Category Archives: Broadway
These ‘Fallen Angels’ are Beautiful, Starring Rose Byrne and Kelli O’Hara
When Noël Coward’s comedy Fallen Angels was first performed in London, an official who was a censor in the Lord Chamberlain’s office denied its license because the married female characters had licentiously cavorted in premarital sex and planned to commit adultery. Only until the Chamberlain personally intervened, was the hilarious, slapstick comedy given its license and performed.
Far from being an “unpleasant play,” as critics suggested in 1923, Coward’s early work reveals his ingenious wit and love of turning situations on their heads. In this, Julia Sterroll (Kelli O’Hara) and Jane Banbury (Rose Byrne), riotously turn to alcohol to get up the courage to see Maurice, an old beau both were madly in love with at different times. When their affairs with Maurice ended, they married spouses who were the opposite of their lover and settled down. But the aftershocks of their love are very much ever present and cause the old friends to be jealous of one another, which they keep just under the surface of their close relationship. Then the “green-eyed monster” rears its ugly head when Maurice announces he is coming to visit them turning their settled lives inside out with riotous consequences. Fallen Angels is currently spreading its joyous, madcap delight at the Todd Haimes Theater through June 7, 2026 in a limited engagement.
O’Hara’s Julia and Byrne’s Jane are left to their own entertainments when husbands Fred (Aasif Mandvi) and Willy (Christopher Fitzgerald) go off on an overnight golf outing. After a relaxed breakfast with Fred before he leaves for golf, Julia brings up a divorce reported in the papers. With this theme of the end of love announced, Julia tells Fred she loves him but is not in love with him, Fred avers. His ego is upset that the passion and sex have gone out of the relationship, and companionship has taken its place as Julia suggests. Coward has cleverly set up the farcical conceit which he will play upon with wit, whimsy and alcohol, throughout the comedy because as it turns out, Jane feels similarly about her husband Willy.
Are the women teasing their spouses or are they serious about Julia’s suggestion she is not in love with Fred and Jane’s presentment that disturbs Willy? Clearly, the men don’t feel the same and still love their wives, they believe, and passionately. And why not? O’Hara ad Byrne are lovely. On the other hand their husbands, thanks to hair and make up by David Brian Brown and Victoria Tinsman, are not gorgeous Leo DiCaprio types to swoon over. They have aged and are not their wives physical equivalents.
Not only is this a casting coup, by director Scott Ellis, it ridicules a patriarchal, cultural more in relationships and marriage about what is appropriate. It is incumbent upon lovely women to pretend that average looking men are “sexy” and “attractive,” if they have money and status. Clearly, the money and status are the alchemy that transforms the men’s looks. Also, clearly, Julia and Jane are younger than their husbands, another more that Ellis’ casting takes a swipe at.
After all, a wealthy older man with money is not to be seen with a status-downer, i.e. a fat, older woman (sorry, this is the psycho culture). The younger, more beautiful the woman he is with (eye candy), the more the average-looking man’s status and attractiveness increases. Of course the absurd end result of this is one-sided. Heaven forbid, if women practice the same and seek out younger men or more attractive men around their age as Maurice is. Abomination! Ellis takes advantage of these unspoken cultural folkways and enhances Coward’s wit because of his choice of the attractive TV persona he casts to play Mauice Duclos, their old flame, who is to- die-for-adorable in comparison to their husbands. He causes the fallen angels to fall more quickly and deeper into the abyss of “shame.”
Julia and Jane have married up for money. They have most probably compromised and settled for Fred and Willy, though if the situation was right, they easily would have gone with Frenchman Maurice if he proposed. Their husband’s wealth and status are revealed from their lifestyles, thanks to David Rockwell’s set design, a lovely Art Deco apartment with a balcony, large paintings, columns, appointments, and an eye-popping chandelier.
Their period costumes, dressing gowns, street clothes, evening gowns and accessories, designed by Jeff Mashie, show their personalities and economic status. Only Byrne could wear the deep emerald green, silky, long gown to cavort around in and look totteringly-elegant as the champagne, wine and cocktails wreck her balance. O’Hara’s pratfalls include sliding belly-front down a flight of stairs in a lavender gown with cinched waist and chiffon, floor-length skirt. She is beyond riotous. Both are dressed to the nines after having blown up their imaginations with expectation of the passion to come with their former lover.
Saunders (Tracee Chimo), their prodigiously qualified and hyperbolically talented servant bests then at every turn of a glass of alcohol. Chimo’s Saunders, a new hire, is smashing in the role of the foil, the straight woman whose sincerity at showing up the “angels” with her knowledge of piano, opera, languages, her prior appointments to exotic places, her infinite talents, and her expertise as a chef and efficient servant is breathtaking. Saunders deserves every tuppence she makes and reveals she is five times more accomplished than the leisure trad wives Jane and Julia who, by comparison, are useless toys, perishing of boredom. Chimo’s Saunders also has preternatural hearing and anticipates where Jane and Julia are going, a function of her job, which they find annoying because all they discuss is Maurice. Indeed, Saunders must not hear them go on and on. This sets up more Coward wit when the women change the subject to outrageous topics to throw off Saunders’ sniffing out their over-the-moon conversation about Maurice’s visit, which they fear will never come and must get drunk to salve their over-excited imaginations at the mere thought of him.
The mayhem and gradual explosion of their drunken riot is beautifully timed, staged and wrought. Byrne and O’Hara are world-class comedians.
The hilarity really explodes after the set up when the women wait for their beloved Maurice to appear before dinner, singing his praises, and drinking, and singing his praises during dinner, and drinking, and singing his praises, and drinking after dinner. As they drink, eat and swoon over Maurice, they are interrupted by phone calls which drive them to more drink because everyone but Maurice calls. Finally, even they become overwrought with their own fantasies and turn against each other, the jealousy manifesting. Jane stumbles and storms out. Julia is beside herself thinking Jane is meeting Maurice behind her back which ratchets the excitement and wild comedy toward the heavens.
Who will calm the situation down? Not the husbands. In shock at Jane’s treason Julia spills the beans to Willy, who conveniently shows up moments after Jane huffs out. He questions where his wife is. At the height of the chaos, when Fred and the wayward, back-stabbing Jane return, there’s another twist. The two women unite to fawn off their husbands’ probing queries about their antics. It is then that Coward, perfectly read by Scott Ellis, reveals the pièce de résistance. In walks the stunning Maurice, every inch the living fantasy brought to life in Mark Consuelos, who is having the time of his life. The audience was thrilled to see him. Indeed, he is Julia’s and Jane’s equivalent, but not for marriage, for love and passion.
Interestingly, the implication is that neither Julia or Jane would be adverse to a ménage à trois, if the situation wandered in that direction. Coward suggests this inherent possibility at the conclusion when Jane and Julia follow Maurice upstairs to see his apartment. (Ironically, he has moved into their building.) This most probably was another unspoken reason why the British censor withheld the comedy’s license. Seventy years later since Fallen Angels appeared in the U.S. the play has found its moment.
Fallen Angels runs 1 hour 30 minutes with no intermission at the Todd Haimes Theater though June 7, 2026. roundabouttheatre.org.
‘Fear of 13’ Starring Adrien Brody in an Incredible Tour de Force
Based on the titular 2015 documentary directed by David Singon, The Fear of 13, directed by Davd Cromer is a prison drama with twists that upends easy assumptions. With Adrien Brody portraying Nick Yarris who spent years on death row. Brody is assisted by the wonderful Tessa Thompson as Jacki Miles, Yarris’ friend, confidante and spiritual lover until she isn’t. The two portray individuals who help each other and then acknowledge they must end their relationship because they have had enough of waking up to dreams that have no hope of manifesting. Currently, the play runs at the James Earl Jones Theater through July 12, 2026.
Written by Lindsey Ferrentino the production opens against a dark stage with a spotlight on Brody who speak as an everyman, Man 1. He discusses the nature of time’s variability: “a blisteringly fast thing, where in the blink of an eye – ten years are gone from your life, but the next week is agony.” “… then you look out the window …and it takes all day for the sun to go down…”
This theme about time relates to Brody’s Yarris who has an intimate, hyper-conscious knowledge of time as an inmate on death row. It is in this setting that we experience events through his perspective and the horrors of incarceration on the death row cell block in a prison in the state of Pennsylvania. On death row where time can’t be “done,” it exists in a state of suspension. On the one hand “time is of the essence,” as the appeals process runs for years and the men like Yarris wait for exoneration or execution. On the other hand, when the final result is achieved, it’s a matter of days to the inmate’s release or death.
We learn about Nick Yarris’ time constructs as the play unfolds and the lights come up on death row, Arnulfo Maldonado’s black, wall cell block with lights by designer Heather Gilbert suggesting the men housed behind the impassive doors closing out freedom. Against this backdrop, the plays events unfold in flashback as Nick Yarris relates his amazing story to Jacki Miles. Cromer stages various events in scenic vignettes with props (Tessa’s home, a pawn shop) but the bulk of the scenes take place against the dark, prison backdrop. Jack’s ability to speak to volunteer Jacki is one of the miraculous occurrences that happen to Nick, who was just out of teenagehood when he received his death sentence.
Ironically, the theme about time reflects the play’s pace. Toward the conclusion from Yarris’ perspective time slows to a crawl. But in the beginning time moves at a clip. Yarris relates events that Cromer theatricalizes when volunteer Jacki Miles visits and eventually has sessions with Yarris alone, becoming a friend. Cromer stages his visits with Jacki stylistically with minimal fan fare, as he stages Nick’s interactions with his appellate lawyer Beau Mullen (Victor Cruz) and others. Nick’s interactions in the prison setting are powerful and terrifying, thanks to Cromer’s direction and the ensemble’s superb acting.
During Nick’s one hour visits with Jacki, he tells her that death row used to be a place where they were buried alive, as Lieutenant Walker (Jeb Kreager) tells him, “you’re already dead.” The inhumanity he experiences is egregious and the play advocates for an end to the death penalty as punishment, as well as an end to the horror of the traumatic, abusive prison atmosphere and barely livable conditions. To make matters worse, when Nick first arrives, there is no redress; there is no communication between or among prisoners or others. When Nick is encouraged to speak by Walker after he’s told he can’t and Nick answers “yes” out of politeness, Walker punches him in the stomach.
Nick tells Jacki about the brutality and sadism of the guards who abuse the inmates to instill hopelessness and fear to keep them in line. He intimates the guards’ personal satisfaction at beating those who can’t fight back to bolster their “masculinity.” Of course the guards allow the prisoners to harm each other and don’t protect them.
When Nick describes a brutal murder he witnessed in the shower, Nick asks whether Jacki believes him. She hesitates. He tells her his assigned appellate lawyer Mullin didn’t believe him either. When Nick mentions he’s been waiting 7 months for the appeal process to begin, Mullin tells him coldly, “Before you go on, know that I am a Christian… and an officer in the U.S. Army, and so I fully support the death penalty.” Then Mullin tells Nick, “You are guilty due to overwhelming evidence.” The play turns into the abyss as we watch hope leave Nick and are swayed to believe Mullin’s comments that Nick raped and murdered a woman. Nick doesn’t speak or communicate to anyone for two years. Years later when Nick shares Mullin’s comment with Jacki, she leaves abruptly and we note she realizes she is speaking to a killer and a rapist. Why would she ever return?
However, she does. As Thompson’s Miles continues to visit Nick, though she questions herself, she drives miles to see him. Clearly, a bond forms and as a result Nick is able to tell her how everything changed when they found drugs in the music room and gay lovers Wesley and Butch, who were in the men’s choir, were moved into their cell-block temporarily. Brody’s Nick moves between the present with Thompson’s Jacki to the past as he relates the situation between Wesley (Ephraim Sykes) and Butch (Michael Cavinder). The scene is powerfully drawn and theatricalized, thanks to the superb acting by Sykes and Cavinder and the ensemble who sings creating a high point emphasizing how Nick’s hope is stirred. Even the guards change after the event. Communication is allowed and volunteers like Jacki are brought in.
The events well staged by Cromer are thrilling and more adventures follow as Brody actualizes Nick’s story and makes us hope that Nick, who says he is innocent, gets off on DNA evidence. Brody is mesmerizing, heartfelt, amazing. Thompson gives him a superb performance to exchange emotional resonance against. Brody conveys the extremity of emotions that Nick goes through with each encounter as he smashes into the penal system and shocked, we empathize with him. We learn how Nick is able to maintain his psychological well-being because he reads voraciously. It is his reading which brings his discovery in 1988 about DNA being used. Nick, tells Jacki he is innocent. And he affirms his innocence saying, “If DNA is getting people convicted, why can’t it get people released?” Then he tells Jacki, “I love you.”
The interaction is another turning point in a series of unexpected occurrences, one of which is Nick’s incredible escape during a sheriff’s transfer which the ensemble humorously activates. Unfortunately, the adventure ends up in Nick’s arrest and return to death row. But gradually, Nick reveals his life to Jacki and together they work to unravel “the evidence” that Mullin said was overwhelmingly against him, but which they find out is non-existent. Then, the action and events slow down to stasis. Mullin employs the use of DNA evidence and we understand that Mullin is right when he says the process can take a long time. But undeterred, Jacki’s and Nick’s love blossoms. She receives his calls from home and their hopes and anticipation lead to a marriage in prison.
The problem is neither Nick nor Jacki understand the import of Mullin’s words about the DNA process. And it is at this juncture when the play has been unfairly criticized for dropping its pace. At this point the themes about time’s variability apply and “ten years are gone from your life, but the next week is agony.” It is at this juncture that we realize how “it takes all day for the sun to go down.” We and the characters agonize. Yet, Nick cannot reveal his deepest secret to Thompson’s Jacki: the mystery of how and why he ended up doing drugs, getting kicked out of his house, stealing cars and getting arrested by a cop which led to his incarceration on death row. Sadly, she never finds out. But we do and in Nick’s revelation of trauma and darkness, his salvation comes.
The Fear of 13 runs 1 hour 50 minutes with no intermission through July 12 at the James Earl Jones Theater. thefearof13broadway.com.
.
‘Titaníque,’ the Crazy Romp on the High Seas is Unfathomable, Riotous Genius
The story how Titaníque moved from a concept to a concert, gained momentum traveling from venues to its final ascension to premiere on Broadway, garnering awards along the way, is as miraculous as the survival of any passengers from the ship it is named after with a French-Canadian flourish. Thanks to its solid team who adore Céline Dion and her music, their ingenuity, prodigious talents and playfulness couldn’t resist a parody of the 1997 blockbuster film Titanic. If imitation is the highest form of flattery, then Titaníque, which is at the St. James Theater through July 12, surely “represents.”
At the top of the zany, fanciful musical, tourists come down the audience aisles and go onstage to enter the museum of the Titanic to view the artifacts collected, and learn the history. All of a sudden, who emerges but Céline Dion (Marla Mindelle) dressed to the sparkling gold nines, looking every inch a star, because she is a star, and she has a new gig. She’s rocking-out a re-imagining of what happened on the Titanic that seems vaguely familiar if you saw the James Cameron film starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslett.
However, surprise! You didn’t see it this way, through the perspective of Dion with references to Ru Paul’s Drag Race, Rent, A Chorus Line and more, spilling out its fun-filled, chaotic, pop-culture vibrancy into the audience. They hop on the roller-coaster for the thrills, jokes and clowning and never want to get off. As Mindelle’s Dion tells it, she was was on the doomed Titanic, though it’s an impossibility, because she would be over 150 years-old. However, through her mega-watt celebrity, force of personality, our suspension of disbelief and love of farce, she convinces the audience she was there to bring us her LOL version of events.
Quickly, the time reverts to the early twentieth century and we see the costumes of the period (Alejo Vietti) which are simply, tastefully designed so that Dion’s over-the-top, gold lame-like outfit outshines the other women’s outfits, maybe with the exception of Molly Brown (the anointed Deborah Cox plays a feisty Unsinkable Molly Brown with Kathy Bates’ riffs) and Ruth De Witt Bukater (a phenomenal Jim Parsons who enjoys being in drag every moment). Parsons who wears a hat with two large birds, that are presumably live because he refers to their incontinence, portrays the cruel, broke, “aristocratic” mother of Rose (the lovely Melissa Barrera). Parson’s Ruth is not adverse to physically slapping the disobedient Rose (leaving two feet of airspace between them) as Ruth’s hand makes contact with Rose’s cheek in the perfect timing of “slapstick,” seamlessly shepherded by Tye Blue.
By this time, the curtain has long fallen away to show the innards of the ship with scaffolding, erector set, lighted beams (Gabriel Hainer Evasohn & Grace Laubacher for Iron Bloom Creeative Production and Paig Seber lighting design). The band is situated upstage center with an elegant, lighted staircase on either side, and a balcony connected to the stairs where Mindelle’s Dion sometines narrates events. The director also stages her on the balcony for signature songs from Dion’s well known music catalogue. She is helped by the glorious cast whose voices are top-notch under Geoffrey Ko’s music direction.
Intruding into the action and serving as the guide to “what really happened” with ad libs, one-offs and her endearing, audience- interactive, Dion essence, Mindelle supervises and sings. She is the glue that holds the show together. Mindelle originated Dion’s character. She also co-authored the show with actor Costantine Rousouli (the heroic and romantic Jack Dawson), and Tye Blue who also directs. Titaníque is every inch a farce that speeds from beginning to end, covering most of the important scenes from the film sending them over-the-top and into gales of audience laughter.
Not one character escapes farcical treatment with bits that actually reference the film and take the opportunity to send up the characters’ foibles with affectionate humor. Frankie Grandie who plays Luigi from the Mario Brothers gaming universe perfectly, also plays Victor Garber, the actor who portrayed the Titanic’s architect in the film. John Riddle is LOL boorish and always behind the 8-ball, as Rose’s fiance Cal Hockley. Rousouli’s Jack Dawson, Rose’s escape hatch from a disastrous betrothal with Cal, makes reference to his “bootleg Newsies outfit. The tight, form-fitting khakis feature his muscular, dancer’s athleticism and hottie persona. As Dawson, Rousouli’s costume offers Mindelle’s Dion a chance to make an untoward advance toward him, winking at the audience which she lovingly plays to throughout.
From the very beginning Mindelle shatters the fourth wall with ease and capitalizes on the audience energy to stoke their response and in turn find new ways to electrify her performnce. She is a comedian with superb timing, waiting for the audience to get the humor which they always do. Yet, Mindelle’s superb voice faultlessly vibes with Dion’s musical instrument and stage presence. She manages to be adorable and funny at the same time as she does high fives with the front row at the conclusion.
As the ship steams toward disaster and Rose and Jack go to steerage and enjoy the dancing with the poor folks who will perish, then consummate their love, the iceberg is looming and ready to take Victor Garber’s poorly designed ship to the ocean bottom. In an enlightened moment, the creators decided to “soften the blow” of the cataclysmic event by casting a ferocious performer as the iceberg who knows how to sing “hard” like a b&tch. Layton Williams dressed in a glorious, white, spiky wig (Charles G. LaPointe) and Tina Turner-type rhinestone drag outfit made just for him, cavorts with fury, sings and dances raucously and amazingly to bring on the riot. Williams who won the UK’s Olivier Award for “Best Actor in a Supporting Role in a Musical” kills the part with comedy, dance and song a la Tina Turner. His height-defying split perfectly lands and is just smashing, which is what Williams’ Tina Turner iceberg does to the ship.
Every aspect (from spectacle to performances, voices, dancing {Ellenore Scott’s choreography}) of this gobsmacking show is worthy of its second 2025 Olivier Award for “Best New Entertainment or Comedy Play.” It is no coincidence that the show continues to draw crowds in a time where much-needed live farce holds a special place in audience hearts to stave off the dire headlines and news stories that beat the same egregious drum of our sinking ship of state. Thankfully, there’s live theater to offset censored news which, if truth be told, is probably much worse than what is reported. In contrast even the rats refuse to desert Titaníque. They are having too much fun.
Titaníque runs 1 hour 40 minutes through July 12 at the St. James Theater. titaniquebroadway.com.
‘Becky Shaw’ Brilliant Acting, in a Mind-blowng Play
Becky Shaw is titled for the female character who shows up one-third of the way into the play written by two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist Gina Gionfriddo. The character Becky Shaw is the linchpin that sets the hellish interactions in motion as the wheel goes round in this profoundly drawn comedy of dark complications. When the pieces of the puzzle fit at the conclusion revealing who the play is actually about, the revelation shatters. Perhaps the adage people are hell (a theme of Jean Paul Sarte’s No Exit) has validity here. For by the conclusion we certainly see the hell continuing into the future of all the characters Gionfriddo sets in motion in her tight, sardonic, superbly woven comedy. Smartly directed with pace by Trip Cullman, the Broadway premiere of Becky Shaw currently runs at the Helen Hays Theater through June 14, 2026.
We expect the opposite of darkness at the top of the play as Gionfriddo brightly introduces us to the sharp retorts and humorous thrust and parry between family/friends Suzanna (Lauren Patten), a psychology grad student and Max (Alden Ehrenreich), a money manager handling her recently deceased father’s estate. It turns out these two have been like family for over twenty years for Max was adopted by her father. So they grew up together and know each other’s insides and outsides and count on each other in a symbiotic way for emotional support and purposefulness. Max runs interference for Suzanna, helping her with her imperious, controlling mother Susan (Linda Emond), who, to Suzanna’s disgust, has taken up with a younger opportunistic man because she has money and needs him emotionally, sexually and psychologically.
During Suzanna’s and Max’s discussion of Susan, her man and the family’s dwindling finances, we understand how domineering, remote and unavailable Susan is when she drops by Suzanna’s room to talk to her daughter and Max. After her snide remarks to Suzanna, Susan makes her demands known, ignores Max’s explanation why funds had been siphoned from the family business by their accountant, and leaves after stating she will be taking Lester with her to dinner and everywhere else, especially her bed. Bereft at losing her father though he passed four months ago, Suzanna turns to Max for comfort. And he is there for her in a way he never was before, assuring her it will not change their relationship.
Because of their close family dynamic, Max’s comedic, ironic responses as the wiser person and Suzanna’s dependence on him, though there is only one year difference in age, sets up the next step into intimacy. This doesn’t surprise and seems natural when Max assures Suzanna sex is not as she suggests “epic,” and it doesn’t have to change anything as they make love. Unexpectedly, the stage crew upends Max who initially watches with surprise then helps them as they move in tables and chairs and rearrange the room (David Zinn’s excellent, symbolic design displaying Cullman’s insightful vision.). Max exits following Suzanna as the former hotel room in New York City becomes Suzanna’s apartment in Rhode Island, months later. Strangely during the set up, a skier in a jazzy, hot outfit zooms across the stage. In the next scene we understand this transition.
The scene opens into a modest apartment with the same dark walls as the hotel room reflecting the lack of prosperity and luxury because of the family’s diminishing finances. However, we expect to see Suzanna and Max follow up their new found intimacy in better digs since Max has money, but that’s not the case. Gionfriddo effects a bend in the characters’ journeys when we note Suzanna has a new man whom she met on the ski slopes. In a whirl wind romance, she marries the younger office worker and unproven writer Andrew (Patrick Ball), on the rebound from Max and mourning her father’s death. Andrew manages to distract her, somewhat, but thing have indeed upended from Max and Suzanna’s sexual encounter which was “epic,” after all.
Suzanna’s needy personality forces her to move from the familiar Max who loves her but hesitates, to Andrew, whose kindness and savior complex propels her with little thought to permanently coupling. This marriage to someone she doesn’t know opens the door to Becky Shaw (Madeline Brewer), Andrew’s co-worker, a college drop-out though obviously smart. Down on her luck, with little money, no car and the desperation to prove herself less of a loser at thirty-five because of bad life choices, Becky Shaw manipulates others with an eerie, savvy, innocence.
Andrew’s savior complex draws him to needy women like a dog to bacon, so he listens to Becky’s problems. With Max nearby in Boston on business, Suzanna and Andrew arrange a double date with independent, prosperous Max and the needy, pretty Becky. Knowing the sardonic, Max as intimately as she does, with his no nonsense snarkiness and duty-bound obligation to her mother, we wonder how Suzanna could set Max up after their intimacy. Additionally, how could she agree to Andrew’s co-worker who is more Andrew’s equal than Max’s? Without thought Andrew and Suzanna agree to this date for Becky and Max clearly for their own ulterior reasons whether they realize it or not. Max’s hilarious, blunt comment about Becky’s dress (Kate Voyce’s costumes) dials up the initial introductions to tense, though Suzanna and Andrew front for her. But the double date fizzles because of a complication with Susan. So Becky and Max go out on a town Max doesn’t know and Becky can’t afford.
Gionfriddo’s characterizations are incredibly rich, nuanced and perceptive. Humorously apparent are the foibles of people trying to extricate themselves from emotional mine fields while endangering themselves the more they attempt escape. And so it goes for the men who fall prey to Becky Shaw’s steely velvet machiavellian femininity and Suzanna’s hapless fear of being alone.
The introduction of Becky Shaw into the family dynamic brings another turning point. Becky’s smarmy desperation has found new, welcome ground upon which to seed itself. Cleverly, she mines an unfortunate incident that happens on their dinner date, which she exploits as an irresistible damsel in distress who needs salvation twice. One salvation is from the upsetting incident which she believes Max mishandled. The second is from inconsiderate Max who is not particularly empathetic or responsive to her charms to answer her numerous phone calls and soothe her soul. With his behavior as proof that she is a loser, her desperation sends her to the brink. She must be rescued from her misery, and the white knight to do it is Andrew, who feels guilty for introducing her to Max and is thus responsible to help her get over her distress and impulse to self-harm.
Meanwhile, when Suzanna’s fear of losing Andrew to Becky manifests, she involves Max. She chides him for Andrew’s sake and on Becky’s request. The mounting chaos erupts like a volcano. It will take someone of Susan’s ironic gravitas and queenly stature to “save the day.” With her threat to Suzanna that Andrew may cheat on her, to allowing Becky to wait at the house instead of at the train station so she can be around Max, Susan encourages the same dependency, fear and desperation she feels with Lester to be unleashed on Max and Suzanna via the subtle machinations of Becky and Andrew. For future entertainment to assuage her chronic illness, Susan will referee and make presumptuous determinations about the two couples.
If not for the exceptional ensemble, and perfect timing of one liners and Cullman’s expert shepherding of the actors, Gionfriddo’s work would not soar into the heavens as it does. Cullman’s vision, especially the changing of scenes (Stacy Derosier’s lighting and M.L.Dogg’s sound design) conveys themes and symbolism. The contrast between the darkness of the city hotel rooms and the couple’s apartment against the creme colored beige decor and appointments of Susan’s upscale house in Richmond, Virginia reminds us of the safety and security of wealth even on the downhill slide to someone like Becky who is on the edge of poverty.
Financial problems create desperate individuals who prey upon those with money. The irony at the conclusion is that Max has the wealth and holds the cards, but he becomes the most vulnerable to be exploited, not only financially but psychically. Alden Ehrenreich gives an amazing portrayal of a character who we feel has the most to lose. Predators Becky and Andrew will bind up Max and Suzanna with each manipulation, demand and velvet gloves of domination, as Susan watches and criticizes. What we’ve seen is only the beginning.
Becky Shaw runs 2 hours 25 minutes through June 14 at the Helen Hayes Theater. 2st.com.
Jon Bernthal, Ebon Moss-Bachrach in ‘Dog Day Afternoon’ Humorous, Riveting
Murphy’s Law (what can go wrong, will go wrong) upends the plan of 3 bank robbers reduced by one who is high on drugs, forgets a shot gun and leaves in a panic literally sh&tting his pants, while apologizing for being unable to do any of what Sonny (Jon Bernthal) asked him. Also, he didn’t bring the getaway car, but took the subway instead. If this isn’t the makings of a gonzo, botched, bank heist, it just may be the makings of a riotous play. However, don’t compare it to the film it is based on.
Sonny can’t believe that the evacuating Ray Ray (Christopher Sears) dumped their well-made plans into the toilet. Indeed, what other situations will be turned over in the Broadway premiere of Dog Day Afternoon at the August Wilson Theater running through July 12, 2026? Directed by Rupert Goold (Ink), Stephen Adly Guirgis (Pulitzer-prize winning Between Riverside and Crazy) wrote the script. He based it on the article “The Boys in The Bank” written by P.F. Kluge and Thomas Moore, published by Life Magazine, and the titular Warner Bros. film directed by the impeccable Sidney Lumet. The production softens the film’s tension and danger and adds humor that provokes raucous laughter.
I’ve resisted the temptation to compare the urgency and depth of the iconic 1975 film with this production that leans heavily on irony and humor to convey a wild situation in a 1972 New York City, itself under siege. More enlightened critics have drawn contrasts and found the play seriously wanting. Judging from the audience’s response the night I saw the production, Adly Guirgis and Goold succeeded in creating a vehicle for friends Bernthal and Moss-Bachrach (TV series The Bear) who elucidate Sonny and Sal with their exceptional talents. They emphasize the “haywire” in a bank heist inspired by real events.
Gould and Adly Guirgis have kept the setting of Brooklyn, 1972 with a few updates in ideas and language (oligarchs substituted for the rich). However, the tone of the play is vastly different from the film which critiqued the social issues looming throughout the decade and became a landmark for cultural reform by creating sympathy for its LGBTQ characters. In this production Sonny’s wife is played convincingly with humor and pathos by Eseban Andres Cruz to reveal Sonny’s explosive relationship and foreshadow the inevitable conclusion.
In light of the state of the world’s particular horrors, the play’s memorializtion of that time in a deteriorating New York City becomes eerily soothing. The tone that borders on farce feels safe. We can look at a less problematic time where decency abides. It’s in the character of Detective Fucco (John Ortiz), and Colleen (Jessica Hecht) and security guard Mr. Eddy. And it’s reflected in Sonny. Ironically, the sinister, cynical, cold cruelty of the FBI’s Sheldon (Spencer Garr), reflects today’s cynical law enforcement. Overall, the production succeeds with its sometimes riotous approach, sterling performances by Bernthal, Ebon Moss-Bachrach, Hecht, Ortiz, fine ensemble work, and period set, lighting, great music selections and sound design (David Korins, Isabella Byrd, Cody Spencer).
The set design features a revolving stage which effects the exterior 1972 bank facade on the streets of Gravesend, Booklyn. The stage swivels to the bank’s interior of teller’s stations, seating area adjacent to the office manager’s desk and a view into the vault upstage.This set design effectively engages the audience when Sonny steps outside to address the crowd in the play’s most theatrically satisfying moment. Outside the bank Bernthal’s Sonny dynamically, humorously chides the cops. He invites the crowd (audience members) to participate, rousing their enthusiasm. Various passages of Adly Gurirgis’ seminal writing resonate for us today as Sonny’s works the crowd who identify with his truth.
Cops in the audience aisles point their guns at Sonny while he says, “All this show of force — all this shit — it ain’t for me! They don’t need a whole army of blue bozos to put two in the back of my head — bag me, tag me — this is for you people! Make no mistake. They wanna scare you!” As we cheer him on, Hecht’s Colleen encourages him with the word “Attica!” which he shouts arms raised in remembrance of the prisoners and hostages who unjustly were shot by law enforcement in the 1971 riots.
The one-off jokes arise from the situations that Gould pulls off with fine pacing. Bernathal explores Sonny’s vitality, electric energy and sociability as the mastermind manipulator who thinks on his feet, corrects what goes wrong as it happens, all the while capitalizing on helpers like flirtatious older Colleen who becomes a friend. She is LOL when she decides it’s more fun to stay behind, though Sonny offers her the chance of being the first released hostage. Ironically, the other tellers joke amongst themselves that the one least liked should go first. This is the most adventure they’ve had in their lives. Clearly, they believe Sonny when he repeatedly assures them no one will die, a statement that runs counter to what Sal and Sonny privately agreed to.
Because of the light-handed approach, there is a reduction of the overall tension and danger which essentially has been left to the character of Sal (Ebon Moss Bachrach) to convey. Additionally, Sonny and Sal are pitted against the dark, insulting Sheldon and Feds as the enemy, a current theme today. Moss Bachrach thoughtfully portrays emotionally broken Sal as the former convict with PTSD from his prison experiences. His attendant nihilism has left him with two bad choices: worse crimes (Sonny’s hair-brained robbery) or suicide vengeance, taking others with him. Even though Mr. Eddy was accidentally shot when Ray Ray dropped the gun, having guns in an armed bank robbery in which a security guard was shot, means more prison time that Sal tells Sonny he won’t do.
As circumstances progress, the more the charismatic Sonny shines socially even creating a weird Stockholm Syndrome effect with Colleen (Jessica Hecht), the more Sal loses the bond he thought he formed with Sonny. Abruptly, Sal ends Sonny’s love fest. With an edgy brutality he stomps out the congenial atmosphere and stomps on the donuts that John Ortiz’s Detective Fucco gets them. It’s an important moment when the fun stops and the audience are reminded of what he is capable, though Sonny might not be as desperate.
When Lorna (Wilemina Olivia-Garcia) tries to calm him with a Boston creme doughnut, we are frightened when he says, “I’m not your friend. He’s not your friend. And this — this ain’t no fuckin’ picnic, got it?” We realize Sal has chosen and will probably stir that choice unless the congenial Sonny with his positivity and charisma convinces him to calm down. Sal’s speech to Sony about his speaking “words” in a manipulation resonates with power. He’d like to believe Sonny about a helicopter escape, but he can’t because he knows all too well Sonny is a con artist and his words don’t ring true.
Dog Day Afternoon runs 2 hours 15 minutes through July 12 at the August Wilson Theater, Manhattan; dogdayafternoon.com.
John Lithgow in ‘Giant,’ a Towering Triumph in a Giant of a Play
Roald Dahl, beloved British children’s author and poet, has sold more than 300 million copies world wide. He has been called “one of the greatest storytellers for children of the 20th century.” Dahl was also a self-proclaimed anti-Semite. How could a tender-hearted children’s author who answered children’s letters and nursed his wife back from death, be a bigot? The answer to this question turns the drama Giant by Mark Rosenblatt into thrilling, dynamic and controversial theater. Acutely directed by Nichols Hytner and designed by Bob Crowley, Giant runs in a limited engagement at the Music Box Theatre until June 28, 2026.
Mark Rosenblatt’s thought-provoking and slippery play about Dahl takes place in 1983 in the deconstructed living room of Dahl’s family home in Buckinghamshire, England during a summer afternoon. At the odd moment workers who renovate upstairs, pepper the quiet with loud bangs thanks to Darron L West’s sound design, which supports the set design, an undressed living room awash in plastic curtains, boxes and a table and chairs. The cacophony drives John Lithgow’s Dahl up the wall as he discusses the final draft of his latest children’s book, Witches, with Tom Maschler (Elliot Levey). Tom, the managing director of his British publisher, counters Dahl’s complaints with cheerfulness and irony.
With this foray into book corrections we get a glimpse of the terrific John Lithgow’s best selling children’s author responsible for Mathilde and James and the Giant Peach to name a few. Rosenblatt painstakingly constructs the direct, intrusive style of the author with specificity. We note that Dahl listens to every word and humorously spits out whiplash retorts. Apparently, he finds fun in provocative wordplay and enjoys stirring argument.
Lithhgow, who has gotten inside the skin of Dahl and walks in his shoes comfortably, reveals Dahl’s steel-trap mind, and his prickly personality, a mine field to carefully navigate with eyes open. His adversary Mrs. Jessie Stone (Aya Cash), discovers by the play’s end that his cheeky, dark, playfulness should not be underestimated as silly or childish. Indeed, his actions reveal intention. His demeanor may be dismissed as egotistical and inflexible, but it can also be described as adamantine regarding his convictions, however wrong-headed one may think them. On closer investigation Dahl is the giant that should not be self-righteously challenged. He must be responded to in like kind to bring out his generous, sensitive heart to receive the best results for all involved.
Tom and Liccy, Dahl’s long-time lover and fiancée (Rachael Stirling), have learned to smartly counsel him. And this particular day of aches and pains and banging and agitation requires that he be subtly “managed.” Grumbling about royalties, Dahl waits for Jessie Stone, the sales representative from his American publisher. Prompted by the publishing house, she visits to discuss a scandalous review he wrote that exploded with negative press into a death threat by a “crank-caller.” The book Dahl reviewed was God Cried by Catherine Leroy and Tony Clifton. It concerns the 1982 siege of Beirut, Lebanon where Israeli soldiers killed 22,000, mostly Lebanese women and children.
An RAF fighter pilot who shot down German Junker 88s during WWII, Dahl knows the death threat was from a coward because “genuinely violent people don’t call beforehand.” He remains nonplussed, despite Liccy and Tom’s concern, but he keeps the hired policeman stationed outside to protect his family. Furthermore, he dismisses the impact of his review. Later in the play Liccy implies he knew what he was doing and avoided discussing it with her because she would have moved him to take out his inflammatory statements.
Gradually, we learn of the trouble Dahl caused for himself as Liccy and Tom discuss how to “make the stink go away.” Liccy quotes the “Spectator’s” Paul Johnson, who said Dahl’s book review was, ‘The most disgraceful thing to be written in the English language for a very long time.” Though Tom dismisses Johnson as “a hysteric,” Liccy says the criticism about Dahl is “everywhere. All the rags. Left and right.” The point seems to be how badly this will tank his career, reputation and book sales without an apology.
However, we don’ t know what Dahl wrote in his book review until after Jessie arrives. Her mission is to run interference, reveal the fallout in the United States and get Dahl to make a statement, at best, disavowing his objectionable comments so the company’s profitability and launch of Dahl’s Witches goes swimmingly.
The controversy begins when Dahl asks if she’s Jewish, a question Liccy gently chides him about because of its rudeness. However, Jessie’s answer about her name change from Stein to Stone helps Dahl consider how he should proceed. Does she feel attacked by Dahl’s remarks which she deems antisemitic because they are anti-Israel? Dahl’s provocative question rankles her. A cut-out of his review with her accusatory notes scribbled on it that falls out of her son’s book she wished him to sign provokes him.
Rosenblatt sets up the mounting drama conveniently. Tensions increase as Jessie backs Dahl into a corner and the celebrated author reacts defensively. In a private moment Tom criticizes Jessie for not keeping quiet and for not “managing” Dahl away from his incendiary impulses. If only she had returned Tom’s call so he might have debriefed her about how to best conduct the meeting which now, crashes and burns.
As adversaries, Cash’s Jessie and Lithgow’s Dahl electrify the audience to side with their opinions as the characters take their stands. Obviously, Dahl feels justified about condemning Israel for its heartless massacre in the siege of Beirut. He will not amend his comments, one of which stated, “Never before in the history of man has a race of people switched so rapidly from being much pitied victims to barbarous murderers.” But by the end of Act I Cash’s Jessie counters his view with forceful righteousness. She points out Israel’s response to Lebanon’s attack as self-defense. And, she takes umbrage with Dahl’s blaming all Jews for the actions of Israeli soldiers. Additionally she reminds Dahl that 400,000 Israeli citizens condemned and protested the attacks, “protested Sharon, and the Supreme Court forced him out of the army.” The audience responded to Cash’s Jessie with applause and cheers the night I saw the play. She wins a vital, personal victory in her confrontation with Dahl.
Her remarks, however forceful, propel the second act into darker rumblings, her conciliation, Dahl’s growing uncertainty about his remarks, and further attempts by her, Tom and Liccey to get Dahl’s apology on the record. When Liccy reveals his antisemitic comments may inhibit his investiture, Dahl hesitates for her sake, though he dislikes the thought of doing a “begging” interview before a committee to qualify for a knighthood. Further insights into Dahl’s character in a conversation with his gardener Wally, reveal a kind, loving individual who Wally counsels to be himself. But in his last conversation with Jessie, she cannot resist provoking him with one final salvo about how she responds to this experience with Dahl.
Unwittingly, she escalates Dahl’s anger with the revelation of a “white lie” that pushes Dahl over the edge. He sees what he now must do in a final response to the press in remarks which he will not take back. He proclaims his antisemitism with a caveat and qualification, easily overlooked because he mentions Hitler. Only long after his death does the family apologize. How and why he responds to a white lie that Jessie reveals clues us in to his identity. Depending upon how one perceives the portrayal of events, Rosenblatt’s alignment of Dahl with a giant found in his stories, may be interpreted a number of ways in this memorable, wonderfully acted, tragically current play.
Giant runs 2 hours 20 minutes through June 28 at the Music Box Theater, gianttheplay.com.
Daniel Radcliffe Smashes it in ‘Every Brilliant Thing’
Every Brilliant Thing starring the inimitable Daniel Radcliffe in a solo, interactive performance as The Narrator succeeds on many levels. The show has become a global phenomenon and has been performed for over a decade. Presented Off Broadway at the Barrow Street Theatre in 2014, it finally landed in its Broadway Premiere at the Hudson Theatre. The joyous, hybrid comedy/drama runs through May 24, 2026.
Written by British playwright Duncan Macmillan as an initial 15-minute monologue the play evolved into a longer work with Jonny Donahoe. Over the years culturally diverse cities and theater companies around the world performed the piece with male and female “Narrators,” tailoring the particularities of the list to various cultures, which playwrights included in the notes. These provide a fascinating and humorous read.
The usually triggering subjects of suicide and depression swallow easily because Radcliffe’s Narrator introduces the topic from the innocent perspective of a seven-year old. The production becomes an extended flashback of The Narrator’s life with delightful, often humorous audience participation seamlessly woven into his storytelling. Not understanding his mom’s profound desolation, The Narrator relates how he tries to joggle her out of depression during her initial hospitalization. He attempts this by giving her his “list of life’s brilliant things,” the first being “ice cream.”
The Narrator flashes back to key turning points related to his mom’s first act to take her own life. These parallel the expansion of “the list” which develops a life of its own. While eventually enumerating hundreds of thousands of great things, ironically, the narrator is no closer to understanding his mom’s mental state. Additionally, he is in denial about his own depressed, isolating behaviors and ignores his beloved partner when they try to alert him to go for help. However, recognition is the dawn of his enlightenment. With both sorrow and joy he confronts the devastating and untenable impact of his mom’s condition upon his and his father’s lives as the play ends.
What makes this production so special is its humanity, love and the encouragement conveyed by Radcliffe as he elicits enthusiasm from participating audience members. Because they’re thrilled to be a part of this experience on Broadway, the show manifests a unique, communal vibe. It begins when the first audience member shouts out in response to Radcliffe’s “#1,” their response, “ice cream.” They do this from the balcony, or the back row, or audience left, or wherever the person is who has the paper with #1 written on it.
Amazingly, Radcliffe sentience is tuned like a seismograph to audience members’ locations and responses and discomforts, if any. Prepared for the unpredictable with “in the moment” spontaneity, Radcliffe’s performance can’t be quantified. It’s breathtaking, ineffable, divine genius.
In addition to Radcliffe’s numbered shout-outs, he guides the participation of lucky folks who help him tell the segments of The Narrator’s life. These include a vet, a librarian, an old couple, his dad, his partner, his college professor that Radcliffe selects. Interestingly, The Narrator’s mother never appears. The enigmatic mom cannot be known, nor does anyone ever portray her.
The key players in his life circle around Radcliffe’s Narrator on stage. To their surprise Radcliffe sits next to a few of them or asks them to perform at crucial moments. In one example the vet gives his suffering dog a shot (a pen was used the night I saw it), to ease him out of the world. These electrifying moments happen magically as audience members anticipate being ready for anything as they stand before Radcliffe, who demonstrates great good will. They pay attention and listen acutely, taking their lead from him. What results brings humor, uplift and surprise. What happens comes at the whim of the audience members who Radcliffe entrusts to trust him in whatever they do together.
Directors Jeremy Herrin and Duncan Macmillan shepherd Radcliffe to prepare by selecting audience members as they arrive. Some might be visiting actors though there are no plants. The audience members’ parts scripted by the playwrights leave the freedom for ad libs, jokes and funny or somber retorts. Some of the unique responses even tickle Radcliffe. As he moves through The Narrator’s stages of development from teenager to adult, the list becomes an afterthought that he unearths unwittingly or others (his partner) give him. In reflection about his “childish” perspective, Radcliffe’s Narrator questions the list ‘s efficacy. Did it help to mitigate his mother’s extreme ups and downs? Did it startle his unemotional, undemonstrative father into a more responsive relationship with his family?
Clearly, the list’s intended result fails. But what does succeed are the positive unintended results of the list as a light that shines for however long because others he meets and befriends keep it going as an uplifting fulfillment of hope. For example the list even has a Facebook page that you might add to if invited.
One of the high-points of Every Brilliant Thing occurs when the Narrator meets his partner. In rehearsals, Radcliffe and the directors considered every contingency for the segment which moves The Narrator’s relationship from the first date, to a wedding, to a marriage to a split. The night I saw it, the lovely audience member he selected as his partner glowed. And Radcliffe’s energy played back the enthusiasm and transmitted it to the audience. The Narrator achieves a high not experienced before as his parents show their love and acceptance happily dancing at his wedding.
Another fun moment occurs when Radcliffe’s Narrator runs around the audience, attempting to “high five” everyone. However, his “manic” peak immediately craters into the downward spiral of a depressive state. Even the Narrator’s list in the hundreds of thousands of brilliant things can’t stop his “peaks and valleys” from happening like they happened to his mom.
The play must not be underestimated because of its elements of easy enjoyment. Powerful and understated themes of silence, and the inability of the sufferer and those impacted to connect, help or effectively confront the crisis, gently thread throughout. The fun comes with the audience’s effervescence. Yet, the playwrights take pauses identifying convenient truths and salient information tucked in by The Narrator when the audience takes a breath between laughs. What is known of the mind that takes its own life? The Narrator leaves many unanswered questions. Evident underneath is the pain which clarifies when no specific information about his mom, his parent’s relationship and The Narrator’s emotions ever comes.
Every Brilliant Thing runs 1 hour 10 minutes with no intermission, through May 24, 2026 at the Hudson Theater. everybrilliantthing.com.
Carrie Coon and Namir Smallwood are Frightening in Tracy Letts’ ‘Bug’
She’s a cocktail waitress. He’s a Gulf War vet. When they get together they create an unforgettable relationship in Tracy Letts’ sometimes comedic, mostly compelling psychological drama Bug, currently making its Broadway premiere at Manhattan Theater Club’s Samuel J. Friedman Theatre through February 8, 2026. Aptly directed by David Cromer for a maximum thrill ride, Agnes (Carrie Coon) and Peter (Namir Smallwood) gain each other’s trust in a world that increasingly threatens to destroy them.
Stellar performances by Coon (The White Lotus, The Gilded Age) and Smallwood (Pass Over on Broadway) carry the production through a slow build first act into the harrowing intensity and climactic finish of the second.
Letts’ chilling drama unfolds in a motel room on the outskirts of present-day Oklahoma City. Scenic designer Takeshi Kata features a typical mundane bedroom with cream colored walls and complementary cheesy lamps and appointments that spell out Agnes’ challenged socioeconomic position. By the second act, after a time interval during which Agnes and Peter panic and go through stages of emotional terror, the room’s once benign look transforms to a place whose inhabitants are under siege.
At this point Kata’s design shocks. It is then we understand how badly the situation has progressed in the minds of the characters .
At the top of the play we meet Agnes who lives in the motel room hiding out from her violent former husband Jerry Goss (Steve Key) an ex-convict. As Coon’s Agnes and her lesbian biker friend R.C. (Jennifer Engstrom) do drugs, R.C. warns Agnes to protect herself against Jerry whose prison release she questions because he is dangerous.
Ironically, Agnes asks about the background of the stranger using her bathroom. R.C. vouches for Smallwood’s Peter who she brought with her as they make their way to a party that R.C. also invites Agnes to. While R.C. is on the phone with personal business, Peter assures Agnes he is “not an axe murderer,” and expresses an interest in her.
Instead of going to the party with R.C., both Agnes and Peter decide to hang out together and talk, feeling more comfortable getting to know each other than being in a larger crowd. It is during these exchanges and Peter’s staying overnight at Agnes’ invitation that her emotional neediness clarifies. When Jerry shows up, they argue and he hits Agnes. After Jerry leaves, Peter’s attentiveness draws her closer to him. As Agnes and Peter settle in and do drugs, they share secrets and bond. Increasingly Agnes’ perspective shifts. She accepts Peter’s world view and personal reality despite its extremism.
Though Peter says he should go, Agnes uses his hesitation to encourage him to stay, insisting upon it. She makes a symbolic gesture that clever viewers will note conveys her acceptance of Peter because of her emotional desperation more than a belief in his perspective and backstory.
In the next act we see the extent to which Peter has made himself comfortable living with Agnes whose resolve against being with Jerry has strengthened because of her relationship with Peter. Because their concern and care for each other resonates with trust, Peter relaxes into himself. He examines his blood under a microscope and finds “proof” of a conspiracy theory that the government uses military vets and unsuspecting individuals as guinea pigs to experiment on. With convoluted half-truths about government cover-ups related to the war in Iraq, Oklahoma City bombing, the Tuskegee syphilis experiment and more, he panics, fearful that aphids bite him and Agnes, feed off their blood and infest their living space.
Convinced that egg sacks have been planted in him by doctors who also monitor and follow him with helicopters because he has gone AWOL, he persuades Agnes to accept his “bug” theory that he grounds in explanations. Together, they plan a way out of the infestation which has taken over their bodies and minds.
To complicate matters Dr. Sweet (Randall Arney) shows up and explains Peter’s medical case with R.C. and Jerry to legitimize taking Peter back with him to “Lake Groom.” Letts offers the intriguing possibility that there may be many truths about this situation. But without independent investigation and research, belief takes over. Whether Peter is part of an experiment and a guinea pig or not, Agnes expresses her love for him comforted by their bond which gives her life meaning. Within the horror of the infestation, they have found their emotional sustenance. Their relationship is their sanctuary from life’s pain.
Cromer’s vision and his shepherding of the fine performances by Coon and Smallwood make this stylized production all too real and terrifying. Thematically current, with various cultural attitudes related to government cover-ups, and conspiracy theories stoked by the questionable motives of those in power, the creative team’s efforts (Heather Gilbert’s lighting design, Josh Schmidt’s sound design) hit the sweet spot of relevance.
Though written decades ago, in Bug Letts intimates how and why certain women embrace what others deem to be their partner’s extremist perspectives. Wounded and seeking love, women like Agnes more easily accept their partner’s ideas, rather than search for facts and proof to dispute them. Governmental cover-ups of the truth fan the flames of extremist belief systems. The consequences can be socially and culturally devastating.
Bug runs 1 hour and 55 minutes with one intermission at the Samuel Friedman Theatre ( 47th St. between 7th and 8th) https://www.manhattantheatreclub.com/shows/2025-26-season/bug/
The Fine June Squibb Heads up the Stellar Cast of ‘Marjorie Prime’
When Marjorie Prime by Jordan Harrison opened Off Broadway in 2015, starring Lois Smith, it appealed as science fiction. Since then the use of various forms of artificial intelligence to support human behavior have become ubiquitous.
Reinforcing this new reality the playwright and director Anne Kauffman dusted off the prescient family drama and shined it up for its Broadway premiere with few changes to the script. Maintaining the prior production values, director Anne Kauffman works with set designer Lee Jellinek, sound designer Daniel Kluger and Ben Stanton’s lighting design to create the almost surreal and static atmosphere where AI takes over the lives of a family and exists for itself in the last scene.
The production runs at the Helen Hayes Theater with the superb cast of June Squibb, Cynthia Nixon, Danny Burstein and Christopher Lowell through February 15. They are the reason to see the revival.
On one level the excellent performances outshine the themes of Marjorie Prime which deal with death, identity, the grieving process, artificial intelligence and more. The science fiction aspect of the play, so striking before, has diminished.
Yet, Harrison’s conceit that AI holograms might be used to reconcile the death and loss of a loved one still fascinates a decade later. Our culture fights death and aging with its emphasis on ageless appearance, looking 25-years-old at the chronological age of 90-years-old. Some other cultures have a healthier approach, viewing the acceptance of death and aging as a normal part of life cycles. However, with technological advancements, regardless of the culture or country, AI will have its uses in the battle against disease, dying, death and mourning.
The “Primes,” in Marjorie Prime are the spitting image of loved ones at a particular time in their lives. Created by the company Senior Serenity to help the bereaved get through inconsolable grief, Marjorie’s family believes a holographic duplicate of husband Walter will help her adjust to his death. The replica keeps her engaged, sentient and interactive, unlike passively watching TV.
Walter Prime (Christopher Lowell) duplicates the younger, good-looking Walter in his thirties. Happily, he reminds her of the distant past, not the more recent, sick and dying Walter. The hologram’s programming and presence also help stir Marjorie’s memory, complicated with dementia. A work in progress, Walter Prime evolves based on the information that 85-year-old Marjorie (June Squibb), her daughter Tess (Cynthia Nixon), and son-in-law Jon (Danny Burstein), give him about Walter and Marjorie’s life together.
Thus, at the top of the play Walter Prime and Marjorie discuss movies they went to, for example, My Best Friend’s Wedding, which Marjorie has forgotten until Walter tells her the synopsis. The spry 96-year old Squibb, who made her Broadway debut playing one of the strippers in Gypsy (1959), portrays the spicy, funny, confused, chronologically younger woman with a failing memory, an irony that amused me to no end. Squibb is just terrific.
As Marjorie’s identity and memory dim, Walter Prime builds up the identity of Walter with her help. However, Harrison’s play raises questions about this process and never answers them. For example, how much information has Walter Prime been fed prior to his engagement with Marjorie, Jon and Tess? How can Marjorie be expected to keep track of information from before their marriage into their elderly years with her failing memory? Won’t she feed him incorrect details?
Indeed, facts and details shift and Marjorie confuses the truth. An imagined past becomes easier to accept with one’s husband “Prime” fed information by others. This problem never resolves. Neither does Tess’s incomplete acceptance of Walter’s function to stimulate Marjorie, the supposed benefit that Senior Serenity, the company that made him, affirms. The impatient, edgy Tess doubts Walter’s usefulness, but the upbeat Jon thinks that he helps improve Marjorie’s engagement and memory.
When Walter Prime’s presence annoys Tess, Jon accuses her of jealousy. Does Marjorie prefer Walter over Tess, who must nag her mother to eat and “obey” her in the reversal of mother/daughter, parent/child roles? Losing her autonomy Marjorie must rely on Tess and Jon in her living arrangements and personal care needs.
As Jon, Marjorie and Tess converse in Jellick’s minimalist, living room-kitchen combination that lacks futuristic style, Walter Prime sits on a sofa in the living room. He waits in a “listening mode” ready to interact when needed.
For his part Jon is positive about Walter’s impact on Marjorie. As the scene progresses, Tess mentions after an interval that her mother surprisingly recalls a situation long buried in pain. We learn the specifics of this later in the play. Some of the action referred to happens off stage. (i.e. Tess and Jon take Marjorie to the hospital after a fall).
Guided by the “Primes,” who Harrison sequences to move the action forward, time jumps. Marjorie has died and Jon and Tess engage Marjorie Prime to help console Tess and move her through her bleak depression and grief at her mom’s passing. After that we learn through Jon’s conversation with Tess Prime what transpired with Tess. In the various scenes Nixon’s Tess gives a heartbreaking speech about her mother, memory and imagination which sets up the rest of the play. Burstein’s Jon listens and responds with an uncanny authenticity. Both are superb.
Since the “Primes” “live” forever in holographic form until someone decommissions them, they occupy the home in the last scene. Jon is elsewhere, so Walter, Tess and Marjorie converse among themselves having been given life from their human counterparts as an ideal, evolved “being.” Eerie perfection.
Marjorie Prime runs 1 hour 15 minutes with no intermission at the Helen Hayes Theater on 44th Street until the 15 of February. 2st.com.
Lesley Manville and Mark Strong are Mindblowing in ‘Oedipus’
Just imagine in our time, a leader with integrity and probity, who searches out the truth, no matter what the cost to himself and his family. In Robert Icke’s magnificent reworking of Sophocles’ Oedipus, currently at Studio 54 through February 8th, Mark Strong’s powerful, dynamically truthful Oedipus presents as such a man. Likewise, Lesley Manville’s lovely, winning Jocasta presents as his steely, supportive, adoring help-meet. Who wouldn’t embrace such a graceful couple as the finest representatives to govern a nation?
Sophocles’ classic Greek tragedy, that defined the limits of the genre and imprinted on theatrical consciousness the idea that a tragic hero’s hubris causes his destruction, evokes timeless verities. In his updated version, Icke, who also directs, superbly aligns the characters and play’s elements with today’s political constructs. Icke retains the names of the ancient characters. This choice spurs our interest. How will he unravel Sophocles’ amazing Oedipus tragedy, especially the conclusion?
Cleverly, he presents Oedipus as a political campaigner of a fledgling movement that over a two-year period gains critical mass. The director reveals Oedipus’ backstory in a filmed speech to reporters on the eve of the election. The excellent video design is by Tal Yarden.
During his speech Oedipus goes off book and makes promises. Though his brother-in-law Creon (the fine John Carroll Lynch) tries to stop him, proudly Oedipus shows himself a man of his word. He galvanizes the crowd when he states he will expose the lies of his opponents. Not only will he reveal his birth certificate (an ironic reference to President Obama), he will investigate the mysterious death of Laius. The former leader from decades ago married Jocasta when she was a teenager. After Laius’ death, Oedipus meets and marries Jocasta despite their age difference. Over the years they raise three children: Antigone (Olivia Reis), Eteocles (Jordan Scowen) and Polyneices (James Wilbraham).
How has Oedipus become the people’s candidate? Without ties to the political system, he speaks a message of reform and justice. Indeed, he will override the corrupt, derelict power structure. Former leaders served their rich donors and let the other classes suffer. Oedipus runs on a mandate of equity and change.
After Oedipus’ speech, the curtain opens to reveal the campaign headquarters that staff gradually dismantles as the campaign phase ends. To signify the next phase the countdown clock, placed conspicuously in scenic designer Hildegard Bechtler’s headquarters, ticks away the seconds down to the announcement of the winner. As the clock ticks toward zero (an ironic symbol), the contents of the campaign war room are removed like the peeling of an onion to its core. As the destined announcement of the winner nears, gradually, the revelation of Oedipus’ true identity happens. Icke has synchronized both concurrently.
Icke’s anointed idea to shape Oedipus as a newbie politician, whose actions and words are singularly unified in honesty, resonates. He represents the iconic head of state we all yearn for and believe in, forgetting leaders are flesh and blood. Of course Icke’s flawed tragic hero, like Sophocles’ ancient one, results in Oedipus’ prideful search for the truth of his origin story and Laius’ cause of death.
Oedipus’s determination is spurred by the cultist future-teller Teiresias (the superb Samuel Brewer). His authoritative and relentless drive to prove Teiresias wrong, despite warnings from Creon and Jocasta, shows persistence and courage, positive leadership qualities. On the other hand, Oedipus doesn’t realize his search has a dark side and his persistence is stubbornness prompted by a prideful ego. This stubbornness causes his destruction. His pride leaves no way out for him but punishment.
Because the truth is so horrid, Strong’s Oedipus can’t suffer himself to cover it up. In searching to validate his true self, he discovers the flawed human that Teiresias proclaims. Indeed, he is more flawed than most. He is lurid; a man who killed his father, married his mother, and had three children born out of love, lust and incest. He can never be the leader of the nation. He must hold himself accountable after he sees his debased true self. How Mark Strong effects Oedipus’ self-punishment is symbolic genius. Clues to Jocasta’s end are sneakily tucked in earlier.
Because of Icke’s acute shepherding of the actors, and the illustrious performances of Manville, Strong and Brewer, with the cast’s assistance, we feel the impact of this tragedy. The love relationship between Jocasta and Oedipus, drawn with two passionate scenes by Manville and Strong, especially the last scene, after they acknowledge who they are with one, long, silent look, devastates and convicts.
Those who know the story feel a confluence of emotions at the irony of mother and son lustily loving and pursuing their desire for each other off stage, while Oedipus delays speaking to his mother Merope (Anne Reid). Manville and Strong are extraordinary. Both actors convey the beauty, the wildness, the uniqueness and enjoyment of their characters’ love, that is unlike any other.
In the last scene when Strong and Manville untangle from their hot grip, clinging to each other then letting go, they acknowledge their characters’ unfathomable and great loss. Manville’s Jocasta crawls away to reconcile the enormity of what she has done. In her physical act of crawling then getting up, we note that fate and their choices have diminished their majestic grace. Their sexual likeness to animals, Oedipus ironically referenced earlier with family at the celebration dinner. Through the physical staging of the final sexual scene, Icke recalls Oedipus’ earlier comparison.
As a meta-theme of his version Icke reminds us of the importance of humility. The more humanity presents its “greatness,” the more it reveals its base nature.
All the more tragedy for Oedipus’ supporters and the unnamed country. Because fate catches up with him and conspires with him to cut off his acceptance of the position he rightfully won, the nation loses. All the more sorrow that the truth and his honest search is what Oedipus prizes, even more than his love for Manville’s Jocasta, the brilliant, equivalent match for Strong’s Oedipus.
Rather than live covertly hiding their actions, both Oedipus and Jocasta hold themselves accountable with a fatalistic strength and nobility. Initially, we learn of her strength as Jocassta tells Oedipus about her experience with the evil Laius (a reference to current political pedophiles and rapists). We see her strength in her self-punishment. Likewise, Oedipus’ strength compels him to face his deeds where cowards would cover up the truth, step into the position and govern autocratically censoring and/or killing their opponents who would “spill the beans.” Oedipus is not such a man. It is an irony that he is a moral leader, but is unfit to lead.
Icke’s masterwork and Manville and Strong’s performances will be remembered in this great production, filled with ironic dialogue about sight, vision, blindness and comments that allude to Oedipus and Jocasta’s incestuous relationship and downfall. Those familiar with the tragedy will get lines like Jocasta’s teasing Oedipus, “You’ll be the death of me,” and her telling people she has four children: “two at 20, one at 23, and one at 52.”
Though I prefer Icke’s ending in darkness with the loud cheers of the supporters, I “get” why Icke ends Oedipus in a flashback. In the very last scene the date is 2023, the beginning of the end. We watch the excited Oedipus and Jocasta choose the rented space (the stripped stage) for their campaign headquarters. The time and place mark their disastrous decision which spools out to their destruction two years later. I groaned with Jocasta’s ironic comment, “It feels like home.”
Her comment resonates like a bomb blast. If Oedipus had not had the vision of himself as the ideal, righteous leader with truth at his core, the place where they are “at home” never would have been selected. Oedipus, a humble mortal, never would have run for high office.
Oedipus runs 2 hours with no intermission at Studio 54 though February 8. oedipustheplay.com.
CAROLE DI TOSTI 