Theater: New Shows (July 3-9)

Despite the national holiday, more shows make their debut this cycle than did in June's final week. The show to see is probably DruidMurphy, which rides into town on a wave of anticipation. But I'm a sucker, so I can't wait to see Alan Cumming's one-man Macbeth. It sounds silly, and likely will be, but it's also singular and potentially revelatory.

DruidMurphy

where: Lynch Theater at Lincoln Center

first night: Thursday, July 5

A nine-hour epic trilogy of violent, ugly Irish theater. Notes about the playwright, Tom Murphy, possess the sort of blushing enthusiasm that imply he'd been forgotten for a few decades; he definitely isn't well-known on this side of the Atlantic. But LC Festival-goers enjoy a long, hard sit since it's almost invariably rewarded with a phenomenal experience.

Nymph Errant

where: Theater Row

first night: Saturday, July 7

Cole Porter's the main draw to this musical production, which revises and adapts the non-Porter book. A sophisticated English gal tromps around the world, trying her damnedest to lose her virginity.

Macbeth

where: Rose Theater at Lincoln Center

first night: Thursday, July 5

Alan Cumming plays the thane, his wife, and every other role in this one-man version of Shakespeare's tightest tragedy. I've never seen him perform Shakespeare (live, anyway―he was fine in Taymor's Titus), but I hesitate to call this show a gimmick. He's definitely got enough vitality to hypnotize an audience into buying it.

Serious Money / Monster

where: Atlantic Stage 2

first night: Tuesday, July 3

As usual, the annual summer double-bill from the Potomac Theater Project shows a great program but likely will disappoint with stagey productions. Still, I'll risk it to see Serious Money, a vicious look at insider trading from radical leftie/genius playwright Caryl Churchill. And who wouldn't feel tempted by Neal Bell's essential adaptation of Frankenstein?

Last chance!

Anything Goes

where: Sondheim Theater

The Columnist

where: Friedman Theater

The Gershwins' Porgy and Bess

where: Rodgers Theater

Recall

where: The Wild Project

A Thick Description of Harry Smith (Volume I)

where: The Culture Project at 45 Bleecker

Theater: New Shows (June 25-July 1)

The two strongest festivals in town make their entrances this week, just what you need in the swelter of a New York summer. My picks are below. But somehow, the most “fest-like” of the summer's shows stands apart from the circuses: A Thick Description of Harry Smith (Volume I). It reworks old-timey folk songs to reveal the strange, secret face of America! 

Dogfight

where: Second Stage

first night: Wednesday, June 27

Portentously set on 11/21/63 (spoiler: JFK gets assassinated), it follows a sweet little romance between a Vietnam-bound Marine and a plain-looking coffeeshop waitress. Joe Mantello directs & he's usually worth your while. Alternatively, it's worth digging up the 1991 indie film that this musical is based on. 

Ice Factory 2012

where: The New Ohio Theater

first night: Wednesday, June 27

Hands down, Gotham's best festival―guaranteed to blow your mind. Personally, I want to see Flying Snakes in 3D, an attempt to create an experimental play out of material more suitable for a summer multiplex. But maybe an adaptation of a 1911 novel/spaghetti western is more your thing. Or a Southern Gothic by Bekah Brunstetter.

A Thick Description of Harry Smith (Volume I)

where: The Culture Project

first night: Thursday, June 28

A sort of psychedelic radio-play biodrama about Harry Smith, a mid-20th-century free thinker (a beatnik, in the period idiom). He edited the seminal Anthology of American Folk Music, which is almost a mystical portal into our musical inheritence. This a developmental workshop, so watch with an eye towards what the show might become, not what it is.

Undergroundzero Fest

where: Lower East Side

first night: Friday, June 29

A madcap series of hit-and-run works, this midsummer festival is what the Fringe wishes it were. The Living Theater, keeping the countercultural spirit alive, makes a strong showing with work about the Weather Underground and another about the suffragette movement. But if political theater makes you squeemish, try a Gospel of St. Matthew or a folk-opera about the Titanic.

Last chance!

4000 Miles

where: Lincoln Center's Newhouse Theater

As You Like It

where: The Public's Delacorte Theater

I Am a Tree

where: Theater at St. Clement's

Democracy

where: The Brick Theater

Jesus Christ Superstar

where: Neil Simon Theater

Man and Superman

where: Irish Repertory Theater

More of Our Parts

where: Theater Row

Murder in the First

where: 59E59

Sovereign

where: The Secret Theater

Space//Space

where: Collapsable Hole

Storefront Church

where: Atlantic Theater

The Hunchback Variations

where: 59E59

The Lathe of Heaven

where: 3LD Arts & Technology

The Lyons

where: Cort Theater

These Seven Sicknesses

where: The Flea Theater

This Is Fiction

where: Cherry Lane Theater

Tiny Dynamite

where: 59E59

Theater: New Shows (June 12-18)

Two shows have my ticket this week. One's Sovereign, the third part of a sci-fi trilogy. The first two parts were choice dramas that managed to be both B-movie fun and sharply intelligent theater. The other is The Bad and the Better. Despite the spaghetti western title, it's actually a modern noir. A teaser clip suggests a French New Wave vibe.

7th Monarch

where: Theater Row

first night: Tuesday, June 12

The parents of a onetime math prodigy are missing, which leads a social worker to uncover the truth behind the wunderkind's teenaged crack-up. Despite the tease of higher math, Monarch sounds like one soppy drama.

The Bad and the Better

where: Playwrights Horizons

first night: Thursday, June 14

TB&TB sees the Amoralists, a mangy bunch of downtowners, ditch the corny domestic melodrama that they've made their reps on. Instead, a monster-sized cast evoke a film-noir cityscape of corrupt pols, anarchist cells, heavy-truncheoned police, and surly bartenders: just the setting for a pair of brothers to stage their showdown.

The Honeycomb Trilogy: Sovereign

where: The Secret Theater

first night: Thursday, June 14

The final part of a crackerjack sci-fi trilogy, a sort of War of the Worlds by way of Ibsen―and even more fun than it sounds! High points of the first two parts have included a homosexual, interspecies romance and a nine-foot fiberglass bee's leg. Part 3 has the rebellion's leader, once a surly teen, try her brother as a collaborator. I'm probably more excited for this show than any other play this summer.

This Is Fiction

where: Cherry Lane Studio

first night: Tuesday, June 12

A young writer, about to publish her first novel, returns to warn her family it's based on them. That scenario sounds over-familiar, which doesn't inspire confidence.

Last chance!

The Bad Boys

where: Second Stage Uptown

The Caretaker

where: BAM Harvey Theater

Don't Dress for Dinner

where: American Airlines Theater

February House

where: The Public Theater

The Golden Veil

where: The Kitchen

Luther

where: HERE Arts Center

Rangoon

where: Theater Row

Title and Deed

where: Signature Theater

Venus in Fur

where: Lyceum Theater

Theater: New Shows (June 5-11)

No longer writing this column for a website, I don't have to recommend just one play. And frankly, I'm looking forward to half of this week's debuts! Two classics get remounted: a traditional (probably) As You Like It in Central Park and an Uncle Vanya in modern vernacular. These Seven Sicknesses is a myth cycle worth the 5+-hours time; I saw it in January, & I'll see it again. To balance these, I'll catch the forward-looking Space//Space, an avant-garde comedy set in deep space! And if I have any evenings left over, I'll visit 3C, by one of my favorite young playwrights, David Adjmi.

As You Like It

where:  Delacorte Theater

first night:  Tuesday, June 5

Celebrate this NYC institution's 50th anniversary by heading to the Forest of Arden. As Rosalind, Lily Rabe continues to stake her claim as a great Shakespearean, after her subtle turn as Portia in summer 2010. Oliver Platt plays the Fool, Stephen Spinella gets the “All the world's a stage” speech, and Daniel Sullivan directs, presumably in his typical low-key manner.

3C

where:  Rattlestick Playwrights Theater

first night:  Wednesday, June 6

A pastiche of Three's Company―seriously. But David Adjmi also wrote Elective Affinities, a stunning and dense monologue about art, existence, and (obliquely) the War on Terror that may've been the best play of the '11-'12 season. So expect less farce and more absurdism. Plus, the cast looks great, with the intriguing Hannah Cabell in the, uh, “Janet” role.

These Seven Sicknesses

where:  The Flea Theater

first night:  Wednesday, June 6

The Flea remounts an astonishing evening of theater. This five-hour work adapts the complete works of Sophocles, transforming them into a cunning, often hilarious cycle on Oedipus and Troy. Dinner's included with the ticket, served at the first intermish. I recommend TSS unreservedly.

Tiny Dynamite

where:  59E59

first night:  Thursday, June 7

A small British play that made a big noise in its original production a decade ago. It's a three-hander, a bittersweet love triangle, about how lives can be altered by a small, random event.

Uncle Vanya

where:  Soho Rep

first night:  Thursday, June 7

One of the most anticipated shows of the summer, this take on Chekhov has been couched in a contemporary idiom. The heat comes partly from collaborators Annie Baker (adaptor) and Sam Gold (director), whose Circle Mirror Transformation and The Aliens were two of the most memorable shows in the last few years. But it's also because of a stupendous cast that includes Maria Dizzia (In the Next Room), one of the most gutsy actresses around.

Recall

where:  The Wild Project

first night:  Friday, June 8

A version of the Bad Seed trope, as a child does some very naughty things. Playwright Eliza Clark makes her rent by writing for The Killing, a smart TV show about murder, so she should know from evil. She also describes her script as a “sci-fi play” set in an “alternate present.”

Space//Space

where:  Collapsable Hole

first night:  Friday, June 8

Subversive science-fiction from Banana Bag & Bodice, a Brooklyn troupe that pushes the adjective “experimental” in bold directions. In this oddity, two brothers get launched into deep space; one swaps genders, the other gets existential. A claustrophobic absurdity with futuristic SFX and mod projections. I can't wait!

The 66th Annual Tony Awards

where:  The Beacon Theater, CBS, and online

first night:  Sunday, June 10

Neil Patrick Harris returns to MC; that may be enough for you to enjoy Broadway's night of plaudits. I'm bored by awards ceremonies, however, so I'll sit this one out.

Theater: New Shows (March 20-26)

 Clybourne Park is much better than this photo would imply
photo credit: Joan Marcus

 

Ironically, I missed last week's post because I had to prep for vacation―paid work and parenting trumped blogging―but now that I'm away on holiday, I have time to look at what's new! Mid-March has lined some fun new shows ups, including the Broadway revival of Clybourne Park. My Pick of the Week is a radical experiment so faithful to the spirit of David Foster Wallace, its title has parenthetical digressions.


Clybourne Park
where: Walter Kerr Theater
first night: Friday, March 23
The best American drama of the last five years finally moves to Broadway, with its original New York cast reprising their roles. It's savage and smart in all the fun ways that you wish every show could be. Act 1 shows Truman-era neighbors fret over the sale of one home to a black family; act 2 sees a white couple buy the same house, auguring a wave of 21C gentrification.

Elephant Room
where: St. Ann's Warehouse
first night: Thursday, March 22
A trio of performers play low-rent illusionists in a slapstick perf-art piece about the magic of theater. According to the press release, ER "mixes the glory of a Styx reunion tour with the transcendental power of a 200-year-old Zuni shaman and a dash of trailer park ennui.” Not sure what that means but it's worth an evening to find out!

Li'l Abner
where: Theater Row
first night: Tuesday, March 20
Half a century before Spidey swung onto Broadway Al Capp's classic strip about political corruption and hillbillies in love got turned into a musical. It rarely gets a revival, so buffs of musical comedy should check out this concert-style performance.

Magic/Bird
where: Longacre Theater
first night: Wednesday, March 21
On the court and in cultural debate, Magic Johnson shared a fierce rivalry with Larry Bird; off the court they were pals. Unconventional material but ripe for drama, and playwright Eric Simonson is a stalwart of Chicago's scene. Plus, Off-Broadway talent Deirdre O'Connell is part of the cast!

The Morini Strad
where: 59E59
first night: Tuesday, March 20
A certain type of realistic, bourgeois drama revolves around the brokering of a valuable object (the finest case of this is The Cherry Orchard, of course). In this case it's a Stradivarius violin, the sale of which threatens the friendship between a former child-prodigy and a temperamental restorer of instruments.

Out of Iceland
where: Walkerspace
first night: Saturday, March 24
A New Yorker takes a tumble in Iceland and lands on a cowboy's couch; she also has conversations with a troll named Thor. This new play portrays Iceland as a mystical land, setting to a modern fairy tale like one of Haruki Murakami's dream-realities.

A (Radically Condensed and Expanded) Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again (after David Foster Wallace)
where: The Chocolate Factory
first night: Thursday, March 22
Six actors, fed their lines via earbuds, improvise a performance of DFW's nonfiction works. The ensemble includes two great young actresses, Jenny Seastone Stern and Lisa Joyce. If all that weren't enough to draw you out to Long Island City, the show's by director Daniel Fish, one of those essential NYC artists who seems to do more work in Europe than here at home.

Tis Pity She's a Whore
where: BAM Harvey Theater
first night: Tuesday, March 20
Possessing one of the great titles in the dramatic canon, Whore audaciously sets an incestuous affair against a decadent Italian court, with the siblings looking a lot more noble than the aristos. The company is Cheek by Jowl, a British company whose cool, stylized approach to classics earns applause, but I find it remote.


Last chance!
And God Created Great Whales
where: 45 Bleecker

The Deepest Play Ever: The Catharsis of Pathos
where: The New Ohio Theater

Evolution
where: Cherry Lane Theater

Hurt Village
where: Signature Center

Love, Loss, and What I Wore
where: Westside Downstairs

The Real Thing
where: The Secret Theater

Spring Tides
where: The Secret Theater

The Twenty-Seventh Man
where: The Public Theater

Off-Broadway: Painting Churchs & other revivals

Painting Churches

The Keen Company at Theater Row

written by Tina Howe

directed by Carl Forsman

Critics tend to thump for new plays over revivals, so I want to take a second to applaud the fine revivals of plays by American women right now. Edson's sharp Wit plays at MTC, which Vogel matches with How I Learned to Drive at Second Stage, and now Howe gets a nod from the Keen Company with Painting Churches. All three prove their stageworthiness by themselves. But it's good to see plays that were successful in their initial run get remounted. The productions serve to canonize the works and their writers, strengthening a modern tradition (which is larger and less rigid than a school or genre) of women writing great work. And it brings these plays from the '80s & '90s to a subsequent generation of theatergoers. I doubt these three shows are an incipient movement, but wouldn't it be cool if they heralded revivals of Fornes, Wasserstein, Congdon, and many others?

Of the three, Tina Howe's 1983 play is less dramaturgically flashy than Wit or Drive, presenting its three-actor family drama in a standard format of linear episodic realism. Its subject, a bohemian daughter who paints a portrait of her daffy parents, (wealthy Bostonians who have friends named “Spence Cabot”), offers minimal tension. Howe's style is elusive & challenging, subtly shifting dramatic focus along with audience sympathy from one character to another. A dreamy neoclassical set (Beowulf Boritt) captures her impressionistic tone, while the casual delivery of the actors (Kathleen Chalfant, John Cunningham, and Kate Turnbull) slowly plumbs deep pools of loneliness. Carl Forsman, however, directs the play with a forthright realism, perhaps a mistaken attempt to counterbalance Howe's limpid warmth with comedic whimsy. But Howe's lovely and humane play pulls loose from Forsman's anchoring, proving itself a sturdy script worth the revival.

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Painting Churches plays at Theater Row, closing on April 7. Tickets?

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Theater: New Shows (March 6-12)

A tough week for audiences, since they have to choose which shows to see and which to miss. The cast of The Best Man makes it a must-see; the creativity of Now. Here. This. does the same. My pick of this week, The Maids, says more about my taste than the line-up. The Red Bull takes a break from 'Jacobethan' drama to produce Genet's radical absurdism.

The Best Man

where: Schoenfeld Theater

first night: Tuesday, March 6

The last time Broadway saw Gore Vidal's backroom political potboiler, Gore and Bush were locked in a dire campaign. The social and economic situation in 2012 is worse than in it seemed in 2000, so we're rewarded with a much stronger cast, including James Earl Jones, John Larroquette, and Candice Bergen.

The Deepest Play Ever: The Catharsis of Pathos

where: The New Ohio Theater

first night: Friday, March 9

The title lets you know what you're in for: a deeply silly take on dramatic self-importance. The focus of the parody is Brecht, as protagonist Mother LaMadre drags her wagon across the apocalyptic battlefields of the fifth World War, hunting zombies and books. Sounds like a good show for a spring evening!

Give Me Your Hand

where: Irish Rep

first night: Wednesday, March 7

A middle-aged Irish duo take the audience on their afternoon tour of the National Gallery in London. It's billed as a “poetical stroll”, which doesn't sound very dramatic. But since the script's by an Irishman as well, Hand may pull out several colorful observations on famous art and celebrated artists.

Lifeline

where: Abingdon Theater

first night: Friday, March 9

A nice guy rents his basement apartment to an unstable neurotic, resulting in an Odd Couple friendship that goes sour as the tenant's problems mount. Sounds like standard stuff: a bit of comedy, a dollop of drama. The show will hinge on the leads' chemistry and the writer's rejection of conventions.

The Maria Project

where: 59E59

first night: Tuesday, March 6

The utilitarian title tips its hand: The Maria Project is a stage documentary. Its subject is one Maria Salazar, a Hispanic woman who went missing over fifty years ago. The staging mingles music and film footage with the performer's story, as she tracked Salazar through her own family history.

The Maids

where: The Red Bull at St. Clement's

first night: Tuesday, March 6

The Red Bull gives NYC the chance to catch Jean Genet's too-rare absurdist comedy about class, identity, language and other favorite themes of puzzling French art. A sparking cast—just three talented women—has me tempted, while the promise of a uniquely intimate staging for a small audience wins me over.

A Moon for the Misbegotten

where: The Pearl Theater at City Center

first night: Tuesday, March 6

Fans of classic American drama have already caught a few of Eugene O'Neill's early work this winter. That should prep them to revisit Moon, a work from the playwright's colossal late period. This elegiac piece is a sort of spin-off from Long Day's Journey, as the older Tyrone brother finds salvation.

Now. Here. This.

where: Vineyard Theater

first night: Wednesday, March 7

A blend of anecdotes, monologues from plays, original music, philosophy, this piece is hard to classify. But those who saw its workshop production at the Vineyard claim that the disparate Now. Here. This. (great title, by the way) add up to something special. Just don't go expecting a conventional evening.

Regrets

where: MTC at City Center

first night: Thursday, March 8

Britain's theater mavens have been thumping the tub about this play's writer, Matt Charman, for a few years. But he hasn't made it in New York yet, so who is he? His debut is a period drama set at a quick-divorce residency in 1950s Nevada, and pits a young man against McCarthy-era paranoia.

Spring Tides

where: The Secret Theater

first night: Friday, March 9

A closet door opens onto a beach, where a pregnant woman finds a sword-wielding nun battling a monster. The conceit sounds like Narnia, or Alice in Wonderland, but the show's surrealism may be more slippery, since reality and fantasy start to mingle and fuse. Plus, to repeat, a sword-wielding nun!

Last chance!

As Wide as I Can See

where: Here Arts Center

Assistance

where: Playwrights Horizons

Blood Knot

where: Signature Center

Call Me Waldo

where: Abingdon Theater

CQ/CX

where: Atlantic Theater at Signature

Early Plays

where: The Wooster Group at St. Ann's Warehouse

How I Learned to Drive

where: Second Stage

Russian Transport

where: The New Group at Theater Row

Theater: New Shows (February 27 - March 4)

photo credit: David Hou

As if in response to the prayers of Senator Santorum, theater gets religion in our godless city this week. Skip the Lloyd Webber musical on Broadway and try the demon-puppet of Hand to God. Or ditch the divine altogether and see Once, a lovely romance based on the 2007 Irish cult film about a busker and an immigrant.


Eternal Equinox
where: 59E59
first night: Thursday, Mar. 1
Bohemian artists in a love triangle with an athlete! In 1924, a mountaineer pays a visit to the Bloomsbury set, where he tests a couple's open-minded approach to sex and adultery. Equinox made an impression on LA audiences with its frank sexuality and emotional heft, good ingredients to any period drama.

Flight
where: DR2
first night: Friday, Mar. 2
The background info on this show sounds awfully high-minded: “a man's search for truth, love, and his identity” etc.; a dying mother is also involved in the soulful analysis. But none of that info tells us much about the dramatic engine, a sign that, despite its claim to be “touching”, Flight may not be compelling.

Hand to God
where: Ensemble Studio Theater
first night: Wednesday, Feb. 29
This satire earned a massive audiences in its autumn run. A Texas Sunday school uses puppets to teach kids about Christ. But one puppet gets possessed by Satan himself, leading to anarchy in the congregation both in church and at home. Sounds like a cross between The Twilight Zone and Robot Chicken!

Jesus Christ Superstar
where: Neil Simon Theater
first night: Thursday, Mar. 1
By our count, this is the third Jesus to bow on Broadway now: he's spieling parables in Godspell and making a cameo in The Book of Mormon. So which should you see during Lent? This one's definitely the show biz-iest, with its “Jesus as Rock God” approach and direction from Jersey Boys' Des McAnuff.

Much Ado About Nothingwhere: The Secret Theater
first night: Thursday, Mar. 1
The squabble between Beatrice and Benedick hides mutual affection; the passion between Claudio and Hero masks uncertainty. Shakespeare's witty comedy always gives pleasure, so pull the script off your bookshelf to skim on the 7 train out to the aptly-named Secret Theater in Long Island City.

Once
where: Jacobs Theater
first night: Tuesday, Feb. 28
A Broadway transfer for this acoustic musical based on the lovely film of 2007, which won an Oscar for Best Song. An Irish busker and Czech immigrant develop an complex, true-to-life romance over the course of a week. Netflix the original film and then seek out this generous, emotional adaptation.

The Real Thing
where: The Secret Theater
first night: Saturday, Mar. 3
Tom Stoppard gets meta (more so) with this fictionalized autobiography―he left his wife only after the protagonist, a middle-aged, left-wing playwright, had done so! Happily, Thing has plenty of emotional heft, which Stoppard's plays often lack, as well as the wit and intelligence that are his hallmark.

Teresa's Ecstasy
where: Cherry Lane Theater
first night: Sunday, Mar. 4
Rather than chase Jesus around Times Square, try this drama about sex and religion. A professor researching a saint of the Spanish Renaissance makes a stopover to serve her husband divorce papers. Will she realize that a quest for the divine doesn't necessarily lead away from the pleasures of the flesh?

Thirds
where: Theater Row
first night: Friday, Mar. 2
Too often, estate dramas (where the conflict hinges on who gets what) soften the pettiness and viciousness that could make the show fun. Thirds, however, may get the inheritance right: one of three sisters begins to wall off her section of the house with actual brick and mortar!


Last chance!
The Broken Heart
where: TFANA at the Duke

The Inexplicable Redemption of Agent G
where: Theater Row

The Navigator
where: WorkShop Theater

Poetic License
where: 59E59

Professor Bernhardi
where: Marvell Rep at TBG Arts Complex

Richard III
where: BAM Harvey Theater

The Road to Mecca
where: Roundabout at American Airlines Theater

Rx
where: Primary Stages at 59E59

Shatner's World: We Just Live in It
where: Music Box Theater

The Threepenny Opera
where: Marvell Rep at TBG Arts Complex

Yosemite
where: Rattlestick Playwrights Theater

Sci-Fi Theater: The Navigator

Workshop Theater Company
written by Eddie Antar
directed by Leslie Kincaid Burby

Witness an everyman whose GPS starts offering stock tips, career advice, even solutions to his domestic stresses. The Navigator wears its Rod Serling influence broadly, by delivering the requisite twists, of course, but also a belief in the little guy and a touch of moral homily. It's even got a timely note in the hero's financial stresses. But it's no simple teleplay: a casting fillip adds theatricality with the GPS played by a live actor, Kelly Anne Burns, cool with her android twitches and robo-voice. She's paired with Joseph Franchini, whose ordinary Joe performance has a neurotic simmer that recalls Jack Lemmon. The deeper themes of how 21C Americans relate to our technology get brushed lightly, but they don't need much since the play views people with such warmth. This light comedy, just over an hour long, stands out as one of the most charming pieces of off-off-Broadway theater all season.

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The Navigator plays at the Workshop Company Theater, closing on February 26. Tickets?

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Off-Broadway: These Seven Sicknesses

The Bats at the Flea Theater

written by Sean Graney, after Sophocles

directed by Ed Sylvanus Iskandar

The most innovative staging in New York right now remounts one of theater's oldest bodies of work. Adapting Sophocles' complete plays, These Seven Sicknesses reimagines some of the most fundamental conventions of theater. Instead of shushing the audience under darkness while seven tragic acts play out solemnly onstage at the Flea, the cast mingles with the audience before the curtain, chatting, relaxing, and offering to fetch wine from the bar. At intermission, they serve dinner (a delicious eggplant curry) as well. By breaking down the conventional separation of stage and house, Sicknesses sets the audience up immediately for a evening of Greek theater that's unorthodox without being alienating.

Beware Greeks bearing eggplant curry?
photo: Laura June Kirsch

The performance itself follows suit with a lively low-tech staging. There's no bearded chorus chanting in unison to a be-togaed Oedipus. Instead, director Iskandar establishes a fast pace under the easygoing atmosphere: while the chorus sings a swinging blues, Oedipus shows his smarts by solving a Rubik's cube. Adaptor Graney has a loose poetic style that includes a great ear for idioms and a winning application of stock phrases. More importantly, he evokes ancient mythical elements without getting stuck in expository mode. As the evening moves from play to Sophoclean play, it brings back characters, places, props; Antigone (Katherine Folk-Sullivan, offering the most nuanced performance in the enormous, energetic cast), the Bow of Hercules, the Trojan War make multiple appearances. And so (naturally) does Greek theater's ubiquitous Messenger, who skims in on a sidewalk scooter, dressed like a telegram deliveryman, with news of another tragic offstage disaster.

Over the course of the evening, as the shades of the dead warn their daughters and sons of yet another impending tragedy, the tone darkens slowly like twilight falling. But Sicknesses never loses its sense of imagination. Even in its final act, Iskandar comes up with new theatrical devices for staging Sophocles' plots. His directorial brio matches the energy that Graney brings to Sophocles' work. Every few minutes brings another delightful moment: a clever line-reading, a cunning costume, a fantastic fight scene, a slab of warrior beefcake. The show works superbly from beat to beat, which makes the 5+ hours runtime (including intermissions for dinner & dessert) speed by. It slips in political commentary, offering perspectives on power and stances on waging war without obtruding into the mythic setting. Sicknesses is, quite simply, the sort of mounting of classical work that rekindles a passion for modern theater. It's also a fun party.

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These Seven Sicknesses plays at the Flea, closing on March 4. Tickets? 

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Theater: New Shows (February 14-20)

It's time to dive into the juvenilia of Eugene O'Neill! The Irish Rep takes a trad route into his 1920 Broadway breakthrough, while the Wooster Group will likely stay more faithful to the master's radical roots in their collection of one-acts. I'm a sucker for O'Neill's romantic gloom, so I'll see both. But for Pick of the Week, I'm drawn to the one-man Iliad at NYTW, which sounds like it's got great potential to stagger the viewer.

Beyond the Horizon
where: Irish Repertory Theater
first night: Wednesday, Feb. 15
Eugene O'Neill won the first of four Pulitzers for this drama. In retrospect, Horizon turned out to be the work of a still-immature master, so it gets produced only rarely today, but it prefigures many of O'Neill's obsessions: the sea, Cain/Abel relationships, female endurance, and a heated (some say overwrought) passion for language.

Call Me Waldo
where: June Havoc Theater
first night: Tuesday, Feb. 14
An otherwise whimsical comedy adds intellectual heft by mashing up union politics with American transcendentalist philosophy. So the collectivist action collides with individualist spirit, Alinsky shakes hands with Emerson, radicalism finds many forms, and a plumber finds his place in the world.

Early Plays
where: St. Ann's Warehouse
first night: Wednesday, Feb. 15
The Wooster Group goes even deeper into Eugene O'Neill's catalog than the Irish Rep this week, producing a collection of early one-acts from his Provincetown days. Turn-of-the-century maritime life gets the sleek experimental treatment, with NYC director Richard Maxwell subbing for Wooster guru LeCompte.

An Iliad
where: New York Theater Workshop
first night: Wednesday, Feb. 15
Tony-winning actors Denis O'Hare (Take Me Out) and Stephen Spinella (Angels in America) have taken a loose, modern approach to the original myth of endless war. Homer's account of the Siege of Troy gets a treatment so exhausting and imaginative that its creators alternate evenings on this one-man show.

The Lady from Dubuque
where: Signature Center
first night: Tuesday, Feb. 14
Aside from Virginia Woolf, Edward Albee's work tends to be dramatically obscure and freighted with symbolism. This mid-career revival creaks with allegory, staging a dinner among the well-heeled who carry on when an uninvited guest interrupts the party games. Not-really-a-spoiler: the lady is Death.

Painting Churches
where: Theater Row
first night: Tuesday, Feb. 14
This fine revival about aging WASPs stars the classy Kathleen Chalfant. Doesn't sound like much? It's produced by the Keen Company, whose mission is to program plays for grown-ups. Not dull Masterpiece Theater stuff or cynical vulgarities but work that has some heft, both emotionally and intellectually.

Shatner's World: We Just Live in It
where: Music Box Theater
first night: Tuesday, Feb. 14
William Shatner, a onetime Shakespearean actor from Canada, parlayed his cult role as Captain Kirk into strange para-celebrity. Now it takes him to Broadway. By now, you probably know if you want to see this one-man show that covers his eccentric career; no word if he sings or not, but we can hope!

Tribes
where:  Barrow Street Theater
first night:  Thursday, Feb. 16
David Cromer, one of the most compassionate directors in American theater, helms this script, which got nominated for an Olivier (London's big theater award). A deaf man living with his loud-mouthed family doesn't realize what he's missing until he falls in love with a independently-minded woman.

Last chance!
Inadmissible
where: Canal Park Playhouse

Merrily We Roll Along
where: City Center

The Philanderer
where: City Center Stage II

Samuel and Alisdair: A Personal History of the Robot Wars
where: The New Ohio Theater
Read my review

Tokio Confidential
where: Atlantic Stage 2