Kate Walsh spices up "Dusk Rings A Bell"

Kate Walsh is known to most people from “Grey’s Anatomy” and “Private Practice” but she is now starring in a two person play getting its premier of Dusk Rings A Bell.

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Reviews of this show, which runs through June 26th, have been pretty good.

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tickets

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NY Times

Backstage

Theatermania

Out of pocket until Tuesday

Out of the country until Tuesday.

Burnt Part Boys opens: Mining Disaster Musical?

I have to start off by saying that I don't like Mining Disaster Musicals - it is not my fault, I was scarred by Floyd Collins at a impressionable age. However, given that, I have been pleasantly surprised by the reviews of the Burnt Part Boys - now at Playwrights Horizon.

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tickets

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reviews:

NY Times

NY Daily News

Backstage

Eguenie and Kirill are now BIG Sean Hayes fans

Last Saturday we went and saw Promises Promises with a bunch of friends. Included in this group was a new family who had adopted 2 young boys from Russia, Eguenie and Kirill - aged 12 and 10. We also went with a good friend of Sean Hayes.

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After the show we went backstage to see Sean and he was nice - but the boys were a little confused.

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They knew that they had seen Sean, but didn't know from where. So Sean said, "I was up here tonight."

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But the boys explained that while he looked like the guy on stage he didn't sound like him.

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So Sean said, "Well right now I am talking in my normal voice, but when I am on stage I have to speak louder to get to the back of the theater!"

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Then he did a little schtick that reminded them of the show and the kids were star struck.

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Eugenie and Kirill followed him around and asked questions until their mom finally pulled them away and out the door. Sean was nothing but sweet and gracious.

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More than that, he was wonderful as CC Baxter.

Reviews of White Woman Street

White Woman Street is a new play set in 1916 in Ohio. One Irish expat, Trooper O'Hara leads his gang into a brothel in the town of White Woman Street.

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Tickets

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Reviews are here.

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TheaterMania

Backstage

Curtain Up

Drama Desk Winners (Off Broadway)

The full list of Drama Desk Winners can be found here. But these off-Broadway show won awards as well.
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Outstanding Book of a Musical: Alex Timbers, Off Broadway’s Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson).
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Outstanding Lyrics: John Kander and Fred Ebb, The Scottsboro Boys
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Unique Theatrical Experience: Love, Loss and What I Wore

Tony Randall Theatre Fund Winners Announced!

The Tony Randall Theatrical Fund continues last year’s mandate of providing operating support to assist outstanding theatre companies meet the challenges of the current economic climate. Grants were awarded to several deserving companies.
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Playwrights Horizons, The Wooster Group, St. Ann’s Warehouse, and PS 122 are being recognized for sustained artistic excellence and for developing and presenting new and exciting artists and theatrical works.
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The Fund also awarded grants to the young theatre companies New Georges and Pig Iron Ensemble in recognition of their groundbreaking experimental work. Pregones Theatre is being honored this year for its commitment to providing popular, affordable arts programming in the Puerto Rican and Latino communities in the Bronx.
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The Classical Theatre of Harlem under the new leadership of Ty Jones, Producing Director, has also been awarded a Tony Randall Grant for its commitment to serving the Harlem community as a cultural destination for the last decade and for providing opportunities for remarkable actors of color to play great classic roles which would otherwise be scarce.

The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity

Second Stage is presenting The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity, which deals with sterotypes, wrestling and self image.

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tickets and info

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It doesn't sound promising, but Second Stages always present good works, so give it the benefit of the doubt. Here are some reviews:

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NY Times

NY Post

NY Daily News

Advice Videos from Tony Nominees

There are a lot of programs and help that come out of New York Theater for people who want to study or learn about working on or backstage. One interesting one is SpringboardNYC.

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You can find more information about it at the American Theater Wing Organization, but in addition to their programs in New York, they have launched a YouTube series of discussions with Tony nominees. I quote from their press release.
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The American Theatre Wing has launched its latest online video series, SpringboardNYC “Cues from Tony Nominees 2010,” in which the current slate of Tony nominees (there are more than thirty participants in total) answer questions specifically crafted to enlighten, inspire and encourage aspiring theater professionals. New videos are being posted daily on the American Theatre Wing website through Tony Sunday, June 13. The videos are also available on The Wing’s YouTube channel (www.youtube.com/AmericanTheatreWing).
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SpringboardNYC is a yearly two-week college-to-career boot camp for young performers moving to NYC. Each year, the program includes a series of mentor conversations with working artists in the field. These mentors have included Neil Patrick Harris, Allison Janney, Lauren Graham, Cynthia Nixon, Liev Schreiber and many more. While only 36 select students have the opportunity to hear from these artists first-hand each season at SpringboardNYC, The American Theatre Wing is using their website to vastly expand the reach of this educational program with this ongoing video web series, which includes interviews with Jude Law, Sean Hayes, Sherie Rene Scott, Marian Seldes, David Alan Grier and many more.
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I think it is cool that these types of things can be offerred to a greater audience with the internet.

Moving to Broadway News: Yank and Scottsboro Boys

Two of the best received off-Broadway musicals of this season will move to Broadway next season.

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Yank (reviewed here by me) just announced a new Director, Broadway vet David Cromer (NY Times).

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Bobby Steggert, one of the stars of the show, wants to return when it comes back to Broadway. Mr. Steggert is nominated for a Tony this year for his supporting work in Ragtime.

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The second show with news is The Scottsboro Boys. The Scottsboro Boys features music and lyrics by John Kander and the late Fred Ebb, a book by David Thompson. The "Scottsboro" case in 1930s, concerned 9 African American men unjustly accused of attacking two white women on a train in Alabama. The young men were convicted by an all-white jury and spent years in jail, while the case was reviewed over and over.

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The Scottsboro Boys opens October 31 at the Lyceum Theatre.

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I like these shows because they are unique and new - not based on a movie, TV Show or a revival. It is a good sign for Broadway that producers are moving with new content.

Last Chance (Closes June 6th) Oliver Parker

"Oliver Parker" continues its run at the Cherry Lane Theater until June 6th.
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It has received interesting reviews given an off-putting subject, with John Larroquette and Michael Zegen (pictured) being singled out for great work.
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Tickets and Reviews:
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MusicOMH
Time Out New York
TheatreMania

Openings: Lascivious Something and Housewives of Mannheim

Two shows opened recently and were reviewed by a number of sites.

The Housewives of Mannheim concerns 4 jewish women from the greatest generation time and their response to art and moreover, their response to changes in the world and gender roles. It has gotten good reviews. web site

NY Times
TheaterMania
NY TheaterGuide


Lascivious Something also opened (tickets at the Women's Project) with new reviews today. Lascivious Something is set in the Greece of the 1980's, but with reflections of current troubled times.

NY Times
NY Post
Time Out New York

This Wide Night: Eddie Falco and Alison Pill

This Wide Night opened on May 16th and I have linked to some reviews about it. It concerns 2 women who became friends in prison and their attempts to reconnect that friendship outside of the jail.

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People either enjoy the 2 person interaction - or they find the talk talk too slow.

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NY Times Review

NY Post Review

Variety Review

Review of The Glass House

The Glass House is a carefully and methodically constructed bit of theater as benefits the subjects, Miles van der Rohe and his Farnsworth House. The precise placement of set pieces, the marched scene changes, the movement of the actors between scenes, all is metaphor for the strictness of architecture. The slow building of art, controlled and planned (as opposed to most creative arts which are free and spontaneous). This is a new play by June Finfer which explores the attraction of Architect and Architecture to patron and collaborator.
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Janet Zarish plays Dr. Farnsworth, a professional woman who has acquired some beautiful land outside of Chicago and wants to build an architectural work of art as a week-end house. Ms. Zarish brings a cool professionalism to the role of Dr. Farnsworth that warms and melts as the Doctor is drawn into the orbit of Architect Miles van der Rohe. As Dr. Farnsworth, Ms. Zarish is attract to the prestige of architecture as compliment, only later to be seduced by the love architecture for art’s sake.
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Harris Yulin does a masterfully understated job with the role of the famous Architect Miles van der Rohe. He is driven by a reserved passion for line and form in Architecture, which he creates, and in women, which he enjoys. The Glass House then, is a love story. It is a love story of Miles van der Rohe and Doctor Farnsworth that yields both an intimate relationship and a collaboration for art’s sake. The physical manifestation of their relationship is the Farnsworth House, a perfectly constructed glass house in Plano Illinois.
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And yet this love story is as sparse and transparent as the Farnsworth House itself, a glass walled work of art that invites the landscape in, while keeping it just out of reach.
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The other woman of the physical relationship is played by Gina Nagy Burns in a lightly sketched role that Ms. Burns fills out. The “other woman” of the artistic collaboration is Philip Johnson, played as jealous villain by David Bishins. Mr. Bishins is appropriately smarmy, but the role as written is a bit jarring for anyone who only knows of Philip Johnson as a very good architect.
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The play not only discusses architecture as art, and collaboration as an intimate relationship, but discusses plagiarism as compliment, as necessary, as organic development. And as self-delusion.
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The transitions between scenes are carried out by 3 men, variously dressed as draftsmen, construction workers or hotel staff. They stiffly move the overly detailed set pieces in a linear chorography that mimic the details of blueprints, layered with more and more detail. These repetitive motions mimic the creation and design of the detailed house.
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The van der Rohe method, detailed, studied and slow in both art and love, is contrasted against the Philip Johnson’s rush towards reward and recognition.
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The payoff of The Glass House is wonderful. Rarely is there a physical manifestation of a great love affair. Mush less one that you can actually visit. The Glass House makes you think there is probably an interesting story buried inside the walls of most famous buildings. The writer, Ms. Finfer, does a great job in bringing it out. And the director, Evan Bergman, gives the piece the light touch to slowly reveal it to the audience.
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The Glass House may not sound like it is for everyone, but it casts a wide net to show the ability for us to architect our own truths.
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The Glass House
Cast: Harris Yulin, David Bishins, Janet Zarish, Gina Nagy Burns
Director: Evan Bergman
United Stages at Theatre Row, May 9 – June 15th in Rep
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Rating: Well Worth the Money
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What works: The slow unfolding of venerability to beauty and love.
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What doesn't work: For many people the unfolding will be too slow and too structured
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What you get to brag about to your friends: A deeper understanding of Miles van der Rohe. He is the father of the German Bauhaus movement, here gloriously fleshed out. AND the problems with the Philip Johnson’s Glass House in Connecticut
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Review of The Master Builder

The Master Builder is long, two intermissions long. One of Henrik Ibsen’s last plays, it is full of imagery, angst and ponderings on guilt. Chris Ceraso plays Halvard Solness, the Master Builder, so wonderfully that the play moves reasonably well, but by the end of the second intermission one realizes the show is a lot longer than it really need be.
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On one level, The Master Builder is a complex story of a man at the height of his power, but afraid of losing it all. The arrival of a young woman, full of sexy worship brings the insecurities and fears of Halvard Solness to the fore, but her arrival also triggers a reckless youthful streak of bravado in the Master Builder. There is much discussion of trolls, mind control and the meaning of responsibility. One cannot help but think that if this 50 year old guy just got a hooker and a Miata – he would get through his mid-life crises a lot easier.
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Perhaps it is the long Norwegian winter darkness that foists this insanely constricting emotional detachment from life. Perhaps Lutheranism is more restrained in practice in Norway. Whatever the case, there is a lot of navel gazing to sit through – and no matter how well acted I began to hate Ragnar and Knut and Aline and Kia. I wanted them all just to blow up and get on with it.
However, this is not to be. This being a 19th century Norwegian drama there must be much talk of duty, heavy sighs and swallowing of deep felt emotions. It was all done well. Susan Ferrara plays Mrs. Solness with appropriate gravitas of a woman who’s life has fallen out of control on the altar of her husband’s ambition. Mrs. Solness is all Norwegian sturdiness and reserve, bound in a costume that is as constricting as the role she plays.
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Jennifer Gawlik plays a young woman in the Master Builder’s thrall, only to be ignored once a more exciting woman enters the scene. Ms. Gawlik’s young heart visibly breaks when Mr. Solness is done with her. It is a rather thankless role that Ms. Gawlik plays very well.
There is another story of a father and son who work for Halvard Solness, Knut and Ragnar Brovik. They represent the men that the Master Builder has used in his quest to reach the pinnacle of his profession. But the characters are marched in and out so mechanically the only need to have been referred to, perhaps they were more important in the original language, but in translation the audience needs to imagine that they play a great symbol of the Master Builder’s ruthlessness. This is in a play with plenty of symbols enough!
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Sarah Stockton plays Hilda Wangel, the brash, exciting, sexy young lady that enters Mr. Solness life and immediately captivates his. Ms. Stockton handles the coquettish duties easily. Her attractiveness is matched by a zest for life. She breaths fresh air into a stuffy situation. Ms. Stockton cannot help to bring to mind the young Kate Winslet, the freshness interwoven with a woman coming into her own sexually. It is clear why the captivating Hilda Wangal awakens the youth in the Master Builder.
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Director Eric Parness stages the scenes well, and lets Mr. Ceraso pull the audience along with the show as long as he can. However, ultimately The Master Builder feels dated, and, as it is in repertory with The Glass House, feels less connected to architecture than expected.
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The Master Builder
Cast: Chris Ceraso, Susan Ferrara, Sarah Stockton, Brian D. Coats, Peter Judd, Pun Bandhu, Jeffifer Gawlik
Director: Eric Parness
United Stages at Theatre Row, May 9 – June 15th in Rep
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Rating: If it sounds interesting to you
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What works: A good version of an Ibsen Show.
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What doesn't work: Slow and long
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What you get to brag about to your friends: A great Ibsen show
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Other Off Broadway Openings

This week these 3 shows opened. Here are the shows, a summary and links to reviews.

First up: The Kid

This is a musical created from Dan Savage's memoir of he and his boyfriend trying to start a family. Reviews were positive.
NY Times Review
NY Post Review

Second Up: Gabriel

This is a romantic melodrama set on German occupied Channel Islands. There reviews have been mixed, but the people who liked it, loved it.
NY Times
NY Post

Finally: Family Week

This is Beth Henley's new play, and Jonathan Demme's first New York stint as director. It is a show about a woman in a rehabilitation facility after the death of her son. It received mediocre reviews, but there were some standouts in the cast.
MusicOMH
NY Times
NY Post

Subject of "The Glass House"

Opening on Sunday are two plays, "The Glass House" and "The Architect" alternating nights in rep. Both plays deal with Architects and Architecture. The subject of "The Glass House" is Mies van der Rohe house outside Chicago (in Plano Illinois).

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The play uses the rumored relationship between Architect and patron to understand why, when the project was very nearly finished, Mrs. Farnsworth (not married) put an end to their collaboration.

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The week-end retreat house was restored to its original design intent after Mrs. Farnsworth sold it in 1972 (21 years after completion). The new owner, a British Art collector, restored it to the original vision of van der Rohe - as seen above.

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Mrs. Farnsworth had made various changes to it that infuriated the architect including a bronzed in screen porch and a teak closet that ruined the look. The play deals with the vision of both the Architect and the Patron as well as the human relationship that might have ruined it.

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Full review on Sunday after it opens.

This is one of the wonderful things about off-broadway

One of the many very interesting things that occur off-Broadway is the chance to see people you may be familiar with from TV or the movies in an intimate setting. One such chance is coming up with a show called "Voice Lessons."

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It starts Laurie Metcalf from Roseanne fame and French Stewart from Third Rock From the Sun fame.

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I haven't seen it, but it looks and sounds fun. I quote.

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VOICE LESSONS
by Justin Tanner
Featuring Laurie Metcalf, French Stewart and Maile Flanagan

"Playwright Justin Tanner infuses his quirky insight and jaundiced sense of humor within the hilarious machinations of self-deluded community theater actress Ginny (Laurie Metcalf) and her catatonically despairing vocal coach Nate (French Stewart). Complicating proceedings is the intrusion of Ginny's theatre rival, Sheryl, played to the self-righteous hilt by Maile Flanagan...(The play) is unhinged." - Variety

"Laurie Metcalf gives a performance that must be seen to be believed. I sat through it and am still not sure what passed before me...Metcalf and Stewart know how to work every moment of this 60 minute show!" - L.A. Times

Fundamental Theatre Project Fun Nights

A young man I saw in Shaw's Candida, Sam Underwood, has started a new theatre group as Artistic Director. It is called the "Fundamental Theater Project." More information here on the group here.

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I don't know how great he is as an Artistic Director - but he was great in the show I saw (my review at the bottom of the post.)

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They are having a 2 night fundraiser - the first a singalong and the second a reading of a play.

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Both are noted in the poster and on the site.

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Feel free to join them - I'm going to try to make it as well. It should be fun - and the Artistic Director is a Brit and the young lady who is Producing Director is Irish - so you know they can drink if they have to.

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http://www.musicomh.com/theatre/nyc_candida_0310.htm

At Hand Theatre Company

One of the very cool things about Off Broadway is that there are so many theatre companies working in different ways.

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The At Hand Theatre Company (website) is one such group.

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I have now seen two of their shows (Letters to the End of the World and Lila Cante) and loved them both. The currently put on productions where they can - they don't have a set home I think, but it doesn't matter.

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So far, everything I have seen I have loved. They are a very young group.

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They focus on sustainable productions with minimal environmental impact. And so, their plays are often done with a minimal set - but their players and playwrights bring the emotion out without the need for too many props and set pieces. They are great.

Letters To The End of The World: A Journey of Growth and Hope

Letters To The End Of The World could easily have been a tired cliché of a show, just wading into a mess “do-good”ness. I am thrilled to say it is not that at all. Letters is a wonderfully satisfying piece of theater. The simple staging and straightforward story pull you into the play before you realize it. The characters are well written, amazingly acted and full of the same frustrations and longing that inhabit all of us before we get old, bitter and witty. You ache for them as you ache for your younger self.
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The product of writer / director Anton Dudley, a simple plot summary doesn’t take into account much of the play’s emotions. Letters concerns the journey of a delicate young man named Todd, the privileged but not spoiled son of New Yorkers. He is still young enough to yearn to do “global good”, and frustrated he doesn’t know how to proceed. Todd finds articles by a teacher in Africa, a woman named Agnatha, with whom he starts a correspondence. Ultimately, their letters multiple an ache he already feels to do “more” and so it is no surprise that in the second act he travels to Africa to help at the school.
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What is a surprise is the life that occurs there, not overwrought dramatic shenanigans, just the day to day lives that Todd has to deal with. It is simple premise, done plainly and acted with touching gentleness.
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Charles Socarides illuminates Todd as an idealistic young who thinks of himself as an old soul and desperately wants to be useful. Todd personifies the story of youthful frustration – full of hope and idealism but without the experience to turn desire into deeds. Mr. Socarides’ actions, reactions, fears and wonderment anchor a wild mix of characters into a believable whole. Mr. Socarides is able to pull off some edge walking emotions. He shows a deep understanding of how a desire to do “something” can be a cover for not living the life in front of him. His character struggles between his ethereal desire to “help” and his base need to be loved. It is a common story, but a powerful one none the less.
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Shannon Burkett plays the American teacher in Africa and her sister, Tess, in New York. As Agnatha she is convincing and realistic, but the writing lets her down as Tess. It would have been simpler to use another actress altogether. As Agnatha, Ms. Burkett brings an honesty to the person that seems just a little too good.
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Tyrone Mitchell Henderson and Francesca Choy-Kee play the teachers in the African school. They bring both warmth and restraint to well written roles, and they provide glimpse into a life that is foreign to both Todd and the audience. Their performances are key to bringing Zambia to life for the audience. Not in a tourist, or observer sense, but Zambia as reality for them. They pull off this difficult task.
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Finally Peter O’Conner plays Bryan, Todd’s quasi-boyfriend. Bryan has to understand his own journey with regards to Todd. The script and Mr. O’Conner give just enough hints to allow the audience to devise their own insights into this relationship, without cheating the story.
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Credit has to go to Anton Dudley, who both wrote a beautiful story and manages to pull its delicacy out of these great actors. The story juggles at least three stories excellently, while never losing focus on the human relationships that lie at the heart of drama. There is space surrounded on three sides by the audience and Mr. Dudley uses this space very well as a director. He brings the actors close to the audience without forcing the action.
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The “At Hand Theatre Company” has mission to produce original work using sustainable means, and so there is very little in the way of sets. The sense of place is never lost, and credit there goes to the actors, director and beautiful Lighting Design by Ryan Bauer. With a bench and a painted wall, the audience is transported between New York and Zambia effortlessly.
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Letters To The End Of The World explores stories that are familiar. The joy in this show is the unique manner that the audience is presented these stories through the eyes of people with foibles, hope and love.
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Letters to the End of the World
Studio Theatre at Theatre Row, April 29 – May 16
Cast list: Shannon Burkett, Francesca Choy-Kee, Tyrone Mitchell Henderson, Peter O’Connor, Chalres Socarides
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Rating: SEE IT
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What works: The emotional growth journey. Charles Socarides performance
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What doesn't work: Tess – the sister
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What you get to brag about to your friends: This is a show you will want to share with a friend, go out afterwards and talk about your youth and what you always wanted to do.
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Spend The Night In Jail: Truer Tag Line Never Spoken

It is no fun to really dislike an evening at the theater. You know in your heart that a lot of people, mostly talented, have put a lot of work into the show. You traveled to the play, taken a rather skecthy elevator up to the 4th floor, and suffered the heat to watch this. You really want it to be good.

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And yet the two plays that make up the Theater Experience "Spend The Night In Jail" are not good. One is actively bad.

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“Spend the Night in Jail” is the thematic title for a theatrical evening of two one act plays, Hello Out There by William Saroyan and Deathwatch by Jean Genet. Both plays are set in a single jail cell and look at the dynamics of individuals trying to connect emotionally, even as one character in each is certain he is facing death. However, there is less commonality between the two than you expect.

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Hello Out There was written in 1941 and is the story of a man accused of raping a married woman. He admits to the intercourse, but claims it was consensual until she demanded payment. The man has been moved to another city to protect him from being lynched, although he expects the mob will find him soon enough. The jailhouse cook and janitor, a delicate and emotional marooned young woman, is drawn to him. Richard Hymes-Espositio and Kerry Fitzgibbons play the couple and are able to establish a believable connection very quickly. Mr. Hymes-Espositio plays a slick hustler and Ms. Fitzgibbons is desperate to believe there is some way out of her life, a dead end road by the time she is only 16.

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One problem is that the intimacy is built on whispered conversations. Whispered conversations in a Theater with an air-conditioner. Yes, that's a problem if you are trying to follow the story.

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As written, the drama should come from the dichotomy between the time it takes to gain the girls trust and affection, versus the rapid rate time is running out on the drifter’s life. But it does not. The drifter never seems rushed as he tries to win over the girl, his entreats of “Hurry” are just words without a lot of feeling or action behind them. The audience doesn’t feel that doom is approaching. In the end, the audience doesn’t buy into the stakes of this game.

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Somehow, maybe vainly, I don't think this is Mr. Hymes-Espositio's fault. The play depends on archetypes and shorthand out of the depression era. If you are familiar with the movies of the era, it is helpful.

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But if Hello Out There is detached from the audience, it isn’t from lack of trying. On the other hand, the second play, Deathwatch, is incomprehensible. Deathwatch was written in 1944 in French by Jean Genet. It attempts to be a study in masculinity, relationships and betrayal in prison. Due either to the translation or because the original play is dated, it does not succeed. Really not succeed.

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Two young prisoners, John Paul Harkins and Greg Engbrecht, struggle for the admiration and attention of the cell-block boss Raul Sigmund Julia, who faces death for his offenses in 2 weeks.

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There is a lot of running around, some fights and torrents of existential ramblings by the characters, but none of it connects. Without a grasp of these characters or even their motivations, then their fights, taunts and screams are meaningless to the audience. The interplay and discussions are not easy to follow, labored as they are by references to free will, duplicity and the hierarchy of evil deeds. Director Richard Hymes-Espositio (the drifter in Hello Out There) directs this show and plays up the action to keep the audience’s attention. It works for a while, but ultimately we don’t care what these characters are saying and no amount of stage fighting can hide that.

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Deathwatch is a French Existential Mess. It is a monument to the actors that they remember the lines - but in truth they could rearraign the lines randomly and it would make just as much sense.

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I passed much of my time fantasizing how much better it would be it they all used the bad Steve Martin and Peter Seller's accents from the Pink Panther.

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Spend the Night in Jail.
*
Rating: So Not Me
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What works: The sets?
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What doesn't work: The 1940's scripts (but they both don't work in different ways :-)
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What you get to brag about to your friends: Oh, it's quite a tale to tell to friends...

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Bloody Bloddy Andrew Jackson: Extended Until May 31

Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson was recently extended until May 31st at New York’s Public Theater (www.publictheater.org). If you enjoy a raucous good time, enjoy (or can tolerate) emo-rock music, remember your teen angst, or interested in how Benjamin Walker can make Andrew Jackson the personification of youthful anger, angst and sexiness, then go now and see it.

This show has been bathed in superlatives since it opened, which unfortunately sets expectations sky high. And, for some people, the explosion of sound, fury and fun doesn’t live up to the hype – particular if they were expecting a detailed exploration of our 7th President from a Rock Musical.
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But gang, for me Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson was an outlet, a rave, a party and a celebration of the complexity of American spirit and just plain fucking fun. I use the expletive purposefully here because if the use of the word fuck bothers you – do not see this show. The play though done in the current vernacular, is set in the early 1900s. It is full of modern vocal vulgarities and historical prejudices. It is, as warned in the Playbill, extremely incorrect, politically speaking.
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Credit has to go to writer / director ALEX TIMBERS and music & lyrics writer MICHAEL FRIEDMAN for daring to run everyone so over the top to such good effect. If you know a little something about Andrew Jackson – it helps. If you don’t remember any of your 4th grade US history – it’s okay, the show fills you in on the basics in a new and groundbreaking way.The cast is great, with Lucas Near-Verbrugghe as Van Buren and Jeff Hiller as JQ Adams as comic standouts. Their portrayals of these Presidents will make you think twice about the Founding Fathers.

But the scene stealer, the star, the narcissistic flame at the center of this show is Benjamin Walker who plays Andrew Jackson with a sexy sheen and enough petulance to make you aware of the kid underneath. He combines this duality in much the same way Ashton Kutcher did early in his career, and with a minimal amount of exposure and some luck Mr. Walker could be just as big. See him while you can. He tears up the stage as Andrew Jackson.
In a completely non-traditional method, the play actually explores the meaning and results of populism and national destiny. It looks back at a time when our nation was pulled between traditional growth models, and wild west swagger. It emerges with a shitload of fun, but no easy answers.

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Finally, I would be remise if I didn’t note that the set, the stage, the house is fabulously immersive (by DONYALE WERLE). It crawls from the stage along the walls and ceiling engulfing the audience. A riot of neon, chandeliers, Christmas lights, portraits and log cabin paraphernalia screams Frontier boy teen-age room just as posters of Hot Rods and St. Pauley girls might today. It is “ego” gone mad. It, like the entire show, left me gob-smacked.
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BLOODY BLOODY ANDREW JACKSON

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Rating: SEE IT!!

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What works: Benjamin Walker, the amazing presentation of this story

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What doesn't work: if you can’t stand a rock musical – you will not like it

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What you get to brag about to your friends: You saw it. This show will remain in the hearts and memories of anyone who was lucky enough to see it for a long time. Years from now people will say “Remember Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson” and you can say, “Remember it?! I saw it at the Public!”
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Tony Nominations

Well, it isn't Off-Broadway, but the Tony nominations are out...

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There are some Off-Broadway transfers up for big Awards.

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Next Fall is up for Best Play. I haven't seen it yet (I KNOW!), but I will have to make the trip very very soon.

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Sherie Rene Scott is up for Best Lead Actress in a Muscial for the same role in Everday Rapture that was at the 2nd Stage last year.

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But for me, the biggest surprise was the HUGE nomination haul for Ragtime. A show that opened and closed while I was on Christmas Vacation in Palm Springs! The Nomination Committee must have LOVED it. It took a Best Revival of a Muscial spot I thought would go to Promises Promies. Sean Hayes was the only major nomination for Promises Promises, it surprised me that Kristen Chenowith wasn't nominated.

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As for the "Best Original Musical", all the nominees have been greated with mixed reactions by viewers. My hope goes out to American Idiot, which- like the Love Boat - is exciting and new. Memphis and The Million Dollar Quartet - ehhh. As for Fela, it has gotten the best and the worst reactions I have ever heard. Some people love the shake-your-booty-along, and some feel that it is to cult like. Addams Family was left out (no surprise) and Come Fly Away was left out (yay! - it's not a muscial if you play pre-recorded Sinatra to me). In the "Best New Play" catagory, no Enron nomination did surprise me (although again - mixed reviews).

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My favorites (not projected winners, just my favorites)...

Sherei Rene Scott : Lead Actress in a Musical

Jude Law: Lead Actor in a Play (for Hamlet)

Little Night Music: Best Revival of a Muscial

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Full List Here

Theater Breaking Through Barriers

The play reviewed below (Bass for Piscasso) was presented by Theater Breaking Through Barriers (TBTB). This is a Off-Broadway company that integrates able-bodied actors with artists with disabilities.
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The woman on the left (holding the artificial leg) is Anita Hollander, an actress in "Bass for Picasso" and the East Coast National Chair of the AFTRA Performers with Disabilities committee. Ms. Hollander lost one leg to cancer.
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One thing I found interesting and refreshing in the show was that the actress' artificial limb was incorporated into the show. It was not mentioned as a joke nor as a plot device. The show merely noted that she had a artificial limb, as anyone watching the show would note.
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Of course, the picture her veers into farce - on purpose.
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But I think the idea of TBTB is exempleary. The group chooses to mainstream actors with disabilities by portraying them as they would be portrayed in real life.
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And, as I note, I though Ms. Hollander was excellent.

Bass for Picasso: Fish Stew

It is hard to tell, exactly, where “Bass for Picasso” goes south. For me it was probably the discussion about the use of nipple clamps in a child’s tableau of Beauty and the Beast.

The title “Bass for Picasso” refers to an overly complex fish recipe that Alice B. Toklas created for Pablo Picasso; unfortunately it could just as easily refer to this overly complex play that keeps adding disparate ingredients to a dinner party to the point that the narrative collapses. The play is uneven in the extreme and more than once you will wish it could settle upon a tone and stay there. It is part farce, part melodrama, part social commentary and part love story that ultimately doesn’t add up to complete whole.

Anita Hollander and Felice Neals play Francesca and Pilar, a lesbian couple throwing a dinner party in order to taste the title dish, “Bass for Picasso”. Francesca is a disabled food writer for the New York Times, and is working her way through parts of Alice B. Toklas’ famous and celebrity rich cook book. Francesca is a bit of a food perfectionist who demands attention and timing. Pilar is her loopy, purposefully dense, life partner with a thing for Ikea. Thankfully unseen, but all too often referred to, are their young children, one a cross dresser and one a sadist. Anita Hollander brings a cool detachment and the appropriate distain to the role of Francesca. Felice Neals does a great job with a role that veers further and further from reality. She plays the culturally superior European who feigns an ignorance of bourgeois entertainments. It is hilarious until it drifts into idiotic.

Their dinners guests are a single gay man, Terry Small as Kevin, a frustrated dramatist that has started drinking after a six year stint in AA. Instead of the author they expected, Kevin brings Bricka, Mary Theresa Archbold in a difficult role. Bricka is a recent widow who’s dead lesbian lover left her with a son, threatening Republican parents and a venomous hatred towards Francesca , who once had an affair with the deceased. Ms. Archbold does an adequate job, but the role as written whips too much between emotions. The final guest is Joe, play by Nicholas Viselli, an OB GYN with a crystal meth addicted boyfriend and a penchant for telling the truth. Mr. Viselli is wonderful and on stage way too little. Joe, as written and winningly performed, is refreshingly honest and blunt.

Director Ike Schambelan has to expend too much effort in keeping the audience up to speed with the shenanigans and signaling where the characters are emotionally, which is important because the emotions don’t arise organically. With this material, he is not able to create a cohesive experience.

“Bass of Picasso” often works its way into an impossible corner, only to cut to black and resume sometime later – irresolvable situation somehow resolved. It is a funny device once, but it soon becomes an annoying crutch for the show. And, unfortunately, this is the lasting impression of “Bass for Picasso”.

It’s too bad that the material ultimately moves into melodrama, because it works for quite a long time as farce. And, perhaps with the addition of Joan Crawford, it would work as camp. However, as written it doesn’t ultimately work at all.
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Bass for Picasso
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Rating: If It Sounds Interesting
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What works: The building of the farce early; unforced hilarity...
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What doesn't work: The sudden shift in tone
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What you get to brag about to your friends: You saw a woman use her artifical leg as a weapon (if you brag about that sort of thing)
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also review for musicOMH