The Pushover

The Pushover
Chain Theatre
April 10, 2026 

Photo courtesy of Chain Theatre

John Patick Shanley’s new play, The Pushover, is intriguing and mysterious.  Burning passion fuels the action, while lust leads to bad decisions.  Or is it the other way around?  The characters struggle to find their way out from under each other’s control, only to run back when they are in need.  Director Kirk Gostkowski guides this small cast of highly skilled actors to dig deep and find the driving impulse that invigorates their character. 

Pearl (played by Di Zhu) is in the first session with her new therapist (played by Christopher Sutton).  She wears white gloves and just came from church.  She is tight with anxiety.  She admits that she is gay, attracted to strong women, and not sure if this new therapist is right for her.  He does get her to take her gloves off and tell him about Evelyn and Soochi. 

The action moves back in time to when Pearl sent Soochi (played by Christina Toth) to a resident resort in New Mexico to deliver a package to Evelyn (played by Rebecca De Mornay).  Evelyn tells Soochi she was excepting her.  Pearl previously contacted Evelyn to tell her that Soochi stole from her.  In the package is a wedding ring that Evelyn gave Pearl with instructions to return it to her if she is ever in need of terminating a relationship.  Evelyn knows what needs to be done, but instead of making Soochi disappear, she puts her to work to earn back the money she stole from Pearl.  When Evelyn visits Pearl to deliver the money, the three women confront one another with their expectations and the hard truth.   

Christopher Sutton, Di Zhu, Rebecca De Morney, & Christina Toth
Photo courtesy of Chain Theatre

Each of the characters have quirks that spark interest.  Pearl is intense and dark.  Evelyn is controlling and self-serving.  Soochi is neurotic and manipulative.  These three actors portray these qualities from their core.  Christina Toth’s Soochi gets more self-destructive as the action progresses.  She is brought to that point by Evelyn’s domination, which Rebecca De Mornay cunningly underplays.  Pearl goes back and forth from victim to persecutor, and Di Zhu plays these shifts with skillful ease.  She is the pushover, constantly being taken advantage of.  She has reached her breaking point; however, it is Evelyn who has the final compelling moment.  It is unexpected, and Rebecca Du Mornay makes it genuine. 

Scenic design by Jackson Berkley makes the Chain Theatre stage feel expansive.  His unit set transforms to different locations with quick changes of furniture.

Chain Theatre continues to build a strong reputation for high quality work with the world premiere of this new John Patrick Shanley play.  It is excellently produced.  

The Pushover has been extended at Chain Theatre through May 2. 

Domenick Danza

Humpty Dumpty

 Humpty Dumpty
Chain Theatre
April 12, 2025 

Photo courtesy of Chain Theatre

In Humpty Dumpty, playwright Eric Bogosian strips four characters of everything they believe themselves to be, forcing them to face some stark truths.  The Chain Theatre production spares no expense bringing this play to fruition.  Scenic designer David Henderson creates an isolated environment, complete with every rustic comfort that would send any urbanite off the deep end.  Director Ella Jane New guides each cast member to find the breaking point for their character as they unravel and face their flaws and weaknesses.  

It is the year 2000.  Four high-powered city dwellers decide to take a week off from everything and spend it in a rural town, hours away from their daily stress.  No work.  No phones.  No computers.  Max (played by Kirk Gostkowski) is eager to start his week vacation in this rustic, cozy environment.  His wife, Nicole (played by Chritina Elise Perry), continues to connect to her office, answering calls and demanding they meet every deadline.  Their friend, Troy (played by Gabriel Rysdahl), arrives with his girlfriend, Spoon (played by Marie Dinolan), and bags full of expensive gourmet foods and wine.  When the power goes out, the handyman, Nat (played by Brandon Hughes), brings a lantern and supplies to get them through the next day or two.  Nicole is freaked out by the loss of power, while Spoon finds it relaxing and grounding.  As days go by with no electricity, yet sporadic and skeptical information from the outside world, each of them faces their breaking point.  Nat leaves in a frustrated huff, then Spoon disappears.  In a moment of weakness, Nicole asks Nat to stay at the house with her and Max, pushing them to face the truth about their relationship.  When the lights come back on, nothing is the same. 

Marie Dinolan, Gabriel Rysdahl, Kirk Gostkowski,
& Christina Elise Perry
Photo courtesy of Chain Theatre

Kirk Gostkowski, Christina Elise Perry, Gabriel Rysdahl, and Marie Dinolan do a brilliant job establishing their high-powered characters in the opening scenes.  They are all successful in their own right and have no problem exhibiting their pride.  Troy is the most pompous and the first to crack.  Gabriel Rhysdahl genuinely plays this moment with a heightened vulnerability and aggressiveness.  Marie Dinolan experiences Spoon’s downfall from the inside.  She skillfully displays this implosion with subtle panic.  Brandon Hughes portrays Nat with an underlying sense of danger and mystery.  The power shifts when he is left alone in the house with Max and Nicole.  In these scenes Kirk Gostkowki and Christina Elise Perry strip the characters of Max and Nicole bare.  Their emotions are raw.  Their anxiety is high.  Their terror is intense.  The action goes way over the top, and Mr. Gostkowski and Ms. Perry play these moments with daring honesty, bringing the action to a sudden and stunning conclusion.

This is the New York premiere of Mr. Bogosian’s play, which was written twenty-five years ago.  It remains fresh and relevant, especially in a time where technology rules our lives and uncertainty is waiting outside the door.  

Humpty Dumpty is playing at Chain Theatre through May 3.  

Domenick Danza

On a personal note: A special shout out the Stage Manager, Grace Loeb, and her crew for a great job on this very heavy prop show, which includes food.

 

Simpatico

 Simpatico
Chain Theatre
June 22, 2024 

Photo courtesy of Chain Theatre

The Chain Theatre production of Sam Shepard’s Simpatico is intriguing.  Mr. Shepard keeps the tension building throughout the play by withholding the details of the backstory.  Director David Zayas Jr. and this amazing cast illuminate every moment of that tension, keeping the audience fully engaged, leaning into the action, and waiting to see what will happen next.  The second act explodes as the action reaches its high point and the power shifts.

Vinnie (played by Brandon Hughes) called his old partner, Carter (played by Kirk Gostkowski) for a favor.  Carter immediately gets on a flight from Kentucky to California to see him.  Carter and Vinnie are indebted to one another, sharing a secret from previous business dealings.  Vinnie needs help because he was arrested for harassment.  He asks Carter to speak with Cecilia (played by Elizabeth Bays), the woman who is pressing charges.  Before he agrees to meet with her, Cater offers Vinnie any amount of money he wants in return for a set of photos and negatives.  Vinnie refuses.  When Carter meets with Cecilia, he finds out that she and Vinnie were dating.  She might have called the cops, but there are no charges pending.  Carter and Cecilia return to Vinnie’s place to find that he left town.  He flew to Kentucky to sell the set of photos and negatives to Simms (played by Pete Mattaliano).  Simms refuses the deal, and immediately calls Carter.  Carter flies into a panic, and convinces Cecilia to help him out with Simms.  While he is in Kentucky, Vinnie pays a surprise visit to Rosie, Carter’s wife (played by Christina Elise Perry).  He gives her the photos and negatives.  They are of her and Simms.  Rosie was the one who planned the blackmail deal fifteen years earlier.  The table have now turned. 

Christina Elise Perry as Rosie
Photo courtesy of Chain Theatre

Christina Elise Perry and Brandon Hughes set Act II on fire as Rosie and Vinnie.  It is visceral.  There is
aggressive passion between them, as the backstory of their characters comes fully to light.  Rosie is fully in control, no matter what tactics Vinnie attempts.  It is a continuous cat and mouse game, and Ms. Perry never lets up. 

Elizabeth Bays has an effective scene with Pete Mattaliano in Act II.  Both their characters (Cecilia and Simms) show their vulnerable sides after doing all they can to make a deal.  There is a genuine connection between them after the two characters come clean with each other. 

Brandon Hughes & Kirk Gostkowski
Photo courtesy of Chain Theatre

In the final scene, Carter is physically ill over the powerless position he finds himself in.  Vinnie shows no mercy.  Kirk Gostkowski plays this scene with unwavering conviction and physical mastery.  Brandon Hughes plays Vinnie’s new status for all it’s worth.

Simpatico is playing at Chain Theatre through June 29. 

Domenick Danza

A Will to Live

 A Will to Live
Chain Theatre
August 26, 2023 

Photo courtesy of Chain Theatre

Chain Theatre took on a monumental project by adapting Helena Weinrauch’s Holocaust memoir, A Will to Live, into a one woman theatre piece.  The outcome is a production of pure gold.  The memoir was originally written in 1945.  Kirk Gostkowski, who adapted the piece, said that when he read it, the words “were fresh and unique.  It felt like a primary document, and it needed to be preserved.”  In striving for this, Mr. Gostkowski has kept the perspective pure and authentic.  This piece honors Ms. Weinrauch’s words and experiences, and reminds us of the value and fragility of life. 

We first meet Helena (played by Masha King) when she wakes up in a hospital bed in Sweden.  She starts to tell of how she got there.  The allied soldiers were piling the skeletal bodies of the deceased prisoners from a Nazi concentration camp, when one soldier noticed her body was still warm.  She was rushed to the medic, then transported to a hospital in Sweden.  She now spends the days staring at the lake from her hospital window, catatonic, hiding food out of fear of starvation, and trusting no one.  She takes us back to her sixteenth birthday.  She is living in Germany with her parents and older sister.  The Russians invade, causing her family to separate in order to remain safe.  Then the Nazis take power.  While she is at work, the Nazis sweep her town for Jewish residents, taking her parents and sister.  She is alone.  Her boss helps her obtain false papers and puts her on a train to a different city.  She hides in plain sight under an assumed identity, until she is recognized by someone from her home town.  What follows is years of torture, dehumanization, hard labor, and starvation in three different Nazi concentration camps.   She survives. 

Masha King as Helena Weinrauch
Photo coourtesy of Chain Theatre

Masha King delivers a masterful performance as Helena Weinrauch.  She is alone on stage for two and a half hours (with a ten minute intermission).  Her performance is flawless.  She ages in front of you.  You see the emotional toll on her face, and feel it in her eyes.  Her center shifts as the physical pain overwhelms her, yet she does not succumb.  Ms. King’s ability to embody these expereinces, but not delve so deeply as to cause the audience to look away, is phenomenal.  She takes the audience from one horrific event to the next, carrying the weigh and devastation, while keeping the audience connected to every step of her journey.  

Rick Hamilton has directed this piece with such skill and sensitivity that you are fully present and absorbed, yet not overwhelmed by the violence and demoralization.  You wait for the next action, hoping it will bring resolution, only to delve deeper and darker into more horrific events.  When  the second act starts, the main characters tells of the years she spent in three different concentration camps, including Auschwitz.  Mr. Hamilton brilliantly keeps the action moving at a brisk pace, keeping the audience fully engaged, while limiting the time to process the horrors taking place.  The audience has no choice but to move forward, as does the main character.  The audience hangs on her every word, taking it all in, and gathering every detail of evidence from her experiences. 

Masha King as Helena Weinrauch
Photo courtesy of Chain Theatre

Every choice in this production was clearly made to honor the words and experiences of Helena Weinrauch.  The main character speaks directly to the audience as if sharing her story with a friend.  The other characters are heard as voice overs, keeping the focus fully on the main character.  At the age of 101, Ms. Weinrauch is still alive and living in New York City.  We hear her voice and see footage of her in the epilogue of the piece.  To hear her say how she has forgiven those who caused her harm and carries no hate is truly cathartic.  She says that hate is evil, and to respond with hate perpetuates the evil that caused the devastation.  This piece reminds us of the atrocities in our history, and speaks loudly to why we need to remember so as not to repeat. 

Over the years Chain Theatre has built a strong reputation for quality work, and this production raises the bar even higher.  A Will to Live is playing through September 16.  It is an important piece of theatre.  Get a ticket right away! 

Domenick Danza

This G*d Damn House

 This G*d Damn House
Chain Theatre
March 24, 2023 

Photo courtesy of Chain Theatre

Chain Theatre is producing the world premiere of Matthew McLachlan’s This G*d Damn House.  The play is a complex story of a family coming to terms with their truths.  The stakes are high and the clock is ticking as the characters do all they can to hold it together.  Director Ella Jane New works with an excellent cast to uncover the secrets that have kept this family together for years, and ultimately end up destroying them. 

Angie (played by Sachi Parker) has been evicted from her Florida home.  She has less than twenty-four hours to get out.  She called her son Jacob (played by Kirk Gostkowski) to do the heavy lifting.  He called his brother, Danny (played by Gabriel Rysdahl), a playwright living in New York City, to fly down to help him.  The brothers do what they can to avoid the memories they unearth as they work through the night sorting the trash and belongings Angie horded over the years.  When Angie’s teaching assistant, Hannah (played by Rica de Ocampo), arrives to lend a hand, it is revealed that Angie lost her job six months ago.  This begins a slow unraveling of the lies Angie has told about her eviction.  It is not until Jacob’s wife, Ally (played by Christina Perry), who is eight months pregnant, shows up at 3:30 AM that the full truth is uncovered and the unavoidable transpires. 

Sachi Parker, Kirk Gostkowski, & Gabriel Rysdahl
Photo courtesy of Chain Theatre

Sachi Parker beautifully portrays the complexities of Angie’s character.  In Act I she is witty and
charming.  Her slow, aging physicality is juxtaposed by her fast-paced, energetic, non-stop talking.  Her sly smile and enigmatic gaze seduce her sons into helping her in her time of need.  In Act II, after her pregnant daughter-in-law confronts her, she shows her true colors.  She is cold, cunning, and manipulative.  This scene between Ms. Parker and Christina Perry is riveting.  It is the key turning point of the play, and these two women skillfully deliver the potent punch that shifts the action for all the characters.    

The set design, by David Henderson, and set dressing, by David Kaplan, create an atmosphere that truly reflects Angie’s character.  At the top of the show, the set is filled with boxes and shopping bags.  Piles of dirty clothes are strewn everywhere.  The old, worn furniture is completely hidden.  As the characters pack up and empty the house, dirt and stains are revealed on the walls and carpet.  The truth of the house is uncovered.  It is filthy and repellent.  The house is Angie.  When Jacob loses all patience with his mother, he shows her the dirt on his hands and says, “This is you.”  Angie is the g*d damn house.

This G*d Damn House is playing at Chain Theatre (312 W 36th St. 4th floor, New York, NY 10018) through April 8. 

Domenick Danza

Garbageman

 Garbageman
Chain Theatre
March 17, 2022 

Photo courtesy of Chain Theatre

Keith Huff’s play Garbageman, now running at Chain Theatre, is packed with twists, turns, and unexpected surprises.  Director Greg Cicchino keeps the bold action moving at a brisk pace.  Each scene builds to a high point, propelling the action into the next unanticipated moment.  Set design by Richard Hoover and Kis Knekt is visually impactful, creating a bold metaphor for the boggled and cluttered minds of the characters.. 

Buddy Maple (played by Deven Anderson) needs to get his hands on a gun, so he drops in on his old friend from high school, Dan Bandana (played by Kirk Gostkowski).  Dan asks for an explanation.  Buddy tells the whole story, which starts with his becoming a Garbageman straight out of high school, and continues to when he was hired to work at a recycling plant.  It is there he finds a severed head, which he keeps in the trunk of his car.  Buddy goes on to tell of when he backed up his work vehicle and crushed the skull of a red headed little boy, whose father took revenge by putting Buddy’s son in a coma.  Buddy wants the gun so he can kill the red headed boy’s father.  This story motivates Dan to admit he wants to kill his ex-wife.  The two men become entwined by their rage and need for vengeance, but don’t seem to be able to follow though with their plans.  When Dan gets severely depressed, Buddy grows concerned he might be suicidal, or worse.  To cheer him up, Buddy suggests they drive to Washington DC for a rally on January 6.  What ensues is recorded and broadcast to the entire country. 

Deven Anderson & Kirk Gostkowski
Photo courtesy of Chain Theatre

Playwright Keith Huff offers a gripping perspective on the causes for rise of violent behavior in America.  He creates two characters drowning in despair and desperately seeking a way out.  The humor keeps the audience connected to the characters, yet allows them to distance themself from the action.  This gives them a chance to absorb the events that lead to the January 6 insurrection.  The final scene makes a strong statement on the harsh realities of America’s present state of mind.

Deven Anderson and Kirk Gostkowski develop an intriguing relationship between Buddy Maple and Dan Bandana.  The severity of their emotions becomes almost absurd at times, yet these two actors stay grounded in each moment, drawing the audience deeply into their reality.  They skillfully play the timing of the dark humor in Mr. Huff’s writing, keeping the action connected and the audience alert.

The Chain Theatre production of Garbageman has been extended through April 16.  The play delivers a bumpy ride, yet definitely one worth taking.  Visit their website (chaintheatre.org) and get a ticket today.  

Domenick Danza