Book Review: The Best American Short Stories 2023

(Ordered from Amazon.com) I took a course in short stories and this was our text. We read two stories each week and then met over Zoom to discuss them. The collection offered insights into so many different experiences and cultures with many of the stories detailing the lives of immigrants from Iran, Ukraine, China, Mexico, etc. as well as stories set in Nigeria, South Africa, etc. My favorite was probably Taryn Bowe's Camp Emeline about a young girl coming to terms with the death of her severely disabled sister as her family sets up a camp for similarly challenged children. Her family is grieving and she doesn't know how to deal with it. She forms an attachment to the bedraggled handyman. Also liked Manuel Munoz's Compromisos, Joanna Pearson's Grand Mal, and Lauren Groff's Annunciation.

B'way Review: Rob Lake Magic with Special Guests The Muppets

Rob Lake (l.) with the Muppets
in Rob Lake Magic with Special Guests
The Muppets
Credit: Evan Zimmerman

“Now this show has some real star power,” declares Miss Piggy, the porcine puppet star, late in Rob Lake Magic with Special Guests The Muppets, now in an abbreviated run at the Broadhurst. The glamorous felt pig is not wrong. The family-friendly special attraction does feature some fun-filled fare for the kiddies, but lacks a strong driving force. Lake himself, who gained recognition as a finalist on America’s Got Talent, is a genial enough presence, attractive and self-effacing, but his demeanor is so mellow and laid-back, his impressive illusions produce mild smiles rather than astonished gasps. Unfortunately, the show has not sold enough tickets to justify its original limited holiday-season run and, after delaying the official opening twice, producers have decided to shutter after only four performances and 15 previews. 

There could be several reasons for this disappointing box-office performance. The high price of Broadway ducats may have kept families with multiple children away. In addition, the similar Jamie Allan’s Amaze! is still running Off-Broadway at New World Stages until Feb. 22 and parents may have opted for the more affordable and intimate alternative. Lake’s efforts suffer by comparison with Allan’s not just in the economy department. Allan’s venture had a narrative arc and structure, offering details on his childhood obsession with legerdemain, his parents’ show-biz credentials as well as the history of magic in vaudeville and popular entertainment. In short, we get to know Allan as a person, not just as a performer. Lake briefly touches on his background, but we are not offered similar insights into his development as a magician. In addition, several of the illusions in both shows are similar.

Rob Lake in his show
Rob Lake Magic...
Credit: Evan Zimmerman

The program credits do not list a director or writer. Lake created and conceived the evening. Bethany Pettigrew is down as “Creative Consultant” and Kevin J. Zak is credited with “Additional Material.” Perhaps a stronger creative hand behind the scenes would have crafted the show into a cohesive whole. As it stands, the illusions do not feel connected and the usually delightful Muppets seem like cameo performers. Kermit the Frog, Fozzie Bear, Rowlf the Dog, Gonzo the Great and Animal the drummer appear early in a taxicab, exchanging slightly amusing banter with Lake. Fuzzy later shows up in a box, delivering elementary-school level gags. It’s significant that Miss Piggy does not show up until much later and her campy, imperial tone is much missed. I did enjoy Gonzo’s quips about the supposedly upper-class Broadway audience as he prepared to be shot out of a canon. “Good evening, Cultural Elite! Here’s a trick you can tell your butlers about!” he cries in the one of the show’s few instances of adult humor.

There is also a guest shot with a current Broadway performer helping out with a pick-a-card trick. Jak Malone of Operation Mincemeat was the celebrity at the performance attended. Audience members are also called upon to ascend the stage to assist in the proceedings and it must be a thrill for them, each seemed genuinely astonished at Lake’s efforts, enhanced by assistants videoing their reactions. Jessica Forcha, Jennifer Orf and Natalie Vatalaro are sexy and vibrant stage assistants. 

Even given the show’s weaknesses, this is a cute distraction for families wishing to expose their children to Broadway. Too bad it will disappear so soon.

Opens Nov. 14 and closing Nov. 16 after 4 performances and 15 previews. Broadhurst Theater, 235 W. 44th St., NYC. Running time: 90 minutes. telecharge.com.

Off-B'way Review: Richard II; Kyoto

Michael Urie in Richard II.
Credit: Carol Rosegg

Michael Urie proves he is as adept at Shakespearean tragedy as he is at musical comedy and TV sitcoms in a powerful staging of the Bard’s Richard II from Red Bull Theater at the Astor Place Theater. Craig Baldwin’s modern dress adaptation has its idiosyncratic flaws, but the central thrust of Richard’s downfall due to his arrogance and lack of empathy comes across with intensity and power.  

Baldwin has set the tale of Richard’s selfish reign and the rise of his rival cousin Bolingbroke in 1980s Manhattan. Rodrigo Munoz’s period-perfect costumes and Bobbie Zlotnik’s wigs and make-up put us in that era of shoulder pads and big hair. Richard and his court are more interested in disco dancing to the Eurythmics and snorting coke than in governing a fractured realm. Also, Coleman does not shy away from Shakespeare’s gay subtext, bringing Richard’s homosexuality out of the closet. This king is clearly carrying on an affair with his cousin Aumerle (sly and slinky David Mattar Merten) and his Queen (a limp Lux Pascal) doesn’t seem to have a problem with that. There’s even a scene set in a steambath where all genders of the king’s court get extremely chummy. 

Emily Swallow, David Mattar Merten,
Grantham Coleman, Michael Urie, and Lux Pascal
in Richard II.
Credit: Carol Rosegg

Baldwin has also switched sexes in some of the casting with the Duke of York and Northumberland rewritten as women (masterful Kathryn Meisle and cunning Emily Swallow). This reversal and other shifts in Shakespeare’s text don’t always work. An imprisoned Richard is seduced by an assassination-bent Aumerle disguised as a stable hand, putting on a tumbleweed Southwestern twang. It’s as if the two are flirting at a leather bar just before Aumerle stabs the king. Because the Duke of York is now a woman, the Duchess’ lines in the last scenes have been reassigned to the Queen, who should be on a boat, returning to her native France after the deposing of her husband.

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. 

Off-B'way Review: Queens

 “I did the best I could,” cries the intense Marin Ireland as Renia, a Polish immigrant struggling to justify her questionable actions in abandoning her daughter while pursuing the American Dream in Queens, Pulitzer Prize winner Martyna Majok (Cost of Living)’s affecting but overcrowded new play presented by Manhattan Theater Club. The anguished declaration comes at the end of the play as multiple storylines involving eight different women leaving their native land and scrapping by to build a remarkable legacy in the US come together. Majok creates indelible characters and heart-tugging plots, but there’s so much going on, the proceedings can get more than a bit confusing. 

Marin Ireland, Nicole Villamil, Brooke Bloom,
and Nadine Malouf in Queens.
Credit: Valerie Terranova

Nevertheless, she makes you feel for these resilient, flawed women by the end of the tumultuous, event-filled evening. Director Trip Cullman’s straightforward, clear-eyed staging, with a big assist from set designer Marsha Ginsberg (more on her amazing environment anon), allows us into this complex world and helps us keep all the stories straight.

The main setting is a crowded basement apartment in the Masbeth section of the titular New York City borough, with a side trip to Ukraine. Ginsberg’s detailed set perfectly evokes the desperate, makeshift life of the characters from the cluttered kitchen to the tiny sleeping areas to the flickering overhead lighting fixtures. Majok trips back and forth in time as well as locale. Initially we are in 2017 Queens as Renia is violently confronted by Inna (heartbreaking Julia Lester), a Ukrainian emigre, who is searching for her mother. (No spoilers, it may or may not be Renia.) From this starting point, we flashback to 2001 when Renia first arrives at the apartment which she shares with Aamani from Afghanistan (Nadine Malouf), Isabela from Honduras (Nicole Villamil) and Pelagiya from Belarus (Brooke Bloom). Eventually we also meet Agata (Anna Chlumsky), also Polish; Lera (Andrea Syglowski) who never makes it out of Ukraine, and Glenys, Isabela’s daughter (Sharlene Cruz). 

Off-B'way Review: Bat Boy The Musical; Oh Happy Day!

Two fantasy-based productions are currently running Off-Broadway, one darkly satirical, the other raucous yet reverential. The campy comedy is Bat Boy, New York City Center’s annual gala presentation, and the roof-raising and religious offering is Oh Happy Day! at the Public. Both have moments of joy, fun, and outrageous theatrical flair.

Taylor Trensch, Mary Faber, and
Christopher Sieber in Bat Boy The Musical.
Credit: Joan Marcus

Bat Boy opened Off-Broadway in 2001. It was one of many funny spoof-ical shows, satirizing pop culture and musical conventions. Inspired by a sensational tabloid story, Keythe Farley and Brian Flemming’s jokey book focuses on a bat-like youngster found in a West Virginia cave. A veterinarian’s family takes the boy in and attempts to assimilate him into their conservative community, but his natural blood lust, not to mention his vampirish appearance, causes issues. Like Little Shop of Horrors, Urinetown, Hairspray, Reefer Madness, and Book of Mormon, the goofy show takes a parodistic tone and Alex Timbers’ confident new staging combines a cartoonish viewpoint with slick professionalism.

Taylor Trensch, Alex Newell, and
Gabi Carrubba in Bat Boy The Musical.
Credit: Joan Marcus

Laurence O’Keefe’s songs still hit the bull’s-eye on their satiric targets, especially as staged by choreographer Connor Gallagher with a tip of the hat to Broadway tropes. The Sondheim-esque “Three Bedroom House” retains its driving energy, reminiscent of “Another Hundred People” from Company, delivered with humor and power by Kerry Butler as Meredith, Bat-Boy’s adoptive mother, and Gabi Carrubba as Shelley, his more than sisterly temporary sibling. (Butler originated the role of Shelley and has beautifully transitioned to the more mature role.)  “Show You a Thing or Two,” in which Edgar aka Bat Boy is given a crash course in history and culture, is a delightful tribute to Eliza Doolittle moments and Main Stem pizzazz, complete with a Chorus Line kick line, courtesy of Gallagher. “Children, Children,” a forest-set sexual fantasy with Edgar and Shelley teetering on the brink of sexual awakening, makes fun of Julie Taymor’s Lion King menagerie. The chorus is transformed into horny woodland creatures, led by a delightfully Dionysus-like Alex Newell as the God Pan. Jennifer Moeller’s crazy critter costumes are a hoot (as is David Korins’ Halloween-ish haunted-house set.)

Subway Encounter #3: A Poem

A singer with a guitar was performing Tracy Chapman’s Fast Car
On the number 7 subway platform at Grand Central
The song always made me cry
But the singer was blurring and mumbling the lyrics
I couldn’t understand them
I tried to remember them and they only came back in snatches
“You got a fast car.”
“Leave tonight or live and die this way.”
“I-I had a feeling that I belonged. I-I had a feeling I could be someone, be someone.”
My eyes misted up.

The train arrived and I entered a near empty car.

Immediately there was an overwhelming smell 

I only smelled it a few times before—always on the subway.

Like unwashed bodies. Like ammonia.

In the corner of the car were two people, a man and a woman, youngish.

The man was black, sitting up,

The woman who was brown-skinned was lying down with her head in his lap. 

She seemed to be sleeping.

She wore a red jacket.

The four other people in the car sat far away from them.

I felt bad for them

They really stank.

I wondered if they just rode on the 7 train back and forth from Shea Stadium to Hudson Yards all day.

When did they sleep? Where did they go? Were they in love or did they just cling to each other for protection with no home outside of the subway?

Once we got into Queens, the car filled up and the smell of other bodies

covered up the couple’s stink.

People sat and stood near them and I couldn’t see them anymore. Did they feel like someone?