Macbeth (Shakespeare)

Another energetic and lively Elm Shakespeare production in Edgerton Park. I saw one with T&K my first summer in New Haven, and I've tried to ensure that I've seen each one since then.

Highly recommended.

The Train Driver (Athol Fugard)

A moving exploration of responsibility and guilt, of regret and redemption, and ultimately of forgiveness and forgiveness once again. Fine performances of a conundrum particular to post-apartheid South Africa but easy to universalize to any peoples anywhere.

Selvish (Carly Flint)

By re-imagining the Adam and Eve myth through the lens of Koranic additions and revisions, as well as modern conceptions of human love, this play adds Flint's voice to the voices of other, more established poets & playwrights--I'm thinking particularly of Zimmerman, Hughes, and Ruhl--who've taken ancient myths as their source text but made them so much more.

Excellent performances under strong direction.

Recommend.

Title and Deed (Eno)

This fascinating production is the result of a close collaboration between Will Eno and Gare St Lazare, the theatrical company energized by Conor Lovett and Judy Hegarty Lovett. 

Conor Lovett plays an unnamed someone "not from here."  The not-quite bare stage, the man's uncertain posture, and his hesitant delivery place the audience in an ambivalent position that wavers between sympathy and amusement. 

The talk-back with Lovett and Eno was intimate and revealing.

Highly recommend.

The Tempest (Shakespeare)

This is the first Shakespeare play Darko Tresnjak has directed at Hartford Stage since he began Artistic Director.  And as such, it promises many interesting productions.

This production is most distinctive in its visual imagination, its most arresting moment occurring in the first few minutes when a sleeping woman and lengths of cloth become the prow and sails of a ship in a tempest-tossed sea.  The play also features dancers and an acrobat in the frequently omitted masque of Ceres. And the porthole at the back of the stage is effectively used, especially when the fathers peer at Miranda and Ferdinand playing chess.  As far as interpreting the play, this production takes no chances and offers nothing fresh.

Recommend.

My Children! My Africa! (Athol Fugard)

(We sat next to Allie Gallerani's family.)

Highly Recommended.

Medieval Play (Kenneth Lonergan)

Solipsistic silliness or sly satire? Either could be possible in Lonergan's Medieval Play, though the first scene goes a long way toward establishing the first possibility as the dominant one.  Despite certain lapses into (somewhat tedious) absurdity, the satire frequently cuts sharp.  By infusing the dialogue of his medieval characters with the locutions and sensibilities of Gen Y'ers, Lonergan persuasively argues for our inability to act outside our historical constraints, no matter how self aware we are, no matter how much we are able to think outside those constraints.  Energetic acting by Anthony Arkin and Tate Donovan playing the two knights, and a special nod to Heather Burns playing Catherine of Siena.

Recommend.

The Caretaker (Harold Pinter)

 For a long while, I've loved the words "caretaker" and "caregiver" with their simultaneous invocations of both "taking care of/giving care to" and "taking/giving care." (For instance, when I returned to work after the birth of my second child, my advert didn't request a "babysitter"; instead, it requested a "caregiver," and I hired the first respondent who noticed that shift in wording.  It turned out to be an excellent strategy.)  Pinter draws upon these denotations as well as the connotations of a caretaker as someone relegated to minding that which needs to be minded but the rest of us don't want to fiddle with: buildings and grounds, the old and the infirm.

The Theatre Royal Both Productions/Liverpool Everyman and Playhouse production, directed by Christopher Morahan with Jonathan Pryce, Alan Cox, and Alex Hassell, drew on the black humor found in the pauses in the script and ambiguities of its language. Though some audience members found the humor misplaced (as revealed during the fascinating talkback with the actors), I found it to be an effective means for highlighting the despair.   

Like many, I find Pinter challenging, and I enjoy his plays more in retrospect than I do watching them.   Nevertheless, during this performance, I was held captive by the performances of all three actors and after the talkback wished for a chance to see a replay.

Highly recommended.

Isherwood's 5.6.12 NYTimes review

American Buffalo (David Mamet)

A terrific, persuasive performance. 

The 3rd in Elm Shakespeare Company's annual Kehler Liddell Gallery productions.

Recommend.

My Name is Asher Lev (adapted by Aaron Posner from Chaim Potok novel)

When I was in high school, Chaim Potok's novels introduced to me to Hassidism--in truth, Judaism.  Though I lived in the middle of the West Texas Bible Belt, I identified with the protagonists in both The Chosen  and My Name is Asher Lev as they struggled to understand how they could accommodate their their desires and inclinations with their native religion. 

Thus, I was naturally inclined to enjoy My Name is Asher Lev, a 2009 play derived from the 1972 novel. And I did.  It avoided being overly sentimental, and any gaps in the script were papered over by the excellent cast.

Recommend. 

Gatz (Elevator Repair Service, based on Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby)

We'd been hearing about Gatz from friends since it first appeared in the states a couple of years ago.  The premise sounds improbably: a reading of every word--and only the words--of Fitzgerald's novel.  6 hours. Every word. Yikes!

Believing in the good judgment of friends, we tried it any way.  And what a wonderful confirmation of their recommendations. 

Set in a nondescript warehouse office, it begins with a clerk picking up the novel and reading it aloud while he waits for someone to come repair his computer.  Gradually, other office workers are drawn into the reading and they begin to act (and speak) the parts, until the first guy becomes Nick, and the others become the other characters in the novel.  Difficult to describe, but not at all difficult to become absolutely engaged by.

Highly recommend.

The Realistic Jones (Eno)

Fascinating Will Eno play that foregrounds the multiple layers of meaning in every utterance.  Great acting brought together by forceful direction.

When Yale Rep takes chances like this one, I hope the plays success with audiences and critics will encourage them to take many more chances.

Highly recommended.

'Tis Pity She's a Whore (John Ford)

I've never read this Ford play from the late 1620s, so my impression of the production is based solely on the production.  That is, I didn't come to the performance with any notions of what the play was about or what I expected to see.

Cheek By Jowl modernized this production by setting it in the bedroom of a 16-year girl, complete with posters on the wall and clothing strewn about.  This girl, however, will be courted and eventually impregnated and murdered by her fawning older brother.

I found Lydia Wilson's performance as the Annabella who is pulled between her brother Giovanni (Jack Gordon), her maid Putana (Lizzie Hopley), and her (eventual) husband Vasques (Laurence Spellman) engaging and convincing. 

The production, however, tends to be too busy: do I really want to watch actors dance and/or sing for more than 12 seconds? And should I be expected to understand lines delivered while actors are jumping about to loud music? 

Recommend...highly, if only because this play deserves to be seen.

The Lady from Dubuque (Edward Albee)

Signature's Theatre's revival of The Lady from Dubuque is an excellent production of an intriguing, moving, yet nevertheless flawed play.  The characters from the first scene, three couples, none of whom seem to like another, suffer from a dearth of kindness and intelligence.  None of the witty repartee that we expect in an Albee play.  That appears, like a breath of fresh air, when the Oscar and Elizabeth (The Lady from Dubuque played by Jane Alexander) arrive to bring comfort to the hostess Jo, who is dying. Though Elizabeth claims to be Jo's mother, her husband Sam vehemently refutes that claim.  Jo, reduced to whimpering pain, merely embraces Elizabeth without identifying her one way or the other.

Elizabeth and Jo are more than the charming urbanity that we've been wishing for.  And they are more than Jo's mother and her friend (or not). They are allegorical representations of Death, who confront the reality of Jo's imminent death (which neither her husband nor her guests are willing to do) and gently usher her beyond the pain.

Fine performances by all..though I can hardly imagine what it's like to inhabit such distasteful characters eight times a week.

Highly recommend. 

The Winter's Tale (Shakespeare)

A fine, refined production by Yale Rep and directed by Liz Diamond.  Except for the inexplicable decision to have Autolycus sing many of his lines, the production provided the audience with clearly conceived characters whose lines are so well delivered that no notes were necessary to follow the plot.

Highly recommend.

Hurt Village (Katori Hall)

I learned a great deal from the play set in a condemned housing project in Memphis, Tennessee.  Though parts of the play didn't work as well as others, I'm glad we saw it.

Recommend.

Krapp's Last Tape (Beckett)

Not many people get the chance (or dare take the chance) of seeing two productions of the same Beckett play on the same weekend. We did. After seeing John Hurt's performance on Friday, we saw Brian Dennehy's performance in a Sunday matinee. In light of the tight control the Beckett estate exerts over productions of his plays, I was surprised by the substantial differences between the two productions. (Note: I saw the Royal Shakespeare Company's production in 1998 at BAM; I remember little about it beyond the interminable silences and the way it looked. I do not remember being able to understand the tape recordings very well.) There was no comedy in Dennehy's performance. Here, Krapp is clearly a pitiful alcoholic whose pratfalls would be comical if not so pathetic. There was nothing tedious and unclear about the performance. And as he had done for all the previous performances at Long Wharf, he returned to the theatre for an extensive talk-back (really a mini-lecture explicating the play followed by an opportunity for the audience to ask questions): worth the price of the ticket alone.

Recommend highly.

Krapp's Last Tape (Beckett)

John Hurt provided an engaging (that is, clear) performance of Beckett's quintessential curmudgeon overwhelmed by remorse and denial of that remorse. Excellent sound design aided the performance immensely. Recommend highly.

Collaborators (John Hodge)

A National Theatre Live broadcast. Set in 1938 Moscow, the play imagines the circumstances in which Mikhail Bulgakov wrote his play celebrating Stalin's sixtieth birthday. Great play. Excellent production.

Highly Recommended

Doctor Faustus Lights the Lights (Gertrude Stein)

This fine production by the Yale School of Drama students was directed by Lileana Blain-Cruz and earns high marks for being somewhat coherent and, shall we say, illuminating of a very obscure text.

Recommend