Greig Sargeant (center) and the company of Elevator Repair Service’s MEASURE FOR MEASURE, created by Elevator Repair Service and directed by John Collins, running at The Public Theater. Photo credit: Richard Termine By Ron Cohen With the backing of The Public Theater, Elevator Repair Service, one of New York’s most audacious theater companies –…
Rachel Pickup phtos Carol Rosegg By Ron Cohen Years of Irish-English strife are compacted into one day in Brian Friel’s drama, The Home Place, and the Irish playwright’s sympathies extend to both sides of the fray. It makes for an absorbing if somewhat tempered look into the destructive nature of colonization and political repression,…
by Edward Medina Sharon is a basket case. She’s a New York City, Upper West Side psychoanalyst in need of her own New York City, Upper West Side psychiatrist. She’s off her meds. Has been for a while. She’s a recovering alcoholic. Desperately in need of a drink. Sharon’s barely keeping it together but she’s…
Photo by Evan Zimmerman By David Schultz The past year has proven to be extremely stressful with the new political regime in place. Every new day posits a new twilight zone mentality to disturb and unnerve the soul. What better time then to go back…. way back to the 1950’s…
Matt McGrath and Arnie Burton Photo credit Carol Rosegg By Ron Cohen In the category of plays dealing with the AIDS epidemic, Lonely Planet is notable for its rather blithe, fanciful ambience. The play, which was first produced in 1991 at the Northlight Theatre in Evanston, Illinois, and saw an Off-Broadway premiere in 1994,…
Deanna Dunagan & Peter Friedman photos by Joan Marcus By Eugene Paul Startlingly accomplished new playwright Max Posner is having his long gestated, lovingly autobiographical first major play being hijacked by the brilliant performance of Deanna Dunagan as his captivating grandmother sliding into dementia.That he as well as we lose sight of the…
ALEC LEYZER BURKO, GERA SANDLER Photos: Pedro Hernandez By Eugene Paul The New Yiddish Rep returns after Moshe Yassur’s distinguished production in Yiddish there of Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman with his earnest, underfed staging of Eugene Ionesco’s indigestible Rhinoceros, whose Yiddish translation – there are the necessary crutch of titles –…
Liza Colón-Zayas and Carrie Coon photos by Joan Marcus By Ron Cohen Be prepared to have your emotions shredded. Amy Herzog’s Mary Jane quietly pulls you into the life of its title character, a single mother caring for her chronically ill child, and never lets you go. And Herzog does this without any…
By Ron Cohen The story’s a little muddy, but director John Doyle and company still fill this trip to Shakespeare’s Forest of Arden with lots of happy sightseeing. Oscar- and Tony-winner Ellen Burstyn sits quietly on stage, atop a wardrobe trunk, a big book on her lap – presumably the collected works of…
By Eugene Paul Playwright Dan McCormick is having a valuable production of his play, The Violin, under splendidly sympathetic direction by Joseph Discher in an uncommonly atmospheric setting by Harry Feiner. Giovanni’s Tailor Shop. You can’t take your eyes off Gio’s musty, cluttered old tailor shop. Illuminating designer Harry Feiner has made…