Off-B'way Review: The Ford/Hill Project

Elizabeth Marvel and Gabby Beans in
The Ford/Hill Project,
Credit: Rebecca Smeyne

A docu-play made up of verbatim Senate testimony? Doesn’t exactly sound riveting. Yet The Ford/Hill Project, now at BAM’s Fishman Space after regional productions and a run at the Under the Radar Festival, provides a searing portrait of the workings of government power and its failure to deal with violence and harassment against women. Elizabeth Marvel (one of four cast members) and Lee Sunday Evans (who directs) have stitched together the most dramatic excerpts of testimony and questions from the confirmation hearings of Supreme Court nominees Clarence Thomas in 1991 and Brett Kavanaugh in 2018. Both high-profile events were rocked by the respective eyewitness accounts of Anita Hill and Christine Blasey Ford, both of whom claimed the nominees mistreated them. 

Hill testified Thomas pressured her to date him and then, when she refused, used lewd, pornographic language and innuendo in front of her when they worked together at the US Department of Education and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Ford claimed Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her at a party when they were in high school. At the time of both hearings, the accusations made headlines and threatened the Republican nominees’ appointment to the highest court in the land. Both vehemently denied the allegations and were eventually successfully confirmed. With the passage of time, the impact of these events has faded, but this intense distillation of Hill and Ford’s stories and Thomas and Kavanuagh’s insistent denials bring them vividly into focus.

Off-B'way Review: The Real Ivanov

Sam Adegoke and Sam Underwood in
The Real Ivanov.
Credit: Russ Rowland

Beware of director-adaptors who use the word “real” in their versions of a classic script. Laura Strausfeld has chosen to employ the adjective to describe her edition of Anton Chekhov’s Ivanov and subtitled it “A Comedy about Despair.” It’s currently playing at the Lynn F. Angelson Theater and not a production of the CSC. While her staging does have some innovative moments and there are a few glints of pathos and humor, this Ivanov is not particularly “real” since much of the direction is stylized and most of the acting is either overblown or shallow.

The rarely-performed play was Chekhov’s first produced work (in 1887) and has not been seen in a major NYC production in almost 30 years. (The last staging was Gerald Gutierrez’s moving 1997 edition for Lincoln Center starring Kevin Kline, Marian Seldes and a brilliantly funny Max Wright.) Ivanov is not seen as frequently as Chekhov’s four other major plays because of its unrelentingly melancholy story. The title character is a depressed Russian landowner managing a bankrupt estate and his terminally ill wife Anna with whom he has fallen out of love. Nikolai Ivanov is surrounded by comically covetous buffoons and rascals including his ever-scheming estate manager Borkin, his pompous uncle Count Shabyelski, and the frivolous, mercenary Lebedev family to whom he owes a huge debt. In addition to his perpetual sadness, he is also racked with guilt because his spouse left her Jewish religion and her parents to marry him and he is now attracted to Sasha, the Lebedevs’ foolishly idealistic young daughter. 

Soph Metcalf,William DeMeritt,Kimberlee Walker,
Sam Adegoke,Jordan Lage,Sarah Long,
Sam Underwood,Spencer Aste, and Amelia Mason
in The Real Ivanov.
Credit: Russ Rowland

Bringing off the play’s delicate balance between tragedy and comedy is a difficult challenge. Strausfeld attempts to make the case that the protagonist is a victim of clinical depression and would benefit from therapy and medication if he were born about 120 years later (at least that what is claimed in program notes and advertising for the production.) 

She stages much of the action in interesting patterns, reflecting Ivanov’s confined psyche. For the group scenes at the Lebedevs’ soiree, the characters move as if at an uncomfortable, awkward dance. In the scenes at Ivanov’s gloomy house, all action revolves around a simple bench or a table with only one chair. In the fourth act, she places them on a narrow strip of light and the actors tightly maneuver around each other like passengers on a crowded subway—again symbolizing the psychological oppression they feel. Jiyoun Chang’s lighting helps out here, defining the cage-like spaces of Ivanov’s neuroses. While the direction can be innovative, Stausfeld has neglected to emphasize the human dimension of the characters. They are either mopey victims or broad clowns.

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.

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.

Off-B'way Review: The Whoopi Monologues

Kecia Lewis (center) and cast of
The Whoopi Monologues.
Credit: Angela Marie Orellana

Back in 1984, the comedienne-actress Whoopi Goldberg seemed to come out of nowhere, bursting onto Broadway with an eponymous, self-written one-woman show presenting a quartet of characters rarely seen on what was then universally known as the Great White Way. She presented a sharp-edged, female, African-American perspective on our society. Her material was skewed in a comic way yet also achingly real and somewhat tragic. Goldberg went on to EGOT (Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, Tony) status and now is best-known as a political commentator/talk-show host on ABC’s The View. She did headline a revival of her breakthrough piece in 2004 called simply Whoopi, adding a fifth segment addressing then-current concerns. 

A revival of Goldberg’s show, with five different performers enacting each monologue, has been given an imaginative and vital staging by Whitney White at Lincoln Center’s Off-Broadway Mitzi Newhouse Theater. Though several of the allusions are dated (a commercial promoting Jamaican tourism, The Love Boat, dearth of racial minority representation on TV), the basic themes of political oppression of women, a lack of abortion access and little compassion for addiction are sadly still relevant. Divvying up the material diffuses the impact slightly and exposes the thinness of much of the material. Goldberg impressed with her versatility and comic timing (HBO filmed the event as a comedy special if you want to see Whoopi’s original performance). Fortunately, the current cast deliver complex, deep characterizations and encourage vocal audience reactions. In addition, White provides a varied staging with the aide of Studio Bent’s backstage-style set, Cha See’s versatile lighting, Hana S. Kim’s off-kilter videos and Fan Zhang’s edgy sound and original music. Qween Jean’s costumes combine street reality with individual style.

Off-B'way Review: Dad Don't Read This

Sophie Rossman, Kayta Thomas, Amalia Yoo, 
and Renee-Nicole Powell
in Dad Don't Read This.
Credit: Valerie Terranova

“You can’t be bad at this game. It’s like life but on the computer,” says one of the four young girls comprising the character list in Eliya Smith’s compelling and insightful play Dad Don’t Read This at the Greenwich House Theater after a run at St. Luke’s Theater. That line sums up her young characters’ conflicts between living real life and in the digital realm. As she did with her previous play on adolescent angst Grief Camp, Smith’s intense script is jagged, funny, painful, messy and very real. Dad follows a quartet of teen girlfriends obsessively playing the computer game SIMS where they create artificial worlds rather than cope with the actual one. The play begins with Mal reading a warning to her father, quoting the title, and pleading with him to stay away from her computer. The action takes place in Mal’s bedroom (Forest Entsminger designed the accurately chaotic set) as she negotiates the rocky path of adolescence and yearns to break out of her central Ohio town. Her friends Noelle, Sophie and Lida bicker, share secrets, and sleep over as they go through similar identity crises.

Smith compassionately documents the young ladies’ attempts at forging their own life stories and being kind to each other while surrounded by gossip and peer pressure. Director Chloe Claudel smoothly stages the action so the scenes flow into each other as Mal deals with her warring parents, creating homes and activities for her SIMS creations, fighting feuds and making up with her pals. Choreographer Lena Engelstein devises expressive dance moves to interpret the girls’ frustrations and eagerness to become grown-up. Mitchell Polonsky’s sound design provides an evocative aural environment including the muffled offstage voices of Mal’s mom and dad. Abigail Sage and Finn Bamber’s lighting design reflects the violently shifting moods from a dreamy starscape to harsh reality when one of the girls switches on an unforgiving overhead bulb in the middle of a sleepover. Costume designer Olivia Vaughn Hern dresses them in character-defining casual wear. 

At the performance attended, director Chloe Claudel covered for Amalia Yoo as Mal and was movingly convincing in conveying her struggles to find self-actualization outside of Ohio and the SIMS world. Sophie Rossman is especially touching as Sophie, particularly in a frightening monologue in which she describes a sleazy encounter with a predatory adult in a family restaurant. You can see the conflicting emotions play across her face as Lida expresses revulsion and then guilty excitement and finally shame. Katya Thomas captures the clingy neediness of Lida who shyly hides her empathy for fear of appearing weak. Renee-Nicole Powell displays the athletic Noelle’s seeming confidence, actually a shield for her insecurity. 

Recent plays like John Proctor Is the Villain, Grief Camp, Indian Princesses, and this striking one are dealing with the pain and challenge of being young in the 21st century. Let’s hope more playwrights emerge to address this relevant topic.

June 23—July 18. Try for Baby Productions and The Goat Exchange at Greenwich House Theater, 27 Barrow St., NYC. Running time: 95 mins. with no intermission. daddontreadthis.com.

Off-B'way Review: Giulia: The Poison Queen of Palermo

Jennifer Nettles and company in 
Giulia: The Poison Queen of Palermo.
Credit: Andy Henderson

You really have to admire author-actress Jennifer Nettles. In addition to playing the title role, the Grammy-winning vocalist of the duo Sugarland wrote the songs and book for the new musical Giulia: The Poison Queen of Palermo, now at the Perelman Performing Arts Center. She (or the producers) enlisted Tony-winner Mary Zimmerman to direct. Plus the basic idea is intriguing. The plot is based on a true story of a 17th-century Italian female apothecary who aided the women of her community by poisoning several abusive husbands including her own. Nettles creates a proto-feminist heroine, sort of a socially progressive Sweeney Todd. 

Unfortunately, while there are several entertaining elements, Giulia doesn’t quite come together for a satisfying whole. Nettles’ book is earnest in its desire to create a plucky protagonist challenging an oppressive patriarchy represented by a hypocritical cardinal (powerful Quentin Earl Darrington) and a villainous civil governor (mustache-twirling Christopher M. Ramirez). But Nettles doesn’t seem to be able to make up her mind as to what kind of show this is. The tone is mostly deadly serious, but switches to dark humor halfway through the first act, but then switches to girl-power tract as Giulia gleefully massacres all the nasty men who assault their spouses and sets up a women’s talk therapy session in her shop. The show opens like Pippin with a commedia dell’arte troupe performing a scene-setting intro number led by an overplaying Bre Jackson. But then the play-within-a-play concept is dropped. 

Off-B'way Review: Girl, Interrupted

Juliana Canfield in Girl, Interrupted.
Credit: Joan Marcus

Though it has flaws in terms of pacing and repetition, the new musical adaptation of Girl, Interrupted at the Public, based on Susanna Kaysen’s 1993 memoir, is a heart-wrenching portrayal of surviving mental illness. Pulitzer Prize-winner Martina Majok’s book feelingly depicts Susanna’s struggles with suicidal tendencies and her two-year residency at a mental facility in late 1960s Boston. The country’s collective nervous breakdown over civil rights and Vietnam parallels the psychological battles taking place within Susanna and her fellow patients. The title derives from a Vermeer painting “Girl Interrupted at Her Music.” Susanna obsesses over the work which she encountered during a visit to the Frick Museum with her high-school English teacher who may or may have been sexually inappropriate with her. She identifies with the girl in the painting since they both are interrupted at pursuing their full potential.

Ta'Rea Campell, Juliana Canfield and 
Lauren Jeanne Thomas in 
Girl, Interrupted.
Crdit: Joan Marcus

Issues of sexism are also addressed as her therapist dismisses her ambitions of becoming a writer (“No one is a writer”) and advocates a career for her as a dental technician. (Susanna is finally released when she accepts a proposal of marriage, but later fulfills her literary dreams.) There is only one male actor (a versatile Manoel Felciano), listed as “The Male Presence” who represents the restrictions of the patriarchal society. Majok emphasizes the bond developed between the protagonist and the other inmates. Their shared experiences of trauma and misogyny and feelings of oppression provide a strong connection. One of the most moving scenes involves Susannah and her friends visiting a patient in the violent ward. You can feel their hearts breaking at the degraded state of their former wardmate (she has smeared the walls of her cell with her own excrement), but also the fear that they could slip this far down.

Aimee Mann’s songs starkly evoke the period of the late 1960s, mixing folk-rock with soft-pop, Bacharach-like melodies. Her poetic lyrics chart the strange, far country the young women are trekking through. “Now you’re split in two/And each side isn’t you” they sing as they contemplate their interior conflicts.

Katherine Reis, Mia Pak, Juliana Canfield,
Gabi Campo, King Princess, and Sally Shaw
in Girl, Interrupted.
Credit: Joan Marcus

Director Jo Bonney’s staging is fluid, facilitated by the flexible set by the design team dots and the scene-shifting lighting by Heather Gilbert. Sarah Laux’s costumes subtly denote character such as a frilly mini-skirt for the flirtatious Daisy or radical rags for the rebellious Lisa. But, on the negative side, there are several slowly-paced sequences and many of the women’s stories are too similar, though the actresses including Gabi Campo, Mia Pak, Katherine Reis, and Sally Shaw do their best to provide differentiation.

The entire cast is exemplary. Constantly on stage, Juliana Canfield as Susannah carries the weight of the show on her slender shoulders and delivers a bravura performance, expressively conveying the young woman’s descent into irrationality and her valiant fight to regain her sanity. King Princess is fiery and funny as the defiant Lisa, the role which won a Best Supporting Actress Oscar for Angelina Jolie in the 1999 movie version.

Ta’Rea Campbell has several forceful moments as the compassionate nurse Valerie, expressing her divided emotions between sympathy for the young women and responsibility to perform her unpleasant job. Emily Skinner is properly starchy as Susanna’s no-nonsense British therapist. Lauren Jeanne Thomas is delightfully naive as an eager student nurse. She also ably doubles on the bass, flute and violin, along with Felciano who plays the guitar, bass and violin. Andrea Grody is the proficient music director and plays keys and guitar. There are slow patches, but over all, this Girl is a vibrant one.

June 4—July 12. Public Theater, 425 Lafayette St., NYC. Running time: 110 minutes with no intermission. publictheater.org.

Off-B'way Review: Indian Princesses

Serenity Mariana, Haley Wong, Lark White,
Anissa Marie Griego and Rebecca Jiminez
in Indian Princesses.
Credit: Ahron R. Foster

The pain of adolescence and being labelled as different is conveyed with humor and compassion in Eliana Theologides Rodriguez’s insightful comedy Indian Princesses, now at Atlantic Theatre Company’s Linda Gross Theater in a co-production with Rattlestick Theater. The title refers to a father-daughter YMCA bonding program modeled on the Boy Scouts, but as the author explains in a program note, the well-intentioned activity is based on a “pernicious fiction.” An Indian Princess “is an archetype invented to justify the ongoing brutalities of colonization.” Ironically, five middle-school-aged, mixed-race girls spend a formative summer with their white fathers but fall victim to the program’s stereotyping cliches and the cruelty of the other girls’ tribes. The results are a deeper understanding of the young girls’ cultures and uncomfortable confrontations for the dads.

Each of the potential “princesses” and their conflicted pops are drawn with telling details. Andi, the eldest at 12 (entertainingly sullen yet suffering Rebecca Jimenez), longs for more information on her late Mexican Mom. Her macho working-class Anglo father Mac (Pete Simpson, expert at conveying subtext) refuses to open up to her. Whimsical Maisie (delightfully smart and perceptive Lark White), is obsessed with magic and fantasy while her unemployed, unfocused dad Wayne (soulfully struggling Ben Beckley) in an effort to protect from harsh reality, refuses to discuss her African-American background or the history of slavery. 

Anisa Marie Griego and Greg Keller
in Indian Princesses.
Credit: Ahron R. Foster

Well-meaning lawyer Chris (comically blundering Greg Keller) clumsily attempts to interject progressive ideas and attitudes into the gathering and to his strained relationship with his Native American stepdaughters, show-biz-crazy Lily (sweetly show-off-ish Anissa Marie Griego) and shy Hazel (enchanting Serenity Mariana). The group’s heavily religious “Chief” Glen (moving Frank Wood) is torn between keeping “politics” out of the program and acknowledging the raw truth of racism the girls have to face. His granddaughter Samantha (desperate and darling Haley Wong) is wracked with guilt for what she describes as “sinful thoughts.” 

Ben Beckley and Lark White in
Indian Princesses.
Credit: Ahron R. Foster

The Glen-Samantha storyline is the least developed here. We don’t find out why Samantha is living with her grandfather as opposed to with her parents or what she considers sinful. However, Wood and Wong fill in the missing backstory with subtle and layered performances, as does the entire cast. Director Miranda Cornell balances the dramatic and comic moments like an expert juggler. The troupe’s bizarre skit for the Indian Princesses’ Talent Night called “America the Beautiful” is a particularly wonderfully staged and written sequence. Chief Glen has written a wholesome, vanilla-flavored rendition of American history, suitable for a conservative audience. But each of the dads and daughters has their own agenda—Andi wants act on her secret crush on Chris; Chris wants to impose his “woke” sense of  diversity on Glen’s whitewashed version of our national past; Lily sees this as her big opportunity to sing and dance; and slightly embarrassed Wayne and Mac are just looking to bond with their girls. The resultant fiasco is a mess in terms of the story with the kids and parents stepping on each other’s lines, dropping props, and missing cues, but thanks to Cornell’s clear staging we understand each character’s objectives. 

This scene, along with the unspoken dialogue and incomplete sentences that mark the rest of this lovely play, tell us volumes about each of the unhappy daughters and their fathers. They’re all trying to love each other, but so much stands in the way. Rodriguez lovingly chronicles their efforts, failures and attempts to surmount the barrier of prejudice and to celebrate their heritages.

Emmie Finckel’s versatile set recreates a believable community center and the surrounding rustic woods while Mextly Couzin’s atmospheric lighting provides for several different additional locations. This is a beautiful and tender play of healing families and seeking one’s identity.

May 19—June 7. Atlantic Theater Company and Rattlestick Theater at the Linda Gross Theater, 336 W. 20th St., NYC. atlantictheater.org.

Off-B'way Review: Public Charge

Zabryna Guevara in Public Charge.
Credit: Joan Marcus

Though Julissa Reynoso and Michael J. Chepiga’s Public Charge (fittingly at the Public Theater) takes place only a few years ago, this fast-paced docu-play feels like a relic from another era. Based on Reynoso’s experiences as a diplomat under Hillary Clinton’s State Department and as Barack Obama’s Ambassador to Uruguay, Public Charge follows the intricacies and infighting to accomplish meaningful and constructive foreign policy changes through persuasion rather than violence. In our current political moment, the administration blunders into war and bombs targets indiscriminately, eschewing diplomacy or even civility. 

Focusing on the herculean task of Reynoso, Obama and Clinton to reform the US’s entrenched no-contact policy toward Cuba, the play is a primer on how government at the highest level works or doesn’t. We open with an ironic prologue. Eight-year-old Julissa is attempting to emigrate from her native Dominican Republic to join her mother in the US. In an embarrassing interview with immigration officials, her request is delayed for fear she will become a “public charge” or a burden on the state by depending on welfare. We jump ahead several years to see Julissa become an official in Obama’s administration, helping to determine our policy towards Latin America. 

Smoothly and swiftly staged by Doug Hughes, the play shifts around the globe on Arnulfo Maldonado’s versatile set, transformed by Ben Stanton’s lighting, and Lucy MacKinnon’s video design into a plethora of settings from a bodega in the Bronx to the corridors of power in Washington, Havana, and Montevideo.  

Reynoso and Chepiga’s script is short on characterization but long on fast-paced action. Apart from the layered portrayal of Julissa herself (brought to vivid life by Zabryna Guevara), the other personae are given only one or two traits. Career State Dept. official Cheryl Mills is brusque and no-nonsense, constantly telling those under her to “Pause,” dispense with chit-chat, and deliver results. Julissa’s initial superior and later subordinate Ricardo Zuniga, a hard-line anti-Communist conservative from Honduras, exists to represent opposition to her attempts to knock the walls between the US and Cuba. Marinda Anderson and Dan Domingues do their best to bring extra dimension to these roles. Al Rodrigo is more successful as Julissa’s uncle and the pragmatic president of Uruguay. 

Zabryna Guevara, Marinda Anderson,
Armando Riesco and Maggie Bofill
in Public Charge.
Credit: Joan Marcus

Yes, the characters are thin, but the plotting takes up the slack with more twists and turns than an espionage thriller. Just as a breakthrough appears possible, an American aide worker is imprisoned and held hostage by Castro’s government (After five years in captivity, he is finally released.) The roller-coaster ride continues until Obama’s famous declaration of plans to normalize relations with Cuba. Jules celebrates and predicts years of progress under a Hillary Clinton presidency. We all know how that turned out. Despite the downer ending, Public Charge is a vital reminder of the difficult but necessary struggle to make the world a safer place.  

Public Charge: March 25—April 12. Public Theater, 425 Lafayette St., NYC. Running time: 100 minutes with no intermission. publictheater.org.

Off-B'way Reviews: Cold War Choir Practice; Bigfoot!, A New Musical; Chinese Republicans

Alana Raquel Bowers, Andy Lucien, and
Crystal Finn in Cold War Choir Practice.
Credit: Maria Baranova

That distinctly weird, transitional decade, the 1980s, provides the time frame for two wildly funny Off-Broadway productions. This was a time when America was rejecting the liberal ideals of the hippie-Vietnam era and moving into the narcissistic, ego-driven period of “Me first and the rest of you be damned.” Both shows use parody to lampoon the excesses of the time. One examines serious conflicts while the other is a silly spoof. The more complex work is Cold War Choir Practice, Ro Reddick’s imaginative, surprisingly riotous take on Reaganomics, nuclear threats, and race relations co-presented by MCC Theater, Clubbed Thumb and Page 73. Set in 1987 and written with a sharp satiric edge, this insightful and mercilessly dark comedy focuses on African-American adolescent Meek (intense and winning Alana Raquel Bowers) who becomes embroiled in international espionage when she corresponds with a Russian pen pal.

Will Cobbs, Lizan Mitchell, and 
Alana Raquel Bowers in
Cold War Choir Practice.
Credit: Maria Baranova

Matters get complicated when Meek’s estranged uncle Clay (solid Andy Lucien), a prominent black conservative, brings his mysteriously ill white wife Virgie (appropriately shattered Crystal Finn) home to the family’s Syracuse, NY, roller-skating rink for the holidays. Meek’s choir Seedlings of Peace and Virgie’s cultish women’s affinity group are involved in attempting to steal Clay’s state secrets. Meek’s dad Smooch (fiery Will Cobbs) and grandma Puddin (fun and feisty Lizan Mitchell) clash with Clay and Virgie, trying to fathom their family member’s transformation from radical Black Panther follower to Reagan White House advisor. 

Off-B'way Review: The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee

The cast of The 25th Annual
Putnam County Spelling Bee.
Credit: Joan Marcus

In a program interview, director-choreographer Danny Mefford reveals he never saw The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee before taking on its first-ever NYC revival playing now Off-Broadway at New World Stages. His virgin encounter with William Finn and Rachel Sheinkin’s adorable 2005 tuner about a crew of misfit kids vying for the top prize at the titular academic event, is a blessing. He sees the material with fresh eyes and delivers a sparkling, warm, and intimate production. The original production opened Off-Broadway at Second Stage and later transferred to Circle in the Square where it won two Tonys and played 1,138 performances. 

Sheinkin’s quirky book and Finn’s tuneful yet innovative songs combine compassion and humor so that we are laughing with the odd characters but never at them. Mefford’s staging is economical and swift, giving equal weight to all six tween spellers, three supervisory adults and the four audience members recruited to join the contestants. Teresa L. Williams’ colorful and funny school auditorium set, with the aide of David Weiner’s imaginative lighting, accommodates shifts in tone and flashback settings. Emily Rebholz’s delightfully off-kilter costumes delineate character. 

Jason Kravitz and Lilli Cooper in
The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee.
Credit: Joan Marcus

The excellent ensemble skillfully imparts their characters’ eccentricities and displays impressive musical liming (Carmel Dean is credited with the vibrant musical supervision and vocal arrangements). The six spellers are also quite believable as middle schoolers. Most impressive is Jasmine Amy Rogers whose shy Olive Ostrovsky, longing for a deeper connection with her distant parents, is the exact opposite of the bubbly cartoon Betty Boop Rogers played on Broadway last season. Her sweetly aching rendition of “My Friend the Dictionary” is both heartbreaking and heartwarming. Kevin McHale exposes nasally-challenged William Barfée’s arrogance and his vulnerability. He shines in Mefford's hilarious staging of “Magic Foot,” William’s celebration of his secret spelling weapon. Justin Cooley is adorably off-kilter as self-doubting but ultimately self-affirming Leaf Coneybear, drowning in a sea of siblings. 

The cast of The 25th Annual Putnam
County Spelling Bee.
Credit: Joan Marcus

Philippe Arroyo is a riot as Chip Tolentino whose distracting hormones disastrously interfere with his spelling performance. Lana Rae Concepcion delightfully explodes as the high-achieving Marcy Park, finally giving weight to the idea that she doesn’t have to be the top at everything. Autumn Best is enchantingly desperate to please as Loraine Schwartzandgrubenuerre, a frazzled loner eager to be a winner for her two gay dads. Lilli Cooper, Jason Kravits and Matt Manuel bring depth to the spelling bee officials, each with their own neuroses and conflicts. 

This fun and fuzzy production originated at the Kennedy Center, now the center of a political storm. There are some new jokes about the controversy of the President’s involvement with the Center and the COVID pandemic, perhaps provided by Jay Reiss who is credited with “Additional Material.” The topical references add bite, but they are not the main reasons for this revival. It’s the charm, the compassion for outsider kids who enjoy learning and the snappy wit that makes this Bee buzz. 

Nov. 17—Sept. 6. New World Stages, 340 W. 50th St., NYC. Running time: one hour and 45 mins. with no intermission. telecharge.com.

Off-B'way Review: Data

Sophia Lillis, Karan Brar, and Justin H. Min
in Data.
Credit: T. Charles Erickson

Matthew Libby’s Data could have easily become like one of those made-for-streaming spy thrillers in which attractive young techies steal vital software and wind up running through the streets of LA or London after bedding each other. But what the playwright delivers is a thoughtful, complex work exploring scary issues of government overreach and technological eradication of human rights. With the inflammatory national debate over immigration raging on our streets, Data is an important and gripping indictment of the Trump administration’s authoritarian policies and the digital industry’s complicity.

We begin innocently and almost comically with low-level programmers Maneesh and Jonah playing ping pong in the break room of the giant programming corporation Athena. They are interrupted by Riley who works on the higher-up Data Analytics team. At first Libby seems to be steering us into rom-com territory with the alpha-dog Jonah moving in on the aloof Riley—who isn’t interested—and Maneesh attempting to minimize his college relationship with her. (Libby confounds our expectations with dexterity, casually revealing Maneesh is gay and treating this information as a detail and not a vital plot development.) But as we learn more about the secret project Riley is working on and for which she wants to recruit Maneesh, the play takes on dark and dangerous dimensions.