Theater Review: Blood from a Stone

Ethan Hawke, Ann Dowd. Photo: Monique Carboni

Dysfunction Gets Another Go-Round in Playwright’s Debut
By Lauren Yarger
Tommy Nohilly has reached for an old standby theme for his playwriting debut in Blood from a Stone – dysfunction – and finds it to such an extreme that he makes the folks over at August: Osage County look like the Brady Bunch.

The New Group’s Production of Blood from a Stone Off Broadway is enhanced by some fine performances, tightly directed by Scott Elliott, but because the play never really develops beyond “mother and father hate each other with every fiber of their beings” we never understand why this family is in such bad shape, or end up caring about any of the rather unlikable folks.

Ann Dowd gives a dynamic performance as Margaret, full of hatred and venom for husband, Bill (Gordon Clapp), but with a soft spot for favorite son Travis (Ethan Hawke, in a good, layered performance) who has stopped back home for a visit. His brother, Matt (Thomas Gurley), steels from the family members to support his gambling habit. He sides with Dad in the conflicts. The other sibling, Sarah (Natasha Lyonne) is caught in the middle of the messy household, where mother and father live on separate floors of their New Britain, CT home (designed in all its shabbiness by Derek McLane) and don’t even share contents in the refrigerator, so strong is their dislike for each other.

Meanwhile, Bill tries to manage his violent temper and keeps forcing his “friend,” Deborah, on the children who, with the exception of Sarah, who’s trying to make a go of normalcy with her growing family, have affairs of their own to worry about. Travis, addicted to his mom’s pain pills, has taken up with old girlfriend Yvette (Daphne Rubin-Vega) who lives next door with her unsuspecting husband. Matt is leaving his wife and kids to have an affair with a married woman and even Margaret has a “friend” on the side. Every-day occurrences in this house involve throwing kitchen cabinets, punching out windows and some of the darkest verbal threats family members ever have uttered to one another.

Believe me, no matter how bad you think your family is, there’s a good chance you’ll be glad you’re related to them instead of this clan. I don’t even want to know where Dowd has to reach on an emotional level to maintain such a dark and hopeless character. Margaret’s one outlet for love is her cat, but even the poor animal can’t escape the sadness that surrounds this family.

The dark interactions really are all that happen in this play, however, despite the promise of potential in the playwright’s first effort. Nohilly’s characters are interesting and lend themselves to some great acting, but without any explanation of how these folks got here (why is this venom-filled couple still sharing the same house, and what is the cause of such festering dislike?), the play fails to justify its almost three-hour run time.

It runs through Feb. 19 at the Acorn Theatre, 410 West 42nd Street. For tickets, visit http://www.thenewgroup.org/.
Christians might also like to know:
• Language
• Lord’s name taken in vain
• Sexual activity
• Partial nudity

Theater Review: A Small Fire

A Small Fire Rages with Emotions
By Lauren Yarger
Just how hard would you fight to stay in a world you no longer could smell, taste, see or hear? And how far would you go to reach out to your wife, mother or friend if she were the one losing her senses?

These questions are the kindling for Adam Bock’s A Small Fire, an inferno of emotions and a blaze of great play writing stoked by riveting performances as directed by Trip Cullman Off Broadway at Playwrights Horizons.

Tony Award winner Michelle Pawk is Emily Bridges, a woman who, in between living a settled-for life with husband, John (an excellent Reed Birney), running her construction contracting business with friend and colleague Billy Fontaine (Victor Williams) and planning a wedding she’s less than enthusiastic about for her estranged daughter, Jenny (Celia Keenan-Bolger), suddenly finds she’s losing her senses. Literally.

First she loses her sense of smell, then taste (a sample of the wedding cake tastes like chalk). She tries to hide the problems from her family and Billy, but as sight and hearing soon fail her as well, she reluctantly becomes dependant on them for every need. The play’s one weakness is that no explanation for the phenomenon is given. We’re left to wonder whether it’s a medical condition or a psycho-somatic withdrawal from her world. In any case, it doesn’t really matter, because the core of the fire comes from the characters’ interaction with each other.

As Emily’s senses fail, John’s become more acute and he assumes the roles of his wife’s eyes and ears as well as her caretaker. Birney is an explosion of talent. In a scene where he’s describing to Emily what’s happening at the wedding, he portrays every kind of emotion. A simple smile he gives his wife early in the play conveys love and devotion – and later – serves as an anchor of truth when he defends his decision not to abandon his marriage to his daughter, who increasingly finds it difficult to be around her mother and wants her father to be released from his existence.

Pawk is riveting as the woman slowly finding herself in a nightmare from which she can’t awake. Williams is excellent as Emily’s one true friend – and also lends some needed comic relief with his enthusiasm for racing “athlete” pigeons. The roles are demanding and require the actors to take the characters further than the mere words that are being said. Here Keenan-Bolger’s Jenny falls a bit short of the others, as we never fully understand why she’s so hostile toward her mother.

The creative team adds snap and crackle to the production as well. Loy Arcenas designs a set that easily changes from construction site to living room (helped by sound and music effects designed by Robert Kaptowitz and lighting design by David Weiner); Ilona Somogyi designs the costumes.

Bock stacks an amazing amount of wood to build a roaring fire in this play – incredible character development and swift movement of story build to a raging conclusion– all in just 80 minutes. It’s one of most engrossed times I’ve spent watching a play in a long time.

A Small Fire has been extended through Jan. 30 at Playwrights Horizons, 416 West 42nd St. For tickets, call (212) 279-4200.

Christians might also like to know:
• Language
• Lord’s name taken in vain
• Homosexuality (mentioned, but not central to the themes)
• Sexual Activity
• Nudity

Spiderman Delays Opening Again -- March 15

© Jacob Cohl

SPIDER-MAN Turn Off The Dark has delayed its opening night (previously set for Feb. 7) to Tuesday, March 15 to allow for more time to fine-tune aspects of the show, including the new ending.

Performances scheduled for Tuesday, Jan. 18 and Tuesday, Jan. 25 have been cancelled, and all ticketholders for those performances will be offered refunds or exchanges. All other preview performances will go on as scheduled. Directed by Julie Taymor and featuring a book by Julie Taymor and Glen Berger, and new music and lyrics by U2’s Bono and The Edge, SPIDER-MAN Turn Off The Dark is in previews at Broadway’s Foxwoods Theatre, 213 West 42nd St.

Theater Review: Miss Abigail's Guide to Dating, Mating & Marriage!

Eve Plumb and Manual Herrara Photo © 2010 Carol Rosegg

A Little Advice from a Grown Up Jan Brady
By Lauren Yarger
Miss Abigail offers advice on love to a ready-for-fun audience (the bar is open…) downstairs at Sophia’s Restaurant in New York, but it turns out she might need some tips herself, in this tongue-in-cheek, rollicking production from the pen of director and producer Ken Davenport (Sarah Saltzberg co-writes), and starring Eve Plumb (a.k.a. Jan Brady on TV’s The Brady Bunch.

Plumb is the drive behind the show’s charm. She delivers her lines with expert comedic timing and a panache you might not be expecting from the Brady sister who always seemed to get overshadowed by wonderful Marcia, Marcia, Marcia! (a photo of Jan in a black wig in one of the Brady’s Bunch’s well-known shows brings a bunch of laughter). Miss Abigail, surrounded by the hundreds of books she’s read on love, dating and marriage, offers her advice to the audience while fielding hotline calls from high-profile celebrities phoning for advice about their love lives (Hilary Noxon designs the set).

Dressed in a sharp looking suit I’d like in my closet (Abbi Stern, design), she’s assisted by Paco (Manuel Herrera), her Mexican sidekick. Miss Abigail is so busy giving advice and bringing audience members up on stage to discuss things like “How to Flirt,” “How to Kiss” and “Where to go on a Date,” she misses some obvious signs that Paco is interested in more than a working relationship with her.

The show, based on the book by Abigail Grotke, is silly, sometimes borders on crass, and of course has to have an obligatory political statement – this one about illegal immigration and the border fence (why do all shows and films feel it is necessary to throw these statements in scripts these days?), but overall, it’s an enjoyable 90 minutes of entertainment. And Plumb is really good. Eve, Eve, Eve!

Sophia’s is at 221 west 46th St., NYC. For tickets, call 877-964-7722.

Christians might also like to know:
• Sexual dialogue
• A film about how to have sex contains some scantily clad women.

Theater Review: Dracula

l-r: Michel Altieri (as Dracula) and George Hearn (as Van Helsing) in DRACULA

at Little Shubert (422 W 42nd St). Photo Credit: Carol Rosegg

This Production of 'Dracula' Lacks Life
By Lauren Yarger
With all of the vampire frenzy lately over the “Twilight” series and other incarnations of the bloodsucking undead like “True Blood” on HBO, I guess it’s no surprise that now would be a good time to resurrect the stage play based on Bram Stoker’s novel “Dracula,” playing off-Broadway for a limited run at the Little Shubert.

The play, adapted by Hamilton Deane and John L. Balderston has had previous success, starting in 1927 with Bela Lugosi in the role of the 500-year-old Transylvanian Count who must suck the blood from humans to exist and to transform himself into creatures of the night like wolves and bats. Broadway best remembers the 1977 production starring a sensational Frank Langella as the sexy vampire. He won the Tony as did the play for best revival and he went on to star in the 1979 film version opposite Sir Laurence Olivier as vampire expert/stalker Abraham Von Helsing.

This current rendition, directed by Paul Alexander and starring Italian stage star Michel Altieri, who makes his American stage debut as Dracula, seems dead, ironically, and tends toward humorous rather than chilling. Altieri, very slim, and brushing back very long black hair locks (Paul Huntley, hair design) brings to mind Fabio romance-novel covers. Or, when the light strikes his full lips in a wide grin standing out against a pale face, he looks like the Joker from Batman. He never convincingly exudes the haunted, sexual masculinity that draws Lucy Seward (Emily Bridges) against her will from the attentions of her devoted fiancé, Jonathan Harker (Jake Silbermann), causes Lucy’s maid Miss Wells (Katharine Luckinbull) to betray her mistress or enslaves the mind of spider and fly-eating Renfield (John Buffalo Mailer) to make him a vampire in training.

To say that there is any sexual tension between Dracula and Lucy here would be like saying vampires crave sunlight. It would be false. Truthfully, if this hair-tossing, cape swirling Dracula appeared in my bed chamber, I’d wake the rest of the house with my laughter. Lucy and Jonathan throw more sparks, and truthfully, Silbermann, who gives one of two believable performances in the production, would have made a better Dracula. The second believable and solid performance comes from Timothy Jerome as Lucy’s father, Dr. Seward.

There also isn’t any tension between the vampire and his nemesis, Van Helsing, played here by the hapless George Hearn who seems to be grasping for lines at times and who on several occasions called Lucy “Mina.” Mina is Lucy’s companion (also played by Luckinbull) who succumbed to Dracula’s charms and deadly bloodsucking to become the Woman in White who preys upon small children in this remote section of England. Hearn, usually a treat, was more fun in his other bloody role: Sweeney Todd.

Funny, though I don’t think he’s supposed to be, is Mailer’s Renfield, who vacillates between playing a courteous southern gentleman and trying to act like a mad man. He spends most of his time escaping from orderly Butterworth (Rob O’Hare) and climbing down the walls of Dr. Seward’s manse like a spider to answer his master’s call. Dare I say at least one New York spiderman’s special effects worked well (Flying by Foy).

Overall, the production has an amateur feel, from the level of performances to obviously fake books in Dana Kenn’s rotating set to overkill on the fog every time Dracula appears (Rick Sorelet and Mike Rossmy, flight choreography and special effects), though I did like their fluttering bat and a scrim effect that has Dracula suddenly appear in a portrait. Canned music in between scenes and the obvious sound effect of wolves howling are annoying (Chris DelVecchio, design). Wila Kim’s costumes are uninspired and Dracula’s cape looks like it has the image of a bat outlined inside – almost like something you’d see in a Halloween shop.

Also generating a few chuckles is the group’s apparent slow wittedness (blame the book along with the staging which has them walking around awkwardly for no reason). What are those two puncture marks on Lucy’s neck? Could they be related to those found on Mina? Hey guys, wouldn’t it make sense to have someone – or everyone—stay with Lucy at night when she is plagued by nightmares and appears to lose a lot of blood just like Mina did or even take Lucy away to somewhere safe (though this really never happens because if it did, there wouldn’t be a play)?

No one ever notices the truly massive amounts of fog portending Dracula’s arrival on the scene. Alexander simply has cast members turn their backs every time Dracula enters so they can be surprised when they turn and see the count in the room. “I have a light footfall,” Dracula tells them (many times – again redundancy), which makes it kind of comical when his footsteps are clearly audible as he walks to his mark.

The group is astonished to find that there’s a secret panel behind those fake books. They also are hunting around the set for Dracula’s resting place, but fail to notice a rather large coffin sitting stage center. The trapped Dracula gleefully informs them they have their facts all wrong about the stake-driving thing and that they might not be able to save Lucy if she dies at night. Gee, you’d think that the wolfbane, crucifix, wooden stake-carrying Von Helsing might have known about that being up on vampire lore and all.

Well, here’s another piece of trivia for Dracula to think about. I’m not a vampire expert, but I do know that the undead aren’t supposed to have reflections (he does tell us this, though I couldn’t see the mirror from my seat, so I don’t know whether he was visible) or shadows. This Dracula casts large shadows on the walls of the sets and on the house right wall all through the performance, however (Brian Nason, lighting). Maybe it’s just the shadow of Langella’s excellent performance haunting the current staging.

Dracula, which was scheduled to run through March 13 at the Little Shubert Theatre, 422 west 42ns St., apparently has closed, though I haven't received an official notice. Tickets suddenly could be purchased only through Jan. 9.

Christians might also like to know:
• Crucifix, holy water and elements of the Lord’s supper used to combat the vampire.

Theater Review: A Free Man of Color

From left, Jeffrey Wright, Mos
(Photo: Charles Erickson)

By Lauren Yarger

Several colorful plots, though I'm not sure I followed them accurately, crash together on the stage at the Vivian Beaumont for John Guare's A Free Man of Color, wrapping up its run for Lincoln Center this Sunday.

JeffreyWright heads the large ensemble cast as Jacques Cornet, a sort of Don Juan map collector in turn-of-the-19th century New Orleans; Mos is his slave sidekick Cupidon Murmur. There's a lot of history connected with the time of the Louisiana Purchase and lots of characters (more than 35 played by some 26 actors) like Napoleon Bonaparte (Triney Sandoval), Thomas Jefferson (John McMartin), Meriwether Lewis (Paul Dano), among others, but despite a few moments of humor, and strong performances by Wright and Moss, there isn't much to engage.

The noncohesive story, at more than two hours and 40 minutes, runs at least an hour too long. At one point I found myself counting the stripes and stars on an American flag and wondering whether it was historically accurate, so my mind obviously had wandered from the story.

George C. Wolfe directs the production which at times seems like it's trying to be La Bete as the characters, clothed in shiny, colorful and elegant costumes (Ann Hould, design) suddenly launch into verse or compete with drumming when delivering their lines. Only here, we're not sure why any of this happens or what all of the stories really have to do with each other.

There are some nice visual images created with stage and lighting design (David Rockwell; Jules Fisher and Peggy Eisenhauer) and a chase through the Spanish moss by lantern light is particularly stunning

Discounted tickets are available at http://www.givenik.com/show_info.php/Masterworks/262/individual.

Christians might also like to know:

A Nude is shown in a portrait

Suicide

Language

Sexual Situations

Broadway Attendance Up; Week Brings Highest Grosses Ever

The Broadway League reports robust holiday grosses and a strong start to 2011 with the last two weeks grossing $60 million. The most recent week ending Jan. 2 bringing in $34,997,571 on its own was probably the highest grossing week in recorded history, according to The League.

For that week, 27 shows averaged more than 80 percent of their seats occupied; more than 32 shows averaged 70 percent of occupied seats and 21 shows averaged 90 percent of capacity. Season-to-date yielded a 3.8-percent increase in attendance and 3.6 percent in grosses year over year.

Calendar Year Stats
2010: $1.037 billion / 12.11 million in attendance
2009: $1.004 billion / 11.88 million in attendance

Holiday Grosses (Christmas and New Years, weeks 31 and 32 combined)
2010: $60.0 million (actual $59,991,360)
2009: $52.4 million

Season-To-Date
As of week 32 (week ending Jan. 2), the current 2010-11 season is up 3.6 percent in gross and 3.8 percent in attendance over 2009-10.