Kristin Salaky - Page 6

No dear playgoers, it has not come to pass that some smart producer put up a quickie, low-budget revival of Spamalot in the Barrymore Theatre and tried cutting costs by removing all the songs. But there's definitely a Pythonic style in the look and text of Ionesco's Exit The King as co-adapted by Geoffrey Rush (who also stars) and Neil Armfield (who also directs). You can sense it in the way Brian Hutchison, as a faithfully detail-oriented armored guard, dutifully announces each royal occurrence as it happens, correcting himself, when necessary, with bellowing authority ('The King is dead.'... 'The King's alive.'... 'Long live the king.'). It's there when AndRea Martin, as a sullen, much-abused servant, makes a comic production out of trying to keep the monarchs' royal robes draped straight, and it's abundantly present when Rush, as the 400-year-old King Berenger, who is down to his last 90 minutes of life ('When the play is over you'll be dead.'), kicks up what's left of his heels in a silly little dance.

'Men like women with character,' is the sisterly advice a muddied, snarling, grief-stricken and murderously-crazed Elektra gives to pretty little Chrysothemis in Ann Carson's wildly clever adaptation of the ancient Greek story of bloody family doings titled An Oresteia. Growled in all seriousness by the fabulously bitter Annika Boras, the line got a huge laugh the afternoon I caught Classic Stage Company's crackling good premiere production; the swiftest five hours of theatre I've enjoyed in a long, long time.

There's a fine, fine line... No, let me rephrase that. There's a wide gaping canyon between clever social commentary and unmotivated slapstick. And while I'm not suggesting that Yasmina Reza's God of Carnage had me longing for the subtle nuances of Messrs. Moe, Larry and Curly I will admit to being reminded of the famous Tallulah Bankhead quip, 'There's less to this than meets the eye.'

'If musical theatre doesn't address important issues, who will?,' read a t-shirt I spotted at the Broadway Flea Market several years ago. And while America's theater history is rich with important issue addressing musical dramas like Show Boat and Ragtime, when Finian's Rainbow hit Broadway in 1947 it was pretty much unheard of for a musical comedy to have its main plot centered on attacking institutionalized racism.

Though probably best known to theatre folk as author of the long-running Broadway comedy, Luv, Murray Schisgal first hit it big with the Off-Broadway double bill of one-acts, The Typists and The Tiger, and the short play form continues to be a steady part of the 81-year-old humorist's repertoire.

If you're going to open your play with the two main characters discussing their preference of either muffins or coffee cake with their morning brew, your dialogue had better be sparkling. It's not. In fact the biggest problem with Michael Jacobs' Impressionism is that its main characters can't seem to express themselves as cleverly as the author seems to believe they are. Pseudo-sophisticated urban shorthand abounds in this ninety minute pounding into the brain of the notion that, like an impressionist painting, life is so much clearer when observed from a distance.

While there are laws restricting the tattooing of minors, the unseen infant title character in Christina Anderson's Inked Baby has the unfortunate honor to be indelibly marked even before birth. The play's premiere production at Playwrights Horizons' Peter Jay Sharp Theater is honored with a fine cast and some truly captivating moments provided by both the playwright and director Kate Whoriskey. But once the very human story is firmly established, the plot takes a twist that - while certainly based on realistic situations - abruptly changes the mood of the piece into something akin to sci-fi mystery. The awkward clashing of the two worlds of the play reduces what is no doubt meant to be a pivotal scene into the kind of silliness that, at least on the night I attended, draws loud giggles from a good part of the audience.

One of the many delights of director Michael Blakemore's revival of Noel Coward's giddily funny 1941 froth, Blithe Spirit, is that this 2009 production looks like it could have been seen in the play's premiere year. No doubt contemporary Broadway theatre can provide more spectacular ways for an actress playing a ghost to enter a room than to just have her walk through the French windows. And certainly if an invisible spirit chooses to destroy her husband's drawing room, modern technology can whip up a few tricks more gasp-inducing than simply having a picture frame fall and a bookshelf topple over. But when you have one of the English language's great comedies played by a company that excels in the verbal dexterity of the playwright's wit, there's no need for such distractions.

If the gang at Madison Avenue were looking for the perfect spokesmodel to help win support for the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 60s, they couldn't have done better than Rosa Parks, a sweet-looking, modestly dressed woman who spoke with quiet dignity. Or Ezell Blair, Jr., David Richmond, Joseph McNeil and Franklin McCain, the conservatively dressed, well groomed college freshmen who started the Woolworth lunch counter sit-in. White people who feared the consequences of desegregating America could have their views softened with a look at these clean-cut 'credits to their race' (as the old saying went) who were everyday people just like them. And if that sounds like a crass way of referring to the brave souls who put themselves on the front lines in the fight for equality, well that's a major point playwright Tracy Scott Wilson makes with her new drama, The Good Negro.

The opposites attracting plot is probably as old as romantic comedy itself, but even if Rooms: a rock romance follows familiar paths, the Paul Scott Goodman (book/music/lyrics) and Miriam Gordon (book) two-person musical is such a buoyant, funny and upbeat affair that the clichés of the story are conquered by the cleverness and exuberance with which the story is told. Under Scott Schwartz's swift and breezy direction, the 90-minute one-act scoots the audience along on an immensely enjoyable ride.

Barbara Walsh may not be a world famous performing artist but she's damn convincing at playing one in Paper Mill's sparkling new production of Terrance McNally's Master Class. With only four weeks of preparation after scheduling conflicts forced announced star Kate Mulgrew to withdraw, Walsh's well-balanced mixture of poise, regality, insecurity, wit, intelligence and compassion bring a captivating portrayal to this intriguing and comical character study of an acclaimed artist no longer is possession of the tool through which her artistry earned its acclaim.

While I have a sneaking suspicion that playwright Evan Smith meant for his new comedy, The Savannah Disputation, to bring out provocative issues of faith from underneath its many, many, many big laughs, I'm afraid director Walter Bobbie's production at Playwrights Horizon settles for being ninety of the funniest minutes currently gracing Manhattan's stages. Oh sure, maybe some churchgoers will have reservations, but this heathen had a helluva good time.

Though The Paper Mill Playhouse has just opened Master Class and still has productions of 1776 and The Full Monty geared up for their current season, plans are zipping along for the four musicals and one straight play that will make up their 2009-10 campaign. The official announcement comes this Friday afternoon, but they've released these five pictorial clues as hints. See if you can guess what the gang at Millburn has in store next season.

While The Mint Theater Company built its well-earned reputation as New York's leading archivists of plays they proudly proclaim as 'worthy but neglected,' their latest ventures suggest they may want to consider adopting the new slogan, 'I betcha didn't know (insert name of literary giant here) wrote a play.'

I don't know how far along set and lighting designer Maruti Evans was with his work for INTAR's double bill of Eduardo Machado's In Paradise and Nick Norman's She Plundered Him when the company lost its home due to the sudden closing of the Zipper Theatre and its season was rescued by the availability of the much smaller studio space at the Cherry Lane Theatre, but I imagine the switch necessitated some drastic changes in his view of the two pieces. In any case, the end result is perhaps the most memorable and effective part of the evening.

Whether the Prospect Theater Company is presenting a Dadaist piece about the birth of Dada or a kick-ass musical comedy about Tin Pan Alley tunesmiths putting on a show for the Soviet Union, the theatregoer's eye will inevitable be drawn to the elegantly simple dome that towers above their West End Theatre playing space inside The Church of St. Andrew and St. Paul. So for the company's ten year anniversary, their adventurous artistic director, Cara Reichel, conceived and curated a site-specific piece called The Dome, inspired by their home's architecture.

As the denizens who frequent Manhattan's halls where two-drink minimums reign are well aware, the lass or laddie serving your cocktail is often an artist of greater experience and show-stopping talent than the perfectly fine entertainer who is on stage putting his or her own personal spin on 'This Is The Moment.' Being a serious, full-time cabaret singer usually means being the president, CEO, investor and product of your own unintentionally non-profit corporation in a world where hobbyists with deep pockets and lots of friends who don't need to think twic

It was believed by many back in 1932, as it still is today, that the only reason Eugene O'Neill was not awarded that year's Pulitzer Prize for his Mourning Becomes Electra, an epic retelling of Aeschylus' Oresteia trilogy that declares Sigmund Freud as the true victor of the American Civil War, was that after granting him top honors for Beyond The Horizon (1920), Anna Christie (1922) and Strange Interlude (1928) the gang at Columbia figured enough was enough. So history was made that year when the Gershwin, Gershwin, Kaufman & Ryskin lark Of Thee I Sing became the first musical so honored, leaving O'Neill waiting until after his death to nab another, for Long Day's Journey Into Night.

If the blocked sight lines caused by Santo Loquasto's dominating set - the wooden skeleton of a Russian two-story country home - seem at first a bit of an annoyance in Classic Stage Company's engrossing and well-acted production of Chekhov's Uncle Vanya, the wonderful moodiness his work helps create becomes more evident as the evening moves onward. With most of the action taking place on the porch pushed to the forefront, the audience can partially view the unseen business of others through thick structural beams. Or perhaps watch scenes with those not directly involved in the forefront. And while the clarity of your view depends on which of the three sections you're seated in, it seems intentional that nobody can tell exactly what is happening in one key moment.

Near the conclusion of Will Ferrell's You're Welcome America. A Final Night With George W. Bush the actor/playwright takes a brief respite from the evening's frivolity to have his title character express sincere emotions that are no doubt shared by everyone in his audience. He looks down with a sorrowful expression and his voice even quivers a bit as he speaks of the brave men and women of the military, and the civilians as well, who have died under his command. He feels grief for those who have lost their spouses, and for the children who have lost parents, because of decisions he felt were best for the nation. Whether or not you believe our former president experiences that same grief, the sincerity of the man portraying him is evident, and the moment of silence he requests becomes a bonding moment for all of those present.