Off-B'way Review: The Winter's Tale

Lily Rabe and Raul Esparza
in The Winter's Tale.
Credit: Joan Marcus

After a radical reinterpretation of Romeo and Juliet, the Public Theater’s summer Shakespeare in the Park returns with a traditional and highly engaging production of The Winter’s Tale, one of the Bard’s lesser-known romances. This has always been one of the more difficult Shakespearean plays to bring off because of its fractured structure. The first half is a florid tragedy of jealousy destroying the peace of the kingdom of Sicilia while the second half is a comic frolic in the countryside of Bohemia. Director Daniel Sullivan balances the two halves perfectly by staging it straightforwardly without “concepts” or gimmicks and simply allowing the fantastic tale to unfold. Even the infamously ridiculous stage direction “exit, pursued by a bear” is cleverly and quickly conveyed the aide of Bradley King’s atmospheric lighting design. Maruti Evans’ imaginative set places the action on a giant clock, denoting the change of seasons and passage of time. The first half is set in wintry ice, suggesting the frigid environment of Sicilia’s court while the second becomes a lush spring garden, evoking the thawing of enmities.

The convoluted, fairy-tale-like storyline is set in motion by the Othello-like madness of King Leontes (an intense Raul Esparza) who suspects his faithful wife Hermione (a magnificent Lily Rabe) of cheating on him with his best friend, the visiting Polixenes, King of Bohemia (charismatic Gilbert Owuor). While imprisoned for her alleged infidelity, Hermione gives birth to a baby girl whom Leontes banishes. The queen dies of grief (or does she?), the child resurfaces in Bohemia sixteen years later, and after many machinations, all ends well.

Chuck Cooper (l.) and cast in
The Winter's Tale.
Credit: Joan Marcus

Sullivan treats the Bard’s fanciful devices as perfectly plausible and focuses on the human emotions generated by the not-quite-believable story. The cast creates credible people caught up in incredible circumstances. The standout is Rabe as the besieged Hermione. In previous productions, this pitiable heroine is played as a weak, defenseless victim, shrinking from her spouse’s unjustified wrath. Rabe is a tigress, railing against her wrongful accusations. Her physical life is startlingly realistic. In the trial scene, where Leontes is set to sentence his wife to death, Rabe as Hermione remembers that she has just given birth and is physically weak and exhausted. She is also dirty and disheveled (Linda Cho created the fanciful costumes). The actress plays against this condition to give full vent to Hermione’s rage and proves herself a roaring advocate for her defense.

Marsha Stephanie Blake, Lily Rabe,
and Raul Esparza in The Winter's Tale.
Credit: Joan Marcus

Esparza takes us on a roller-coaster of emotions from unreasoning jealousy to ragged regret. Marsha Stephanie Blake provides sturdy support as the sage councillor Paulina. Chuck Cooper gives unexpected depth to the comic role of the Old Shepherd who takes in the lost child Perdita (enchanting Isabela Ferrer). Steven Skybell ably doubles in two very different roles as Paulina’s put-upon husband Antigonus and the outrageously rascally theif Autolycus. Michael Khalid Karadsheh, Matthew Eby, Teagle F. Bougere, and Daniel Kyri also have moments to shine in this delightful summer romance spanning winter’s frost and spring’s flowering.

Aug. 11-23. Public Theater at the Delacorte Theater, Central Park at W. 81 St., NYC. Running time: two hours and 50 mins. including intermission. publictheater.org.

Off-B'way Reviews: An American Daughter; Disruption

Dakin Matthews and Mary Beth Peil in
An American Daughter.
Credit: Joan Marcus

Two Broadway veterans and incisive character actors, Dakin Matthews and Mary Beth Peil, deliver fascinating and detailed performances as a conservative Republican senator and his fourth wife, a seemingly flighty but actually canny socialite, in La Femme Theater Productions’ revival of Wendy Wasserstein’s 1997 play An American Daughter at the Pershing Square Signature Center. The trouble is these two wonderful actors are playing supporting characters and are not the center of the play. That role is Lyssa Dent Hughes, the senator’s daughter and nominee for Surgeon General whose appointment is in trouble. Lyssa is played by Jean Lichty, the executive producer of La Femme, who also starred in the company’s previous Off-Broadway revivals including Night of the Iguana and A Lovely Sunday for Creve Coeur. You have to admire Lichty for mounting a gorgeous production of a rarely-done play (Sarna Lapine smoothly directs and Mikiko Suzuki MacAdams designed the handsome Georgetown living room set). She wisely surrounds herself with a cast of Tony winners and nominees, but she lacks the acting heft to carry Daughter’s dramatic weight.

Montego Glover and Jean Lichty in
An American Daughter.
Credit: Joan Marcus

Wasserstein wrote the play in response to President Bill Clinton’s controversial appointments of two successive women for Attorney General, both of whom were lambasted and eventually withdrew because they did not pay Social Security taxes on wages for their nannies. Wasserstein used the incident to examine how women in public life were judged by unfair standards never applied to their male counterparts. Clinton’s wife Hillary would later find herself in similar sexist traps during her 2016 Presidential campaign. In Wasserstein’s fictional treatment, her candidate is a highly qualified doctor and descendent of President Ulysses S. Grant, tripped up by blowing off a jury summons and criticizing her mother for being a housewife. Wasserstein exhibited her customary wit and generated keen observations on women’s struggles to balance personal and political issues. It’s an entertaining and insightful work, but Daughter received mixed reviews and had a limited run of 89 performances.

Book Review: Turning Off the Morning News; Naomi in the Living Room and Other Short Plays

John Pankow, Kristine Nielsen, Rachel Nicks
and Robert Sella in Turning Off the
Morning News at McCarter Theater (2018).
Credit: T. Charles Erickson

(Borrowed from Lincoln Center Library for the Performing Arts): Christopher Durang is one of my favorite playwrights. His plays were marked with an insanely dark humor and veered awfully close to comedy sketches. He passed away in 2024 at 75 after being diagnosed with a rare form of Alzheimer's Disease and I was thinking of him when I finished Julie Salomon's Wendy Wasserstein bio. They were close friends. His last full-length play Turning Off the Morning News, has yet to be produced in NYC so I was curious about it. It was produced at the McCarter Theater in 2018. In typical Durang fashion, he combines a tragic trend with wild satire. Like too many Americans, Jimmy is deeply depressed and fully armed. He threatens to kill himself and others in a mass shooting. His wife and son attempt to ignore and minimize his dangerous behavior. The neighbors Clifford and Salena aren't much better off. Both are recovering from personal tragedies and live together but are not married or romantically involved. The sixth character Rosalind suffers from multiple skin cancers and walks around with a pillow over her head to avoid exposure to the sun. Darkly funny and scary. Durang's Author's Note is deeply moving as he explains his reaction to our national epidemic of violence. I wish I had seen this production, particularly since Kristine Nielsen who has appeared in several of Durang's plays was in it. I still remember her inspired performance as Mrs. Sizemagraff in Betty's Summer Vacation. 

When I found this play at the Lincoln Center Library for the Performing Arts, I also came across a collection of equally hilarious short Durang plays Naomi in the Living Room and Other Short Plays. These shorter pieces run no more than a few pages each and include contributions to revues, play festivals, TV shows and even a sketch for Carol Burnett and Robin Williams. As with Morning News, Durang's comments are as entertaining as the plays themselves. Among the mad playlets is a funny meeting between the Madwoman of Chaillot and Wallace Shawn's Aunt Dan who each justify their questionable morals.

Off-B'way Update: Julianne Moore in Faydra

Julianne Moore will star in
Faydra for MTC.

Oscar winner Julianne Moore (The Vertical Hour on Broadway) returns to the New York stage in Faydra, Tony nominee Sarah Ruhl's modern adaptation of the classic Greek tragedy Phedre, a tale of a woman whose passion for her stepson leads to disaster. Tony nominee Les Waters (Dana H.) directs. Manhattan Theater Club presents the play at its Off-Broadway space at City Center Stage I with previews beginning Feb. 2, 2027 with an opening scheduled for Feb. 25. 

“There’s nothing like watching a homegrown Manhattan Theatre Club commission become a magnet for talent,” said MTC Artistic Director Nicki Hunter. “Sarah Ruhl’s bold, funny, and devastating reimagining of this classic tale will draw the immensely gifted Julianne Moore back to the stage, and mark Les Waters’ return to MTC after three decades. We look forward to announcing additions to this exciting company in the months ahead.”

Additional casting and another MTC production will be announced at a later date.

Off-B'way Review: The Saviors

Julius Rinzel and Ivan Howe in
The Saviors. Credit: Ahron R. Foster

Bubba Weiler emerges as a major playwriting talent with The Saviors, his second major Off-Broadway production, now at the Atlantic Theater Company. Apart from joining the American company of the Harry Potter play on Broadway, Weiner has appeared on the New York scene as an actor in Rebecca Gilman’s Swing State, portraying an ex-con barely holding on to a grinding truck delivery job. His sensitive performance of a desperate young man earned him nominations for Drama Desk, Outer Critics and Lortel Awards. He made his NY debut as a dramatist with last season’s multi-leveled and moving Well, I’ll Let You Go, a compassionate chronicle of a recent widow coming to terms with her loss and the varying reactions of her community. Weiler demonstrates he is no one-track pony with this new play, an equally probing examination of the painful search for faith in a confusing world.

Ivan Howe and Julius Rinzel in The Saviours.
Credit: Ahron R. Foster

The setting is a Catholic church in a suburban neighborhood, possibly in the Midwest where middle schoolers and best pals Michael and Paul serve as altar boys. Devout Michael eagerly prepares for his upcoming confirmation while Paul is doubting the very existence of God. Their friendship and Christian belief is tested when homeless drifter Julian enters seeking shelter during a snowstorm. Conventional Michael bristles at allowing Julian to stay, but Paul secretly grants him access after hours by leaving the side door unlocked. Meanwhile, Michael seeks advice from Judy, the adult advisor of the church’s youth group. Unfortunately, Michael is the only kid that shows up for the first meeting and Judy is experiencing hidden struggles of her own involving her son whom she says is heading a mission in Africa.

Book Review: Leading Lady: A Memoir of a Most Unusual Boy

(Bought at Time and Space Limited Used Bookstore in Hudson, NY for $7): Charles Busch's wildly entertaining memoir is as funny as his dozens of stage comedies (I've seen 13 of them as well as two musicals for which he wrote the book, his cabaret act and two of his movie screenplays.) He alternates a straightforward narrative of his career from childhood, college and stage and film triumphs with amusing later encounters with the likes of Joan Rivers, Valerie Harper, Linda Lavin, Beatrice Arthur, Patrick Swayze, Liza Minnelli, Milton Berle, Esther Williams, Debbie Reynolds, Ann Miller, and many others. Busch came to prominence with Vampire Lesbians of Sodom, which he wrote and starred in and which ran for over 2,000 performances Off-Broadway. (The long run is attributed to the salacious title which brought in curious theatergoers.) Rather than relying on waiting for a big break that might never come, he created his own vehicles. He realized his strength and passion was for playing female roles in tribute to great stars like Bette Davis and Joan Crawford. He wrote his own plays to star himself. The book joyfully chronicles his self-made journey to cult-goddess status.

I recently encountered Busch at the Broadway Flea Market. We chatted about a Bette Davis film I caught on TCM called Payment on Demand, one of the few screen appearances by Broadway star Jane Cowl. I loved that he knew who I was talking about and that he celebrates classic film divas. 

Book Review: Wendy and the Lost Boys: The Uncommon Life of Wendy Wasserstein

(Bought at the Little Red Book Shack in Hudson, NY for $1):  Julie Salamon's well-researched biography of Pulitzer and Tony winning playwright Wendy Wasserstein reveals a complicated woman. Wasserstein became the voice of a generation of women who were underrepresented in media, advocating for fulfilling identities outside of male protection and dominance. In her personal life, she gravitated to gay men, and attempted to have a child with many of them. Her "husbands" included playwrights Christopher Durang and Terrence McNally, director Gerald Guitterez, artistic director Andre Bishop and costume designer William Ivey Long. She recreated her relationships with her family in plays like Isn't It Romantic and The Sisters Rosensweig and the real-life connections were even more complex. 

The book also provides a social history of changing women's roles in American society and the theater from the 60s into the early 2000s when Wendy passed away at the age of 55. 

I interviewed her once for a book I was writing on long-running on and Off-Broadway shows. My cousin went to college with her. I was an usher for the Off-Broadway run of Isn't Romantic at the Lucille Lortel Theater, so I saw the play many times. So it was fascinating to get to know the real Wendy, funny, smart, maternal, and complex.