Off-B'way Review: The Burning Cauldron of Fiery Fire

Bobby Moreno, Bartley Booz, Cricket Brown,
Donetta Lavinia Grays, Jeff Biehl, and
Bruce McKenzie in The Burning Cauldron
of Fiery Fire. Credit: Carol Rosegg

I was looking forward to Anne Washburn’s The Burning Cauldron of Fiery Fire, a co-production of The Vineyard Theatre and the Civilians playing at the former’s Off-Broadway space. Washburn’s Mr. Burns: A Post-Electronic Play was a clever and moving depiction of a grim electricity-free future where the only entertainment is re-enacting episodes of The Simpsons. Her 10 Out of 12 was a delightfully daffy send-up of tech rehearsals of a struggling theater company. Burning Cauldron has an interesting central premise, but Washburn fails to develop it significantly. None of the characters are relatable. The main action doesn’t go anywhere and its theme is unclear. The play is a rough first draft. Very rough. Steve Cosson’s indifferent direction and the flat performances fail to make up for the script’s shortcomings. By the end of two hours-plus running time, my only reaction was “What a waste of time and talent.”

The first act does show potential. We’re in a farming commune in Northern California. (Andrew Boyce’s homey set imparts rustic charm.) The crunchy-Granola residents’ goals appear to be getting away from the madness of modern civilization, conveyed by the cast reciting natural images of their property Greek-chorus style. One of the members, a painter named Peter (Tom Peckina), dies under mysterious circumstances and his co-habitants don’t want to contact the authorities. Government bad, remember? Milo (Bobby Moreno), one of the many children in the commune, speaks to the audience as a grown-up and informs us that he never liked Peter and also gives his impressions of life in the community from his perspective as a grown man. Washburn seems to offer foreshadowing that Milo had something to do with Peter’s death, also that the child was sexually molested by one of the other adults in the group, but these plot elements are never really developed. 

B'way/Off-B'way Update: Vineyard; Dates for Punch, Oedipus, Chess

Anne Washburn

Vineyard Theater has announced two productions for its upcoming 43rd season. A third winter production will be announced soon. First up this fall is The Burning Cauldron of Fiery Fire by Anne Washburn (Mr. Burns: A Post-Electronic Play) in a co-production with The Civilians and directed by Obie winner Steve Cosson. The story concerns a community living off the grid who must cope with the death of one of its members.

||: Girls :||: Chance :||: Music :|| by Eisa Davis (Warriors concept album) follows in a winter premiere. Tony and Drama Desk winner Pam McKinnon (Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?) directs. Four gifted teenagers collaborate and collide one pivotal summer at a prestigious girls’ music program in Berkeley. As their connections intensify, the world outside thrums with a steady

Eisa Davis

undercurrent of disaster and emergency – and they must find new ways to improvise on stage and off.

In other news, three previously announced Broadway shows have confirmed dates and theaters.

Punch at Manhattan Theater Club's Samuel J. Friedman Theater will begin previews Sept. 9 ahead of a Sept. 29 opening.

The revival of Chess will begin previews at the Imperial Theater (where the original Broadway production ran in 1988) on Oct. 15 in advance of a Nov. 16 opening.

Robert Icke's adaptation of Oedipus starts previews at Studio 54 Oct. 30 and opens on Nov. 13.

Off-B'way Review: Bowl EP

Essence Lotus and Oghenero Gbaje in
Bowl EP.
Credit: Carol Rosegg

When you walk into the Vineyard Theater for Nazareth Hassan’s Bowl EP, a co-production between Vineyard and the National Black Theatre in association with The New Gorup, you’ll certainly be impressed with the elaborate set by Adam Rigg and Anton Volovsek. The entire playing space was been converted into a empty swimming pool with the audience behind mesh fences on all four sides. According to the digital program we are “on the edge of an urban wasteland in the middle of the galaxy.” The hollow bowl of the pool serves as a meeting place for two African-American wannabe rappers, the bisexual Quentavius da Quitter (Oghenero Gbaje), and the transgender female Kelly K. Klarkson (Essence Lotus). They are trying out their skateboarding and rhyming skills. Hassan’s jagged, fragmented script begins promisingly with short, sharp vignettes of Quentavius and Kelly alternating between brainstroming names for their rap group, skating, and flirting with each other through food. Quentavius suggestively offers Kelly a banana, an apple, and a sandwich. The scenes are punctuated with brief titles, or tracks as in a music album, in different type faces projected on the floor of the empty pool (Zavier Augustus Lee Taylor created the eye-popping video and projection design.)

Essence Lotus and Oghenero Gbaje in
Bowl EP.
Credit: Carol Rosegg

The two grow gradually closer and slowly reveal their damaged past as they try out various meaning-laden catchphrases for their rap duo’s name (Dad’s Vomit, Dead Mothers, Michael Jackson’s Accusers). It’s almost as if they talking in code, hiding their true feelings. The dialogue is funny and tender, Hassan’s direction is well paced and subtly undercovers subtext as does the acting by Gbaje and Lotus. Gabje’s shift in tone from jovial wisecracking to sober recollection when the topic of sexual abuse is introduced is shattering. Plus the two are pretty nifty skateboarders. 

But about half-way through the play’s 85 minutes, the proceedings take a bizarre turn and what started off as a moving love story of two alienated outsiders reaching out to each other through their love of rap and skateboarding turns into a confusing jumble. A third character pops out of an opening in the pool and

Essence Lotus and Oghenero Gbaje in
Bowl EP.
Credit: Carol Rosegg

takes over. She is dressed like a cosplay version of a Japanese anime character (DeShon Elem created the flashy costumes) and identifies herself as Lemon Pepper Wings. Presumably she represents Quentavius’ inner demons and dominates the action until the end of the play. She forces Quent and Kelly to live out their dreams by performing a rap concert. (Free Fool is credited with the intense infectious music.) Then Lemon Pepper performs an act of symbolic violence on the two (literally ripping their guts out) and explains their tragic fates in a powerhouse monologue. Felicia Curry delivers a stunning performance as this force of nature. She manages to convey the essence of longing, passion and self-hatred and still portray a credible character rather than a symbol. 

Unfortunately, for the latter half of the play, Hassan tells us about the two rappers’ unhappy story instead of showing us. Lemon Pepper Wings’ long speech which is half abstract concepts and half storytelling, goes on too long and interest in Quentavus and Kelly is lost. The set and the skateboarding are fun, but they are not enough to maintain a fully-fleshed work.

May 18—June 22. Vineyard Theater and National Black Theater in association with The New Group at Vineyard Theater, 108 E. 15th St., NYC. Running time: 85 mins. with no intermission. vineyardtheater.org

Off-B'way Reviews: Liberation, The Antiquities

Susannah Flood and Betsy Aidem in
Liberation.
Credit: Joan Marcus

The trouble with most “issue” plays is the characters seem more like animated talking points, rather than complex, flesh-and-blood human beings. Fortunately, Bess Wohl’s Liberation (at Roundabout’s Off-Broadway Laura Pels Theater) does not fall into this trap. Wohl addresses the feminist movement, where it has succeeded and where it has failed. You might suspect from the play’s basic structure, she would employ a checklist of stereotypes to examine the different aspects of the topic. But each of her characters is a unique individual.

Wohl begins with what appears to be a fairly obvious device: a narrator, Lizzie, greets the audience while the houselights are still up and explains she will be leading us into a memory play about a 1970s female consciousness-raising group founded by her mother, also named Lizzie. “We’ve lost something,” the 2025 Lizzie tells us, “and how do we get it back?” The implication is that recent years, the women’s quest for equality is moving backwards, best exemplified by the new Trump administration and its rejection of the concept of DEI in the workplace. But there’s also a personal dimension. By reenacting her mom’s early forays into the Women’s Lib movement, Lizzie hopes to find out why her parent chose the path of traditional marriage and motherhood and did not continue on the road to individual identity.

Audrey Corsa, Irene Sofia Lucio,
Kristolyn Lloyd and Adina Verson in
Liberation.
Credit: Joan Marcus

Lizzie plays her own mother in the flashbacks (once the lights have dimmed) and the other members of the group could easily have been characterizes as types, but Wohl adds depth to all with telling details and ambivalent motivations. There’s Margie, the conventional housewife who has been performing domestic duties for her entire adult life and is ready to cut her husband’s throat. That’s a joke, she laughs, but is it really? Attractive Dora is subjected to humiliating male chauvinism at her wine-selling job and feels pressure to marry. Radical African-American activist Celeste struggles with her identity as a black woman within a predominately white movement. Rootless Susan lives in her car, having been rejected by her family, and finds her ultimate freedom on a beloved motor-bike. Fiery Isidora is an Italian immigrant trapped in a green-card marriage, ready to explode the oppressive patriarchy by any means necessary. Harried mom Joanne appears to reject the group’s intentions, but she has several valid points to make and plays a deeper role than you might expect. And there is Lizzie herself (the mother) torn between a career in journalism (though she is relegated to covering weddings and obituaries) and marriage with Bill, the sole male in the play.

B'way Update: Outsiders Musical, Vineyard Season

Cast members of The Outsiders
at La Jolla Playhouse
Credit: Rich Soublet II

A new musical based on The Outsiders,  S.E. Hinton's young-adult novel about rival teen gangs in 1967 Oklahoma, will be opening on Broadway this spring after a world premiere production at the La Jolla Playhouse in Feb.-March of this year. Oscar winner Angelina Jolie will be among the lead producers. Previews begin March 16 at the Bernard B. Jacobs Theater prior to an April 11 opening. Danya Taymor (Pass Over) directs. 

The Outsiders is regarded as a classic in young-adult literature and has been named by BBC News as one of the 100 most influential novels and was voted one of 100 Best Loved Novels in PBS' Great American Read. Francis Ford Coppola directed the 1983 film version which made stars out of Matt Dillon, Patrick Swayze, Emilio Estevez, Tom Cruise, C. Thomas Howell, Ralph Macchio, and Diane Lane. There was also a short-lived TV series in 1990.

B'way Update: Dana and Room To Play in Rep, Etc.

The new post-shutdown Broadway season just got really interesting. In an unexpected and startlingly different move, two highly-praised, but bizarre Off-Broadway plays will transfer to Broadway to be performed in repertory. Tina Satter's Is This A Room and Lucas Hnath's Dana H. will alternate performances at the Lyceum Theater with the former beginning previews on Sept. 24 and opening Oct. 11 and the latter commencing previews on Oct. 1 and 

 Is This a Room? (top) and Dana H (bottom)
will alternate performances at 
Broadway's Lyceum Theatre
(Credits: Carol Rosegg; Craig Schwartz)

opening Oct. 17. The dual-show engagement will play until Jan. 16, 2022. Both plays were presented at Vineyard Theater as part of the foreshortened 2019-20 season.  

Each presentation is unique and not your typical Broadway fare. Is This A Room, directed and conceived by Satter, concerns the real-life Reality Winner (her actual name), an Air Force linguist who was imprisoned for leaking information that the Russians interfered in our 2016 Presidential election. The entire 70-minute play is composed of transcripts from her FBI interrogation and the search of her home. Emily Davis repeats her stunning performance as Reality. She won an Obie and was nominated for a Drama Desk Award and the production won a Drama Desk Award for Unique Theatrical Experience.

Dana H. is also based on actual events and transcripts. The playwright's mother Dana was abducted and held captive in a series of Florida motels for five months. Deirdre O'Connell lip-synchs to recordings of an interview conducted with the real-life Dana and directed by Obie winner Les Waters. The production was interrupted by the COVID shut-down and O'Connell won the Obie, Drama Desk, Outer Critics Circle and New York Drama Critics Circle awards.