credited but there is a “scenic consultant.”  The placement of the chairs?  The orchestra sits behind the large platform.  That was ill advised since I found myself watching them playing an intermittently enjoyable jazzy score.  The material is deadly serious but totally confusing.  Placing this unfocused material on a completely bare stage is so odd as to be impossible to fathom.

In every show, there are nuggets to be savored.  Ruby discusses what it’s like to be a black girl in a mixed race school as a child.  She shares her thoughts when asked, “what do you want to be when you grow up?”  She just picks someone else’s answer.  As a minority she knows “some people’s dreams are less like dreams and more like a foregone conclusion.”  An insightful and effective line.  You have to search hard – and stay very focused – to hear them.

I am an enormous fan of the Transport Group’s work and Jack Cummings III who directed this misguided effort.  This company has been on a tear recently with exceptional productions including Renascence, Summer and Smoke, The Trial of the Catonsville Nine and Picnic.  I understand that the point being made in Broadbend, Arkansas relates to our continuing national strife over racism.  “We must get back on that bus.”  Theater cannot simply topical and relevant.  It also has to be far, far better than this to be recommended.  Frankly, I was blown away that this show was so awful.

Broadbend, Arkansas is playing at the Duke on 42nd Street until November, 23, 2019.

www.transportgroup.org

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History of Violence (St. Ann’s Warehouse)

On Christmas Eve in 2012, Édouard Louis was raped and almost murdered in his apartment in Paris.  Four years later, a bestselling novel was published based on that traumatic event.  Along with Thomas Ostermeier and Florian Borchmeyer, History of Violence has been adapted for the stage in a riveting and multi-layered production.

A young man is sitting on a chair in what appears to be a waiting area.  The room is sterile in appearance.  In the large St. Ann’s Warehouse space, the set’s backdrop is enormously high.  People in hazmat suits come in and start to lift fingerprints off the floor.  A camera and microphone capture their efforts.  These sights and sounds are projected on the screen and through the superb sound design.  Evidence identification markers are placed around a crime scene.  What has happened?

Édouard reported the attempted homicide several hours after the incident occurred.  In the early morning hours of December 25th, he jumps in the shower.  He aggressively scrubs away the smell of Reda.  On his way home the evening before, the two men met walking down the street.  Reda cruised and charmed his way into an invitation.  The men had sex before things turned extremely dark.

At the start of this play Édouard was sitting on a chair because he went to the hospital for an antiviral prophylaxis treatment.  The grimness of the events are effectively rendered.  The tale is made bearable, and often very funny, by the mechanics of the storytelling and the clear-eyed, inventive and unique staging.

The courtship at the beginning of this horrific one night stand is flirtatious and cute.  Reda comes across as irresistibly sexy.  Renato Schuch is exceptional in the role.  The transformation to a terrifying demon is deeply layered with guilt, shame and self-preservation.

Édouard escapes Paris for a few days to visit his sister in the small town where he grew up.  He is another gay man who fled to the big city rather than fight small mindedness and stifling oppression.  His sister is played by the excellent Alina Stiegler.  She listens to her brother sympathetically and quite critically.  She repeats the story to her husband (Christoph Gawenda) while Édouard overhears them.

The family dynamic, the innate turmoils of homosexuals and societal repressions swirl gently and meaningfully as this tale unfolds.  Racism enters the storm as well.  Reda is an Algerian man.  The police believe he must be a miscreant and a criminal.

An unusually forthright memoir is brought to life through the bookish Édouard himself.  Laurenz Laufenberg impressively captures and demonstrates his naivete, his desire for love, his retreat, his shame and his ultimate survival.  The recollections are intense and uncomfortable.  The pendulum swings frequently and remarkably effortlessly between joyful (dance breaks!) and horrifying (rape).  Both extremes keep the edges sharp and surprising.

History of Violence is a presentation from the Schaubühne am Lehniner Platz (Theatre on Lehniner Square) in Berlin.  Artistic Director Thomas Ostermeier directed this outstanding production which is performed in German with English supertitles.  This is contemporary theater enriched by extraordinary storytelling and an unflinching examination of the human condition.  Be warned.  This show sails through some rough waters.

This company travels the world showcasing its voluminous work.  They have produced one hundred world and German premieres in the past nineteen years.  I will not miss an opportunity to experience again this level of quality and originality.

History of Violence is playing at St. Ann’s Warehouse until December 1, 2019.

www.stannswarehouse.org

www.schaubuehne.de

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The Inheritance

Matthew Lopez has written the two part epic The Inheritance with inspiration from E. M. Forster’s Howard’s End.  That novel addressed social conventions, codes of conduct and relationships in England at the start of the 20th Century.  This play has updated the action to New York City from 2015 to 2018.  The story being told is about gay men.  The ambition of the writing is staggering.

Fascinatingly, Mr. Forster is a character at the start of this drama.  He advises a group that they can use his novel to loosely create their own story and even change the words.  This young generation of gay men are fairly critical of him.  He wrote Maurice in 1913 about a homosexual relationship.  That work was not published until after his death in 1971.  The obvious comparison being made is how much more accepting the world is today.  The other view is simply cowardice.

Are things truly better?  What social conventions have changed?  Which still oppress?  Eric Glass and Toby Darling are engaged to be married.  Toby is writing a play called “Lover Boy.”  Eric has befriended an older gay man who lives in their apartment building.  Walter Poole has been with his billionaire Republican partner for eons.  In a significant nod to Howard’s End, the name Henry Wilcox is used for the wealthy man.  These two older men also own a country house which similarly plays a central thematic role as in the novel.

The Inheritance is so boldly conceived that it has attempted a broad update of the 1991 masterwork Angels in America to the present day.  Tony Kushner’s play memorably covered the AIDS crisis in the latter stages of the 20th Century.  With treatments and preventive options now widely available (to at least those with the means), gay life and culture has moved on from the past.  The play celebrates much of that freedom wittily.  A sideline about whether camp should be over is winningly funny.

As you might expect, the young are not so free and not so happy as it might first appear.  Their gay baggage weighs them down and some much more than others.  The familiar and omnipresent family rejection lingers.  These are not new revelations.  Thoughts of finding one’s own family are a central theme of mainstream topical gay entertainments such as Ru Paul’s Drag Race.  Mr. Lopez’s play does, however, shine a bright light on the responsibility question and necessity of effective community building and support.

The direction by Steven Daldry on an impressively spare set (Bob Crowley) is energetic and fast paced.  The final scene at the end of the first half is mesmerizing theater and completely unforgettable.  The second part is nowhere near as tight as the first half.  There are many plot lines to wrap up and the strain is evident as the grinders of a soap opera finale churn.

At that point, a female character is introduced who is played by Lois Smith.  That scene is quiet and reflective which nicely guides this story to a satisfying conclusion.

The acting ensemble is stellar across the board.  Kyle Soller grounds this whole play in the central role of Eric who realizes that “to fall in love is to make an appointment with heartbreak.”  His solar energy sunbeam of a boyfriend, the brilliantly named Toby Darling, is played perfectly by Andrew Burnap.  The role is complicated, unsympathetic, joyously alive and emotionally moving at the same time.

John Benjamin Hickey commands all the gravitas needed to portray the conservative Wilcox.  Paul Hilton is memorable as the moral compass in the crucial dual role of Walter Poole and Morgan (E. M. Forster).  There are many Broadway debuts in this production and everyone succeeds at the highest level.  In the dual social climber roles of Adam and Leo, Samuel H. Levine was notably superb.

I elected to see The Inheritance on a single day with a dinner break.  That is a long commitment.  I highly recommend Part I.  Then take a few days off and let that half sink in.  There is a lot to process.  A little distance may also help Part II seem less clunky and heavy handed.  The scope of this production is immense.  Serious theater patrons should be impressed.  The gay community should be thrilled by the thoughtful discussions.  As Mr. Kushner advised years ago, “there is more great work to be done.”

www.theinheritanceplay.com

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The Sound Inside

When I first saw David Cromer’s production of The Band’s Visit off-Broadway, I was enraptured by the quietly heartbreaking beauty of its story.  This musical transferred to Broadway and remained an intimate, very focused, purposefully unadorned show.  When you have outstanding material, letting it stand on its own can be a perfect strategy.  The Sound Inside is a great play by Adam Rapp.  Once again Mr. Cromer has mounted an exceptional production which thrills as it travels along a mysterious path.

Mary-Louise Parker portrays Bella, a creative writing professor at Yale.  She has written two short story collections and “an underappreciated novel.”  In her opening scene, Bella communicates directly to the audience.  She jots notes down on her pad as important details need to be written down.  Diagnosed with Stage 2 cancer and living alone, the story appears to be a bleak one.

The creative team’s design for this play never lets visual surroundings get in the way of the words.  Alexander Woodward’s Scenic Design and Heather Gilbert’s Lighting Design are completely in sync with the tone of the play as it has been staged.  Walking outside, there is a darkened hint of a tree which emerges in the background.  Bella’s office is cold and sparse.  Everything is grays and blacks.  Where will this two character play go?

Bella has a student in her freshman writing class.  Christopher is, without any doubt, an oddball.  He does not use Twitter and refuses to schedule his teacher meetings online.  Fighting against everything and everyone that is the Yale stereotype, is he an eighteen year old literary genius in the making?  Why so moody?  And so rude?

Christopher seems to respect Bella, however, and is presently writing his own novel despite his freshman course load.  The manuscript is obviously autobiographical fiction.  His protagonist is named Christopher.  He admits that the story is somewhat writing itself – or at least the characters are in charge.  Bella utters a single line which I wish I heard while struggling through creative fiction writing in college.  She tells him, “if your protagonist is leading you then you’ll likely stay ahead of your reader.”

The Sound Inside is a fascinating and complex tale in both storyline and structure.  Lovers of fiction and the process by which it is formed have much to savor in this ninety minute dialogue between two practitioners of the craft.  The balance between what is real and what is fictional on stage is where this play stays ahead of the listener.  Mr. Rapp has created a tightly wrought tale which seems, however, to meander very casually and organically.  The prose is often gorgeous.

I have long been a fan of Mary-Louise Parker and her impressive stage career.  Her major theatrical achievements include Prelude to a Kiss, Proof, Heisenberg and How I Learned to Drive.  Her performance in this play is flawless.  Will Hochman has the difficult task of keeping pace with her in a two character study.  He was excellent.

There is an important scene between the two where you start to wonder if a romantic angle may develop (the plot considers many different forks though the literary forest).  The lighting is warmer than the rest of the play.  The depth of the writing and these two actors pull you into this critical moment.  You are watching two people in a living room and the large Broadway house disappears.  Everyone who participated in this production made that magic happen.

The Sound Inside by Adam Rapp is unquestionably one of the best plays of this season.  The production is every bit as good as the writing.  This is Broadway at its absolute finest. Listen to the sound inside your head and do your best to see this before it closes.

The Sound Inside is running until January 12, 2020 at Studio 54.

www.soundinsidebroadway.com

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Reparations (The Billie Holiday Theatre)

Every year from 1989 through his retirement in 2017, Congressman John Conyers Jr. unsuccessfully proposed a bill to study whether reparations should be paid for slavery.  In 2014, journalist Te-Nehisi Coates published an article, The Case for Reparations, renewing demands for compensation on a national stage.  On the 400th anniversary of slavery, James Sheldon’s new play Reparations is being presented at The Billie Holiday Theatre.

This company has been located in the heart of Brooklyn’s Bed-Stuy neighborhood for 47 years.  Its long history has enabled diverse voices to create storytelling for, by, about and near people of African descent.  This particular world premiere play is the first one they have produced by a writer of non-African descent.  “In 2019,” Artistic Director Dr. Indira Etwaroo notes, “theater remains a predominately racially segregated experience.”  Here, then, is an opportunity to “see one another anew” and “discover ways to ask new questions of one another and ourselves.”

Her program notes conclude with: “Isn’t that, after all, why we are here… breathing the same air, sharing the same space?  Even if only for a moment.”  This play has been given a mighty introduction for thought provoking discussion and timely consideration.  With this production, the mission has been accomplished.

The beautifully detailed Upper East Side apartment designed by Isabel and Moriah Curley-Clay announces restrained and tasteful elegance.  When the door opens, Ginny and Reg stumble in tipsy from a book launch party.  Ginny is a white woman who is older than her guest.  He is a black man who has been writing freelance travel pieces and has penned a new novel.  The beginning is awkward flirtation combined with somewhat forced cliches.

Ginny’s husband died seven months ago.  Her therapist recommends curing her grief by seeking out intimacy and integrating it into her old life.  Reg is clearly networking.  His book is about an African American police officer who is “Obama with a badge and a gun.”

Conversation between the two is flirtatious and stilted.  They came back to her apartment because she assumed he lived in a “fringey part of town.”  He accuses her of making a racist statement by assuming he lives in a poor neighborhood.  She knows what freelance writers earn.  The play meanders through social climbing rom-com with racial zingers and socioeconomic factoids.

Things get much more interesting when Ginny comments that “we all want to overcome the superficial differences that keep up trapped in our own silly little boxes.”  These include blacks, gays, transgender, Muslims and even white working class Americans.  Each is crying for help with their slogans “Black Lives Matter” and “Make America Great Again.”

In the second act, Ginny will prepare a paella for a dinner party.  Paella can be many different things and is often a combination of various meats, seafood and vegetables.  This play is the wordy embodiment of that dish.  Many disparate elements will be presented and consumed as “silly little boxes” are opened.  Ginny asks, “What happens when we confront realities outside our little boxes?”

There are numerous twists and turns in Reparations.  They dangerously teeter on the edge of soap opera revelations and stock situations.  Amazingly, however, the paella cooks long enough to bring a very satisfying dish to the table.  Reparations are more than a conceptual idea.  They have deep personal meaning and will be aggressively tackled before the play’s end.  Every character is a living breathing individual bringing their own experience and world views into a difficult debate.

Director Michele Shay has staged a high quality production for this intense and uncomfortable story.  Kamal Bolden is a mesmerizing Reg.  He is utterly charming, vengefully angry, cleverly calculating and, in my mind, a consummate survivor.  Alexandra Neil plays Ginny who embarks on her new life with trepidation and, in many respects, fearlessness.  Both share excellent chemistry.  Their early scenes nicely mask the fireworks which will follow.

Pompous Englishman and publisher Alistair (Gys de Villiers) and his wife, Nigerian born Millie (Lisa Arrindell, superb), will join Ginny and Reg for the luncheon party.  Both couples are of mixed races but their thoughts on reparations dig far deeper than the surface color of one’s skin.  The way the onion gets peeled open in this play may seem manipulative and it is certainly that.  However, the volume of stuff contained in all our little boxes – when thrust into the spotlight – allows us to test our humanity and our own character’s ability to rise up.

Reparations was an excellent addition to a fine month of theater.  I’ve been in a conservative Catholic box in Heroes of the Fourth Turning.  I spent time with LBJ as he attempted to forcefully open boxes wide with his civil rights agenda in The Great Society.  I walked through The Black History Museum and was, literally, put in a box.  In the epic The Inheritance opening this weekend, gay men come together to scream for their own escape.  Listening has never seemed more vital and important as we steer our country and its painfully confused moral compass to a better future.

www.thebillieholiday.org

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An Enchanted April

Isn’t is nice to know that a month in a medieval castle in Italy is just the right prescription to shake off the blues?  An Enchanted April is a new musical from the Utah Lyric Opera having its New York premiere.  The story is an adaptation of Elizabeth Von Arnim’s 1922 bestselling novel.  The stifling and endless rain in London prompts four dissimilar women to pause for a moment and take a holiday.

This castle is overflowing with wisteria and enveloped in life altering beauty.  Lotty Wilkins and Rose Arbuthnot belong to the same ladies’ club.  They are not acquainted until Lotty strikes up a conversation.  She is reading a newspaper and sees an ad for San Salvatore.  A month long trip is proposed.  Rose thinks Lotty is quite mad and unbalanced.  Eventually these two women will bond over their unhappy marriages.

Lotty is the dutiful wife to her unappreciative lawyer husband Mellersh (Jim Stanek).  Rose is a quiet type who is absorbed with her charity work.  Her husband Frederick is an author of lurid and titillating novels.  This couple’s relationship my be approaching a dead end.  Their duet, “Everything Was Changed,” is the best song in the show.

Lotty is boisterous and fun.  She doesn’t “mean to be presumptuous and rude, I just am.”  Rose sulks into her books but nervously and excitedly agrees to take the trip.  The rental is very costly, however, so they recruit two additional women to join them.

Mrs. Fisher (Alma Cuervo) is an elderly lady still clinging to her proper Victorian ideals.  She believes “women’s heads are not for thinking.”  Lady Caroline Dester (Gena Sims) is newly engaged but desperately wants to escape the burdens of London society and her celebrity in order to think.  World War I and other tragedies have impacted everyone’s life and mood.  Breathing in the fresh air should be a restorative therapy.

Toss in the castle’s current owner, Thomas Briggs (Peter Reid Lambert), and the gong happy maid, Francesca (Melody Meeks Putnam), and you’ve got a spicy bucatini arrabiata.  Well, not exactly.  These are English stereotypes from 1922 after all.  An Enchanted April is more of a pesto; herbaceous, comforting, recognizable and easily enjoyable, if a tad cheesy.

Elizabeth Hansen and C. Michael Perry wrote this musical.  The score and tone fit seamlessly with the story.  Rhymes are often fun, such as “rules” and “drools.”  William Armstrong’s scenic and lighting design transports these women from depressing London to glorious Tuscany on a shoestring budget.  Alice Jankell’s direction uses limited space creatively which readily accommodates both intimate conversations and awkward tea parties.

An Enchanted April is a sentimental, romantic trifle.  There should be a large audience eager to see this musical, especially in regional theaters.  The show could definitely benefit from a little editing.  Seven reprises is probably too many.  There may be more solos than necessary as well.   Stylistically, the frequent belting vocals seem slightly incongruous with the period.

From start to finish, however, this musical aims to please and entertain.  On that level it succeeds.  The entire cast created nice characterizations and made their story arcs believable without being hokey.  Or, rather, just the right amount of hokey.  Romance, relaxation, reflection and reinvention was in the air!

Christiana Cole’s singing as the introverted Rose was richly melodic.  Leah Hocking’s Lotty is humorously dotty and her facial expressions were priceless.  She sums up San Salvatore in the way I might regard this tuneful new musical.  “We might not need a dungeon… but it is nice to have.”

www.bfany.org/theatrerow.com

www.utahlyric.org

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The Black History Museum… According to the United States of America (HERE)

“I’m old enough to remember Jim Crow.  It may have been waning but it had a heartbeat.  So during Obama it was hard to see it coming back.”  A 2019 descendant from slavery begins and ends the journey through The Black History Museum… According to the United States of America.  This immersive and interactive piece honors “the lives of ancestors stolen from Africa” on the 400th anniversary of American slavery.

Conceived and directed by Zoey Martinson from Smoke & Mirrors Collaborative, this museum tour is an expansive review of and commentary on black history through the use of powerful words, expressive dance, biting satire and historical objects.  Visitors will tour through rooms and hallways of HERE’s entire downtown space.  What makes this material even more compelling and fresh are the questions it directly and indirectly asks.  None more powerful than “what would you say when you found out you were not human?”

After a farcical reenactment of some of the Founding Fathers codifying white privilege into the constitution, the historical tour commences.  A hallway with portholes leads the viewer into a wooden pen.  The joy of freedom is celebrated through dance and video (choreography by Francesca Harper).  The horrors of captivity then flood the screens and change the dancers forever.  The Founding  Fathers are observant and silent.  This beginning is powerful, uncomfortable and very effective.

A recording is played as the audience gathers in the lobby before the performance begins.  “What is black?” is the question asked to multiple individuals.  The replies are thoughtful and personal observations.  Combining a broad outline of black history with insightful details enriches the storytelling from history lesson to emotional interpersonal journey.  Everyone in the room regardless of race faces this truth in their own way.  The piece can seem angry, exhausting, goofy, heartbreaking, heartwarming and cleverly stylized.  Ambitious and a little unfocused at times, there is a ton of intellectual stimulation to absorb.

The surprises continue as you walk through this museum.  People were visibly straining through two hours of standing.  That discomfort is surely intentional.  I believe the middle section where there is time to wander through some exhibits should probably be shortened.  Breathable air in the basement space was less than desirable.

The charms contained in this section, however, enlighten and enrage.  A shrine to Bayard Rustin, the civil rights leader who was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by Barack Obama.  Written communication between people such as a father’s 1914 letter to his daughter.  The recurring themes of individuality and connectivity to ancestral bonds is harshly projected against the overt racism of the questionably believable American Dream.

A poster from a Darryl Zanuck film Pinky! caught my attention.  The tagline was “…She passed for white!”  The second most popular movie of 1949, it was nominated for three acting Oscars including one for Ethel Waters.  Marshall, a city in Texas, banned the film.  The depiction of a white man retaining his love for a woman after he knew she was Negro was too much to bear.  In a segregated theater where blacks watched movies from the balcony, the owner showed the film and was fined.  Joseph Burstyn, Inc. vs. Wilson became the landmark free speech case whereby the Supreme Court gave movies first amendment protection.

Finding these gems of history (and researching their import afterwards) adds a museum-like authenticity to the performed scenes of dark humor and guttural outrage.  I jotted down a note when I saw sheet music for a Bert Williams’ song entitled, “The Phrenologist’s Coon,” written in 1901.  Here’s a sample lyric: “Now by us scientists ’tis often said/If a coon has an egg-shaped head/Means chickens he will steal.”  Another well chosen artifact to help illuminate the countless and deliberate debasements of a race of people in a country whose formation is a legacy of genocide.

The Black History Museum, like many works of art, requires its audience to put some of themselves into the piece.  This production is meant to be experienced.  In my head, I heard my relatives.  When a black woman would be performing on television when I was a child, they sometimes referred to her singing as “coon shouting.”  That memory came flooding back.  Like all worthwhile pursuits, it takes effort to make up one’s own mind between right and wrong when indoctrinated with the often misguided teachings of parents, governments and religious organizations.

Near the end of this play, there is a short section which asks the question, “Did You Know?”  Significant and hardly known accomplishments of black citizens throughout American history are recounted.  The point being made is critical and on target.  How much black history is being taught in schools and in history books told through the lens of the white perspective?

The problems continue today.  The permanent prison class which has been created “to legalize slavery” grows and grows with the overt support of both Republican and Democratic Presidents since the Civil Rights Act.  Ms. Martinson, along with her co-writers Kareem M. Lucas, Jonathan Braylock and Robert King, can hit hard and it stings.

So many people were horrified by the confederate marches in Charlottesville.  The movement has definitely been reignited with the election of Donald Trump.  The Supreme Court is rolling back voting rights.  Dark skinned immigrants are the current target but who knows who’s next on the list of the righteous.  Imagine being a child born here on a family tree containing centuries of slavery.  Imagine her seeing white men carrying flags and torches which can only mean a desire to return to that period.

The Black History Museum makes you listen to a black perspective.  The scope is overwhelming and intimate at the same time.  If you plan to attend this slightly uneven and ultimately rewarding piece of theater, wear very comfortable shoes.  Dress with the knowledge that the rooms can be very warm (coat check is provided).  So many thoughts went through my head during and afterward.  That’s the sign of a successful trip to a museum.

The Black History Museum is presented by HERE and Smoke & Mirrors Collaborative through November 24, 2019.

www.here.org

www.smokemirrors.org

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BrandoCapote (The Tank)

Truman Capote interviewed Marlon Brando in 1957.  The legendary actor was in Japan filming Sayonara.  Hilariously, we overhear one of the movie’s sales pitches.  They are using “real Japanese actors.”  This conversation is one level of the multi-media piece BrandoCapote.  On the flip side, this dance play is a commentary on men and toxic masculinity.

Scenes from Mr. Brando’s films are cleverly projected onto fans and umbrellas.  As the interview took place in Japan, the Noh style of theater is casually referenced here.  The actors wear kimonos.  Movie scenes such as a violent outburst from A Streetcar Named Desire are repeated.  A voice-over makes the excuse that “he worked hard for us” followed by “it was just a different time.”

Snippets from unforgettable movies such as On the Waterfront, Julius Caesar and The Godfather are interspersed with repetitive movements.  Meanwhile, Mr. Brando claims that he is not an actor.  He is a mimic.  The line drawn on stage is the connection between father and son.  The violence is passed down through mimicry.

In BrandoCapote, that overt mimicry is an integral part of this dance.  Brando’s son Christian murdered his sister’s boyfriend in 1990.  She hung herself five years later at the age of 25.  This piece aggressively compares the violence society accepts (or even celebrates) in popular entertainment to the collateral damage it causes in real life.

Occasionally the phrases “let me start over” and “let me get this right” are heard.  What is on the stage, however, suggests that this inherent violence is an unbroken circle.  Juxtaposing the effeminate Truman Capote against this backdrop paints a vivid picture of the vast spectrum of manhood.

Is BrandoCapote a play?  Yes, in some respects.  Brando is asked, “are you religious?”  His reply: “I don’t believe in imaginary friends.”  The movie scenes are carefully chosen to set the mood.  The dance suggests many things including violence, repetition and cleaning sequences.  Abstract is the name for this world.

Sara and Reid Farrington conceived this expressive and specific piece.  She was the writer and he directed.  There is a vast quantity of creativity on display in this seventy minute amalgam of performance art and oddly awkward yet nostalgic glimpse of men.  Brando was THE actor of his generation.  Lines are boldly drawn to the issues still being faced today by abusive men.

The performers play various family members but that’s a loose concept.  Using Noh theater as a guide, both humor and horror make appearances.  The technical projections are frequent and nicely varied.  The choreography by Laura K Nicoll is precise and rhythmic.  There are many pauses when you hear the tape or film reels rewind.  These glitches become movements by the cast which are impressively timed and jolt us from one segment to the next.

BrandoCapote is ambitious, non-linear, memorable and wholly original.  It also is a play, a dance and a historical  multimedia exhibit.  The entire production feels long as the messages and imagery are often repeated.  Patience is advised.  Not all of the segments connected in my mind such as the rearranging furniture.  However, the sheer mass of creativity and research in the creation of this work is commendable.  A most unique dissection of the American male psyche.

BrandoCapote is running at The Tank through November 24, 2019.

www.thetanknyc.org

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Cyrano (The New Group)

Before the show begins, a sole leaf drifted down to the stage.  The comment could not be avoided.  All you can think is “autumn is coming.”  Fans of Game of Thrones have gathered to see Emmy winner Peter Dinklage take on Cyrano based on Edmond Rostand’s 1897 classic play.

Leaves will fall later in this woefully dull musical so I assume the preview was a tiny technical snafu.  Mr. Dinklage’s wife Erica Schmidt has adapted and directed this tale with music from Grammy Award winning rock band The National.  Cyrano the ugly is in love with the beauty Roxanne but she instead yearns for a man with physical rather than intellectual enchantments.  The story clearly feels right for a musical (which has indeed been attempted before).

The book is fairly leaden from the start and the songs, unfortunately, make it worse.  This one is hard to sit through.  The production interestingly aims for chamber-like dirge but there are few sparks to suggest passion on the stage.  Everyone does not seem to be in the same show.

Mr. Dinklage’s dwarfism replaces the long nose of the character as written.  That choice is inspired.  His performance is good and his gravelly singing voice works well with the mood.  The songs are all unremarkable so it is hard to say that his Cyrano was especially memorable.  He does, however, know how to firmly command a stage.  His pain is palpably rendered.

Jasmine Cephas Jones plays Roxanne.  She created the double role of “and Peggy” and Marie Reynolds in Hamilton.  I didn’t connect to her character in this production.  Roxanne is shallow and favors the handsome Christian over the stylized letter writings of a heartbroken Cyrano.  His pain is visibly evident.  Her desirability is not necessarily so but I felt the shallow angle was handled nicely.

As Christian, Blake Jenner fares best in the part which is self-described as “I can’t write a letter.  I’m so stupid, it’s shameful.”  He sings more beautifully than everyone on the stage which makes the physical attractiveness of his character work and stand out.  On the other hand, everyone else’s singing pales by comparison.  The musical never quite gels as a result.

Some of the scenes are creatively moody and cleverly work to showcase the two men wooing Roxanne through their different selves.  Ms. Schmidt’s take on Macbeth with school girls last season was tensely disturbing and visually arresting.  Here, the mood is set but what happens feels staged and fake.  The war scene in the second act goes on and on.  The slow motion choreography by Jeff and Rick Kuperman attempted to add gravitas to the moments.  The result was a overlong war ballet with large rifles.

Fans of Peter Dinklage will find this Cyrano a reason to spend time watching a marvelous actor brave this classic tale on stage.  The New Group has been producing star vehicles in recent seasons.  The results have been mixed.  This show, sadly, is hard to recommend.

Cyrano is being performed at the Daryl Roth Theatre until December 22, 2019.

www.thenewgroup.org

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