The Hairy Ape

The Hairy Ape

The Park Avenue Armory

March 25, 2017

Photo courtesy of The Hairy Ape at the Park Avenue Armory

The production of Eugene O’Neil’s The Hairy Ape, now playing at the Park Avenue Armory and produced in partnership with The Old Vic in London, is a larger than life experience.  Director Richard Jones’ vision is titanic.  Designer Stuart Laing uses the vastness of the Armory space in ways that make your jaw drop.  His design gels with lighting by Mimi Jordan Sherin and sound by Sarah Angliss to magnify the power of the characters, make them feel small when encountering the larger world, and then encage them in isolation and loneliness.  Bobby Cannavale is riveting in the title role, leading an ensemble cast of brilliant actors in Eugene O’Neill’s classic, naturalistic tale.

Bobby Cannavale in rehearsal for The Hairy Ape
Photo courtesy of The Park Avenue Armory

Yank (played by Bobby Cannavale) is the fiercest of Stokers, keeping the coal fires burning in the bowels of a massive ocean liner.  He claims it is his strength and endurance that keeps the tons of steel moving in the open waters.  When Mildred Douglas (played by Catherine Combs), daughter of millionaire steel magnate, faints at the sight of him stoking coal, she calls him a hairy ape.  This sets Yank on a journey through the streets of New York City to find her.  Whether motivated by love, lust, or revenge, he is lead to the realization that he does not fit in anywhere in the class system of the day.

Photo courtesy of The Hairy Ape at The Park Avenue Armory

The themes of Eugene O’Neil’s play are viscerally understood as every element of this production comes together.  The audience, sitting in bright “yellow” seats, becomes a part of the rendition of Mr. O’Neil’s class system.  You identify with Yank as his physical strength leads the other Stokers to succeed at their backbreaking work, then struggles to redeem his lost sense of purpose.  Choreography by Aletta Collins is crisp and sharp.  The physicality of this production has a vitality that serves to establish the setting and tone of the experience and drives the action forward.

The Hairy Ape is playing at the Park Avenue Armory through April 22.  You have to experience the magnitude of this production.  It is a true testament to the potency of Eugene O’Neil’s writing.  

Domenick Danza

The Light Years

The Light Years

Playwrights Horizons

March 18, 2017

Photo courtesy of Playwrights Horizons

The Light Years, now running at Playwrights Horizons, is a story of inspiration and ingenuity.  The story covers forty years, and takes place during the 1893 and 1933 Chicago World’s Fairs.  Playwrights Hannah Bos and Paul Thureen weave fact and fiction into a heartfelt story of struggle, loss, and persistence.  Director Oliver Butler chooses a distinctive style for the production that captures the spirit of the time period.

Rocco Sisto, Aya Cash, & Erik Lochtefeld
Photo courtesy of Playwrights Horizons

Steele MacKaye (played by Rocco Sisto) has a vision for the grandest theatre ever built.  In it he will mount his most spectacular production, telling the story of Christopher Columbus’ journey across the Atlantic Ocean.  Around the proscenium the audience will see the constellations that guided Columbus.  This might be a small technological feat for present day theatre, yet this vision was to be constructed for the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair, when electric light was first being introduced.  Hillary (played by Erik Lochtefeld) and Hong Sling (played by Brian Lee Huynh) are the inventors of the mechanical contraptions envisioned by Mr. MacKaye.  Is the vision too great to be achieved?  What keeps these ideas alive for forty years, connecting them to the Chicago World's Fair of 1933?

Aya Cash & Erik Lochtefeld
Photo courtesy of Playwrights Horizons

The production does an amazing job of traveling forward and back over time.  The actors create a clear illusion that makes it easy and enjoyable to follow.  Aya Cash plays two roles.  First we see her as Adeline, Hillary’s wife in 1893, then as Ruth, the wife a musician in 1933.  Ms. Cash skillfully creates the emotional connection that links the two stories over the forty year span of the play.  The entire cast does an amazing job with this well written and constructed script, yet the stylistic concept of the characterizations does not allow for a personalized connection to the audience.

The design (sets by Laura Jellinek, lighting by Russell H. Champa, and sound by Lee Kinney) give a clear insight into the size and scope of Mr. MacKaye’s visionary theatrical production and the challenges faced by the characters due to the technological limitations of the day.  This makes the story well worth seeing.  The Light Years runs at playwrights Horizons through April 2.

Domenick Danza

The Skin of Our Teeth

The Skin of Our Teeth

Theater for a New Audience

Polonsky Shakespeare Center

March 4, 2017

Photo courtesy of Theatre for a New Audience

The Theatre for a New Audience production of Thornton Wilder’s The Skin of Our Teeth is life affirming.  This American Classic, written seventy-five years ago, is fresh and alive.  Thornton Wilder’s themes and messages are as pertinent to our lives today as they were in 1942, when he won the Pulitzer Prize for writing it.  Arin Arbus’ direction is spot on and clear.  She opens the action of the play in a way that pulls every audience member into the story.  The production rings with vim and vigor due to original music by Cesar Alvarez and choreography by Sonya Tayeh.  The cast of thirty-six unite to create an engaging experience that encourages deep contemplation.

Kecia Lewis, Kimber Monroe, & David Rasche
Photo courtesy of Theatre for a New Audience

Act I opens on Sabina (played by Mary Wiseman), the housekeeper to the Antrobus family, preparing for Mr. Antrobus (played by David Rasche) to return from work.  We meet Mrs. Antrobus (played by Kecia Lewis) and their two children, Gladys (played by Kimber Monroe) and Henry (played by Reynaldo Piniella).  They are the perfect family, except for the alarming secrets they keep hidden and their deep seeded resentment toward one another.  Their existence is threatened by the ice coming from the north, moving everything in its path.  They reluctantly open their home to a large number of refugees in need of shelter and warmth.  It is the ice age, and the world as they know it will soon come to an end. 

Mary Wiseman as Sabina
Photo courtesy of Theatre for a New Audience

Act II find the Antrobus family in Atlantic City among mayhem and merriment.  “Enjoy yourself” is the message of the day, yet a Fortune Teller (played by Mary Lou Rosato) predicts destruction by a great storm.  As the rain begins, the Antrobus family boards a huge boat with two of each animal species in order to start all over again.

Act III is dark.  The great war has ended.  The Antrobus family and Sabina have survived, and Gladys has a baby.  It is time to rebuild, yet Mr. Antrobus is tired and disheartened.  He tells of the three thoughts that got him through the war: the voice of the people, his home and family, and his books.  It takes community effort to restore the safety of their home and, as in Act I and Act II, mankind endures.

Photo courtesy of Theatre for a New Audience

Every member of the cast and ensemble is skillfully precise.  Mary Wiseman is vivacious as Sabina.  Her comic timing is superb.  Her Sabina plays amazingly well when juxtaposed against Kecia Lewis’ Mrs. Antrobus.  Their rivalry is fierce and superseded by their bond of understanding.  David Rasche grounds the action and keeps it moving as Mr. Antrobus.  Reynaldo Piniella creates a multi-dimensional Henry who is plagued by anger and driven by need.  Kimber Monroe’s Gladys grows and matures in the course of the three acts.  Mary Lou Rosato’s Fortune Teller is wild, crazy, and truthful.

Photo courtesy of Theatre for a New Audience

The hordes of refugees in Act I and rounding up of the animals in Act II harkens to the political challenges we face today.  There is a seductive conversation between Mr. Antrobus and Sabina in Act II about wealth and power that could easily be viewed as a (fictional) discussion between Donald and Melania Trump.  With scenic design by Riccardo Hernandez and costume and puppet design by Cait O’Connor, the production is astounding.  The Skin of Our Teeth is running at the Polonsky Shakespeare Center in Downtown Brooklyn through March 19.  It is a mammoth play with timeless themes and a stellar cast. 

Domenick Danza