Theatre Review: Ninth and Joanie

When Bad Theatre Happens to Good (?) People

Dominic Fumusa in Ninth and Joanie. Photo: Kate Edwards.

I never understood the point of reviewing truly bad theatre.

Having already suffered enough as an audience member, why put yourself  –  and quite frankly, the production — through even more by reliving it via writing?  Then again, when the company boasts such fine talent — including Philip Seymour Hoffman, Eric Bogosian, Bobby Cannavale, Stephen Adly Guirgis, Michael Shannon, Daphne Rubin-Vega and  Lynn Nottage — you’ve gotta wonder (and take to task) how something like Ninth and Joanie even happened. And no, most (un)fortunately, none of the folks just listed are involved with this train wreck produced by famed LAByrinth Theater Company.

The man behind this drab, overly dark mafia melodrama is LAB member Brett C. Leonard, a playwright who, it appears, hasn’t done terribly much outside the nurturing bubble of the Lab’s cozy compound (a couple of his plays — The Long Red Road and Guinea Pig Solo – earned some acclaim in Chicago, and he’s written for the HBO series Hung). His first play for LAByrinth since the 2008 premiere of Unconditional (directed by Mr. Hoffman), Ninth and Joanie takes us back to 1986 South Philadelphia, where an Italian American family is mourning the loss of its matriarch. Turns out mom’s death is the least of this highly dysfunctional, emotionally-stunted family’s problems: we’ll hear about another death and see yet another one before the torturous two hours are up (SPOILER: the onstage death is the only giddy jolt Mr. Leonard’s lethargic writing offers us — and really, it’s mostly owed to Jeremy Chernick’s (The Mountaintop, The Hallway Trilogy) spectacular special effects work).

The production’s problems may begin with Leonard’s inert, cliche-riddled writing — a silently grim dad who swills Scotch and smokes incessantly whilst inexplicably wearing goggles; an obsequious, troubled son who’s gone soft and puts all his faith in the Ouija board — but they end, with a dull thud, with Mark Wing-Davey’s increasingly mind-numbing direction. The first fifteen minutes consists of… nothing. Nothing happens. Dad (a one-note meanie as played by Bob Glaudini) comes in and takes off his clothes (five. full. minutes.). Son #1 (a painfully pitiful Kevin Corrigan) follows and does the same, while sporadically sputtering out nonsense to dear ol’ da’: “Can I turn on the fan?… Are you hungry? I’m hungry… I’mma make a sandwich….” (ten. more. painfully. slow. minutes.) Later: Son #2 (a furious Dominic Fumusa) enters and maniacally dances for ten minutes. This torpid indulgence sets the (non-existent) pace  for the entire show which can’t possibly consist of more than fifteen pages of dialogue; there are just so many periods of epic, maddening silence. Instead of correcting this problem, Wing-Davey exacerbates it: just when you think the silent scene can’t go on for any longer, it does. And then it keeps going for longer still.

Only set and lighting designers David Meyer and Bradley King, who together create a depressingly drab lower-middle class home lit in the murky despair of kitchen sink Drama, exit this mess of a production with integrity intact. Leonard’s unpleasant play, worsened by Wing Davy’s leaden direction, truly makes one wonder at the LAB’s astounding ability to attract both the best and the worst of talents.

Ninth and Joanie
Presented by LAByrinth Theater Company at
Bank Street Theater
155 Bank Street
New York, NY 10014
Performances from April 6-May 6, 2012
Opened  April 18, 2012

Theatre Review: Tribes

The North American premiere of invigorating new play about the limitations and liberations of language

Susan Pourfar, Gayle Rankin, Mare Winningham, Jeff Perry and Russell Harvard. Photo: Gregory Costanzo.

Communication is a tricky thing, but its methods and meanings are never more delicate and sinuous than when familial. In Nina Raine’s incisive, Olivier Award-nominated Tribes, language universally excludes rather than unifies, acting as the common divider — not denominator.

All families communicate differently. In some, much goes unspoken, while in others, like Billy’s, everything is said, but nothing is really heard. Tribes shows language as hierarchical: Billy, the deaf son in a hearing family that is verbose verging on virulent, hears everything, but has no voice (literally and figuratively). He’s surrounded by a bunch of overblown egos: a bullheaded and grandiose father (Jeff Perry) who would rather learn Chinese than Sign; a knowing, but oblivious mother (Mare Winningham) more intent on crafting a detective story than a relationship with her son; an overbearing, but emotionally dependent brother (Will Brill) who decries meaning in words, but uses them without reticence, and a spacey sister (Gayle Rankin) who, out of frustration, substitutes music for the words and emotions that she cannot articulate.

It’s not until Billy falls in love with a girl going deaf (Susan Pourfar) that he’s liberated by her ability to sign — his family refused to learn, forcing him to master lip-reading, because they didn’t want his handicap to seem, well, like a handicap. But even as Billy (Russell Harvard, a deaf actor known largely for his part in There Will Be Blood) surges with pent-up resentment, disavowing his family until they learn to sign, he embraces his new autonomy within the deaf community, while Sylvia, deeply grieving for her hearing loss, increasingly resists being defined by her deafness. But in Raine’s play, language determines one’s place not only in society but in the home, and rejecting one form means taking on a whole new identity — and a new tribe.

Raine, with the aid of Daniel Kluger’s intuitive sound design (including a cheekily inserted version of The Jungle Book’s “I Wanna Be Like You”) and Jeff Sugg’s (Chinglish) subtle, poetic projections (supertitles for the sign language appear in various sizes and fonts throughout the playing space) explores both the multiplicities of communication as well as the collisions between its diverse forms. Her insights, like David Cromer’s direction and the performances of the superb cast, are sharp and quick: there’s the vast emptiness of words, music’s inexplicable emotiveness, the palpability of silence, the ceaselessly overlapping chatter of a self-important family converging into a dull roar for the hearing impaired. Imperfect as it is — in her attempt to show the family as a flawed unit, burdens her characters with too many unresolved/explained problems and the final, sentimental scene of reconciliation comes off as forced — Tribes is quick-witted and provocative in the questions it asks about language (but cleverly eludes answering in black and white terms), and Raine’s is a refreshing, vibrant voice with quite a bit to say. Thankfully though, unlike Billy’s family, she understands that over-articulation is another form of disability.

Tribes
Barrow Street Theatre
27 Barrow Street
New York, NY 10014
Opens March 4 – June 3, 2012

Theatre Review: Carrie

Carrie’s Curse: To Camp or Not to Camp

Marin Mazzie and Molly Ranson. Photo by Joan Marcus.

Before a singing, web-slinging Spidey fell from the sky, “Scary” White was doused in pig’s blood gathered by leather pants-clad teens writhing and gyrating over pyrotechnic pig troughs under the glow of red disco-lights. With what Frank Rich could only describe as “uninhibited tastelessness” in 1988, Carrie left a bloody trail all over Broadway, ditching the prom after a brief appearance of only 21 performances (after doing much the same in London, where Barbara Cook, as the mad matriarch Margaret White, was nearly  decapitated by a set piece). Audiences were so appalled/amazed by what they saw that, night after night, half stood booing, while the other half cheered. Many returned again and again throughout the three-week run to delight in the absurd train-wreck of a spectacle, somehow knowing that Carrie, that telekinetic outcast, wouldn’t be able to take much more of the jeers. And they were right: the wealthiest producer jumped ship, shutting down the prom for good. And without so much as a cast recording to endear her to us forever, Carrie officially, and voraciously, become a musical theatre aficionado’s white whale.

I’ve not read Stephen King’s 1974 gothic tale, and my memory of the 1976 film is a wee-bit fuzzy, but what is forever etched in vivid, glorious detail in my musical theatre-lovin’ mind is this show I have never even seen. Thanks to the wonders of You Tube, a musical bootleg or two and Ken Mandelbaum’s too-amazing-to-be-true scene-by-scene chronicle of the first preview (Not Since Carrie: 40 Years of Broadway Musical Flops), you, too, can feel like you were there. And if you see MCC Theater’s current Off-Broadway production, you’ll be relieved and adrenalized to finally be able to say with triumphant veracity that yes, you did it! You finally saw Carrie!

An unhappy prom queen. Photo by Joan Marcus.

Except that you didn’t really see her – not Carrie as you think of her anyway. When I spoke with Canadian-born director Stafford Arima, he, like every other devoted Carrie-cultist, could trace the exact start of his fascination with the much buzzed-about and bloody musical to age 19 when he saw one of the notorious preview performances. But it wasn’t until 20 years later, after he’d staged the Off-Broadway hit Alter Boyz and Ragtime on London’s West End, that he revisited Carrie, and discovered what he says was a universal story: “We’re all Carrie. We all know what it’s felt like to be an outsider.”

And it’s true: Carrie is the extreme of the prototypical outcast. Raised by her religious-fanatic, man-hating momma, she doesn’t know that the blood running down her leg is a natural occurrence — “And Eve Was Weak,” mother explains in the show’s most extraordinary and memorable song — and the girls in her gym class mercilessly taunt her for her unbelievable ignorance, screaming and chucking tampons at her head. And when Carrie gets angry — and boy, can she get angry — her hotheaded emotions materialize in the most violent and physical extremes.

While it’s not fair to compare the two productions, it’s impossible not to. It’s no secret that the show’s creators were exceedingly unhappy with director Terry Hands’s original over-the-top vision (they did not allow the show to be produced anywhere, again, until now), and so Stafford’s seriously straight “reimagining” — he doesn’t consider it a revival, though most of the book and score remain intact — minimalizes everything that was beloved/abhorred about the Broadway incarnation to better suit it for the 299-seat Lucille Lortel Theatre. The small and nearly uniformly excellent cast of 14 includes 11 teenagers — or actors who at least look like they could be in high school — who energetically bounce around David Zinn’s (Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo, Xanadu) spare set (essentially chairs and a dressing table) and occasionally rock out Matt Williams’s choreography, which is like a lesser hybrid of Bill T. Jones (Spring Awakening) and Steven Hoggett’s (American Idiot) isolated stomping and arm-pumping.

Needless to say, these aren’t nearly the thirty-year-old toga-clad, breathlessly aerobicizing gym students of the Broadway production (which is good/bad depending on your taste). And while thanks to “magician and special effects consultant” Matthew Holtzclaw, there are some fun visual tricks with levitating objects and mysteriously moving chairs, Kevin Adams’s red-washed lighting and Sven Ortel’s projections — as conveniently unmessy as they are — simply aren’t a substitute for seeing that vat of porcine blood pour down Carrie’s stricken face.

What it comes down to is that Arima’s minimalized modernization — Carrie now lives in the age of sexting, natch — doesn’t fix the original problem with the show, which appears to stem from the source material itself, or at the very least the film: Just like the awkwardly sweet and dangerously naive titular character, this Carrie doesn’t know who or what she is. With the exception of the already mentioned “And Eve Was Weak,” Michael Gore’s (Fame) score does not evoke the dark, unsettling tones of what is oft the horrifying experience of being a teenager. Instead, it revels in a sappy-sweet nostalgia of that period of life (how soon adults forget the depths and despair of teenage trauma!) with poppy duets that earnestly declare, with the help of Dean Pitchford’s generic lyrics, “You Shine” and “Open Your Heart.”

Photo by Joan Marcus.

Lawrence D. Cohen’s book (he also scripted the film) is just as uneven, veering from the operatic misogyny of Carrie’s one-dimensional crazy-pants mom to unfathomable cruel high school bitchery to exaggerated selflessness (no girl would beg her guy to take another girl to the big dance, I don’t care how nice/sorry she is) and even — Yes!! — a bit of deliriously golden camp (bad girl Chris and her bad-boy boyfriend whip themselves into an orgasmic oinking frenzy whilst singing “Old MacDonald Had a Farm.” No joke.) The tone is so inconsistent — one minute ardently sweet, and the next scarily fantastic — it’s doubtful anyone could make this Carrie “work” without going the way of extreme, full-tilt camp, which is what the Broadway version was striving for, even if it didn’t entirely accomplish (or intend) it. The other option, of course, is to start from scratch with new writers (Michael John LaChiusa, perhaps?) who aren’t afraid of going all Black Swan on Carrie: lurid and tense and chilling — with a little bit of campy good fun thrown in for good measure.

None of this is to say Carrie isn’t worth seeing, because she certainly is — some sequences and scenes are highly compelling, especially those that focus on the central, fascinating mother-daughter relationship as played by Marin Mazzie and Molly Ranson. As Carrie, Ranson (Jerusalem, Burnt Part Boys) shuffles across the stage in her matronly skirt and bulky cardigan, at once desperately afraid and strongly desiring of interaction with her clique-ish peers. Ranson’s at her best when she’s that hopeful Carrie of the prom, her bright eyes gazing about her in genuine wonder and delight; it hurts to know what’s to befall her, but her transformation to blood-soaked vocal rage is intensely terrific.

But Carrie’s best moments will always belong to Margaret White, and as the hyper-evangelical, misogynistic matriarch, a haggard-looking Marin Mazzie, with limp, straw-like hair and a makeup-free face, is ridiculously, insanely good. This woman finds depths of crazy — and even empathy — that I didn’t know could exist in such a slight form: her mental balance teeters violently throughout, her inexplicable rage towards her own daughter building and ferociously erupting in “And Eve Was Weak” before petering out in quiet, sad-beautiful acceptance of “When There’s No One.” Sure, she’s played the crazy before (Next to Normal), but not anywhere near like this. And it’s in those few moments of  juxtaposition — her terrifying fanaticism alongside Ranson’s childlike innocence  (the two even look like mother and daughter) — when both women are finally, always, clinging to each other to stave off loneliness and fear – that’s when you catch a glimpse of her.

That’s Carrie.

Carrie
Presented by MCC Theater at the Lucille Lortel Theatre
121 Christopher Street
New York, NY 10036
Opens March 1 – April 22, 2012

Best of 2011: New York Theatre

It’s that time of year. Everyone — Ben Brantley, Charles Isherwood, David Cote & Adam Feldman — has posted their Top Ten of 2011 lists, and so while I’m a little late in the game for this, it’s time to give my own a go, along with a few special awards to select productions…

Top Ten Best Shows of 2011
(in no particular order)

Hello, Again at 52 Mercer Street.

Hello, Again

The Transport Group’s sexy revival of Michael John LaChiusa’s 1994 chamber musical inspired by Arthur Schnitzler’s 1900 play La Ronde, didn’t wink-wink, nudge-nudge its way through the carnalities of couplings. About sex at its seediest level, this was a brazen production of one of musical theatre’s most under-appreciated and complex composers.

The Hallway Trilogy and HotelMotel

Ever a fan of the hyper-prolific Adam Rapp, two of his many productions share a spot on my list: One a hyper-ambitious triptych spanning a century in a single decrepit hallway and the other a reboot of the meandering and magically real Animals and Plants (in a doubleheader with Derek Ahonen’s Pink Knees on Pale Skin), these two works were chockfull of signature in-your-face Rapp: daring nudity, jolting language, shocking actions and of course, difficult and damaged, strangely compelling characters.

The Normal Heart on Broadway. Photo: Joan Marcus.

The Normal Heart

Equal parts hostility and heart, George C. Wolfe and Joel Grey‘s searing, minimalist production did exactly right by playwright-activist Larry Kramer by focusing on content over context with a spare, direct design that drew out the most staggering ensemble work on Broadway of the season. It marked an astonishing example of how truly worthy plays — even less than perfect ones like the preachy-passionate Heart — can endure over time.

How to Succeed in Business without Really Trying

A dancer’s director, Rob Ashford slickly staged a blissfully bright Broadway musical with a full, fantastic orchestra; clever, beautifully executed choreography and a dynamic, dedicated cast. No wizardry there: just some luck, a lot of pluck and quite possibly the Happiest Boy on Broadway this year, Daniel Radcliffe (who, just this week, was replaced with — sigh — Glee star Darren Criss).

War Horse at Lincoln Center. Photo: Paul Kolnik.

War Horse

A boy and his horse and some awe-inspiring puppets combine to create the most imaginative, visionary and theatrically moving work of the season, garnering the Tony Award for Best Play. Quite naturally, it’s also become a Steven Spielberg film (and an inevitable Oscar nominee).

Good People

Even hardened anti-realism folks such as myself must acknowledge when the form is done well — and few contemporary writers do it better than David Lindsay-Abaire. The female-friendly playwright — his protagonists are almost always women — explored the hot-button American issue of class through intricate relationships and richly complex characters, without ever grasping for topicality.

The Book of Mormon

Praise be for Trey Parker, Robert Lopez and Matt Stone who offered up a well-made, very funny, minimally offensive, brilliantly performed, completely original Tony Award-winning Broadway musical about a pair of mismatched, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed Mormons sent on a mission to squalid and violent Uganda. A bit of a musical miracle, indeed.

The cast of epbb's These Seven Sicknesses.

These Seven Sicknesses

Take 23 actors and a bevy of technicians and crew members; throw them in a super-secret Hell’s Kitchen loft; add a select audience, communal dinner and an endless supply of alcohol; mix in a 5-hour play cycle of Sophocles’s works and what you’d come up with is the most intimate, inclusive and enjoyable night at the theatre this year. If you aren’t yet familiar with Ed Iskander’s “theatre collective,” Exit, Pursued by a Bear, you should be. But if you haven’t yet experienced Sean Graney’s epic, clever and affecting take on Sophocles’s work, you still have a chance: The Flea Theater’s production of These Seven Sicknesses, also helmed by Iskander, premieres later this month.

Milk Like Sugar

The pregnancy pact plot is a tad bit Lifetime-y, but Greenidge’s punchy drama has power, and the playwright possesses a knack for language, effortlessly and hilariously fusing urban colloquy with lyricism. With such smart, hip and ambitious work, this talented playwright won’t be “emerging” for long.

Urge for Going at The Public Theater. Photo: Carol Rosegg.

Urge for Going

The deceptively simple play follows Jamila, a 17-year-old Palestinian girl growing up in a Lebanese refugee camp, as she desperately attempts to escape the restriction of her desolate home. Beautifully complex and rich in both character and story, this production was a surprise from start to finish, and playwright Mona Mansour’s talent was the most wonderful surprise of all.

The Worst

Baby, It’s You!

This jukebox musical represented the most inept musical offering of the season. Baby, it’s decidedly not you.

Catch Me If You Can

As shallow and soulless as they come, the only person involved who emerged from this Pepto-Bismol-palletted aural attack with full dignity intact was the always stellar Norbert Leo Butz.

The Most Overrated

Punchdrunk's Sleep No More on West 27th Street.

Jerusalem

The success of Jez Butterworth’s hyperbolically praised “state-of-the-nation” play was, in actuality, due solely to the dazzling performance of one Mark Rylance.

Sleep No More

Wandering through the impeccably decorated five-story McKittrick Hotel with actors silently performing “scenes” from Macbeth was mildly entertaining for about an hour. As for the next three, well, I wouldn’t know: I preferred sleep, more.

The Best Drama Off-Stage

Spider-Man: Turn off the Dark

Lord knows the drama onstage was dismal — except when actors were falling from the sky, of course — but who didn’t love gossiping about this train wreck? C’mon, admit it: we all kinda miss Spidey, The Hottest Mess on Broadway.

The Best Marketing Gimmick

The Importance of Being Earnest

I still can’t stop laughing, and you know Wilde would approve.

(mini)Theatre Review: Horsedreams

Dael Orlandersmith’s lyrical latest has its ups and downs

I’ve never seen or read any of Dael Orlandersmith’s work before (though I’ve always, always confused her Yellowman with David Henry Hwang’s Yellowface), so I had few expectations going in to Rattlestick Playwrights Theater’s production of her newest play, Horsedreams. But once the usher informed me the runtime was just 90 minutes, no intermission, I was already on board with Ms. Orlandersmith (I firmly believe that unless you’re Shakespeare or O’Neill — even then, you’re pushing it — your play should not exceed two hours. Musicals excepted, naturally).

Needless to say, I was pleasantly surprised. Exploring the breakdown of a family due to addiction, Orlandersmith deals mainly in cliches: NYC party girl (read: social coke-user) Desiree settles for big businessman Loman, despite dreams of wanting so much more. Once she’s moved up state and given birth to too-adorable-for words-son Luka, her drug habit increases steadily in attempt to escape the depressing reality of her unrealized dreams, eventually and frighteningly including highballs of coke and dope, which she scores by late night limo trips to Lexington 1-2-5 (Lexington Ave/125th St. in Harlem). Her eventual, inevitable death by overdose causes Loman to spiral into his own addiction, forcing young Luka to parent his own father.

Despite the over-familiar characters and the simplistic plot, Horsedreams surprisingly works. Orlandersmith writes starkly lyrical monologues in a counterpoint that is aggressively paced by director Gordon Edelstein. The superb cast includes Roxanna Hope (Desiree), Michael Laurence (Loman), the impressively mature Matthew Schechter (Luka) and the playwright herself as Mira, the no-nonsense nanny/Nursing student from Harlem who takes horse-obsessed Luka under her wing when his parents fail to raise him (there’s a nice, if obvious, juxtaposition of the highs of riding horses and drugs).

Once again, Rattlestick proves its knack for supporting interesting playwrights. I’ll certainly keep my eye out for Ms. Orlandersmith from now on.

Horsedreams by Dael Orlandersmith
through December 11, 2011
Rattlestick Playwrights Theater
224 Waverly Place
New York, NY  10014

 

Theatre Review: Asuncion

Social Network star Jesse Eisenberg makes his playwriting debut

Jesse Eisenberg is all geeky, nervous energy. Inexplicably unable to maintain eye contact, his gaze darts constantly, words tumbling out of his mouth in an uncensored torrent as he hunches over ever-so-slightly, as if desperately trying to disappear within himself. The only cure for his fidgety fingers is to forcefully shove them under his armpits as he crosses and uncrosses his arms in an attempt to shield himself from any kind of human contact.

As an actor, he’s a delight to watch — bounding across the stage with curls a’bouncin’, splaying his slender frame across a beanbag — even if his range seems narrowly defined (Zuckerberg’s strategic aloofness, Baumbach’s cold pretension). As a playwright… well, let’s just say he’s got potential.

Asuncion isn’t exactly his first play, but it is the only one that’s been produced (what I wouldn’t give to see his musical, Me Time!, for which he wrote the music and lyrics. Jack of all trades, this one). And it’s certainly not original in its premise: Edgar, an unemployed wannabe journalist who mooches off his ex-TA, Vinny — a (white) Black Studies PhD candidate — becomes absurdly suspicious of his brother’s marriage to a Filipina woman named Asuncion.

Eisenberg plays Edgar — he stands in for his own stand in? — who, from his seeming position of privilege, comically projects his white guilt liberalism all over the sunnily naive Asuncion, who he interrogates about about post-Vietnam Cambodia (she’s Filipina, remember?), all the while insisting his brother purchased her in the sex slave trade  – or at the very least as a mail-order bride. Why else would an “untraveled” white Wall Street-er marry a “poor” “Latina”? (There are just so many quotes going on here.) Despite Edgar’s inherent obnoxiousness, Eisenberg imbues him with a likable earnestness — to “protect” his country, to  bring Vinny lunch every day even if it means getting mugged by the young hooligans in the neighborhood, to be fun (he so desperately longs to be fun).

Justin Bartha and Jesse Eisenberg in Asuncion. Photo: Sandra Coudert.

While you may be rolling your eyes by now at the slim, stereotype-driven plot (which only implodes rather ingloriously in the second act), don’t worry — it’s not all that bad. The self-deprecating Eisenberg has a knack for the funny — there are moments of sharp, satirical insight, and the banter between Edgar and Vinny is quick-witted and creates a subtle, at times disturbing, spin on the overly popular bromance (view a few scenes of the play here). It certainly helps that Vinny is played by Hangover star Justin Bartha (who recently starred in Zach Braff’s painfully unfunny attempt at playwriting): unironically sporting Black Power tees and Afrocentric beads (hilariously spot-on costuming by Jessica Pabst), Bartha’s pothead Vinny soulfully drums his bongo, finds a way to drop Malcom X or MLK Jr. quote into any conversation and strikes up a charming rapport with Camille Mana’s Asuncion (which, of course, Edgar is exceedingly jealous of). He’s pompous, ludicrous and disarmingly likable — he’s also the more darkly complex character, carefully exposing shocking moments of liberal racism.

Not a whole lot happens in the weakly premised Asuncion, but it’s still largely enjoyable as directed at a fast and funny clip by Kip Fagan. Eisenberg’s ability to craft damningly humorous dialogue and complex relationships demonstrates his potential as a dramatist and showcases his already proven talent as an actor.

Now let’s see that musical.

Asuncion by Jesse Eisenberg
Presented by Rattlestick Playwrights Theater 
at Cherry Lane Theater
38 Commerce Street, New York, NY  10014
through December 18, 2011

Theatre Review: Queen of the Mist

Michael John LaChiusa’s latest musical lacks drama

Only Michael John LaChiusa would tackle a musical retelling of the real-life story of daredevil Anna Edson Taylor who, to celebrate her 63rd birthday in 1901, hopped in a barrel and plunged over Niagra Falls — and survived to tell the tale.

LaChiusa’s got a proven track record for offbeat offerings that work: a woman quits smoking and starts swimming to compensate for nicotine in Little Fish; Mamie Eisenhower, Margaret Truman, Eleanor Roosevelt and Jackie Kennedy sing of their singular form of entrapment in the First Lady Suite; See What I Wanna See musically imagines three of Ryūnosuke Akutagawa’s famous short stories (including “In a Grove,” which was the basis for Akira Kurosawa’s Rashōmon).

A criticism sometimes levied against MJL isn’t that his work is too “dark” or “challenging” (though some find that it is)  — but that he’s just too darn prolific. Even though we haven’t heard much from him in New York recently, regionally, he’s all over the place. The guy just keeps churning ‘em out.

Queen of the Mist: Annie Edson Taylor

While this isn’t necessarily a problem (Full disclosure: I’m a huge fan, and think his The Wild Party is one of the most brilliant pieces of theatre I’ve seen. Ever.), it is with Queen of the Mist, which certainly needs more development and tighter editing.  Based on this musical, for which MJL also wrote the book, Taylor was a childless widow and failed dance teacher who moved around a lot in a constant quest for financial security. To prove to herself and her sister (who may or may not be a figment of MJL’s imagination — I could find no evidence that she actually existed)  that she is capable of greatness — and quite possibly out of sincere desperation — she determines to pull off the stunt of the century. Afterwards, she attempts to capitalize on her outrageous act by booking speaking engagements and selling postcards, but no one is interested in hearing her story, and her manager embezzles what little money she did make.

Produced by The Transport Group, which gave us last season’s super-sexy revival of MJL’s Hello, Again,  Jack Cummings III directs his  fine cast with an intimate touch, and the score, while quite lovely on the whole, only hits its stride in the final 30 minutes, when we begin to hear an intriguing discordance during Annie’s trippy journey into the afterlife. MJL attemps to flesh out Annie’s otherwise unremarkable life — injecting the disapproving sister and complicating her relationship with her manager  — but the drama simply isn’t there. Annie — despite the super-solid portrayal by the always brilliant Mary Testa (a frequent collaborator of Michael John’s) — isn’t compelling enough for a full-length musical (certainly not a 2 hours and 40 minutes-long musical), but maybe her story could be if tightened into one act.

Then again, perhaps this “Queen of the Mist” is best left as a fun historical anecdote.

Queen of the Mist
book/lyrics/music by Michael John LaChiusa
playing through November 20, 2011 at the Gym at Judson

Theatre Review: Milk Like Sugar

Kirsten Greenidge’s new play is neither milk or sugar –
It’s something altogether better

Full Disclosure: I saw Milk Like Sugar in its very first preview at Playwrights Horizons on October 13, but as this co-production with Women’s Project Theater and La Jolla Playhouse transferred from the latter where it received its world premiere in August, it doesn’t seem entirely inappropriate to review it. Even less so because it’s an entirely solid, engaging production.

Angela Lewis, Nikiya Mathis and Cherise Boothe

Sixteen-year-old Annie and her two spunky high school BFFs crave something more than the powdered milk that sits on their shelves — the milk that tastes sweet like sugar, but offers little sustenance. But these couture-obsessed girls in their leopard-print leggings and sparkly sweat suits (costumed perfection by Toni-Leslie James), with their slide phones and incessant sexting, have more interest in tattoos than textbooks. Their attempts to become strong like “lions” result in a pregnancy pact (remember when those were frighteningly fashionable?) and an inked flame on Annie’s hip that sparks a burning desire that only grows stronger as the tattoo grows more elaborate and all-consuming (and Justin Townsend’s lighting and Andre Pluess’s sound design, otherwise nicely effective, becomes wearily redundant).

If this sounds like an overabundance of metaphors, you’re likely right. Ambitious playwright Kirsten Greenidge packs it all into one play: developing womanhood, female bonds and familial issues, socioeconomic constraints, the escapism of evangelism, brand as status, etc. You can’t help but think that these girls — bubbly, pink-clad and already preggers Margie (a hilariously warm and vacuous Nikiya Mathis); aggressive and defensive alpha-female, Talisha (a fierce Cherise Boothe); the thoughtful, but conflicted Annie (Angela Lewis, both sensitive and stubborn) — may represent varying shades of the playwright herself. But of course that doesn’t matter: when the climactic confrontation explodes between Annie and her hardened, bone-weary “moms” (Tonya Pinkins, who, with a Marlboro perpetually hanging from her dry lips, is like a pot of water you watch in nervous fear of just when it will boil over and burn you), the universality of this tremendously detailed piece is made all the more apparent (who doesn’t have mom issues?).

This is not to say that this piece is merely by a woman, about women, for women: Tattoo artist Antwoine (a charismatic LeRoy McClain) and astronomy-lover Malik (J. Mallory-McCree, warm and charming) are central to Annie’s self-discovery, even as they discover themselves through the course of the piece. Sure, they could each use more of a resolution — as could Keera (a loveably awkward Adrienne C. Moore), whose self-denial about her own family and life happiness is funneled into religious escapism — but with so much else going on, and going on so well, it almost seems silly to nitpick. The subject is a tad bit Lifetime-y — and hey, been there, done that — but Greenidge’s punchy drama has power, and the playwright possesses such a knack for language, effortlessly and hilariously fusing urban colloquy with lyricism. Director Rebecca Taichman, with the help of Mimi Lien’s stark and slick set, for the most part stages both the humorous and heavy at a quick pace and top-40 soundtrack that even her ADD, teenaged characters could appreciate.

Unhappily, I couldn’t get the excessively-used Beyonce’s “Run the World (Girls)” out of my head for a full 24 hours after the show. Happily, though, neither could I forget  the top-notch cast and Greenidge’s smart, hip and ambitious work. This super-promising talent won’t be “emerging” for long.

Theatre Review: Dreams of Flying Dreams of Falling

Adam Rapp attacks the upper-middle class in this new Albee-esque surrealist drama

Reed Birney as Dr. Bertram Cabot , Christine Lahti as Sandra Cabot, Betsy Aidem as Celeste Von Stofenberg, Shane McRae as James Von Stofenberg and Katherine Waterston as Cora Cabot in Dreams of Flying Dreams of Falling. Photo: Kevin Thomas Garcia.

Charles Isherwood is done with Adam Rapp, but I’m not — not even after the disappointing Atlantic Theater Company production of the prolific playwright’s bizarrely shallow Dreams of Flying Dreams of Falling. 

The set-up of Rapp’s latest — two monied families welcome home one of their ilk from a swanky psychiatric hospital — promises the dinner-table drama of August: Osage County with apocalyptic Hitchcockian wild geese. Potentially, it’d be everything you love/hate about a Rappian drama, only this time set in an opulent Connecticut home rather than a squalid motel/hallway/basement: The play’s inhabitants would be just as verbally violent, its plot equally dark and desperate with just enough over-the-top Albee-ian absurdism to mix things up a bit.

And to an extent it’s exactly that: a feisty, Chanel-clad Christine Lahti nails the sharply tongued matriarch who plots the death of her slightly-dopey, but well-intentioned husband (Reed Birney, excellent as always) while also aggressively pursuing an affair with an old family friend (Cotter Smith); an unamused African-American maid (an embarrassingly underutilized Quincy Tyler Bernstine) is condescendingly “educated” by her employers, who uncomfortably (for us) force her to perform Shakespearean sonnets upon demand; the disturbed golden child (Shane McRae), who jumped off a building for no clear reason, nonchalantly chats about his internet friendship with a 14-year-old Iraqi terrorist; and there may or may not be an actual lion chained in the basement (not-so-much-of-a-spoiler alert: there is a lion chained in the basement. And since there’s no props manager listed, I’ll give kudos to set designers Andrew Boyce & Takeshi Kata for the very life-like lioness).

While half of the dagger-like dialogue is deliciously, breezily witty, the other is synthetic and forced — having so-oft written for society’s misfits, Rapp’s colorful verbiage at times feels out of place with the well-to-do. In addition, the play’s many symbols — lions and pterodactyls and geese (oh my) — and sonnets and story lines are largely unsubstantiated. They keep adding up — and director Neil Pepe keeps it all moving along at a nice clip — but they never really amount to anything. When it’s good, it’s great (the raucous sex scene between the two unhappy progeny), but too often it’s not: the usually down-and-dirty Rapp has his white gloves on, and he simply isn’t as shocking in Chanel.

But what’s glaringly missing is the heart that typically pulses a layer (or five or ten) beneath the surface of Rapp’s work (such as in The Hallway Trilogy). In Dreams, none of the characters are explored fully and we’re only allowed to view them from a distance: Lahti’s Sandra is just a rich bitch, and Katherine Waterston’s damaged daughter comes off as just an oddball artist (through no fault of Waterston’s). The one soul we can sympathize with is Dirk Von Stofenberg, the banker dad in black blazer and red dockers with Madoff-like troubles. As Dirk, Cotter Smith treads more softly and subtly than the rest of this loquacious party, radiating equal parts charm and defeat. When he makes that sole, life-altering sacrifice, you feel the weight of his decision and realize that — that care — was what was missing all along.

There’s nothing terribly wrong with Dreams, but it doesn’t have anything new to say, either. So while I’d hate to discourage Rapp from tackling different locales and tax brackets, let’s leave the icy chandeliers and cruel upper-class to that master of the absurd, Albee.

I much prefer those damaged souls in the damp basement with their dark deeds any day.

Theatre to Get Excited About: 2011-2012

Now that we’re officially embarking upon the 2011-2012 New York theatre season, I present to you my most highly anticipated productions (in no particular order). Of course, I don’t imagine many will share my enthusiasm for, say, the next Wildhornian masterpiece, but perhaps we possess mutual admiration of Sondheim’s favorite character-driven, goat-cart-less opera.

And so, without further ado, here are thirteen shows I’m super-pumped about:

1. Dreams of Flying Dreams of Falling: Because the Atlantic Theater Company‘s production promises the dinner-table drama of August: Osage County with the freaky absurdity of Hitchcockian Canadian Geese. And because it springs from the prolific, dark mind of Adam Rapp, who is many things, but boring is never, ever one of them.

2. The Mountaintop: Because, for Katori Hall’s reimagining of the events the night before the civil rights leader was assassinated, no one else could possibly play MLK — the man, not the activist — but Sam Motherfuckin’ Jackson. And because it’s his motherfuckin’ Broadway debut and he’s gonna motherfuckin’ kill it….motherfucker.

3. Porgy and Bess: Because Diane Paulus and Suzan-Lori Park’s controversial revamp has incensed Stephen Sondheim, and any show that can get the musical theatre legend to childishly retort, “Wow, who’d have thought there was a love story hiding in Porgy and Bess that just needed a group of visionaries to bring it out?” is a definite must-see… And because Norm Lewis has the voice of a god.

4. Bonnie & Clyde: Because with a score by Frank “Wonderland” Wildhorn, book by Ivan Menchell (whose only other musical credit is “additional material” for Chitty Chitty Bang Bang) and lyrics by Don Black (Dracula, Dance of the Vampires), this “new” musical, which overflows with schmaltzy, country-fried ballads like “Dyin’ Ain’t So Bad” (I can’t make this stuff up), is sure to be a hot, hot mess. But because I secretly hope it’s his next (delightful) The Scarlet Pimpernel.

5. Venus in Fur: Because comic goddess Nina Arianda, who elevates even the most unworthy of productions with grace, intelligence and the most infectious of giggles, reprises her star-making role as actress-seductress in the Broadway premiere of David Ives’s play. And because this time she’s upgraded her love interest from the handsome Wes Bentley to the even more desirable (and talented) Hugh Dancy.

6. An Evening with Patti Lupone and Mandy Patinkin: Because with his lilting, otherworldly, crazy-town falsetto and her fierce, unmistakable belt, these two legends epitomize “Diva.” And because, according to Patinkin’s amazing(ly) (hyperbolic) website, the evening is “much more than a concert, [it] is a unique musical love story told entirely through a masterful selection of the greatest songs ever written for the stage” — and who isn’t a bit giddy at the prospect of an epic Evita reunion?

7. Rebecca: Because even though it’s the poor man’s Jane Eyre, it’s still an infinitely better idea than any musicalization of Pride & Prejudice. Because even though the “exclusive song” on the website sounds more like Martin Guerre (shudder) than Les Mis (guilty, gleeful pleasure), Daphne Du Maurier’s Rebecca is a classic Gothic romance that begs to be sung. And because, with a score by Hungarian composer Sylvester Levay, Germans think it’s the next best thing since David Hasselhoff ditched his swim trunks, discovered his vocal chords and took their country by pop-music storm.

8. Close Up Space: Because if you like smart, quirky female writers — think Tina Fey, Annie Baker — then you’ll love Molly Smith Metzler. And because she’s wrangled an equally intelligent and hilarious cast  for her off-Broadway debut at MTC about an obsessive book editor (David Hyde Pierce), his long-neglected, fiery daughter; hippie assistant (Michael Chernus); timid intern and temperamental, über-demanding author (Rosie Perez).

9. Asuncion: Because we all want to know if super-brainy The Social Network star Jesse Eisenberg is as talented a writer as he is an actor in this Rattlestick Playwrights Theater production (which he also stars in), and because we all love when white people write about race(ism) (David Mamet).

Molly Ranson as Carrie

10. Carrie: Because Ken Mandelbaum declared that this super-short-lived 1988 Broadway musical adaptation of the Stephen King novel “set a new standard, one to which all future musical flops will be compared and found wanting,” and because Frank Rich, appalled by its “uninhibited tastelessness,” noted derisively in his New York Times review that it “expires with fireworks like the Hindenburg.” Because it has reached extreme cult status among hardcore musical theatre aficionados as The one Broadway musical I’d give my left arm and/or unborn child to have seen! Because the pig slaughtering for the much-anticipated prom-scene blood equates to chanting, leather-clad high schoolers leaping and gyrating over troughs under flashing red disco lights. Because both Barbara Cook (London) and Betty Buckley (Broadway) killed it as the crazy-cruel matriarch, and because if anyone can fill those inestimable women’s shoes, it’s Marin Mazzie. Because MCC‘s revival is a “a newly reworked and fully re-imagined vision of this gripping tale” set in present-day Maine. Because it’s campy and sentimental and pulpy and ridiculous and sad and feminist and over-the-top and confusing and hilarious and ambitious and because it’s never exactly sure what it wants to be, but whatever it is, you can’t tear your eyes and ears away from it. And because I have not been this excited to see a show since The Donmar’s production of Parade.

11. Soho Rep’s season: Because it all looks awesome. Because if anyone’s going to make me enjoy Chekhov, it’s Annie Baker. And because I’ve been wondering where the controversial author of Neighbors has been hiding out, and here Branden Jacob-Jenkins resurfaces, further developing his scandalous, brilliant adaptation of The Octoroon — because, clearly, everyone needs a little black face in their lives.

Anna Edson Taylor

12. Once: Because it’s a “musical” film that may actually translate quiet beautifully to the stage. Because it’s a lovely, quietly moving piece with gorgeous, Oscar-winning music by Glen Hansard & Markéta Irglová and book by idiosyncratic Irish playwright Enda Walsh. Because it’s emotionally subtle and surprisingly real — a refreshing divergence from the current musical theatre landscape.

13. Queen of the Mist: Because after Transport Group‘s fantastic revival of Hello, Again last spring, NYC realized how much it missed the composer/librettist of such dark, challenging works as The Wild Party and Bernarda Alba. Because only Michael John LaChiusa would tackle a musical retelling of the real-life story of daredevil Anna Edson Taylor, who to celebrate her 63rd birthday in 1901, hopped in a barrel and plunged over Niagra Falls and survived to tell the tale. And because he’s the only one who could possibly make such an odd idea work — and work brilliantly.