After the Revolution Comes the Revelation: Then What Do We Do?

More than 50 years after his death, Joseph McCarthy, the late and little-lamented “junior Senator from Wisconsin,” has taken to haunting the New York theater scene.

The malignant spirit of the one-time powerful Senator, who ruined lives and careers by leveling charges of espionage and subversive activities during a reign of anti-Communist fervor in the 1950s, is evoked in no fewer than four current productions: Zero Hour, the one-man show about actor Zero Mostel; the revival of Tony Kushner’s masterwork, Angels in America; a production of Personal Enemy, an early play by John Osborne and Anthony Creighton, and the New York premiere of a play by Amy Herzog, called After the Revolution.

Herzog is one of the young playwrights I have written about, like Annie Baker, Ellen Fairey, and Kristoffer Diaz, who are bringing original voices and ideas to the theater scene and whose work speaks to a broad audience beyond their own same-age peers. After the Revolution, a play about three generations of American leftists, is being given a stellar production at the Playwrights Horizons, thanks in large part to a strong ensemble of actors, including the always-marvelous Lois Smith, who celebrated her “big eight-o” earlier this month, as the matriarch of the clan, and the always-marvelous David Margulies as an old family friend. It is worth the price of admission just to be able to watch these two veterans remind us what stage acting is all about.

In After the Revolution, the central character is Emma (Katharine Powell), who, in her mid-twenties, represents the third generation in her family of proud Marxist-inspired Americans. As “keeper of the flame” and head of a foundation named for her much-revered grandfather—iconicized as one of McCarthy’s targets—Emma is forced to confront some uncomfortable truths about the past and come to terms with her loving but manipulative father (Peter Friedman).

Emma is dedicated, like the rest of her family (save for some for some sneered-upon cousins), to supporting leftist causes. Indeed, the foundation she helms is engaged in a campaign on behalf of a very real death-row inmate, Mumia Abu-Jamal, who remains at the center of an ongoing debate over the fairness of his trial and of the death penalty itself.

Unfortunately, Emma’s personal angst as she strives to find her own place in the grand scheme of things tends to overwhelm what could be a very interesting debate on politics and social justice—something that would surely resonate in today’s political climate. It’s not that the family drama isn’t interesting; it is. I just longed for more of that good old radical, progressive, leftist talk, most of which is left up to Ms. Smith’s character to espouse; for instance, I found her unchallenged take on Stalin to be one of the most telling moments in the play.

Still there is much to commend. Director Carolyn Cantor has shaped the company into a cohesive and believable family unit. In addition to the fine performances by the actors identified above, Mare Winningham, as Emma’s stepmother, does an excellent job treading the line as mediator between the stubborn father-daughter pair.

Seeing After the Revolution, which Herzog has said was inspired by events in her own family, makes me hope that she will come back to this story one day and examine more deeply the complexities of the era that allowed for Joseph McCarthy to shake up so many lives, so that we are still feeling the impact today.

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Free and Discounted Tickets and a Call for Submissions

Free Theater Tickets

Theaters around the country are currently participating in an event in which they are giving away free tickets--no catch.

If you are interested, check out www.freenightoftheater.net. If you don't see anything you want--or if what you want is already sold out--check again later, tomorrow, or over the next couple of weeks. New performances are added pretty much daily.

Or take a chance on a less familiar play or venue. It's got to be worth at least the price of admission!

Discounted Tickets

Websites like Playbill.com, Theatermania.com and Broadwaybox.com offer access to discounted New York theater tickets to the general public—no membership fees involved.

Sometimes theaters themselves provide these discounts directly through last-minute “rush” sales to students or to the general public, through lotteries, or during previews while a show is still working out the kinks.

Case in point: Playwrights Horizons, in its fifth decade as “home to new American theater,” currently is offering discounted tickets for the New York premiere of After The Revolution, a new play about a family confronting secrets of the past, written by Amy Herzog. You can read more about the play at the Playwrights Horizons website: www.playwrightshorizons.org.

If you are intrigued, Playwrights Horizons has approached me about letting readers know about its discounted ticket policy, and, as a fan of the organization’s work, I am happy to oblige.

Order by November 9 with code ARGR and tickets are only:

$40* (reg. $55) for the first week of performances Oct. 21 – Oct. 28

$45 (reg. $55) for all performances Oct. 29 – Nov. 28

HOW TO ORDER:

Order online at www.playwrightshorizons.org. Use code APGR.

Call Ticket Central at (212) 279-4200 (Noon-8pm daily)

Present a printout of this blog post to the Ticket Central box office at 416 West 42nd Street (Noon-8pm daily).

*A limited number of $40 discounted tickets will be available for purchase. Subject to availability. Valid only in select rows.

Open Submissions for 10-minute Plays

Here is an exciting opportunity for aspiring or active playwrights.

Red Bull Theater has announced that it is seeking new 10-minute plays for its spring short play reading day.

New plays of no more than 10 pages, written in heightened language, in verse, with classic themes, adaptations of classics, or that otherwise fit the company’s mission and history are welcome.

Visit www.redbulltheater.com/Collaborate for details.

I'll post progress reports on my own efforts as we approach the deadline in December.

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Hosannah for Angels in America!

Let me be unequivocal. The Signature Theatre Company’s production of Tony Kushner’s masterwork Angels in America is astounding.

“Astounding” is not a term I use loosely or often, so let me provide some context.

Let me begin by saying that I am unencumbered by memories of the legendary original Broadway production from 1993. I did not see it and had to settle for reading the published script and then, later, watching the HBO film version. Neither of these experiences prepared me the play’s sheer theatricality.

I do not have a clue as to how Kushner pulled off such an astonishing juggling act, brilliantly weaving together so many complex ideas: the AIDS crisis, sexual identity, gender roles, the nature of God, U. S. history in the second half of the twentieth century, legal ethics, Judaism, Mormonism, race relations, the healthcare industry, medical ethics, damage to the ozone layer, prescription drug abuse, mental instability, co-dependent behaviors, marriage, loyalty, friendship, and others I am sure I am leaving out. Somehow, all of these come together within a rich tapestry of reality and fantasy, punctured clichés, surprising turns, unexpected humor, and deep, raw, and keenly felt emotions.

This is especially true in Part I of the two-part play, Millennium Approaches. In it, Kushner manages to pull everything into breathtakingly perfect balance and offers a most extraordinary yin and yang of intellectual content and human heart, comparable, in my view, only to Tom Stoppard’s brilliant Arcadia, which debuted in London, interestingly enough, the same year as Angels in America made it to Broadway.

Given the play’s many intertwined themes, it would be difficult to parse the plot. Angels in America takes place mostly in New York City in 1986-1987. The central characters are Prior Walter, a thirty-year-old gay New Yorker who has just learned he has full-blown AIDS; Roy Cohn, the real-life right-wing attorney best known as Red-baiting Senator Joseph McCarthy’s chief counsel, who also has gotten AIDS through sexual contact with men but who adamantly eschews the “homosexual” label; and Harper Pitt, whose mental stability is collapsing along with her marriage to a closeted gay Mormon.

Now would probably be a good time to declare that Christian Borle as Prior Walter, Frank Wood as Roy Cohn, and Zachary Quinto as Prior’s conflicted boyfriend Louis give three truly indelible performances. This is a play that portrays ragged emotions at their most heightened and unvarnished, and one can only imagine the great sense of trust that had to have developed among the actors, and between the actors and director Michael Greif. There is not a false note to be found.

Zoe Kazan seems to me to have been miscast as Harper—looking too young and sounding more like a ditzy California blonde than a Salt Lake City Mormon---but she and all of the rest of the cast perform with all the love and attention and mutual respect anyone could ever hope to see on stage. The rest of this wonderful company is made up of Robin Bartlett, whom I loved as Harper’s mother-in-law Hannah and as the ghost of Ethel Rosenberg, who has come for a deathwatch over her prosecutor, Roy Cohn; Bill Heck as Harper’s lost soul of a husband, trying and failing to keep himself and Harper on what he believes to be the “straight” and narrow path; Billy Porter as Belize, gay friend to both Prior and Louis and a nurse working with AIDS patients; and Robin Weigert as The Angel.

Without the budget of a major Broadway production, the Signature Theatre Company has done some wonderful work through the use of movable sets, projections, and black-clad stagehands. It is only in Part II of Angels in America, Perestroika, that things get a little muddy, especially with the introduction of a new plot element about heaven and the struggle of the angels to keep things together after God has taken off for parts unknown. For me, this is where the juggling fails to keep all of the balls in the air, and the connections are unclear. Still, Part II has some of the play’s most transcendent scenes, focusing as it does on love, forgiveness, and acceptance. Robin Bartlett shines in several of these scenes, and I wish we could have had more of her and fewer angels in Perestroika.

Still, Tony Kushner and all involved with the Signature Theatre Company have given us a wonderful gift with this production of Angels in America.

Did I mention that it is astounding?

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Bloody Bloody What??? When Sexypants Ain't Enuf!

Gotta say, they’ve come up with a brilliant promotional scheme for Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, the emo-rock musical that has just transferred from off-Broadway’s Public Theater to Broadway’s Bernard Jacobs Theatre: “History just got all sexypants!”

The posters and the other advertising materials carry that slogan and display the rear end of a dude in tight black jeans, with an American flag handkerchief sticking out of the left pocket and a holstered pistol on the right hip.

That the dude is a rock star version of the seventh president of the United States, the populist Andrew Jackson of the title, makes for an intriguing and imaginative image.

Unfortunately, from my perspective at least, that’s as good as it gets, despite energetic performances by the members of the cast, headed up by Benjamin Walker in the title role. The show, heavily dependent on fratboy humor and vaguely homophobic burlesque-y comedy—think Saturday Night Live on a particularly bad Saturday night—is just not terribly successful in pulling together style and substance to sell itself as the political satire that lies underneath the layers of inanity.

If watching Andrew Jackson pandering to the people and playing to their xenophobic views of the native American Indian population reminds you of the shenanigans of the Tea Party crowd, that may say more about what you bring to the show than what it brings to you.

In all fairness, I will say that many in the 20-to-30-something crowd that filled the theater during the preview performance I attended laughed heartily at every gag and pretty much every time a cast member uttered the “F” word or its well-known variation, the “MF” word. Since that pretty much included every other word, at least some in the theater had a good time.

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Mrs. Warren's Secret Is Out of the Bag

Remember those old movies—the ones in which Olivia de Havilland or Bette Davis or Barbara Stanwyck played a mother who gives up everything for her child? Generally these characters had been born on the wrong side of the tracks yet were determined that their own child would grow up “respectable,” with a “proper education” and social standing. Typically, these women’s sacrifices would be unappreciated, and their offspring would wind up being so respectable that they would ultimately turn their backs on their uncouth moms.

These films make a good lens through which to watch George Bernard Shaw’s play, Mrs. Warren’s Profession, a revival of which is now in preview at the Roundabout Theatre Company’s American Airlines Theatre.

One of Shaw’s early plays (1893), Mrs. Warren’s Profession brings out two of the playwright’s favorite themes: the plight of women who had to rely on men for their financial support, and the evils of capitalism.

Like filmdom’s sacrificing mothers, Kitty Warren (Cherry Jones) has made sure that her daughter Vivie (Sally Hawkins in her Broadway debut) has had every advantage back home in England, while she, Kitty, has generally stayed away, ostensibly leading the glamorous life in the great cities of Europe.

The play opens as Vivie and Mum are about to have one of their rare reunions, and it doesn’t take long for Vivie to realize that her mother's profession is the world’s oldest one.

Like the children in those old movies, Vivie is put off by the revelation, but Shaw has a way of putting his own twist to things. He has written a deeply touching scene at the end of Act I, in which Vivie comes to understand the dire straits that led her mother into the profession as a young woman. This is the story behind the story that you never heard from Bette Davis’s lips, and it is a compelling one. This scene is beautifully played out by Ms. Jones and Ms. Hawkins, alone on the too-huge stage of the American Airlines Theatre. It’s a powerful moment, one that is likely to leave the audience with moist eyes.

Unfortunately, Act I is followed by Act II, which sadly unravels the good feelings between the two women. Vivie learns far more about her mother’s life than she would have wanted to know, while Shaw gets to inveigh against the greed-inducing influence of capitalism.

With Shaw, the women’s roles are generally more complex and well-developed than those of the male characters, and that is certainly true with Mrs. Warren’s Profession.

The men in the play are all just types: the cynical businessman, Sir George Crofts (Mark Harelik); the effete family friend Mr. Praed (Edward Hibbert); the young and charming ne’er-do-well, Frank Gardener (Adam Driver); and Frank's father, Reverend Samuel Gardner (Michael Siberry), the crotchety old preacher-with-his-own-little-secret. Young Frank and Sir George, who is Kitty Warren’s business partner, are vying for Vivie’s hand in marriage. The former wants to marry her for her mother’s money; the latter wants to buy her outright. The goings-on take place under the direction of Doug Hughes, who has given us a steadfast if unexciting production. The sets, quite elaborate for a Roundabout production, were designed by Scott Pask, who has won a number of Tonys and other awards for his set work. Credit Pask for making the best possible use of the cavernous stage.

The performances by the women, Cherry Jones and Sally Hawkins, are the production’s real strengths, and—as this was an early preview that I saw—they are likely to get better over time. Of the men, I’d like to give a nod to Adam Driver, who has been proving himself to be quite a strong and interesting young actor in such diverse recent Off Broadway productions as The Forest at the Classic Stage Company and Little Doc at the Rattlestick. Keep an eye out for Mr. Driver; his career is definitely on the ascendant.

As for Mrs. Warren’s Profession, I would recommend seeing it if you are interested in Shaw and haven’t seen the play before. There is enough wit and intelligence in the writing itself to make the visit worthwhile.

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Edward Albee's latest: Both ABSURD and absurd

There are two good reasons to see Edward Albee’s latest play, Me, Myself And I, making its New York debut after its original run as a commissioned play for Princeton University’s McCarter Theater in 2008.

The first reason is the obvious one: to see what the octogenarian Mr. Albee, one of the great American playwrights of the second half of the 20th Century, is up to these days.

The other reason is to catch the wonderfully wacked out performance of Elizabeth Ashley in the lead role of Mother.

Picture Albee’s crazed and sharp-tongued Martha from Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolfe? Now take that image and turn it inside-out into a demented comic figure with the same larger-than-life personality, and you’ve got an idea of the gloriously crazy (in a good way) portrayal that Ms. Ashley gives us. You can’t take your eyes off her whenever she is onstage; she is a wonder to behold.

As for the play itself, let’s just say that Me, Myself And I teeters between Absurd (as in “theater of the…”) and absurd (as in ludicrous). Albee has fun toying around with metaphysical ideas such as existence and identity, and borrows shamelessly from a variety of theatrical devices, including the dissolution of the “fourth wall” that is said to exist between actors and audience, and even a wild and crazy twist on the ancient deus ex machina. There is much to enjoy in the performances of both Ms. Ashley and her partner, Dr.--played by Brian Murray with his always delightful flair and comic timing--including one priceless scene with Mother and Dr. picnicking in a large empty space. The dialog in this scene recalls nothing less than a conversation between Didi and Gogo in Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot.

The plot, such as it is, spins on a crisis involving Mother’s identical twin sons, “OTTO” (Zachary Booth) and “otto” (Preston Sadleir), whom Mother has never been able to tell apart beyond believing that one loves her and the other does not.

Given the twins’ names, you would be right to guess that Albee enjoys playing with words; there’s even the suggestion of a “third twin” named Otto (or OTTO or otto), “in italics,” as OTTO explains. It is OTTO who gets everyone riled up when he announces that he intends to “become Chinese” and, also, by the way, that otto no longer exists. OTTO’s declaration about his brother triggers a series of events in which, among other things, otto becomes increasingly frantic to prove that he does, indeed, exist.

Be warned that all is not played for laughs, and there is an element of crudeness that occasionally creeps in that I found off-putting. And given that Albee has previously dealt with the existence and non-existence of children (Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolfe?) and the idea of twin boys who may or may not have been separated at a young age (The American Dream), it will be interesting to see how Me, Myself & I will be parsed and analyzed down the road.

But speaking as a member of the audience, I’ve got to say this is pretty lightweight fare, a joujou to enjoy for its craziness, and, especially, for Elizabeth Ashley’s wonderfully outlandish performance.

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Introducing Three Small Musicals with Potential for Life Beyond the NYC Theater Scene

Small off-Broadway shows are quite capable of standing proudly beside their hot-shot cousins on the Great White Way. Last season, for example, provided theatergoers with some wonderful fare, including at least three stand-out musicals: The Toxic Avenger, The Kid, and Yank. It is no exaggeration to say that all three were head and shoulders above much of the season’s new Broadway shows, at far more affordable ticket prices.

This summer has given us the opportunity to see several more entrants into the field. I would like to talk about three of them that, while not landing in the “must see” category, I found to be original and interesting, with a good potential for future lives.

The first of these, and perhaps the most polished, is With Glee, now nearing the end of what has been an well-received run at the Kirk Theatre at Theatre Row. With book, music, and lyrics by John Gregor, With Glee was first workshopped at New York University’s Skirball Center (Gregor is an NYU alum in musical theater writing) and then given a production as part of the New York Musical Theater Festival back in 2007.

The musical, which recounts the lives of a motley crew of young teenagers attending a boarding school “for bad kids,” boasts engaging, quirky characters, winning performances, a snappy score, and smart directing by Igor Goldin, who helmed the York Theater’s Yank, a show that is about to make its Broadway transfer. With Glee does not have the chops of Yank, but it owes at least a nod to another successful musical in which adult actors played middle school students; indeed, my friend Carol, when she saw With Glee, referred to it as “Spelling Bee Lite,” an apt description of the show’s style and sensibilities.

With Glee would be a good fit for a run at the New World Stages, home of The 39 Steps, Avenue Q, and the ever popular Naked Boys Singing. It may also wind up having an extended life as a staple of community theaters and high schools. It certainly would be interesting to see the roles of teens played by teens for a change.

A second show worth mentioning, Falling for Eve, was penned by this year’s Tony winner for best original score and for best book of a musical, Joe DiPietro (for Memphis). Falling for Eve is his take on the Biblical story of Adam and Eve, with music by Bret Simmons and lyrics by David Howard. There are some original ideas explored within this admittedly lightweight entry, including a God who is both male and female, a pair of all-to-human angels who push the plot along (no snake in this Garden), and, most interesting, a strong-willed Eve, who leaves Eden to explore the world on her own, while Adam obediently stays behind.

While Falling for Eve is not a terribly memorable show, the bland production it was given at the York Theater did not serve it particularly well. In my view, it deserves another shot with better—well, pretty much, with better everything. I suspect that, in the right hands, this is a show that might find its audience away from the New York theater arena. I can even picture it being performed in rep with The Diary of Adam and Eve from The Apple Tree (music by Jerry Bock, lyrics by Sheldon Harnick).

To wrap up this consideration of new shows–with-potential, I’d like to mention a work that was offered as part of this summer’s New York International Fringe Festival, the always-unpredictable “running-of-the-bulls” event that throws together something in the neighborhood of 200 shows at 18 venues in 16 days.

I have yet to immerse myself in the insanity that is Fringe, but I did catch a musical that might just stand a chance if the folks in charge keep working on it. The show is called Menny and Mila, with book, music, and lyrics by Paul Schultz, who is a writer and editor at the New York Daily News.

The show tells the story of Menny, who is, interestingly enough, a writer and editor at the New York Daily News. Menny decides to sponsor a Russian woman, Mila, whom he has met on the Internet, to come to America as a possible love match. Menny is happiest when he can take the lead in their relationship, showing Mila the ropes of living in the Big Apple and expecting her to just melt in his arms. For her part, Mila—while she likes Menny and appreciates his support--is excited about finding her own way. Schultz has created a pair of likeable, if mismatched, characters; neither is interested in taking advantage of the other as one might cynically predict to be the case. The storyline leads us into some interesting situations (his dysfunctional family; her sexist workplace colleagues), and offers up some enjoyable tunes and an interesting set of supporting characters. Gotta say, the charm of Menny and Mila shined through the dismal production values of a show-on-the-run, and I would like to see it nurtured further along.

So there you have it, three musicals with the potential for an extended life beyond their brief runs off Broadway. The lesson in all of this is that not every show needs to be tailored for the New York City crowd in order to be successful. Each of these—With Glee, Falling for Eve, and Menny and Mila—offers ideas, musical voices, and a real spark of talent that should be nurtured and supported, lest the well truly dry up to all but jukebox musicals and Wintuk!

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Want to Know the Secret of Success? Don't We All!!!

With warmth and humor, though admittedly also with a few questionable side trips, Secrets of the Trade tells the story of Andy, a nice Jewish boy from the suburbs with dreams of a theatrical career that he expects will take off after he connects with a well established New York writer-director.

The backdrop for Secrets of the Trade is the era in which it is set--the decade of the 1980s—the time when the heyday of the book musical was giving way to Andrew Lloyd Webber’s extravaganzas, Cats (“Now and Forever!”) and Phantom of the Opera, and Times Square was embarking on its transformation from seedy to greedy.

That the role of Andy is performed by Noah Robbins, who starred in the recent revival of Neil Simon’s 1983 play, Brighton Beach Memoirs, is surely not a coincidence. Indeed, playwright Jonathan Tolins borrows liberally from the Simon playbook, and it is not much of a stretch to view Andy as a suburban version of the 15-year-old Eugene from the Simon play.

Secrets of the Trade begins when Andy, at 16, writes a letter to his idol Martin Kerner, played by veteran actor John Glover. It takes two years for Kerner to get around to responding, but when he finally does, he invites Andy to dinner and regales him with theatrical tales that feed into Andy’s idealized vision. It does seem that the two have hit it off, and an apprenticeship that will lead to a career in the trade appears likely. Certainly there are precedents; think of Stephen Sondheim and Oscar Hammerstein II, or Michael Feinstein and Ira Gershwin.

We follow Andy and Kerner over the next ten years, and watch as their relationship waxes and wanes and reshapes itself, until it becomes clear that it means different things to each of them. It also becomes clear that it is the business side of “show business” that now dominates the trade. Even someone as successful and well-regarded as Kerner is feeling the pressure to keep up with the times.

In the course of the play, Tolins veers scarily towards a lot of potential clichés—the overbearing stage mother, the newcomer overtaking the mentor, the casting couch, to name but three—yet he generally manages to swerve away from them just in time to give us characters who are more complex, less predictable, and thus more human, than they may seem on the surface.

Director Matt Shakman keeps things humming along at a steady pace, and the play is well served by its strong cast, anchored by Robbins and Glover. Bill Brochtrup as Martin’s assistant, and Mark Nelson and Amy Aquino as Andy’s parents contribute greatly to the play by giving life and meaning to their roles as supporting players. In the end, when Andy is older and wiser, that support comes to mean a lot to him.

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A Little Night Music: Don't You Love Farce?

Little Night Music
Buzz Buzz Buzz
Who can do Armfeldt
Like Angie does?
Let’s go with Stritchie
Cuz Cuz Cuz
She’ll help us get through summer’s slump


With CZJ’s leaving
Bye bye bye
No one was grieving
Why why why
With Bernadette Peters
Standing by
We can get through summer’s slump

I cannot recall so much chatter around a production of a Broadway musical as has occurred with the current revival of A Little Night Music, with book by Hugh Wheeler and music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim.

First there was the brouhaha about the production itself, yet another minimalist gift from London’s Menier Chocolate Factory (single drab set and minuscule orchestra). Then there was the noise about the celebrity casting of yet another movie star in a Broadway show, in this case Catherine Zeta-Jones in the lead role of Desirée Armfeldt, an actress longing to escape the “glamorous life” of her career and to settle down with the man who is the love of her life, not to mention the father of her daughter.

Anyway, the show opened in December of 2009 to mixed reviews, with the only unabashed kudos reserved for Angela Lansbury in the role of Madame Armfeldt, Desirée’s mother and a former highly successful courtesan who despairs at her daughter’s lack of skill in using men, as she herself had done, to assure her financial security.

At the 2010 Tony Awards, Ms. Zeta-Jones walked off with the prize for Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Musical, and it appeared that the show would come to a halt at the end of the two stars’ contracts in June of this year.

But then something most unusual happened, and the buzzing revved up again. Maybe the producers could find replacements with enough star power to keep the show running.

The rumor mill and wish lists churned out dozens of names, but two started showing up with greater frequency: Bernadette Peters and Elaine Stritch, both true stars of Broadway, and both with histories of performing in Sondheim shows (Peters in Sunday in the Park With George and Into the Woods; Stritch in Company).

The choice of Bernadette Peters was a no-brainer, pretty much on everyone’s short list for the role of Desirée. But brassy, raspy, tough-as-nails Elaine Stritch, in the role of the sophisticated, worldly Madame Armfeldt? Singing that most difficult of Sondheim’s numbers, Liaisons? Would she dare? Could she pull it off? Would she crash and burn?

Daily reports on A Little Night Music began to pour in when it reopened in July with the new stars. And yes, Ms. Peters immediately won everyone’s hearts. And, yes, it did seem that Ms. Stritch was showing signs of both crashing and burning—forgetting her lines, struggling with defining her character, driving some of her long-time fans to publicly call for her to step down or to use an assistive device (like the earpiece Ms. Lansbury used so that forgotten lines could be whispered as needed by someone backstage).

I did not see A Little Night Music with Ms. Zeta-Jones and Ms. Lansbury, nor had I been particularly interested. I saw the legendary original production back in 1973, with Glynis Johns as Desirée and Hermione Gingold in the role of Madame Armfeldt, and a later first-rate production in 1994 at Chicago’s Goodman Theater.

While I like the show, I felt that twice was enough; it would take something pretty special to get me to return for a third viewing.

And then they went and did do something special.

And so I went, waiting a couple of weeks for the new stars to settle in.

Here is my report:

Bernadette Peters is perfectly cast, lives up to all the high expectations, and gives a wonderful performance.

Elaine Stritch has made the role of Madame Armfeldt her own, and she has such a command of the stage that even her eccentricities, including her talk-through of Liaisons, work. I noticed one hesitation and a few scrambling of words the day I saw it, but neither interfered with the performance or pulled me out of the moment.

The rest of the cast is fine, if not extraordinary, and I can live with the minimalist set. I am glad that, with the exception of Henrik’s cello, we don’t have to see the actors double up as the musicians.

My one quibble has to do with Trevor Nunn’s directing. A Little Night Music, like a Chekhov play, deals with the follies of the young, the middle aged, and the elderly. These follies are fully expressed when the city folks head out for a weekend in the country. There is a lot of letting loose contained within the script, but the humor is, in my view, best performed in a manner that is arch and urbane.

Nunn, however, has opted for an exaggerated air of silliness, as if he had honed in on the line from Send In The Clowns: “don’t you love farce?” For my taste, there is way too much shtick and mugging and running around that threaten to undermine the production toward the end. Send in the clowns, indeed!

Still there is much to enjoy, and Bernadette Peters and Elaine Stritch help turn this revival of A Little Night Music into a truly memorable occasion. If, like me, you hesitated to see it in its Hollywood-Comes-To-Broadway version, now is your chance to see a couple of terrific veteran Broadway stars giving it their all. I wouldn't advise missing it.

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Danny Aiello Shines in 'The Shoemaker'

Special things sometimes do indeed come in small packages.

Certainly such is the case with the compact (2 characters, 45 minutes) play called The Shoemaker, written by Susan Charlotte (based on her screenplay) and movingly performed by Danny Aiello and Lizbeth Mackay as two strangers whose paths cross during a time of crisis.

This one-acter received its world premiere production recently as part of a week of charity events by Cause Célèbre, a not-for-profit theater company with a mission of “fostering an enhanced understanding of psychological, physical, and social issues through drama.” The playwright, who happens to be the executive and artistic director of Cause Célèbre, has done proud by the company’s mission and has offered up more depth of understanding of the human psyche in under an hour than almost anything I’ve seen on or off Broadway in a very long time.

What drew me to the play was the opportunity to see Mr. Aiello, whom I last saw perform on stage more than three decades ago in Gemini, one of the plays on my personal favorites list. He did not disappoint, and both he and Ms. Mackay gave first-class performances.

Mr. Aiello plays the title character, a curmudgeon of a man who seems to be in a persistently surly mood, and certainly someone you would not particularly want to do business with. That Ms. Mackay’s character, Hilary, is insistent on doing business with him is strictly the result of a hole she has worn in her shoe while wandering aimlessly up and down the length of Manhattan. He wants to close up his shop for the day; she wants him to fix her shoe.

On the face of it, this is not much to hang a play on, but the writer has her characters unveil their secrets slowly, and we gradually come to understand what it is that has so affected their lives that normal discourse has become nearly impossible. As it happens with people in times of high stress, one of the characters has more immediately absorbed the blow through personal empathy and a flood of memories; the other, it would seem, is still in a state of shock and has yet to be overwhelmed, even as the pair part company at the end.

Without revealing any more of the storyline, let me just say that the power of the play is such that it has stuck in my mind long since the actors took their bows. Indeed, it wasn’t until I was describing it later to someone else that the emotional impact of it fully hit me and left me choking back tears.

The Shoemaker deserves to have a long life beyond its brief initial run, and I hope that Ms. Charlotte is not tempted to expand it into anything more than the polished jewel that it already is.

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Let the New Theater Season Begin!

With the 2009-2010 Tony Awards behind us, it’s time start taking a look at the new season. Here is a rundown of two new shows, and a report on a one-time event, a concert version of Lerner and Loewe’s lovely, lovely musical, Brigadoon.

Let’s begin with Little Doc by Don Klores, now on view at the Rattlestick Playwrights Theater.

To give you an idea of the sensibility of the play, it’s helpful to recall that Klores is best known as an independent filmmaker with a penchant for exploring what lies beneath the scabs of life. Perhaps his best-known film is “Crazy Love,” the impossible-to-fathom but nonetheless true story of Linda Riss and Burton Pugach, who married some 15 years after he arranged to have liquid lye thrown into her face when she attempted to break off their relationship. Scabs, indeed!

With this new work, Little Doc, Klores examines what happens when a group of ‘60s stoners have evolved into ‘70s druggies and dealers. The events unfold during a gathering of these long-time friends, now a collective of cons, hustlers and misfits, for whom casual marijuana use and free love have shifted into high gear, and cocaine and various injectables shore up their lives and serve as their source of income. The plot hinges on the revelation that one of them has shortchanged their supplier by $50,000, and it is the fallout from that little oversight that carries the play to its predictable, if still sad, conclusion.

The play itself is well performed, especially by Adam Driver in the title role. Driver seems to be channeling a young Jeff Goldblum, which is not a bad thing, and the cast as a whole works well together. But as was the case with “Crazy Love,” Little Doc leaves us feeling a little queasy, uncomfortably eavesdropping on conversations that are so none of our business. You need to decide for yourself if these are folks you would like to spend an evening with.

Speaking of disturbing characters, chances are you would not care to party with the characters in Order, a new play on view at the Kirk Theater on Theater Row. Order, by Christopher Boal, is an offbeat dark comedy about the mental instability that lurks just beneath the surface of what we foolishly call normalcy. The central character is a gentle man, a walking “kick me” sign, who is bullied by his boss and his psychotherapist, and who is a disappointment to his wife. Our hero finds redemption and discovers his inner Hannibal Lecter with the assistance of a demon named “Bathug.”

The “ick” factor may be stronger in Order than in Little Doc (hint: did you pick up on the Hannibal Lecter reference?), but I enjoyed it more because of its over-the-top approach—a little bit Martin McDonagh, a little bit “Little Shop of Horrors,” and perhaps just a dab of H. P. Lovecraft.

The actors, members of the Off-Off Broadway Oberon Theatre Ensemble, do splendid work under the direction of Austin Pendleton, himself a multi-talented actor, director, and playwright. They and the audience are in good, if blood-stained, hands.

I would hate to end this blog entry on a gory note, however, so let’s talk about Brigadoon, with its sublime score by Lerner and Loewe, presented at the Shubert Theater in a concert version as a one-time benefit performance for the Irish Repertory Theatre.

As with any benefit, there were some opening speeches and words of appreciation to sit through. Actors Matthew Broderick and Jonathan Cake were on hand to provide the introductory remarks, which included an explanation as to why the Irish Rep, which specializes in plays by Irish and Irish-American playwrights, had chosen to present a musical that takes place in Scotland. Answer: “The Irish are Scots who learned how to swim!”

But finally the talking ended, and the musicians began to play, and it soon became apparent that the best thing for me to do was to close my eyes and just let the beautiful music sweep over me.

If you are familiar with the score of Brigadoon only from the 1947 cast album, it would be worth your efforts to track down other recordings. Indeed, please let me know if you have any recommendations. While I normally prefer the original versions of shows, in this case, it does not do justice to the score; the singing is overblown and annoyingly operatic in style; songs are left out or truncated; and lyrics are altered. The score also includes some lovely orchestral passages that do not exist on the original cast album.

For me, then, this concert version was an eye opener. Melissa Errico and Jason Danieley, in particular, were in exquisite voice in the lead roles, and it was fun to listen as Christine Ebersole tried on a Scottish accent to sing "My Mother's Weddin' Day." Also nice to see Len Cariou, even if he did sing only a few notes. But the evening truly belonged to composer Frederick Loewe and lyricist Alan Jay Lerner, for whom this was a most fitting tribute. It was nice that Lerner’s daughters were in the audience to once again enjoy their father’s most beautiful musical.

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2010 Tony Awards Show

The Broadway theater industry put on its annual self-love fest last night at the Tony Awards ceremonies.

I don’t want to be a Monday morning quarterback, and so I won’t comment on the winners and losers and the overlooked. But I would like to share some thoughts about the broadcast itself, both as a theatrical event and as an indicator of where the industry would like to position itself in the eyes of the American public.

It seems to me there was a greater understanding that this was a television show as well as a theatrical awards ceremony. More attention was paid to entertainment values and to keeping the adrenalin flowing, with an eye toward attracting a younger audience to both the broadcast and to Broadway.

Nothing wrong with that; the traditional audience for a Broadway show is getting rather long in the tooth, and so an appeal to the next generation is a good thing. Thus, the rock band Green Day and music from the show American Idiot, which features the group’s songs, were given lots of air time. There was a video promo by rock superstar Jon Bon Jovi. Two performers from the popular television show Glee, Lea Michele and Matthew Morrison, were given feature spots in which to perform Broadway show tunes. And there was a very visible presence of popular Hollywood stars as presenters, recipients, and camera-ready front-and-center audience members.

Do note that “younger audience” is a relative term. Green Day and Bon Jovi date to the 1980s, and both Mr. Morrison and Ms. Michele sang show tunes from the late 1950s and mid-1960s, respectively. The target audience would seem to be those old enough (mid 30s to mid 50s) to have sufficient disposable income to pluck down the big bucks for an evening at a Broadway show. Maybe some of them will even be hitherto non-theatergoing guys; hence the presence of New York Jets quarterback Mark Sanchez, who introduced a number from the musical Memphis. (Didn’t Spamalot demonstrate that the right marketing could bring in an enthusiastic male audience?)

It is difficult to turn an awards ceremony into an entertaining must-see event. I don’t envy the producers of the Tony Awards show. Hopes are always high that maybe this year, the show will be exciting and offer up more than the expected. There will be enough people griping about long-winded speeches and problems with the sound, so let me just point out some of the things I did like about the broadcast.

Sean Hayes was a charming, professional, and seemingly comfortable host for the evening. No over-the-top “Just Jack” moments for this actor, best known for his role as the outrageous Jack McFarland on the TV show Will and Grace. He performed admirably—from his introductory piano performance to his gentle humor to his participation in a choreographed sequence from the Broadway show in which he currently stars, the revival of Promises, Promises.

Marian Seldes, the 81-year-old always-working actress, accepted her lifetime achievement award by posing coyly for a few moments, then walking offstage without saying a word. Perhaps the best speech of the evening.

Lea Michele did a gutsy, “out there” rendition of the song “Don’t Rain on My Parade,” from the show Funny Girl. The musical is slated to be revived on Broadway in the 2011-2012 season under the direction of Bartlet Sher, who helmed the near perfect revival of South Pacific, and many believe this was Ms. Michele’s audition performance. I’ll leave it to others to decide whether she might make a good Fanny Brice, but I certainly admired her moxie.

Bibi Neuwirth and Nathan Lane were a delightful pair of presenters for the awards for best actress and best actor in a musical. They were well prepared and appropriately self-mocking of the critical “thumbs down” for the musical in which they currently co-star, The Addams Family. They were a pleasant contrast to the typically formal, squinting-at-the-teleprompter presentation speeches.

It’s always difficult to convey the power of a musical number taken out of context of a show and sprawled across the stage of Radio City Music Hall. The one number that worked best in my view was the song “The Best of Times” from La Cage aux Folles, headed up by Douglas Hodge, who won the Tony Award for his performance as Albin. The number made good use of the stage, and even went out into the audience., lending dimensionality often lacking in such televised production numbers. It certainly played well and could lead to an upsurge in ticket sales for a show that has been revived on Broadway twice since its original production in 1983.

In case you were wondering, tickets for the Tony Awards generally go on sale the same day the nominations are announced. This year, tickets prices were $250 and $450, and the event is billed as “black tie only.” I don’t know about you, but unless I am invited as someone’s guest (tux thrown in), I’ll continue to watch from home.

And so, the 2009-2010 New York theater season ends with its usual share of official winners and losers.

Let the 2010-2011 season begin!

Feel free to tell your friends about this blog, and to share your own theater stories by posting a comment.