Kicking Feminism

Early in Micheline Auger’s Donkey Punch, frank banter and satirical jabs suggest the playwright has written a sex comedy. But Auger is out for more than just laughs. Gradually, in Audrey Alford’s production for the Ivy Theatre Company, the dramatist’s comedy-drama becomes a troubling look at the state of feminism. 

Two women are the focus of the plot: the plump, wryly comic Sam (Lauren Dortch-Crozier), easygoing and unhappy with life, and her high-octane friend Kareena (Cleo Gray), who takes on the role of Sam’s mentor. 

Kareena has recently put Sam in contact with Kyle, a man Kareena once communicated with online, but only briefly, before she met her boyfriend Teddy. Now also talking to Kyle online, Sam has discovered that he makes soft-core “horror porn” films; his latest is called Donkey Punch. Sam is reluctant to meet him because she assumes his work degrades women, but Kareena insists Sam is a prude and needs to widen her erotic horizons; she encourages a first date. (It’s at this point, ironically, that  a role reversal briefly occurs. An unenlightened Kareena learns from Sam the meaning of Kyle's title. It refers to a sexual practice — bizarre and obscure, judging by the surprised reaction of the audience — that heightens a man’s climax during intercourse.) 

Auger has a good deal of fun with the contrast in sexual awareness between the high-earning Kareena and the struggling, diffident Sam, who has hitherto worked as an actress in commercials. “You’re a strong and independent woman,” Kareena exhorts Sam. “You should have a dildo.” Trying to meet her on less intimate ground, Sam responds (with a delivery that evokes a laid-back Jo Anne Worley): “Better health insurance would be nice.”  

Once Sam and Kyle (Jon McCormick) meet, a Pygmalion transformation occurs: Sam bleaches her hair, enlarges her breasts, and ends up the focus of a documentary that entails Kyle’s filming her wherever they go. The repressed Sam embraces life, but it upsets the worldview of the nominally liberated — actually controlling — Kareena. 

Unfortunately, Kareena’s a hard character to like. She is taken aback when Sam begins to talk about her sexual exploits and realizes that Sam’s experience now outstrips hers. A career woman with a vengeance, Kareena declares, “There’s a lot of fish in the proverbial ocean and I’m hot and make a ton of money.” Her feminism is a tangle of contradictions: she advocates pole dancing as “good for your core…it’s totally liberating” but defaults to feminist mantras as well, such as “Bitches before bros.”  

Perhaps the most objectionable thing about Kareena is her emasculating treatment of Micheal Drew’s sensitive Teddy. In Drew’s gentle performance, the strapping boyfriend cooks and attends to her tenderly, but never seems wimpy. Yet when Teddy tries to enter a conversation, Kareena rebuffs him with “We’re having girl talk.” When the accommodating Teddy declares, “I can be one of the girls,” she says, “No, you can’t.” (How many boyfriends would even make that offer?)

Although there’s little about Kareena that’s endearing or redeeming, it’s to Gray’s credit that one is able to feel the character’s confusion and pain even while withholding sympathy — and that includes after she is unexpectedly raped. (Crucially, she doesn’t protest; nonetheless, the sex scene is clumsily staged in a way that tries to be brutal and coy at the same time). 

Meanwhile, Kyle doesn’t conform to any of Sam’s preconceptions. She expects him to call women “bitches” and “hos,” but McCormick, in a nicely understated performance, turns out to be quiet, thoughtful and confident. 

Auger has created four fascinating characters, and situations that make one think, but she doesn’t really offer a diagnosis. Has feminism just created a huge muddle? Have the signals become so mixed, and the dialogue between the sexes so charged, that the old verities of feminism are no longer grounded in reality? Are men now just as much the victims? Auger’s coup is to provide an entry point of discussion.

Donkey Punch runs through Aug. 31 at the SoHo Playhouse (15 Vandam St.). Evening performances are at 8 p.m. on Wednesday through Saturday and 6 p.m. on Sunday. Tickets are $45 and may be obtained by calling 212-691-1555 or visiting www.sohoplayhouse.com.

Agent of Change

Have you ever met a pimp? Or talked to a 19-year-old prostitute? Or tried to avoid your menopausal boss who keeps screaming for the stapler you know you didn’t take? For most people, the answer would be no. But for Helena D. Lewis, she has met these people and many more unique individuals.Call Me Crazy: Diary of a Mad Social Worker is a brilliantly written play, filled with poetry that makes you wonder, “did this really happen?” In her autobiographical one-woman play, Lewis recounts her interactions with 25 people in order to understand how she slowly lost her mind and why she became just as crazy as everyone else. 

With clear transitions between the scenes and distinguishable characters, Lewis did a beautiful job at constructing a play that is easy to follow and understand. While some character portrayals make the audience erupt in laughter, others make you question whether you should be laughing at these very off putting (and sometimes borderline offensive) impersonations. However, it is through the harsh realities that she forces us to face that we finally see that change cannot be made without someone as dedicated as Lewis.

This plays relies heavily on the audience’s ability to use their imagination.  When walking into the space, one must be prepared to see a mostly empty stage. The venue, Nuyorican Poets Café, provides Call Me Crazy a very intimate environment allowing the audience and Lewis to feed off each others' energy. Lewis uses the two long black flats on stage left and right to indicate a different location or character change. The only other set piece is a folding chair located in the center of the stage. In addition, Lewis only used roughly seven props that are easily stored in a pocket or hidden onstage. The very minimalistic set and props help keep the focus on Lewis and her powerful dialogue.

The less smooth transitions occur during the costume changes and lighting transitions. Although she does not change her costume for each character, the few costume changes that occur are a bit awkward. However, this is to be expected when one woman is playing all the characters and has only a matter of seconds to put on/take off a jacket or shirt.   

The lighting is predictable and did not have much of a design concept. It seemed as if the lights were used to add light to the stage rather than add depth to the design. Overall, the lighting was a very simple design — the lights changed color to imply a change in the mood or changed direction to prompt the audience where to look on the stage. 

However, the minimalistic design concepts are often overshadowed by Lewis’s performance. If you are looking for a funny and motivational show, Call Me Crazy is the show for you. Within five minutes, you will be hooked on Lewis’s story of how she strove to change the world for the people who are often ignored in our society. And by the end, you will finally figure out why this woman has sacrificed her sanity in order to be a true agent of change.

Call Me Crazy: Diary of a Mad Social Worker runs until July 27 at the Nuyorican Poet’s Café (236 East 3rd Street between Avenues B and C in the East Village). Daily performances are held at 7:00 p.m. Tickets are $15. For tickets and further information, visit www.nuyorican.org.

Boxing Meets Broadway

Boxing. Broadway. Sound like uncommon bedfellows? Think again, because the current production of Rocky on Broadway — recently imported from its debut in Germany — successfully marries sports and big-budget theater.  Storytelling is not the goal of this musical, since most of the audience members are familiar with the underdog plot line of Sylvester Stallone's 1976 sports drama flick. Instead, Rocky is all about spectacle; in fact, the best thing about this musical is that it is unapologetically popular: loud, obvious and for the masses. Like any proper sporting event, Rocky is above all meant to be fun —  and in spite of its tired and uncomplicated storyline — it is quite possibly the most fun production on Broadway right now.

Rocky's strengths lie in its visual attractions. Supplying plenty of eye candy, Andy Karl (as Rocky Balboa) and Terence Archie (as Apollo Creed) lead a ripped ensemble of boxers, who spend most of their stage time half-clothed. On the design side, Dan Scully and Pablo N. Molina's cinematic montages of Rocky training flicker onto towering concrete facades of South Philly — a beautiful link to the musical's filmic heritage. The awe-inspiring sets designed by Christopher Barreca transition fluidly between Rocky's gritty apartment, a meat locker and a floating boxing ring. Visually citing famous scenes from the movie, part of the fun of Rocky is recognizing these iconic cinematic moments on stage. Even David Zinn's costume design is citational, skillfully duplicating Rocky's famous leather jacket and fedora hat.

With all this visual splendor, Rocky succeeds in delivering high-volume, in-your-face action in droves (especially in the second act). As mentioned before, however, this musical relies heavily on audience knowledge of the film's plot to "fill in the blanks" of its rather stupefying script. Adrian's abrupt disappointment in Rocky's decision to fight Apollo Creed, for example, is less contrived in the film. No bones about it, though: this musical is wholly unconcerned with plot development. Rather, its primary concern is to reproduce and spectacularize the relics of Stallone's filmic legacy. In a more serious genre, this would be a problem; but again, Rocky only presents itself at face value. It's a sports film musical — what more do you want?

Musically, however, Rocky falls somewhat flat. While dynamic songwriting team Stephen Flaherty and Lynn Ahrens' music and lyrics are enjoyable, they are not catchy upon first listen. Do not expect Rocky to deliver an exceptionally innovative musical score that will have you humming all the way home to Brooklyn. Similarly, do not expect performers with unmatchable vocal gravitas. This is not to say that the vocal performances are sub par: the chorus is certainly powerful as one, and Karl and Margo Seibert (as Adrian) match each others' tones quite well. Simply put, Rocky's production value depends far more on adrenaline-inducing spectacle than musical ingenuity.

The moral of Rocky's story is to come for the spectacle and stay for the boxing match. If you're looking for mindless summer fun and are sick of bumming around the movie theater, give Rocky a go.

Tickets for Rocky can be purchased at the Winter Garden Theatre (1634 Broadway between 50 and 51st Sts.) by visiting Telecharge.com or by calling 212-239-6200. Performances run Monday through Saturday at 8 p.m. and Saturday at 2 p.m. A limited number of day-of-show rush tickets will be available at the box office on a first-come, first-served basis. Rush tickets are $35 (Tuesday through Friday) and $45 (Saturday and Sunday). Rush tickets will be become available at 10 a.m. Tuesday through Saturday, and noon on Sunday for performances on the same day. Rush tickets are subject to availability and limited to two per person.

More Ado in Harlem

The Public Theater presentation of Much Ado About Nothing, with a starry cast performing in the bucolic setting of Central Park's Delacorte Theater, is likely to be among New York City's most sought after tickets. Up at the 133rd Street Arts Center, What Dreams May Co. Theatre and Queens Players are currently offering another Much Ado, hardly publicized but well worth a visit. In a perfectly ordered New York City, the masses of would-be theatergoers who fail to score seats for Much Ado in the Park (and those unwilling to sacrifice a day to waiting in line for free tickets) would find their way to Harlem to see the handiwork of 14 unknown actors, directed by Nicole Schalmo, in a tiny, second-floor auditorium with a minimum of scenery and equipment. 

Much Ado About Nothing is a rowdy mixture of the silly and the serious. The central plot comes from classical Greek literature via 16th-century Italian sources — Ludovico Ariosto and Matteo Bandello — and Edmund Spenser's English epic The Faerie Queene. The story concerns Claudio (Gregg Ellson), just home from war, who spurns his bride, Hero (Christina Sheehan), at the altar. Hero is virtuous, but circumstantial evidence, contrived by the toxic Don John (Jonathan Emerson), suggests otherwise; and Claudio has been taken in by Don John's scheme. Hearing Claudio's harsh accusations, Hero faints away; her father, Leonato (Rafael Svarin), claiming she's dead, concocts a plan to clear her name and punish Claudio's arrogance. Things are dire until a band of bumbling rustics — constable Dogberry (Kenny Fedorko), his sidekick Verges (Nathan Beagle), and two officers of the municipal watch (Kate Fallon and Meghan Blakeman) — unwittingly thwart Don John's conspiracy.

There isn't much that's plausible about the misunderstanding between Claudio and Hero or what follows it; and, based on that implausibility, W.H. Auden has declared that Much Ado is "not one of Shakespeare's best plays." Yet throughout the past four centuries, this relatively dark comedy has been a crowd-pleaser. Its popularity is due, in large measure, to the subplot in which Hero's cousin Beatrice (Aimee Marcelle) and Benedick (Gonzalo Trigueros), a military comrade of Claudio, are tricked into falling in love with each other. The opinionated, sharp-tongued Benedick and Beatrice are among Shakespeare's most vivid creations; and Auden aptly describes them as “the characters of Shakespeare we’d most like to sit next to at dinner.”

The youthful cast handles both verse and prose with confidence and brio. Fedorko, adept at low Shakespearean comedy, makes Dogberry a highlight of the proceedings. Emerson, a forceful, nuanced Macduff in the What Dreams May Co. Macbeth last December, does what he can to lend verisimilitude to a one-dimensional role; his Don John is an exuberantly villainous cartoon, enormous fun to watch but inexplicably malevolent.

As in most productions of Much Ado, the evening belongs to Beatrice and Benedick. Shakespeare uses the reluctant lovers as tools to skewer the conventions of courtly love; Marcelle and Trigueros (presumably guided by Schalmo) ensure that Beatrice and Benedick are always emotionally complex and convincing. Marcelle is a striking comedic presence, compellingly vivacious without upstaging her compatriots. She's well-matched in raillery and romantic chemistry by Trigueros's Benedick. The pair navigate a credible, touching transformation from prickliness to devotion. 

In addition to being the production's director, Schalmo is responsible for costumes and, with Emerson, for the lighting design. She has transferred the action of the play from Renaissance Messina to a small town in the American Midwest. This conceit, applied with a light touch, works very well for a story of deception, backbiting and intrigue; and it frees the actors of anxiety about speaking Shakespeare's lines in their natural accents. 

Schalmo and her self-assured cast keep the action moving at a swift, consistent pace and make the most of the modest dimensions of the 133rd Street Arts Center stage. With no design fripperies to distract the audience, the production is focused throughout on the humor and beauty of the Bard's text. The simplicity of this Much Ado turns out to be a formidable asset.

Much Ado About Nothing by William Shakespeare, presented by What Dreams May Co. Theatre, in association with Queens Players at the 133^rd Street Arts Center (308 West 133rd St. between St. Nicholas Ave. and Frederick Douglass Blvd. in Harlem), runs Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays at 8 p.m., and Saturdays and Sundays at 3 p.m. through June 21. Tickets: $18. For tickets, visit www.brownpapertickets.com/event/495842 or call 1-800-838-3006. 

Sexy Star Vehicle

A “village bike,” one learns in the script of Penelope Skinner’s new play, set in an English country town, is slang for a woman who has slept around — she has been ridden by everyone. At the Lucille Lortel Theatre, that description eventually applies to Becky, a young wife who is newly pregnant but not showing. Vividly embodied by film star Greta Gerwig (Frances Ha), Becky exhibits a growing erotic desperation as her husband, John (a superbly blockheaded and smug Jason Butler Harner), seems to have lost interest in having sex. But though MCC Theater's production of The Village Bike initially has the makings of a sex comedy, Skinner has much more on her mind.

Becky gradually tries to spark John's libido by watching porn movies, but nothing seems to help. At the same time, she has bought an old bicycle in the town so she can get herself out of the cottage and get some exercise, in spite of John’s overly solicitous worries. He’s the kind of guy who is more in tune with the rights of free-range chickens than his wife’s needs.

Skinner’s early scenes are laden with comic double entendre. When Mike, a plumber who has come to fix John and Becky’s leaking pipes, needs to be paid, Becky can’t find her checkbook. “What can we do?” she asks, clad in a shift and a skimpy robe. “Is there something we can do?” It’s a scene out of a porn film, delivered by the sexy Gerwig with enough ambiguous lubricity to make Max Baker’s wide-eyed handyman wonder what kind of solution she has in mind.

When Oliver Hardcastle, the seller, delivers the bike to Becky, he and Mike discuss it in language that confuses the sexually volatile Becky: “She’s a pretty one, though.” “Gorgeous.” “Hardly been ridden.” But the bike chain is not quite right, and so Scott Shepherd’s strapping Oliver promises to repair it. At the moment, however, he’s dressed as the historical character Dick Turpin in a redcoat outfit, since he’s a re-enactor in village pageants nearby. (His name and costume also suggest a nod to She Stoops to Conquer, by Oliver Goldsmith, a comedy with a character named Hardcastle that is about people assuming disguises for “romantic” reasons.) The older Oliver is also married, but his wife, Alice, has a high-powered job that takes her away from the village for long periods. Inevitably, fixing the bike becomes fixing Becky's sexual needs.

Ultimately, Becky finds herself more satisfied by the sex-without-love she has with Oliver than by the love-without-sex at home, and she takes risks to keep the fulfillment going. She and Oliver explore fantasies, such as rape-by-intruder and making videos. Skinner’s play is not so much about sexual needs as about the ways that men and women use each other. Under Sam Gold's direction, the point is made that Becky finds herself imprisoned by her marriage. And Becky’s friend, Jenny (Cara Seymour), a chatty but well-meaning neighbor, confides her frustrations at the absence of her husband, Jules, who has a job that takes him abroad. Intellectually stultified, she still advocates parenthood for Becky even as she confesses it destroyed her self-esteem and her desire for sex. But she masks her disinterest from Jules, just as Oliver seems to hide his affairs from his wife, Alice. Or does he?

With nobody to confide in, Becky becomes more and more dependent on her trysts with Oliver, and more desperate to solidify her relationship with him, even as she loses all sense of herself. Gerwig charts a course from befuddlement and dissatisfaction to tearful desperation and near-insanity. Stooping, she still fails to conquer. It’s a harrowing journey.

Shepherd brings a devil-may-care attitude to Oliver, yet Skinner implies he might be far more dangerous than Becky realizes. Harner fills a thankless part, that of a man so obsessed with social issues that he is clueless about his personal life. Talking of the apparently repaired pipes, he says, “They haven’t made a noise. Doesn’t mean it’s fixed. If something makes a noise, then stops making a noise, that’s when you should be really worried.” He has no idea it applies to his own marriage. It’s merely one of many moments to ponder at length in Skinner’s deftly plotted drama.

Penelope Skinner's The Village Bike is running until July 13 at the MCC Theater at the Lucille Lortel Theatre (121 Christopher St. between Bleecker and Hudson Sts). Evening performances are at 7 p.m. Monday through Wednesday and 8 p.m. Thursday through Saturday. Matinees are at 2 p.m. on Saturdays and 3 p.m. on Sundays. There are no performances on July 4 and 7. For tickets, call MCC Theater at 212-727-7722 or OvationTix at 866-811-4111.

Looking Forward to Looking Back

Nostalgia is a powerful thing — it connects us all to a collective memory, reminding us constantly of better days when we were, perhaps, our better selves.  In the midst of the 2010s, when everything from our fashion to our music to even our social media outlets (hello, instagram) derives inspiration from a previous era in one way or another, it is interesting to note the ways in which we are exploring our past. The Mad Ones — which has made its mission to "investigate cultural memory and nostalgia" — are doing just that in their latest outing, The Essential Straight and Narrow, currently playing at the New Ohio Theatre (154 Christopher Street, Ste. 1E).

The play starts when we meet a woman named Jo (Stephanie Wright Thompson) on the set of what looks like a motel room. It is presumably the 1970s, and the movie script she is privately rehearsing is also presumably a cheesy 1970s cop drama. There is a record player in the corner and a bedspread in off-colors: shades of mustard yellow and burnt sienna, just in case you had any doubt when this play took place. The opening scenes start out with Jo practicing a phone conversation and immediately pull you in with humor as Thompson pulls practically every slapstick move known to man while managing to ground it in reality. A hard thing to pull off, and something Thompson does throughout the play with ease and grace. It is this very skill that endears the audience to her, which is important as we start delving in and out of her character's memory. Moments later, the scene with Jo at the telephone "dissolves" — theatrically, of course — into a memory, in a motel room not unlike the one she is playacting in just moments before.  

Here, other characters emerge: there's the charming Miss Debbie (Marc Bovino), a transgender woman Jo befriends; Paul (Michael Dalto), the quiet guitarist to Jo's former music ensemble; and Gram (Joe Curnutte), the gruff and standoffish vocalist. With each recurring flashback, we see snapshots of the group's time together in the motel room: a friendly bout of "The $10,000 Pyramid," a Dia de los Muertos-themed arts and crafts session, a country-folk-rock rehearsal, a crazy Halloween party soundtracked by James Brown and local urban legends are just some of the antics they get up to over the course of the night. With Laura Jellinek's set design, as well as Mike Inwood's lighting, we completely become immersed in these scenes, however brief they may be. (Also noteworthy are Asta Hostetter's costumes, which also delight in the weird and wonderful fashions of the '70s. I mean, flared jeans with cowboy boots, anyone?) 

Adding to the immersion are the actors themselves, displaying a natural rapport and believable ease in their exchanges, creating a voyeuristic feel to each scene. In their respective roles as Paul and Gram, both Dalto and Curnette provide more-than-sufficient support to Thompson, complementing her often self-conscious Jo with their characters' quiet self-awareness. As the vivacious Miss Debbie, Bovino steals more than a few scenes, not only leaving the party-goers in his thrall, but the audience, as well. Rounding out the cast is an equally scene-stealing ensemble; in particular, Blake DeLong as Barrett, a headdress-donning party crasher who not only steals scenes, but also booze, and — of course — "the new James Brown!" 

Despite its title, the play isn't a "straight-shooter" — when it comes to dispensing information, instead opting to leave it up to the audience to come to their own conclusions.  What this critic has come to conclude is that The Essential Straight and Arrow is less an examination and more an ode to our past selves and what we once hoped and dreamt. Just as Jo's past struggle as a musician is reflected in her "current" struggle as an actress, perhaps what we can glean from the play is the idea that we must look back to our past in order to journey on into the future. The road ahead might not be a straight shot into success, but perhaps it's the getting there that's worth looking forward to.

The Essential Straight and Arrow ran at The New Ohio Theatre (154 Christopher Street, Ste. 1E, between Greenwich and Washington Streets) in New York City until June 14. For more information, visit www.NewOhioTheatre.org.

Central Park or the Forest of Arden

Often, when New Yorkers think of theatre in Central Park, they think of the Public's Shakespeare in the Park at the Delacorte Theatre. Flying under the radar of the Delacorte, however, are other theatrical happenings taking place in the nooks and crannies of Central Park.  One of these lesser-known jewels is the New York Classical Theatre, who have been performing their signature "panoramic theatre" in public outdoor spaces such as Central Park, Prospect Park and Battery Park since 2000.  Under the artistic direction of Founder Stephen Burdman, the New York Classical Theatre has most recently applied their panoramic style (a roving, interactive experience that adapts each script to its location) to Shakespeare's As You Like It.  While staging moveable theatre in a park has its obvious difficulties -- such as lighting, sound, and seat comfort -- the overall experience of As You Like It is a delightful summer treat for all ages.

The performances in this play deserve special applause.  While some of the movement is a bit grandiose, this is probably an attempt to fill the unique and sprawling space of Central Park-as-stage.  The cast works together to keep energy high and the pace clipping.  Rin Allen breathes new life into the cross-dressing Rosalind, delivering her lines with vocal color and physical playfulness.  Clay Storseth delivers Jaques' beloved "All The World's a Stage" monologue with insightful nuance.  Also notable is Antoinette Robinson's sassy Phoebe.  Overall, the ensemble has an excellent command of Shakespearean language, making the plotline accessible to even the most inexperienced Shakespeare audiences.

New York Classical Theatre employs crafty design techniques to overcome the obstacles of staging As You Like It outdoors.  Once the sun goes down, company interns whip out an arsenal of flashlights to light the action.  While only partially effective in illuminating the faces of the actors, this makeshift lighting technique creates a magical, "summer camp" type of atmosphere that trumps any expensive lighting system in town.  Similarly, without amplification, the actors must use extra projection to compete with the rich soundscape of the park:  birds, crowds of tourists, people on cell phones, passing ambulances, etc.  These moments of aural interference, however, only enhance the excitement created by the re-articulation of a public space like Central Park.  As you move from scene to scene, be sure to sit close to the action so you can catch most of the lines spoken by the talented performers.  Also, since you will be sitting on the ground, bringing a picnic blanket might not be a bad idea. 

Unlike the Shakespeare in the Park series at the Delacorte, audiences need not wait in long lines to get tickets.  New York Classical Theatre productions are completely free and you can show up at any time to join.  For anyone who enjoys both serious theatre and summer fun, As You Like It is an enchanting summer treat.

Performances of As You Like It runs at Central Park (West 103rd Street and Central Park West) on Thursdays through Sundays until June 22. Performances in Prospect Park (Long Meadow near the Picnic House - 5th Street and Prospect Park West) run every night, June 24–29. Performances in Battery Park (meet in front of Castle Clinton) run Tuesday through Sunday, July 1– 27. All performances are free, begin promptly at 7 p.m., and last two hours. For more information, call 212-252-4531 or visit www.newyorkclassical.org.

Missed Connections to Happiness

In a program note to one of the current productions of his plays at 59E59 Theaters, British playwright Alan Ayckbourn acknowledges a debt to J.B. Priestley. Priestley’s inventive splintering of time in plays like Dangerous Corner, Ayckbourn writes, has inspired him. Thus the simple time frame of Ayckbourn's early masterpiece Absurd Person Singular (1975), which charted the changing fortunes of its six characters over three Christmases, led eventually to Communicating Doors (1994), where stepping through a door in a hotel suite takes a character back 20 years. In 1999 came the tour de force House and Garden, which have to be played in adjacent theaters simultaneously, so that characters from House exit into Garden, and vice versa, and actors work in two plays in one evening.

Ayckbourn also plays with time in his newest work, Arrivals & Departures, a comedy that may rival Woman in Mind (1985) and Wildest Dreams (1991) as one of his darkest.

At a railway station, Quentin (Bill Champion), the director of a police task force, is planning to intercept a seemingly slippery and dangerous criminal, “codename Cerastes.” Quentin is directing a squad of agents in their disguises, and things are going egregiously wrong. One “father” holds his “baby” by the feet; a female “tourist” mangles a would-be Norwegian accent. As Quentin notes, “The closest she’s ever been to Norway is Botswana.” In short order, though, Quentin has other worries. A young female police officer, Ez (Elizabeth Boag), who is about to be discharged from the force, is assigned to his unit to protect the only known eyewitness who can identify Cerastes, a bluff old Yorkshireman named Barry (Kim Wall), who arrives by helicopter.

The story then journeys in flashbacks to Ez's childhood and adolescence, as scenes alternate between her recollections and the inane attempts of Barry to talk to her. Her father dies in military combat, and she develops a deep-seated hostility toward men, feeling abandonment. Eventually she joins the police force. Even though she shrinks at anyone's touch, she has a romance with a man named Rob, but at her insistence there is no sex. At 23, she is constantly morose and, unfortunately, one finds it difficult to sympathize with her. Boag is suitably dour, and suggests that Ez has unresolved daddy issues.

Act II is when Ayckbourn pulls off one of his expected theatrical tricks: the action of the play starts over (with subtle adjustments), and this time we follow Barry's early life — marriage, children, overbearing in-laws — through flashbacks. A man who seemed eccentric, charming, and harmless turns out to be as deeply unhappy as Ez. In what is surely one of the bleakest endings of any Ayckbourn play — and it feels like a forced plot twist — Ez and Barry finally find a connection.

Well-known Ayckbourn themes are reworked here. Among them are the unseen misery of people who seem content and confident, and the incompetence and pettiness of people who hold authority (echoing 2011’s Neighbourhood Watch). The dramatist's observation of the British middle class is as astute as ever.

Although Ayckbourn intends Arrivals & Departures to be in a more serious vein, fans who are used to his generally comic spirit will find this atmosphere predominantly tragic. That’s the playwright’s prerogative, of course, but the comedy and tragedy here jostle each other uneasily. The harshness of Ez’s character, though it abates in the second act, when Barry is the focus, is off-putting. A confrontation between Ez and Rob’s parents touches abruptly on British class friction, and the final portrait of Rob that emerges doesn’t square with the patient, decent character that Richard Stacey has created.

Nonetheless, under the author’s direction, the actors do a fine job bringing this thorny anomaly to life. As part of the Brits Off-Broadway festival, 59E59 is offering a generous helping of Ayckbourn (he has written 78 plays), with visiting productions from the playwright’s own Stephen Joseph Theatre in Scarborough: a revival of his 1992 play, Time of My Life, is also being presented, and though it, too, has a serious side, a third bill contains two one-acts under the umbrella title Farcicals.

Arrivals & Departures, Farcicals and Time of My Life play in repertory through June 29 with marathons on Sundays. For tickets and times, visit www.59e59.org.

Eve of Destruction

Samuel D. Hunter’s fine play The Whale made a big splash last season at Playwrights Horizons (the young playwright received a special Drama Desk Award). Now he has returned with The Few, an absorbing drama at the Rattlestick Playwrights Theater about working-class people flailing in their efforts to survive. Like The Whale, it benefits from canny direction by Davis McCallum.

The talented Hunter has carved out northern Idaho as his stomping ground, just as Lucy Thurber has claimed western Massachusetts. His play A Bright New Boise first brought the Idaho-born dramatist acclaim in 2010. He writes with immense sympathy for people who are isolated and at the end of their rope. You could easily guess that from a glimpse of the living conditions in Dane Laffrey’s set for The Few: the interior of a trailer home that’s cluttered with shabby furniture, shelves with papers, and various ancient computer equipment (it’s 1999, and Y2K has everyone jittery), all sitting under a water-blotched ceiling.

The Few opens with a standoff. Bryan (Michael Laurence) and QZ (Tasha Lawrence) stare at each other, tension thick in the air. Four years earlier, shortly after the death of their good friend Jim in a big-rig accident, Bryan disappeared without a word and hasn’t been in touch. In the interim, his ex-lover QZ has taken over the small paper that the three founded for long-haul truckers — it’s called The Few — and transformed it. Once it featured thoughtful articles by Bryan that struck a chord with big-rig drivers, but that business model, she says, was doomed. Now it relies on classified ads from lonely truckers looking for partners — they call in periodically with their ads, such as “All-American in search of American honey. Like long walks and the second Harry Potter book… All shapes and size welcome, please be under 60.”

QZ seems implacable in her fury: she taunts Bryan with the information that she’s met someone way better than he, though their correspondence is by letter. Harsh and unsentimental, she adds that their dog ran onto the Interstate and was squashed dead. But Bryan still holds the deed to the property. Grudgingly, she allows him to pull out a cot and stay.

Bryan’s settling in is not a complete triumph, and Laurence is excellent in conveying his weariness and brusqueness; the part calls for him to be a cipher for a long stretch, but he makes Bryan compelling. The character must contend with Matthew, QZ’s 19-year-old assistant and Jim’s nephew, who has been thrown out of his home. Since then, QZ has looked after him. As the castoff teen, Gideon Glick gives a startling and assured performance: gawky, nerdy, twitchy, often comical, yet full of unexpected nerve. For years he has secretly awaited Bryan’s return, because Bryan’s articles inspired him when he was 15 and he wants to restore The Few to what it was. Unluckily, an element of Hunter’s plot hinges on Matthew’s being the confidant of brawny truckers and their deep desires, which is not credible.

Nonetheless, McCallum and his cast conjure the feel of people on their last legs, and the wreckage of 20^th-century idealism on the brink of a new millennium. (Passing references to Tetris and floppy disks underline the need for an attitude adjustment toward the future.) Hunter suggests that QZ’s blanket defense of the profit motive is unacceptable, yet an unfocused idealism is no answer either. The final moments of his play bring hope that the profit motive rampant in the new millennium will not totally smother selflessness, and that Bryan and people like him will find some way to lend help to those who need it.

The Few plays at the Rattlestick Playwrights Theater (224 Waverly Place) through June 21. Evening performances are at 7 p.m. on Sunday, Monday and Wednesday; 8 p.m. Thursday through Saturday. There is also a matinee on Saturdays at 3 p.m. For tickets, visit www.rattlestick.org or call Ovationtix at 866-811-4111.

Lost in Baltimore

For more than three decades, New York Theatre Workshop has nurtured cutting-edge dramatists such as Harry Kondoleon, Caryl Churchill, Tony Kushner, and Athol Fugard. The company introduced Rent to the world in 1995; but, only in recent seasons have musicals -- Once, Peter and the Starcatcher, A Civil War Christmas, and the innovative revue What’s It All About? Bacharach Reimagined -- become a major aspect of NYTW's artistic profile. The current offering, Red-Eye to Havre de Grace, is an eccentric music-theater piece about Edgar Allan Poe's last days. Although credited to an authorial committee of six, Red-Eye to Havre de Grace has a singular theatrical style that's as bracing as any of the music-theater pieces mentioned above. 

The six people who have “created” Red-Eye to Havre de Grace are the show’s director and scenic designer (Thaddeus Phillips), its choreographer (Sophie Bortolussi), the actor who plays Poe (Ean Sheehy), siblings who composed the musical score (David and Jeremy Wilhelm), and Geoff Sobelle (listed merely as “co-creator”). Jeremy Wilhelm handles multiple roles, sings and plays guitar and clarinet; David Wilhelm is the production’s pianist. The sole performer not credited as an author is Alessandra L. Larson, who dances the ghostly role of Poe’s wife Virginia. 

Poe, a master of the literary macabre and, arguably, the first professional writer in American history, died in Baltimore on October 7, 1849. Forty years old and a resident of the Bronx, he had been traveling during the preceding weeks, giving lectures and readings, searching for literary work, raising money for a journal he intended to start and, possibly, laying the groundwork for a move to Virginia. After stops in Boston, Philadelphia, Richmond, and Norfolk, Poe boarded the wrong train and arrived in Maryland by mistake. His confusion may have been a function of illness or of alcohol or laudanum (both of which figure prominently in his biography).

Red-Eye to Havre de Grace opens with a prologue spoken by a man (Jeremy Wilhelm) who introduces himself as Steve Reynolds, “a ranger for the United States National Park Service stationed at the Edgar Allan Poe National Historic Site in Philadelphia.” Ranger Steve is in New York, he says, to give audiences a little background on Poe. His speech, which captures the enthusiasm of an obsessive docent, covers Poe's origins, his turbulent personal life, the variety of his literary output, and his desperate hopes for Eureka, the metaphysical treatise “which he believed to be his greatest work, in which he offered  the full explanation of the origin and annihilation of the universe.”

The goofy, satiric quality of Ranger Steve's prologue puts the audience on notice that Red-Eye to Havre de Grace is no common-and-garden docu-drama. The scenes that follow draw on Poe's verse and prose, including letters and a mystifying passage from Eureka. The authors of the play don’t strain to link effects to causes, choosing instead to dramatize in visual and musical terms the grief that consumed Poe following the death of his very young wife (who was also his cousin) and his anxiety about how to promote his literary career while supporting himself and the mother-in-law (also his aunt) whom he adored.

Red-Eye to Havre de Grace is a succession of provocative images rather than straightforward narrative. Scenic designer (and director) Phillips and lighting designer Drew Billiau provide a visually arresting environment through which the actors navigate the complex movements of Phillips' direction and Bortolussi's nearly mesmerizing choreography. The direction and design are enhanced by the Wilhelm brothers' beautiful, varied musical score. Rosemarie McKelvey's simple, picturesque costumes contribute a great deal to the visual effect of the piece, as well.

For 90 minutes, the actors of Red-Eye to Havre de Grace, enact Poe's turbulent emotions and disintegrating intellect with engaging theatricality. The authors wisely avoid reaching for explanations of things that are lost in the interstices of the historical record. Red-Eye to Havre de Grace may do little to dispel the mystery of Poe's last days, but the authors and actors shed considerable light on what it means to strive and hope and grieve.     

Red-Eye to Havre de Grace is running through Sunday, June 1, 2014, at New York Theatre Workshop (79 East 4th St.). Performances are 7 p.m. on Tuesday, Wednesday and Sunday; 8 p.m. on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday; 3 p.m. on Saturday; and 2 p.m. on Sunday. Tickets are $85, $40, and discounted to student groups of 10 or more. Ticket information at www.nytw.org or by calling 212-279-4200.

A Pirate Quagmire

Exiled dissident Edward Snowden shivers in a cramped cabin in Siberia. William Kidd is hung for piracy charges that he didn’t commit. A young Bobby Culliford is both a victim of bullying and bully himself. What do these scenarios have in common? Pretty much nothing and Nolan Kennedy’s original play Bully Me Down does little to convince us otherwise. While the enthusiasm of Letter of Marque Theater Company’s gung-ho ensemble is admirable at the very least, their performance chops are overwhelmed by Bully Me Down’s baffling quagmire of a script. 

It would be one thing if Bully Me Down’s chief flaw were the discordance of its three outrageous plotlines, but there’s something even more disturbing about the tone and content of this script. While it’s somewhat socially acceptable to crack jokes about a whistleblower like Edward Snowden, and even more appropriate to lampoon a several-hundred year-old seaman like William Kidd, the theme of bullying seems to be in an entirely different (and more serious) realm. The bullied teenager Bobby (played by Scarlet Rivera) delivers a school speech about “bullycide,” which is the unfortunate neologism for bully-related suicide. Instead of driving home any real message about this real-world problem, Bobby’s subplot smacks of a bad after-school special, dreadfully eclipsing the actual gravity of the actual issue of bullying. It’s worse than off-color, it's insensitive; and this play would be better off without it.

Despite it's dramaturgical sufferings, Bully Me Down does have certain points of charm.  Worth the trip to Brooklyn itself is a puppet version of Barbara Walters from the bust up, designed and constructed by Serra Hirsch. Especially agile at Barbara-handling is Welland H. Scripps, who manages to coyly flash the puppet’s red-lacquered fingernails as she conducts her interviews with various characters throughout the play. All of the performer’s accents, especially Scripps’ and Kennedy’s, are delightfully overdone and consistent. Also of note is the company’s original and re-imagined musical score: the tune of the song, “Bully Me Down,” is sure to stick in your head, and the musical fun continues during a wacky dumbshow during intermission. Best of all, the performances are free and take place in various bars around Brooklyn, so you can have a beer with locals and enjoy the community vibe.

Overall, Letter of Marque Theater Company’s Bully Me Down suffers from some pretty serious dramaturgical tangles, as well as some unfortunate staging decisions (like word association during improv scene transitions). The script could use renovation, and the cast another week of rehearsals. That being said, you could do worse on a weeknight than hang out in a bar watching some weird (and free) community theater. So if you’re in for a silly and irreverent time: grab a beer, turn off your inner critic, and give Bully Me Down a try.

Bully Me Down runs through May 21 at various bars around Brooklyn. Performances are Sunday through Wednesday at 8 p.m., except for Sunday, May 18, when the performance starts at 3 p.m. Tickets are free. To reserve, call Letter of Marque Theater Company at 718-246-2211. For specific venue locations, visit http://www.lomtheater.org/bmd-performance-schedule.html.

Pushing Comic Revenge to the Brink

It is very difficult for a critic to express one’s full appreciation of a performance without addressing the complexities of the experience. Even if a show does not satisfy, a production requires so much labor from a diversity of voices that define the theatrical event that it would be unfair for a critic to raze over a work without acknowledging the moments of brilliance. The Deer Players’ production of The Brink of Us is not a successful play, yet some elements make it a unique work.

The play opens with a short prologue delivered by the character of Elliot, played by Tom Kelsey, explaining his close relationship with his sister. He is very emphatic about how they shared certain experiences that others would not have understood. Many years later, after his sister committed suicide, Elliot has invited his group of friends to spend a weekend at his cabin in the woods. Yet as they drink and consume every drug with which they experimented in their youth, civility starts peeling away and the audience discovers Elliot’s real motive for inviting them over: he believes that one of them killed his sister.

The people at the cabin are basically divided into four couples. There is the egotistical Alex, played by Julia Piker, a published writer who does not worry about revealing the most embarrassing secrets about herself. She arrives together with Max, played by Zachary J. Smith, who seems to faithfully follow all of Alex’s whims. Then there is Sean, played by Daniel Cuff, and Liz, played by Annelise Nielsen. They appear to be a very normal young couple, when in reality both are dealing with her nervous breakdown, whose ripples are still felt from time to time. After the audience is given a chance to meet the first two couples, Sebastian, played by Peter Staley, bursts in with an energetic indifference stereotypical of a young corporate lawyer. His girlfriend, Ellen, played by Linda Tardif, arrives separately already demonstrating that she will be the complete opposite of Sebastian. Finally, there is the host’s girlfriend, Sally, played by Starr Kirkland, a childish presence whose innocence shines among this group of apparently broken individuals.

The cast does a great job with what they are given, yet suffers from the script’s confusion in how it wants to tell its story. The playwright, Delaney Britt Brewer, takes the traditional yarn of older friends coming together and noticing how each one has changed, yet pushes it down a much darker path. This darkness involves death, revenge, the loss of innocence, betrayal, and coming to grips with an obscure past. Nevertheless, when the story initiates this much more interesting journey, the play becomes an almost farcical comedy. The combination of drama, comedy and horror is very difficult to achieve and I admire the bravery of the artists to do so, yet it bogs down a play that shows so much promise. The characters go from dealing with a seriously dark secret to enthusiastically eating a tablecloth due to extreme hunger. Later one comes out clownishly drenched in blood while another one gives a sweet rendition of Don Henley’s “The Boys of Summer” in the middle of the play’s most chaotic build-up. Kara-Lynn Vaeni’s direction does not add cohesion to these moments and so the audience is lost in its midst. The whole world that is contained within Elliot’s cabin and which shows moments of Hitchcockian humor and gloom, sadly crumbles at the end. Yet there is enough flair in the turns taken by the story and in the way that it is acted to ultimately demonstrate the talent behind the work, even if it suffers from a loss of focus.

The Brink of Us is presented at South Oxford Space (138 South Oxford Street between Atlantic Avenue and Hanson Place in Brooklyn) through May 17. Performances are Fridays through Sundays at 8 p.m. with an extra performance on Thursday, May 15 at 8 p.m. Tickets are $20 for the general public and $18 for students. These can be purchased online at http://brinkofus.brownpapertickets.com or by calling 1-800-836-3006.

Bigger Isn't Always Better

It’s no wonder that with a cast of 35, the production of Nicholas Nickleby, A New Musical was forced to skimp on quality in other areas. This musical was based on Charles Dickens’ 1830’s novel and was presented by the Crummles Troupe as they tell the story of the Nickleby family. Young Nicholas Nickleby, played by the not-so-teenage looking Douglas McDonnell, is left penniless when his father passes away. Soon after, his cruel Uncle Ralph (William Broderick) sends him away to earn a living as a teacher at The Squeers’ boarding school. This “boarding school” is reminiscent of Miss Hannigan’s orphanage — poor conditions and cruel owners (played by Luba Mason and David F. Slone) shock Nicholas, and leave him with no choice but to escape with crippled boy Smike (Jonathan Fox Powers) and return home, where the family bands together against Uncle Ralph.  

Unfortunately, for every strength of this production (which are quite a few), there was a disappointment. The story itself is strong, and I found myself, quite possibly for the first time ever, wanting to pick up a Charles Dickens book. However, the melodramatic way that the Crummles Troupe prides itself on presenting the plot is over the top and often downright annoying. The play within a play premise also works to make the characters one-dimensional, as you are constantly reminded that the actors on stage are playing two roles — they are not only acting as their role in Nicholas Nickleby, but acting as actors from the Crummles Troupe acting in Nicholas Nickleby.

With such a large cast, one would think the staging and choreography would have been less dull and wooden. Distracting throughout the performance were the six children who looked like they had been asked to perform the show after learning it that morning. But perhaps the most distracting weakness of the production was the make-up. Poor William Broderick. The make-up applied to make him look older was a disaster. The production also skimped on scenery and props.

The production featured original music and lyrics by Alaric Jans that worked for the time period of the show, as well as with the book by Robert Sickinger. That being said, you won’t find yourself humming along to any of these songs days later. With an ensemble of 35 strong voices blending together, the songs were often extremely enjoyable to listen to during the musical.

Though not a perfect piece by any means, Nicholas Nickleby, A New Musical, succeeds in entertaining audiences with a strong story, score and cast. Although 35 cast members may have been taking on too much, there’s something to be said for the fact that every seat in the theater was filled. 

Nicholas Nickleby, A New Musical ran at the Theater for the New City (155 First Avenue at East 10th Street) through May 5. 

Top Photo Credit: Peter Welch Photography

The Mighty Hath Fallen

"The younger rises when the old doth fall." So describes one of William Shakespeare's most dramatic plots to ever grace the stage. Based on ancient Celtic legend, the Bard's King Lear is considered one of the most tragic of his plays; its original intended ending had been altered for centuries up until the mid- to late-eighteenth century for this very reason. For many, the story is familiar: an aging king seeks to pass on his estate to the daughter who professes her love the most. However, the king goes mad by the betrayal and greed that quickly engulfs him. Titan Theatre Company's production, now playing at the Queens Theater, keeps this legend of King Lear alive with its signature contemporary take on the classic.  

The company's King Lear is turned into an intense, action-packed conspiracy thriller; instead of the overthrow of a kingdom, here corporate greed reigns supreme. At the top of the ladder, undoubtedly, sits King Lear (Terry Layman) himself, with an array of characters on the lower rungs eagerly awaiting his downfall. Among them are his daughters, Regan (Laura Frye) and Goneril (Leah Gabriel), with their respective husbands Cornwall (John Taylor Phillips) and Albany (Greg Oliver Bodine), in tow. Upon Lear's announcement that his estate shall go to whomever amongst his daughters declares her love the most, the two scheming daughters immediately shower him with excessive flattery, eager for a share in the estate. When it comes time for Cordelia (Susan Maris) to speak, she refuses to act as her sisters do, opting a more honest approach in regards to professing her love. This upsets the old king, who decides to disown Cordelia and divide the share between his two other daughters. Meanwhile, Gloucester's (Michael Selkirk) illegitimate son, Edmund (Tristan Colton), resenting his status, seeks vengeance upon Edgar (Brendan Marshall-Rashid). He composes a letter which is sent to their father, leading Gloucester to think Edgar is plotting against the estate. The string of events which follow lead to various acts of betrayal, greed, madness and cold-blooded murder.

Like many of their previous productions (such as their off-Broadway-bound Midsummer Night's Dream, reviewed here), Titan's King Lear is a perfect amalgamation of the classic and modern. Jasmine Nicole Roberts' ethereal and abstract set design contrasts against the blunt lines of Scott Frost's suit-and-tie costumes for many of the principal characters. The black-and-white motif which runs through the two production elements — from the curtains to their costumes — is an interesting way to represent the world of King Lear, which is not so cut-and-dry, and in which there are many gray areas in terms of friend versus foe. There are instances of pops of color, many for symbolic use: both Regan and Goneril can be seen wearing blue blouses, as opposed to Cordelia's plain white; ensemble members of the cast (such as Kent and Edgar) are decked out in more earthy colors. Other design elements such as Weston G. Wetzel's lighting and sound design make already powerful scenes all the more dramatic. In addition, the idea of various company members doubling as stagehands and changing set pieces between scenes is an effective device that should be used more often in the theater. If scenes in real life changed as as dramatically as they did in King Lear, then real life would definitely be more interesting.

It is Titan's ensemble, as evidently demonstrated in A Midsummer Night's Dream earlier this season, that remains a strong presence onstage — as a group and individually. Layman's Lear was anything but one-note; he was humorous, commanding and moving to watch and when he met his tragic end, you felt his sadness, too. As his scheming daughters, Frye and Gabriel were deliciously devious, and played great foils to Maris' forthright but loving Cordelia. As Edmund, Colton gave off a rebellious edge opposite Marshall-Rashid's equally noteable performance as the wronged brother. Other honorable mentions include R. Scott Williams as the wonderfully flamboyant and witty Fool, and Brad Makarowski as the gallant Kent.

If everyone's downfall played out with as much suspense and thrill as it does in Titan Theatre Company's King Lear, then we should all be glad to go — honor still intact, and guns ablazing.

King Lear is playing at The Queens Theatre (14 United Nations Avenue South) in Flushing Meadows Corona Park until May 11. For tickets and more information about this production, visit www.titantheatrecompany.com or www.queenstheatre.org. 

O'Neill, Completely Condensed

The stalwart Irish American playwright Eugene O'Neill is well known by theater practitioners for his neurotic stage directions, which are meticulously detailed and famously ignored by contemporary directors of his plays. The New York Neo-Futurists, experimental darlings of the East Village, have seized upon this absurder side of O'Neill by again staging only his stage directions in their latest project,The Complete & Condensed Stage Directions of Eugene O'Neill, Volume 2. In this second installment of the Complete & Condensed project, four actors from The Neo-Futurists enact the stage directions from five of O'Neill's lesser known plays: Recklessness (1913), Warnings (1913), Fog (1914), Abortion (1914), and The Sniper (1915). Unapologetic in its literalness, Complete & Condensed is a theatrical exercise that deftly illuminates the constructs and fallacies of theater and performance, though not without moments of long-windedness.

Known by New Yorkers for their long-running signature show, Too Much Light Makes The Baby Go Blind (in which the actors attempt to present 30 plays in 60 minutes), The Neo-Futurists are a mainstay in New York City's downtown theater scene. The manifesto of Neo-Futurism promotes an anti-illusory brand of theater in which performers can only play themselves, generating dramatic material from their actual lived histories; furthermore, performers' actions must be honest and complete (no fake-sleeping, no prop weapons, and only real alcohol is drunk onstage). Though Complete & Condensed does not adhere strictly to these Neo-Futuristic performance criteria, it shares the same goal of calling attention to the presentational strategies used in traditional stagings of theatrical realism.

Like most Neo-Futurist productions, the ensemble of Complete & Condensed is majorly in-tune. Reading the stage directions from a lectern on the side of the stage, the solid and recognizable voice of Cecil Baldwin (of podcast "Welcome to Night Vale" fame) is a constant reminder of the tomes of language often rendered invisible by the staging and directorial process. The elasticity of Cara Francis' face is awe-inspring, as is the physical humor of Dylan Marron. At times, the actors' choices are obvious, while they are delightfully surprising at other moments. Like Volume One, the experience of watching staged stage directions is mercurial: at times hilarious, and at others a bit lackluster. When stripped of their dialogue, O'Neill's plays disengage viewers' focus from the play's plot and characters, and focus them instead on a present moment of interpretive action.  

While Complete & Condensed certainly manages to blow the dust off of O'Neill's elaborate and largely ignored stage directions, it may leave you wondering: so what? Less than homage, but more than an acting exercise, the meta-theatrical construct of Complete & Condensed is not inexhaustible. Viewers who are returning for a second helping of Complete & Condensed after seeing Volume One should expect a very similar performance to the first volume. The production is recommended especially for viewers who have yet to experience Complete & Condensed.

The Complete & Condensed Stage Directions of Eugene O'Neill, Volume 2 runs at Theater for the New City (155 First Avenue at East 10th Street) through May 11. Performances are Wednesday through Saturday at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 3 p.m. Tickets are $25. For tickets, call OvationTix at 1-866-811-4111 or visit www.nynf.org.

Living Rough in London

British actor Harry Melling, best known as Dudley Dursley in five Harry Potter films, has taken a leaf from his famous co-star, Daniel Radcliffe—or perhaps he just found himself on a parallel path. Both actors are currently doing stage work in New York, yet Melling has done Radcliffe, who is starring on Broadway in The Cripple of Inishmaan, one better. Melling’s solo performance in Peddling for the Brits Off-Broadway festival at 59E59 Theaters also marks his playwriting debut.

Certainly, the likable young author has a gift for language with an inclination to the poetical—the script looks like pages of modern verse, with phrases broken into lines of rough poetry and no capitalization, in the style of e.e. cummings. Unfortunately, the language sometimes obscures the clarity of the thought, or the thought itself.

never, eat, shredded what,
(and I’m) never, eating, shredded wheat.
—
trying to
get my bearings on the sweet—
but before I can…
bossman,
already shouting at from the van…
“you better do me proud today boy, otherwise…”
and the gunshot go off…

One might detect a rap-like repetition of rhymes such as can/man/van, but the determined poetic impulse also includes near-rhymes that are common to rap—or, if your inclination is more highbrow, William Butler Yeats. Still, Melling evokes the seamy side of London, the loneliness of an orphan, and the self-destructiveness of many British youth.

Playing a 19-year-old character known only as Boy, the actor is first seen nearly naked inside a square scrim surrounded on all sides by seats. The floor is dirt with a spot of grass, and there’s a telephone pole at the center with lights on it. As the title suggests, the Boy knocks on doors, working as a salesman as part of a social work program and carrying a box of household items. To those who answer the doors he announces, “I’m from Boris Johnson’s young offender’s scheme, and I was wondering whether or not you’d like to buy something.” (Although director Steven Atkinson has helpfully added the surname Johnson to the script’s plain Boris, most Americans still won't connect the name to the mayor of London. But Atkinson has staged the play superbly.)

Melling plays not only himself but gives voice to other characters using a closely held microphone. When he does, Azusa Ono’s colored lights indicate another speaker: a green light may intensify for one person, or a red for another. Some are in the pole, some above the playing area. (At one point the Boy climbs up the pole, as Atkinson uses every bit of the constricted space.) The lighting is expertly coordinated with George Dennis’s outstanding sound design—city traffic, door shutting, doorbell.

One day, by accident, the Boy knocks on a door and recognizes the woman who answers as his own social worker, although she doesn’t recognize him. He tries to engage her young daughter through the home’s speaker system, and at one point he lashes out at the impersonality of the social system, but eventually he bonds with the child, who helps him by locating a crucial piece of evidence about his heritage. Although Atkinson never lets the energy flag, the language periodically gets in the way of an easy comprehension of the plot and becomes a source of frustration.

On the program cover the actor’s photograph gives him a slightly thuggish air of a rugby player, but Melling displays warmth and sensitivity as the hero, abandoned by his mother and wanting a family connection, although the character has his faults. He shows a youthful cockiness, a temper, a drinking habit, and a flash of homophobia along with his yearning. For a writer who is only 25 not to have his gifts completely under control yet is not surprising. The good news is that Melling hasn’t had his play staged because he used to hang out with a boy wizard. He has his own talents to capitalize on.

A Biblical Medley: 50 Plays

The Mysteries is a theatrical and musical journey through most of the love, violence, power struggles, betrayals, and miracles from the Bible. The show is a compilation of short plays from 48 different playwrights that rework themes and stories chosen from both the Old and New Testaments. Every element of the performance works to take the audience through a closer experience of the Bible. Spectators sit in two rows of chairs on two sides of a long passageway, where most of the action takes place. The relatively small area is surrounded by transparent vinyl strip curtains, just as those used in meat lockers, stained with blood. These curtains work as walls to confine the audience within a space of religious myth and give an ingenious visual clue about the bloody events that they will witness. Yet Jason Sherwood’s scenic design does not only emphasize the violence since it also opens the possibilities for beautiful moments, as when performers's heads holding apples in their mouths come through the vinyl curtains tempting Adam and Eve with the forbidden fruit. Seth Reiser’s lighting design works harmoniously alongside Sherwood's designs. Reiser’s effects range from the intense red light that drowns the performing space in blood to the softer lighting that engulfs in shadows the more intimate moments.

Some of the plays are more directly linked to the source material, such as that of Noah, Abraham, and the life of Jesus, among others. That is not to say that these were performed in a traditional way. For example, in Mallery Avidon’s The Flood, humanity reacts in unison to the coming of the deluge with a resounding “fuck!,” while in Nick Jones’s Fruitful and Begettin’, the characters in Abraham’s story come from the deep South and seem to be directly related to the Duck Dynasty family. Most of the plays included in the second act, such as those by José Rivera, Jeff Whitty, and Gabriel Jason Dean, depict various moments in Jesus’s life. Most of the plays portray Jesus as a polyamorous and pansexual leader who is seriously conflicted about the decisions he must make, which will lead him to his ultimate sacrifice. Nevertheless, Whitty’s The Last Supper also underscores Judas Iscariot’s secret sacrifice since he was not only Jesus’s most loved disciple, but he is also persuaded by Jesus himself to betray him thereby laying the foundations for the new church. These playwrights throw new light on these familiar stories.

Other playwrights, such as Max Posner, Bill Cain, and Lloyd Suh, anchor their plays on certain themes; yet depart from the source material. Posner’s The Woman Taken in Adultery focuses on the hypocrisy of those who judge others when a man discovers his neighbor’s adulterous secret as he was coming to ask for some butter. While Cain’s Resurrection proposes that Jesus resurrected as a homeless person in Brooklyn, Suh’s The Next Supper explores the meeting between Jesus and his father, Joseph/God, after he died in the cross. These plays illustrate the smaller moments that escape the epic proportions of the more familiar stories.

The Mysteries has a cast of 54 great actors who are able to muster very energetic performances throughout a show that lasts five hours and a half. All performances shine as part of the ensemble. Matthew Jeffers’s tyrannical God works marvelously together with Asia Kate Dillon’s defiant yet tender Lucifer. At the same time, Rory Kulz’s nosy neighbor is fun to watch as he squirms when accused of being a hypocrite by Janice Amaya’s strong woman. The director, Ed Sylvanus Iskandar, does a great job of weaving together the different short plays into one mostly cohesive show. Yet this is also one of its main downfalls since some of the pieces do not quite come together and the audience is confused when going from one play to the next. The director must pay closer attention to those transitions. Nevertheless, in the end, the audience is made part of a truly communal experience that is not religious, but human at heart.

The Mysteries is playing at The Flea Theater until May 25. The performance has two intermissions and includes nudity. Tickets range from $15 to $125 and include dinner and dessert.

In the Name of Redemption

Religious themes are nothing new in theater; this is an art form, after all, that has boasted the likes of Jesus Christ Superstar and Godspell as product of such themes. At the Gene Frankel Theatre this past Easter Sunday, religion once again took center stage with a production of August Strindberg's To Damascus, Part I. The first of Strindberg's trilogy, On the Road to Damascus, is under the helm of the August Strindberg Repertory Theatre. The company, which holds a residency at the Frankel, was founded in commitment to keeping Strindberg's work alive through productions, particularly of his lesser-known plays.  

Like all biblical fables, Damascus begins and ends at the same place: a lonely corner on the streets of Harlem in the early 1960s. Here, we meet our story's unlikely hero, only known as The Stranger (DeSean Stokes), an Amiri Baraka-like wandering writer figure. On the verge of a spiritual crossroad, he meets The Lady (Kersti Bryan), the wife of a childhood friend known as The Doctor (Victor Arnez), whom The Stranger had wronged in the past. Sent by her husband to lure the wanderer into their home, The Lady soon finds herself spellbound by the tortured writer and his ideals. They arrive at The Doctor's house shortly thereafter, only to have their host slip a rather unhealthy dose of LSD into The Stranger's drink, prompting horrific hallucinations. Subsequently, the young couple seek refuge in a cottage in the woods, where her mother (Victoria Blankenship) and grandfather (Allen Kennedy) reside. Distrustful of The Stranger their progeny has brought into their home, they pronounce a curse upon him. This ultimately drives him into madness, and he wakes up to find himself in what seems like a convent, only to later find out it was an asylum.

Throughout the play, each scene is punctuated with blackouts, perhaps in an effort to signify the different "stations" the youthful hero visits. Modeled after the station dramas of the Medieval era, Strindberg's expressionistic trilogy is rife with religious symbolism, both in its dialogue and characters. However, despite its updated time setting, the production seems to get lost in its own ambitions; it does not find a way to properly reconcile the play's religious themes with the tumult of 1960s America. After all, in the wake of the likes of James Baldwin and Ralph Ellison, it is a time period that seems right for the story of an unnamed pilgrim of sorts in search of redemption and truth. Certain aspects of the production feel right, such as music from the period, which punctuate each scene's start and finish. Donna Miskend's projections of impressionistic images and Angelina Margolis' sets both effectively paint an image of the various stations the nameless Stranger and his mistress visit. All the elements are there, yet they do not coalesce into a singular cohesive vision, and this is the production's flaw.  

The show's own redemption lay in its performers; Stokes makes a strong leading man, believable as a young thinker on the verge of madness and plays against leading lady Bryan well. The rest of the ensemble deliver equally memorable performances, particularly Blankenship and Arnez in their respective roles as The Mother and The Doctor. Still, despite the praise-worthy performances, it was not enough to prevent one to seek salvation elsewhere.  

To Damascus is running until May 11 at the Gene Frankel Theatre (24 Bond Street between Bowery and Lafayette Street) onThursdays through Saturdays at 8 p.m. and Sundays at 1:30 p.m. Tickets are $18 for general admission and $12 for seniors and students. For tickets, call 212-868-4444 or visit www.smarttix.com.