All tagged David Zinn
“Soft Power”, David Henry Hwang and Jeanine Tesori’s dramaturgically breathtaking new musical-within-a-play, experiments with form while rendering a sort of reverse version of “The King and I”. The resulting satire of American culture and politics brims with an unpretentious intelligence and an unexpectedly penetrating sense of patriotism. If democracy will break your heart, “Soft Power” can mend it.
Bess Wohl’s “Make Believe” is a masterful exploration of childhood and its lingering impact set against the mystery of four abandoned children and a reconciliation as their adult selves. Tragic, funny, mysterious, and true, it is easily among the best plays I have seen all year.
The Broadway premiere of Tarell Alvin McCraney’s “Choir Boy” at Manhattan Theatre Club, finely acted and beautifully told, is transcendent. The very presence of this play on Broadway about a black, queer teenage boy navigating private, Christian Prep school life is seismic, and Jeremy Pope offers a memorable debut in this timely and important work.
Elaine May gives a searingly painful and simply heartbreaking performance as a woman descending into dementia in Kenneth Lonergan’s quietly sad play “The Waverly Gallery”. Marking the Broadway debuts of director Lila Neugebauer and actor Lucas Hedges, this naturalistic memory play is a stunning achievement in dramatizing the indignity of aging and the emotional impact of long-term care on a family unit. Perhaps Mr. Lonergan’s best play, Elaine May’s performance alone is worth the price of admission.
Following a hit run Off-Broadway last year, Harvey Fierstein’s landmark gay play “Torch Song” is back on Broadway with an abridged text and title, but its heart and humanity intact. On second viewing, this production feels more muted and a bit too comfortable, but the performances are richer and better, and the subject matter as timely as ever. An uproarious comedy with a suite of characters you come to love, “Torch Song” is a must-see of the fall (or any) season.
Capping an unusually gay year for New York theatre, I take a look at what many consider to be the first gay play (“The Boys in the Band”) and what might be the newest gay play (“Log Cabin”). Catch the former if you can (tickets are scarce and expensive); skip the latter.
A roundup look at three plays that opened recently Off-Broadway. I highly recommend the Vineyard Theatre's striking "The Amateurs" and Signature Theatre's superb "At Home at the Zoo", but suggest skipping MCC Theater's "Relevance".
"SpongeBob SquarePants”—a bright, silly, and sweet new party of a musical—is big-hearted and big fun; director and conceiver Tina Landau has skillfully adapted the popular Nickelodeon cartoon for the stage in a buoyant and exuberant production that is both entertaining and moving for theatregoers of all ages, offering a welcomed antidote to these beleaguered times.
