Off-B'way Reviews: Glass. Kill. What If If Only. Imp.; Wine in the Wilderness

Adelind Horan, Ayana Workman, Sathya Sridharan,
and Japeth Balaban in Glass.
Credit: Joan Marcus

You never know what you’re going to get with a Caryl Churchill play, but it’s sure to be something unique, thought-provoking, and convention-breaking. After exploring gender and racial barriers in Cloud 9, the clash of capitalism and feminism in Top Girls, financial turmoil in Serious Money, magic and demons in The Skirker, cloning in A Number, and numerous other topics in bizarre and weird ways, she tackles the power of legends, myths, and metaphor in a quartet of odd but affecting one-acts, Glass. Kill. What If If Only. Imp. at the Public Theater. 

The first three playlets are short and explosive, detonating like miniature bombs. Director James MacDonald has separated them with entertaining circus acts, performed with winning charm by balancing whiz Junru Wang and expert juggler Maddox Morfit-Tighe. These fun interludes act as palate cleansers between Churchill’s short unusual dramatic courses. Glass concerns a girl made of glass (played with appropriate delicacy and yearning by Ayana Workman). She is easily breakable and transparent, not just physically but emotionally. MacDonald stages the play on a narrow ledge, emphasizing the precarious space the girl occupies. There is no special costume or effect to convey her crystalline condition, MacDonald and Churchill ask us to use our imagination as she converses with the family clock, a ceramic dog and a vase on the need to remain still on a shelf. She falls for an equally vulnerable boy (tender Japhet Balaban), who is victimized by an abusive father. The climax of this bitter fairy tale is shattering, literally and figuratively. 

Deirdre O'Connell in Kill.
Credit: Joan Marcus

The powerful Deirdre O’Connell represents “Gods” in the following piece Kill, a Beckett-like monologue. Costume designer Enver Chakartash has clad her in a silvery suit with the suggestion of wings and she is seated on a suspended cloud. After stating that the gods do not exist, she launches on an epic retelling of the numerous tragedies surrounding the House of Atreus. Phrases detailing the murders within Agamemnon’s family and the endless slaughters that followed are repeated emphasizing the senselessness of death in the name of the deities. (The repetitions and circular nature of the speech reminded me of Lucky’s monologue in Waiting for Godot.) O’Connell’s character is a symbol for the made-up supreme beings of mythologies used to explain humanity’s inhumanity. O’Connell delivers this tirade with a leavening of humor and growing passion which finally erupts in an explosion of anger at the useless killing.

Book Review: Glass. Kill. Bluebeard. Imp.

(Bought at the Drama Book Store in NYC) I bought this collection because the Public Theater has announced they will be presenting 3 of the 4 short title works plus What If If Only instead of Bluebeard's Friends. Caryl Churchill is one of the most influential and important playwrights of her era. I first encountered her in the 1980s and '90s with the Public Theater productions of Fen, Top Girls, Serious Money, and The Skriker. Then New York Theater Workshop's A Number and Far Away; followed by Blue Heart at BAM and a brilliant revival of Cloud 9 at Atlantic Theater Company. Mad Forest and a Broadway revival of Top Girls were presented by Manhattan Theater Club. She continues to reinvent herself and break all theatrical rules. While most authors stick to their signature style, everyone of her works is unique. Here the four pieces detail the impact of fantasy and folklore on modern life. A girl made of glass metaphorically breaks down. The Greek myths of murder are explored. Bluebeard gets the #MeToo treatment. An imaginary wishgranting imp influences four despondent people. Intriguing and haunting as are all of Churchill's works. I'm looking forward to seeing them on stage next year.

The other shorts were all very brief and political, amounting to editorials rather than dramas. I agree with the anti-Trump and pro-gay pieces but disagree with her anti-Israel stance, and would like to see the plays in production.

Off-B'way Update: Public Theater 2024-25 Season

Cara Ricketts, Joel Ashur, and Johnny Ramey
in Good Bones at the Studio Theater
in Washington, DC.
Credit: Margot Schulman

Yet another Gatsby, a new play by Pulitzer Prize winner James Ijames, four short pieces by Caryl Churchill, and the reopening of the Delacorte in Central Park are among the offerings in the Public Theater's 2024-25 season. 

The season opens with the North American premiere of Belvoir St Theater's Counting and Cracking by S. Shakthidharan about a Sri Lakan-Australian family from 1964-2004. Sept. 6-22 (opening Sept. 12) at the NYU Skirball Center.

Good Bones by Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright James Ijames (Fat Ham) follows Sept. 19-Oct. 13 (opens Oct. 1).  A work opportunity to revitalize the blighted neighborhood she grew up in has led Aisha and her chef husband Travis to buy and renovate a charming old house. But as everyone knows, renovation is expensive and stressful—both for buildings and the communities that surround them. Aisha's young contractor Earl grew up in the area too, but his memories are of more than just dangerous streets and hollowed-out homes. The Public's Associate Artistic Director Saheem Ali directs this New York premiere play about community, change, and the soul of our cities.

Australian playwright David Finnigan will star in his solo play Deep History combining 75,000 years of human history and his personal experience with the deadly brush fires which consumed his home town of Camberra. (Oct. 5-27, opens Oct. 10).