"The
Girl With the High Rouge" Anchors in Long Branch
by
Donnie G.
FRED'S
ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT August 3 - August 8
On
Friday, July 28, Vincent Sessa's "The Girl With the
High Rouge" opened at the Lumia Theatre (179 Broadway)
in Long Branch. Presented by the New Jersey Repertory
Company, this show will run until August 20th. Andy
Hall outdid himself with the set design. Members of
the audience were seated on opposite sides of the room.
Acting as the stage, a boat separated both sides of
the room. The walls were painted to be the seascape.
This set increased the lever of anticipation for the
show to begin.
Liz
Zazzi was wonderful as Piper (the woman who couldn't remember
her past). Finding herself on Captain Lob's boat, Piper
quickly captured his fancy. Also on the were Gabriel and
Ryan (Lob's sons). The three men end up competing for Piper's
affection. Barney Fitzpatrick, who played Officer Sharkey
on "All My Children" for three years, gave us a very convincing
Lob. Ryan, who hid from life through literature, was portrayed
by Ken Wiesinger. Lenny Bart portrayed Gabriel, who became
jealous every time Piper directed her attention to one of
the other men.
All
of the actors captured the personalities of their characters.
This is a direct compliment to the director, Stewart Fisher.
Besides directing NJ Rep's first production ("Ends"), Mr.
Fisher directed the critically acclaimed "Adult Fiction".
Being
drawn into the fantasy world of these characters, one can
almost find themselves feeling what they felt. This is a
tribute to the actors. There are some interesting developments
within the story that won't be revealed, so as not to spoil
the fun. The New Jersey Repertory Company should be commended
for bringing these original works to the theatre. Therefore,
bring out your swimmies and reserve your seats by calling
the theatre.
|
ATLANTICVILLE August 3 thru Aug 9, 2000 by
Milt Bernstein
High Rouge Washes Ashore at NJ Rep
The Girl With the High Rouge by Vincent Sessa,
the latest offering of Long Branch's New Jersey Rep Co. on
Broadway downtown, is a surreal drama set on a ship that never
goes anywhere.
With a cast - and crew - of three men, all family members,
a "captain" and his two sons, the play explores what happens
when a supple young woman, clad only in a revealing night-shirt,
mysteriously lands on the deck of the ship, as though she
has fallen from the air above.
As the two sons ponder her sleeping form, one can see the
conflicts arising, and the sexual tensions showing themselves
immediately. One son, the older, is sexually experienced,
and leaves little doubt as to his desires and his methods,
his "modus operandi." His brother, on the other hand, is a
bookish introvert, very shy, and forever to be found with
a paperback classic clutched in his hand. However, he is a
most handsome youth. One can easily see how he would also
appeal to the young woman, who has awakened by now (the "high
rouge" of the title refers to the reddish color in her cheeks,
the source of which is unknown).
And all of this before our captain even comes up from below!
He of course is a single man, a youthful-appearing widower,
who lost his adored wife, the mother of the two boys, in a
mysterious apparent suicide walk which almost seems the reverse
of the way in which the young girl has materialized.
Needless to say, he too, is drawn to the girl, and she
to him, and in the second act of the play, the tensions erupt
in a violent and chilling manner.
The set of the play, which dominates the action, is an
artfully constructed wooden deck of the ship, complete with
hatches and entryways that enable the actors to disappear
from view to further the action. The set is so huge that the
company was forced to abandon the normal proscenium stage
and perform like a circle, or a rectangle, in-the-round; and
limiting slightly the number of seats for the audience as
well.
The Girl With the High Rouge is ably directed
by Stewart Fisher; and the small cast of four includes Lenny
Bart and Ken Wiesinger as the two brothers, Barney Fitzpatrick
as their father, and Liz Zazzi as the innocently seductive
cause of it all. All four actors acquit themselves beautifully.
Performances of this fascinating, mysterious play will
continue through August 20.
|
Set designer can take a bow . . . and a
stern
The Girl with the High Rouge
07/28/00
By Peter Filichia
STAFF WRITER
Where: New Jersey Repertory Company, 179 Broadway,
Long Branch When: Through Aug. 20. Thursdays through Saturdays at 8
p.m., Sundays at 2 p.m. How much: $25. Call (732) 229-3166. Andy Hall can claim to be one of the few set designers
who is playing with a full deck. When the Red Bank resident was enlisted to design "The
Girl with the High Rouge" at New Jersey Repertory Company,
he learned that the action would take place on board a boat.
An important plot device in Vincent Sessa's play about two
brothers has one sibling manning the bow, while the other
constantly stands in the stern. "How do you put a big boat on our small stage?," Hall recalls
wondering. He had previously provided the troupe with a
rustic cabin for "Ends," a suburban Texas home for "North
Fork," and a porno bookstore for "Adult Fiction." But this
time he felt he was in over his head. Indeed, the Long Branch theater is the tiniest of the state's
professional venues. It only seats 62 patrons in armless
chairs, but its stage is even most modest: A scant 18 feet
wide and 24 feet deep. "We'd just have a short, squat boat," SuzAnne Barabas,
the theater's artistic director, had speculated. "The brothers
would be much too close to each other." "I thought of putting the bow in the distance," says Hall,
"but (director) Stewart (Fisher) wasn't comfortable with
that. No matter which way we put the boat on that little
stage, it just wouldn't work." Finally Hall suggested that they just reconfigure the theater. Instead of playgoers sitting in their seats, facing a proscenium
arch, what if he built a boat in the middle of the theater?
The free-standing chairs would be set on platforms surrounding
it. In essence, he'd turn the place into a theater-in-the-round,
with the boat as the centerpiece. "This gives us an environment that's total, which is very
exciting for such an abstract play," Fisher says. Hall, who is also an instructor at Monmouth University,
says he had "a thing" for boats when he was a pre-teen growing
up on Long Island, but didn't know much about them. As luck
would have it, John Wenz, New Jersey Rep's technical director,
is a boating enthusiast and was taking a yachting trip to
Maine. "But, funny thing," says Hall. "I decided not to talk to
him, afraid that I'd get too much information. Because this
is such an allegorical play, I just didn't want to be that
literal." Hall also assured Barabas that, even with building additional
platforms for seats, his conception would not cost more
than any of his previous sets. "Though," he adds with a sigh, "I thought this would wind
up being a little more work, but as always, it's turned
out to be a lot more work, getting all the plywood, sculpting
and laminating it. Still, it's worth it because you do want
to grow and expand." Which is what happened to Sessa's play; after a well-received
reading last year, Barabas decided to give it a full production. "It's kind of a cross between Lewis Carroll's 'Alice in
Wonderland' and Jean-Paul Sartre's 'No Exit,'" she says.
"On the surface, it's about those brothers and their father
who one morning awake to find this woman face-down on their
deck, red-faced from falling. They don't know how she got
there, and she doesn't, either. She doesn't even know who
she is, and even the playwright doesn't give us a final
answer." When patrons enter the Shore-based theater, many will find
their usual seats have been displaced by the 29-foot-long,
9-foot-wide boat. They'll also see some differences in the
seats encircling the bow and stern. "They won't be our usual chairs," says Hall. "Some will
have arms, some won't, though we decided not to have folding
chairs, because they're not comfortable enough. They'll
all look good, though, because we're painting them all white.
And we're going to get even more than 62 seats in there
by doing it this way."
|
Down
to the sea
Published in the Asbury Park Press 7/23/00
By
GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
THEATER WRITER
ALTHOUGH
PLAYWRIGHT Vincent Sessa has spent most of his 40-some years
living on islands, he feels connected to water mostly through
his soul, not geography.
Born
in Brooklyn, raised on Long Island and now living in Manhattan,
Sessa was named after an uncle who served in the United States
Coast Guard and was killed overseas during World War II.
THE GIRL WITH THE HIGH ROUGE
Staged by the New Jersey Repertory Company
179 Broadway, Long Branch.
Previews 8 p.m. Thursday,
opens 8 p.m. Friday,
continues 8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays and 2 p.m.
Sundays through Aug. 20
$25; $35 on opening night with reception
INFO: (732) 229-3166
|
"I have
always loved the sea and all my plays have some kind of sea
imagery in them," Sessa said in a recent telephone interview.
"One day I would love to live by the ocean."
All
of the action in Sessa's latest play, "The Girl With the
High Rouge" -- beginning performances this week at the New
Jersey Repertory Theatre in Long Branch -- takes place on
board a sailboat docked at the end of a long pier.
It centers
on a young woman who can't remember her past and her late-night
encounter with a father and his two grown sons who live on
board the boat. It is stocked with classical literature from
which the sons have learned most of what they know about life.
"During
my teen-age years I was alone a lot and I read, and read,
and read," Sessa said. "One of my regrets now, since I do
so much writing, I don't get to read as much ... there
are so many great books I haven't gotten to.
"I'm
hoping in my future to have a life that combines writing and
reading ... and to be physical," said Sessa, who has a bachelor's
degree in English and works at his cousin's commercial
restaurant supply business.
Being
physical by walking everywhere he goes in Manhattan helps
him in his writing, a solitary endeavor he performs every
day.
"I hear
so many wonderful things on the street and write them down
..things I couldn't have thought of in a million years,"
he explained. "I know there is a play in my future saying
something about the political system from what I hear on the
streets.
None
of his 15 plays are alike, he said.
"It's
hard for me to describe my plays sometimes ... they cover
a broad spectrum of life," he said. 'I think of 'The
Girl With the High Rouge' as a kind of human drama with
a lot of comedy.
"It
has elements of things we've all encountered in life...
happiness, sadness, the idea of fleeing from something," he
explained. "And I guess the sea, for me, represents many things
Piper (the 'girl') talks about, such as it offers
freedom and fear, is deep and dark, we came from the sea and
we are mostly water."
Sessa
admits he tends to worry about things most people never think
about. He was appalled recently to read a story in the Science
section of The New York Times claiming within the next 50
years the North Pole may melt.
"That
kind of catastrophic change is frightening," he said, adding
he couldn't understand why such a story didn't run
on the front page.
He wants
to address such issues and finds the theater a good place
for them. He previously wanted to write the great American
novel but found, over time, that his descriptions were becoming
mostly dialogue and were better suited to the stage.
William
Shakespeare, Tennessee Williams and Eugene O'Neill are
among his main influences. Sessa, who has never taken a playwrighting
course, believes he's come into his own in the past five
or six years.
"I knew
I always had a gift for the lyric line, but putting it all
together with the right characterization -- that took time,"
he said. "I think it was Yeats who said he had the language
early on -- and his early poems are lovely -- but they don't
have the guts of his later ones."
So Sessa
has spent a number of years reworking all his plays.
"I felt
I had an obligation to go back," he said. "There was a lot
of love put into them -- what they lacked were technical expertise."
He expects
to finish that task by the end of the summer. From then on,
he said, it will be "clear sailing" for new plays, including
one he is just finishing about the reservation staff of an
ocean cruise ship company based on Homer's "The Odyssey." Published
on July 23, 2000
|
NJ
Rep's 'Octet' a stunning success
6/06/00
By
Milton Bernstein
atlanticville
With
their latest production, the new play called "Octet",
Long Branch's New Jersey Repertory Company have achieved a
stunning success.
The play,
written by Mark Dunn, and with music by Merek Royce Press,
takes place in a sanatorium where the eight male and female
patients (or residents, as the institution's director insists
they be called), have given up speaking, and communicate with
each other and themselves by playing a musical instrument,
individually or as a group, to the music of a ninth young
man, called the "composer".
Into
this apparently harmonius scene appears a self-confident young
woman (Sally Cubbage by name), who is there to study the methods
used in treating the patients. Trouble soon arises when Sally
tries to find out more about the residents than the director
(Dr. Janice Goldman by name) wishes her to know, and even
more so when Sally finds herself drawn to the charismatic
young composer.
The music,
as seemingly performed by the residents, each in his or her
own style, is a most important part of the play, supporting
the action in a way that is both haunting and unique. Merek
Royce Press, resident composer of the theatre company, has
written a remarkable score which should find its way into
an anthology of music for the theater.
The single
set, designed by Brian Higgason, is an antiseptic, ascetic
study in white walls and white plastic squares serving as
stools for the players/performers.
Director
SuzAnne Barabas, co-founder of the company, did a masterful
job of modulating the action, and the cast, headed by Kendal
Ridgeway as Sally, Kathleen Goldpaugh as Dr. Goldman, and
Chris Tomaino as the "composer", did an outstanding
job.
This
show, which will run through June 18, should be a must-see
for New Jerseyites who are at all interested in supporting
and seeing fine and original theater in the Shore area.
Tickets
for Thursday, Friday and Saturday evening performances and
for Sunday matinees, are priced at a top of $25, and can be
reserved by calling 229-3166.
|
'Octet'
A Witty Look at Music as Therapy
By
ROBERT F. CARROLL
TriCity News
In "Octet", now on stage at the New Jersey Repertory
Company, playwright Mark Dunn uses an ingenious plot structure
to weave a witty love story set in a mental health institution.
Dunn has laid out a difficult task for his actors, all top-notch
performers, and they respond to his mixture of pathos and
bravura with a spellbinding evening in the theater.
As the play opens,
the author's eight sanitarium inmates have been induced by
the medical director, the strident Dr. Janice Goldman (Kathleen
Goldpaugh), to eschew spoken language and express themselves
through musical instruments. A ninth patient, the Composer
(Chris Tomaino), scripts scores for the ensemble at breakneck
speed.
In act one the quirky
therapy seems to be working, but things take an unexpected
turn when chatty Sally Cubbage (Kendal Ridgeway), a research
assistant, turns up to gather facts on the unusual treatment
devised by Dr. Goldman. Sally falls for the Composer, gets
him talking and spreads panic through the institution and
the patients.
In the second act,
the faux musicians--they fake the music expertly thanks to
the offstage experise of sound designer and composer Merek
Royce Press--toss off their muteness and seem headed toward
normalcy. Gabby Sally, on the other hand, veers into catatonia
after her romance with the Composer goes off track. And Dr.
Goldman comes completely unstuck at seeing her life's work
jeopardized, eventually delivering an overwrought, show-stopping
soliloquoy.
The musicians, Cellist
Jim Donovan, Concert Mistress Gigi Jhong, Violist Kurt Elftmann,
Clarinetist Rozie Bacchi, Flutist Marian Akana, aggressive
Trombonist Nicole Godino, Trumpeter Leslie Wheeler (who tosses
in a five-minute tapdance) and Percussionist Billy Stone (he's
a virtuoso with the triangle), lip-sync perfectly and create
characters without a word being spoken.
Playwright Dunn says
he wrote "Octet" years ago when he was a musical
composition student. Real-life composer Press wrote original
music for the play, which the "Octet" inmates "play".
SuzAnne Barabas, artistic director of the New Jersey Repertory
Company in Long Branch, where "Octet" is premiering,
directed.
"Octet"
continues its world premiere Thursdays through Sundays through
June 18 at the NJ Repertory Company's Lumia Theatre on Broadway
in Long Branch.
|
Musical play better composed than written
Octet
06/06/00
By Peter Filichia
STAFF WRITER
Where: New Jersey Repertory Company, 179 Broadway,
Long Branch
When: Through June
18. Thursdays through Saturdays at 8 p.m., Sundays at 2 p.m.
How much: $25. Call
(732) 229-3166.
While New Yorkers
have been asking, "Is 'Contact' really a musical?," we here
in New Jersey can pose the same question of "Octet," the newest
offering from New Jersey Repertory Company in Long Branch. For Mark Dunn's new
play is about a mental health institution where Dr. Goldman
encourages her patients to stop speaking and start playing
musical instruments. Audiences, instead of hearing wall-to-wall
dialogue, get 90 minutes of conversation and a good half-hour
of music. Very good music, in
fact. Merek Royce Press, New Jersey Repertory's composer-in-residence,
is a talent that deserves to be heard. He's written 11 separate
pieces, ranging from a traditionally named Adagio for Cello
in D minor to the less conventionally titled Prelude Confused
in F minor, Anti-Rhapsody for Solo Flute, and Concerto for
Octet and Screaming Woman. All are hauntingly beautiful, though
each contains a requisite number of whimsical sounds that
reflect the oddities of the patients playing them. We hear these works
over the theater's sound system, while they are either mimed
or softly played by The Violinist, The Violist, The Clarinetist,
The Flutist, The Trombonist, The Trumpeter and The Percussionist.
(Dr. Goldman insists that the players discard their names
in favor of their roles.) Dr. Goldman's theories
are put to the test when Sally Cubbage, a research assistant,
comes to the facility to glean information for her boss, who's
writing a book. Sally soon becomes intrigued with The Composer,
who breaks years of silence to speak to her. What happens
to them isn't particularly surprising. That's true, too, of
Dunn's eventual message -- a too simplistic one -- that psychiatrists
are crazier than most. Dunn also makes some
amateurish errors. Dr. Goldman tells Sally what she discovered
about her when she put the woman under hypnosis, but this
is a scene we should witness. Later, The Composer tells of
a rebellion that we also should have seen. "Show, don't tell"
is one of the first lessons taught in Playwriting 101, but
Dunn must have been absent for that class. Director SuzAnne Barabas
has found eight charmingly loony performers for her octet.
She has Nicole Godino blithely use her trombone as a weapon
when things don't go her way, and Marian Akana blast through
her flute when she wants someone to leave. The brooding and
bald Bill Stone plays his triangle with great seriousness,
adding to the fun. That leaves the three
nonmusical roles, and they're well performed, too. As Sally,
Kendall Ridgeway goes from a just-doing-my-job mentality to
a woman who has a purpose in rescuing a man she thinks she
loves. That will get her character into trouble, but it doesn't
get Ridgeway into any. She maneuvers splendidly. Chris Tomaino, who
plays The Composer, carefully builds his character from ostensibly
disturbed to warm. Kathleen Goldpaugh doesn't overdo the officiousness
that has been written into Dr. Goldman. "Octet" is not a significant
work, but once again, New Jersey Repertory has given a play
it loves a handsome production. How many theaters with only
62 seats would choose a work with 11 characters? The expense
would give other producers apoplexy, but when SuzAnne and
Gabor Barabas want to do something, they find a way.
|
'Octet'
is a bold move for the NJ Rep
Published in the Asbury Park Press 05/31/00
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
THEATER WRITER
Who lives
in the real world and who lives a life of self-deception is
at the heart of Mark Dunn's new play "Octet," now receiving
its world premiere at the New Jersey Repertory Company in
Long Branch through June 18.
Sally
Cubbage (Kendal Ridgeway) is a research assistant assigned
to collect information for a book about new methods for treating
the mentally challenged and Janice Goldman (Kathleen Goldpaugh)
is the doctor who has developed a radical new therapy that
allows her patients to use music as their primary language.
OCTET
New Jersey Repertory Company
179 Broadway, Long Branch
Thursdays through Sundays through June 18
TICKETS: $25
INFO: (732) 229-3166
|
They are
the ones who interact normally. The eight other characters,
or octet, are identified by the instruments they play, including
Chris Tomaino as Composer. They are the ones who are supposed
to be sick and in need of help.
But as
Dunn's drama progresses during its 2 1/2 hours, we come to
realize the members of the octet are the ones who have faced
reality and found a way to cope with it by voluntarily coming
to the sanitarium and losing themselves in Composer's music.
It is Sally and Janice who are sick, have refused to admit
it to themselves and thus are destined to have mental breakdowns.
Nicely
directed by NJ Rep Artistic Director SuzAnne Barabas on Bryan
Higgason's functional, all-white set, well lighted by Jeff
Greenberg, the play moves along rather smoothly.

Kathleen Goldpaugh plays psychiatrist Janice
Goldman in "Octet," which is being staged at the New Jersey
Repertory Company in Long Branch through June 18. |
A major
part of "Octet" is Merek Royce Press' music. His music has
underscored nearly every production mounted at this 2-year-old
theater. But this time it takes center stage and it is simply
marvelous. It is the ninth character of the octet.
While
NJ Rep specializes in new plays, "Octet" is a bold move for
the adventurous company. It is the first time music has taken
center stage. It works well, although it is taped and not
actually played by the actors. The play jumps between naturalistic
and surrealistic moments, and that works as well.
As always,
productions values here are superb, even remarkable given
the physical challenges the company has not only mounting
new plays but mounting them in a building still being converted
from a medical supply store to a two-stage performing arts
space.
Dunn's
plays -- last year the troupe presented his "North Fork" --
tackle family and societal issues and his work is a nice fit
for NJ Rep.
Published
on May 31, 2000
|
Part concert, part play
'Octet' weaves drama through classical chamber music score
05/19/00
By Peter Filichia
STAFF WRITER
Where: New Jersey Repertory Company, 179 Broadway,
Long Branch
When: Through June 18. Thursday-Saturday at 8 p.m.,
Sundays at 2 p.m.
How much: $25; $35 opening night May 26. Call (732)
229-3166.
Most New Jersey theatrical productions rehearse for three
or four weeks. But "Octet," which begins performances on Thursday
at New Jersey Repertory Company in Long Branch, began work
in January. The reason was not that the cast had so many lines to learn.
In fact, eight of the 11 characters have no lines at all.
Yet that octet began rehearsing in the dead of winter. "Well, we had to," says Kurt Elftmann. "We're playing musicians
-- and had to learn our musical instruments." The octet of the title is a musical group assembled by Dr.
Goldman, who heads an institute where patients are encouraged
to communicate through music rather than speech. "It's her
nontraditional idea on therapy," says Kathleen Goldpaugh,
who plays Goldman. "She wants it that way . . . because she
doesn't like to tackle anyone verbally. She knows people can
use words as swords." Playwright Mark Dunn, 43, says he wanted to write a work
in which music had a powerful role. "It's a hybrid of a concert
and a play, a story threaded through a classical music chamber
work," he says. While the theatrical rule of thumb says that each page of
script represents a minute of stage time, "Octet" has only
63 pages, yet plays two hours. The rest is music. The playwright didn't compose the score, even though he majored
in music at the University of Memphis. New Jersey Repertory's
house composer, Merek Royce Press, wrote the music, including
a nine-minute piece, "Tea for Eight." Then the cast had to learn it. Says Elftmann, who plays The Violinist, "Getting through
that piece has heightened my appreciation of musicians who
must get through an entire symphony." "We chose actors who'd be willing to take on an instrument
and play it," says composer Press. "We met once every two
weeks from January through April, then stepped it up to every
week. I made CDs of my music, so they could listen and replicate
the notes on their instruments. Rote and repetition is how
they learned." The CD will be playing along with the octet in performance.
"But you'll definitely hear what they're doing, too," Press
says of the cast. Rozie Bacchi, who plays The Clarinetist, did play the instrument
during her grammar school years, but hadn't picked it up in
more than a decade. "Now when I play, some squeaking comes
in," she concedes. Others weren't as lucky. Leslie Wheeler played the viola
as a kid, but was cast as The Trumpeter. "Admittedly, I hadn't
played viola in 30 years," she says, "and while going back
to an instrument isn't like riding a bicycle, I still feel
I would have had a leg up if they had me on viola. But they
saw me as The Trumpeter, and now, I really feel I can play
it." Chris Tomaino once played the trombone and clarinet -- "but
both those roles have to be played by women," he said, ruefully.
He was cast as The Composer. Similarly, Mare Akana already
knew how to play the cello, but that's a man's part, so she
became The Flautist. "I had hoped to be The Flautist, because a flute is so much
lighter," says Nicole Godino. "Now I'm glad I'm on trombone,
because working it has changed my body language. I find myself
taking a wider stance. I'm 5' 6" and of average weight --
but this has made me feel bigger." Billy Stone, who plays The Percussionist, thought his job
would be easy. "I mean," he says, "how hard could it be to
play a triangle? Then I started to learn. You have to strike
a triangle in different ways at different times -- and at
different lengths, too. When you go inside the triangle, it's
going to make a different sound from when you hit it from
outside. It's the same note, always the same note, but it
somehow comes across sounding different."
|
'Octet' sings love's praises
Published in the Asbury Park Press 5/25/00
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
THEATER WRITER
For the first time, the New Jersey Repertory Company is
letting music take center stage.
"Octet," a play by Mark Dunn previewing Thursday
night and opening Friday in Long Branch, takes place in a sanitarium
where all the residents communicate not with words, but with musical
instruments. All, that is, except the composer, who communicates with
the music he writes and the residents play.
OCTET
By the New Jersey Repertory Company
179 Broadway, Long Branch
WHEN: Thursdays through Sundays through June 18
COST: $25-$35
CALL: (732) 229-3166
|
Everything seems to go along just fine until free-lance writer Sally
Cubbage (Kendal Ridgeway) shows up to study this new approach to music
as a therapeutic technique pioneered by Dr. Janice Goldman (Kathleen
Goldpaugh). The two women get along until the composer (Chris Tomaino)
falls in love with Sally and begins "talking" the old-fashioned way
-- with words.
Dunn, 43, who's written 23 plays, said he's comfortable
telling women's stories. His comedy "North Fork," staged here last spring,
centered on the relationship among four sisters with unresolved childhood
issues.
"Sometimes the story involves women as main characters,
and the issues are feminist," he explained from his home in New York's
Greenwich Village. "In this particular case, there is a love story .
. but it isn't as important to the story that Sally Cubbage is a woman
as it was important there were four sisters in 'North Fork.' "
N.J. Rep Artistic Director SuzAnne Barabas, who helms
the production, said she selected it because she was intrigued by how
the story, together with the music, "gels and moves along without actually
being a musical." But, she adds, she and her brother, Merek Royce Press,
who wrote the music, are rehearsing the 11-member cast as if they were
in a musical.
"We worked separately with the musicians and with the
speaking roles," she explained. "Then we put them together, working
on individual scenes, making sure it was coherent, making sure the transitions
ran smoothly."
Although this is the play's first production and its
development has been nursed by the rep company, Dunn said he wrote it
around 1975 while in college studying music composition. At a concert
of a fellow music major's compositions, Dunn heard a piece that transported
him, filled him with emotion. The piece built and built to an almost
unbearable moment in which he felt the only release would be a human
voice -- that of a woman screaming at the top of her lungs.
This idea of the beauty of music versus the beauty of
language evolved into his play. He also explores the theme of head vs.
heart.
"Sally represents someone who comprehends the world through
intellect," he said. "Janice, the doctor, created an environment of
people who see the world in an emotional, nonverbal way."
Dunn himself has begun to explore the world differently
as well. He recently resigned from his job in the rare books and manuscript
division of the New York Public Library and now devotes himself totally
to writing. Royalties from pervious plays and his wife, an interior
designer, help pay the bills.
On the emotional side, he can write plays and devote himself
to the beauty of the language. On the intellectual side, he has signed
a contract with a publisher to write for a geographical encyclopedia
scheduled for publication in 2002.
"Play writing is what interests me and excites me," he
sighed. "The encyclopedia . . . it's practical."
Published on May 25, 2000
|
Music, Madness, Medical Ethics Explored in Octet, Preem in
NJ May 25
25-MAY-2000
Octet, a new play with music on the subject of music therapy for
the mentally ill, has its world premiere by the New Jersey Repertory Theatre,
beginning with a preview May 25 and opening May 26.
The Long Branch, NJ, professional troupe (Equity SPT) brings Mark Dunn's
comic-drama "concert play," set in a sanitarium, to life with 11 performers
under the direction of artistic director SuzAnne Barabas. Performances
continue to June 18.
Merek Royce Press provides original music and actors mimic playing instruments
for the story of free-lance writer Sally Cubbage (Kendal Ridgeway), whose
assignment is to write a story about a new method of treating the mentally
challenged.
She meets eccentric Dr. Janice Goldman (Kathleen Goldpaugh), who has
developed a radical therapeutic technique where her patients communicate
through music. The two women hit it off, until Sally is introduced to
one of Dr. Goldman's "special" patients, the composer (Chris Tomaino).
Their blossoming romance threatens the harmony that Dr. Goldman has worked
so hard to create.
The doctor takes measures to guarantee that life in her safe little sanitarium
will not be disrupted.
"We chose to go with actors rather than musicians," Barabas told Playbill
On-Line. "They have been working with these instruments for six months.
They need to be playing the right notes [to the soundtrack]." She said
audiences will suspend their disbelief for the musical sections of the
production.
Also featured in the cast are Jim Donovan as the enigmatic cellist, Marian
Akana as the obsessive-compulsive flutist, Billy Stone as Jules Richardson
de Speer, Leslie Wheeler as the tap dancing, reclusive trumpeter, Kurt
Elftmann (violist), Gigi Jhong (concert mistress), Rozie Bacchi (clarinetist)
and Nicole Godino (trombonist).
Playwright Dunn is the author of a number of plays which together have
received over 150 different productions throughout the U.S., Canada, Great
Britain and Hong Kong. A new version of his play Belles received
its world premiere by StoneGate Artists in Red Bank, NJ in a production
directed by SuzAnne Barabas. Last year Dunn's North Fork was mounted
as part of NJ Rep's inaugural mainstage season. His The Deer and the
Antelope Play was included in Charlotte Rep's 1998 New Play Festival
and subsequently staged in full production in January 2000.
Composer Press has written music for four short films as well as for
cable TV, computer multimedia and the internet. He has scored the music
for two full-length dramatic musicals, Immortal Interlude and Hyde
and Seek, and has designed sound for numerous theatrical productions.
Director Barabas was the co-founder of the Cincinnati Repertory Company
and the American Repertory Theater of Philadelphia, and served as the
artistic director for these companies. She is co-author and lyricist of
several plays and musicals, including Find Me a Voice, Hyde and Seek and Immortal Interlude.
For NJ Rep, Barabas directed the mainstage productions of Find Me
a Voice and North Fork, and staged readings of North Fork,
Ends, Maggots, Helen's Most Favorite Day and Belial.
Tickets are $25. Performances are at the Lumia Theatre, 179 Broadway
in Long Branch, on the Central New Jersey shore. For tickets and additional
information for Octet and NJ Rep, call (732) 229-3166, or visit
the website at www.njrep.org.
-- By Kenneth Jones
Playbill Online |
Theater company rarely slows down, even to do the
same thing
Published in the Asbury Park Press 5/18/00
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
STAFF WRITER
The New Jersey Repertory Company rarely is idle.
A new marquee announcing upcoming plays has just gone up on
the troupe's art deco exterior at 179 Broadway.

MICHAEL J. TREOLA
photo
During rehearsals for the New Jersey Repertory Company's
upcoming play, "Octet," are (from left) Jim Donovan, Holmdel, and
Gigi Jhong, Kurk Elftmann and Rozie Bacchi, New York. |
A new outer lobby and box office is under construction. An inner lobby,
being turned into a future children's theater performing space, is in
a state of deconstruction with exposed steel cables and duct work, bare
light bulbs, wires and dust everywhere.
Workmen are unloading plasterboard and lumber from a delivery truck
and setting it up inside. It is noon, but they won't be returning until
evening to begin work to continue transforming what once was a medical
supply building into various theater spaces devoted to new and original
work staged by professional actors.
Meanwhile, deeper inside the building in what is called the Lumia Theatre,
Artistic Director SuzAnne Barabas, 50, of West Long Branch, is helming
a rehearsal for the upcoming world premiere of Mark Dunn's "Octet,"
a play set in a sanitarium where patients communicate through their
musical instruments, not words.
Barabas has been at the theater since 8 a.m. Rehearsal began at 10
and will continue until 4:30 or 5. The workmen will arrive soon after
and work until midnight, she says.
The cast is running through the "Resume" scene.
Kendal Ridgeway, 34, of New York City, is approaching the patient-musicians
and reading their resumes as they "play" their instruments to tape music:
Gigi Jhong, 26, of New York City, concert mistress. Kurt Elftmann, 33,
of New York City, violist. Jim Donovan, 41, of Holmdel, cellist. Marian
Akana, of Tinton Falls, flutist. Rozie Bacchi, 25, of New York City,
clarinetist.
Composer Merek Royce Press, 34, of New York City, starts and stops
the tape and watches closely how the actors finger their instruments.
They run the scene over, and over and over as Press and Barabas work
on the fine details.
Then they move on to the next scene in which Ridgeway's character and
Kathleen Goldpaugh's character Dr. Janice Goldman, the head of the sanitarium,
confront a non-speaking patient who is the composer.
"That line . . . it just doesn't feel right," says Goldpaugh, of New
York City, in the middle of the scene the first time they try it.
Barabas moves down from the seating platform, sits down on the stage
and works with the actress to make it "right."
Then they run the scene over, and over and over again.
from the Asbury Park Press
Published: May 18, 2000 |
APPRECIATION: End of a love story
Published in the Asbury Park Press 4/23/00
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
THEATER WRITER
For years, actress Kim Hunter and her actor-writer husband Robert Emmett
had wanted to appear together in the play "On Golden Pond," a love story
about a couple returning to their summer home for the 44th year.

PETER ACKERMAN
photo
Kim Hunter and Robert Emmett rehearse the final scene
of "On Golden Pond" at the New Jersey Repertory Company in Long Branch
last summer. It was to be their last show together. |
One thing or another kept them from committing to it -- until last
August, when it all came together at the New Jersey Repertory Company in
Long Branch. It was to be Emmett's last appearance. He died April 8 in New
York at age 78 from surgery following acute appendicitis.
Hunter's career spans nearly 60 years. She made her Broadway debut in
1949 opposite Marlon Brando in "A Streetcar Named Desire" and is also
well-known for her appearences in the "Planet of the Apes" movies.
Emmett, who had pursued an acting career both on and off-Broadway, was
better known as a writer who penned the satiric 1960s' TV show "That Was
the Week That Was," as well as segments for dramatic shows and specials
for stars such as Barbra Streisand, Julie Andrews and Harry Belafonte.
When news of his death reached members of the NJ Rep, they were deeply
saddened.
"He was such a dear man, always cheerful, a joy to be around, incredibly
funny and very professional," said SuzAnne Barabas, West Long Branch,
artistic director of the company. "After we worked together he would call
us up periodically to check up on us, especially after he'd seen on TV
flooding from a storm along the shore."
Barabas said one thing that struck her was how active the couple were.
After "On Golden Pond," she said, Hunter and Emmett flew to Spain for
a film festival.
"They were constantly traveling and doing things," she noted. "They lived
in an apartment on the third floor for 40 something years.
"They would fly up and down those stairs and I would get out of breath,"
Barabas said.
Hunter and Emmett has also done several staged readings for the troupe,
which specializes in new work. Both were scheduled to return over the
winter, but illness forced Emmett to cancel, she said.
Alex Brumel, a freshman at Marlboro High School, played Billy opposite
Emmett's Norman in "On Golden Pond." Billy is a kid with an attitude that
softens and changes as he spends time with Norman. And Norman finds in
Billy the kind of loving relationship he never found with his own daughter.
Brumel said he was apprehensive about a scene in which his character
yells at Norman.
"The director said to throw everything I could into it," Brumel said.
"And Bob looked me right in the eye and said 'Lay it on me, kid.'
"He was always looking for everything to be real," Brumel continued.
"It was almost like he didn't believe in acting, more like get up and
become the character."
But things got a little too real one night during the run of the play,
Brumel said, which deeply saddened him. In the play Norman takes a walk,
becomes disoriented and returns to the house in a panic afraid he is losing
control.
"Bob was having a lot of problems with with his memory late in his life
and there was one performance when he completely blanked out," Brumel
said. "He tried to improvise but the audience knew something was wrong.
"Later, backstage, I saw him sobbing and I remember feeling so horrible
... it was awful," Brumel said.
But mostly what Brumel and Barabas remember was Emmett regaling them
with stories.
For Brumel, it was hearing about all the stars for which Emmett had written.
For Barabas, it was the time she and husband Gabor spent socializing
with the acting couple.
Hunter, she said, is a gourmet who wrote a cookbook and she and Emmett
loved to eat. They were particularly fond of Joe & Maggie's Bistro
on Broadway and the Fromagerie in Rumson.
"Kim and Bob stayed at the Ocean Place (Resort) for awhile and after
a show we would go sit in the bar, have a few drinks and share stories.
"He was so funny," Barabas said. "I am just so happy they were able to
share 'On Golden Pond' together."
|
Adult
Fiction? Yeah! by Nick Montesano triCity Staff Writer
LONG
BRANCH - Sometimes the most apt of pupils and the most philosophical
of teachers miss emphasizing the single most important aspect
of a lesson. The Result leaves both with more to learn.
The
New Jersey Repertory Company in Long Branch is currently presenting
the New Jersey premiere of Brian Richard Mori's "Adult Fiction". Don't
miss it.
Mori's
tender tale is set in the most unlikely, yet somehow appropriate
of places, an adult bookstore in Times Square in 1979. What
unravels is the relationship between Earl, the proprietor
of the shop and Mikie, the son of one of Earl's former love
interests.
In the
course of one evening, the two men discuss life, women, predestination,
money, coffee, and life. And when Earl sets Mikie up on a
date, Earl instructs his young protégé how to bring candy,
take her to a movie, compliment her, and not expect sex right
away. We are sure that Mikie knows exactly what to do.
The
results however are nothing short of hysterical and disastrous
with bitingly difficult realizations for both men.
This
is an outstanding evening of theater.
The
play itself is a masterwork of character study. Mori
has written a story with a poetic vernacular that rings so
true it almost sounds improvised. Only Earl could get away
with statements like, "Her beauty is in bad shape, I don't
mind tellin you." and "I always try to improve my language
when I am around opposite sexes." There is nothing "unright"
about this writing.
The
language of Mori's play serves to create characters that are
tender and rich, and he weaves a tale that is filled with
subtlety, sadness and an underlying hope.
The
acting is superb. Jerry Marino as Earl and Aaron Vieira as
Mikie are a team of performers so intertwined in their craft
that each complements the other, strengthens the other and
carries the other to funny, unsettling and wonderfully touching
moments while creating a friendship that is not soon forgotten.
Marino
is remarkably adept at showing Earl's gift of gab. Vieira
is the wide-eyed sponge hanging on Earl's every word. The
mere fact that these two men have found so many readings for
the word "yeah" in itself is astounding. They are truly amazing
to watch.
The
Moment these gentlemen create when Mikie reads a note from
his date written on a Snickers wrapper is rife with varied
emotional levels from both actors.
Billy
Stone and Dominic A. Gregoria provide a correctly sleazy presence
as the other customers.
At the
helm of this production, director Stewart Fisher has led this
cast beautifully, never missing a beat in pacing. Fisher has
embraced and clearly presented the nuances of these characters,
making them funny and pathetic while preserving their dignity.
Andy
Hall has created a set that winningly leaves no detail untended
to. Electrical junction boxes run along the walls above viewing
booths with functioning red occupancy lights. The shop has
a black and used to be white tile floor, racks of videos,
magazines (even copies of "Oui" and "Amateur Babes"), dildoes,
paperbacks and pinups. Outside the mottled and scratched windows
of the shop there is a perfectly pre-Disney Times Square assemblage.
It pays to arrive early just to take it all in.
Hall's
scenic creation is pivotal to the story. The fact that such
a tender tale is told in such a sleazy environment serves
to heighten the beauty of the production.
Listen,
too, how craftily Merek Royce Press has created an introductory
sound design that brings you from period music to a grating,
scratching audio depiction of New York City. It partners perfectly
with Hall's set.
So,
go!
|
The Two River Times
March 31, 2000
New Jersey Rep's 'Adult Fiction' in
Long Branch
New play proves fledgling company's mission
possible
by Philip Dorian
After the opening night performance of "Adult
Fiction" at New Jersey Repertory Company, Executive Producer
Gabor Barabas made a brief pitch on behalf of season subscription
plans. Noting that the company, starting its second season,
specializes in new or neglected plays, he made the point that
subscribers will not have the comfort of seeing familiar titles
on NJ Rep's schedule. The idea is to make a leap of trust.
If the next four productions spanning May-December
2000, live up to the promise of the current offering, that trust
will be amply rewarded. For while you probably have never heard
of "Adult Fiction", now running at the 65-seat Lumia Theatre
on Long Branch's lower Broadway, be advised that it is a startlingly
good play. Playwright Brian Richard Mori has a sure ear for common dialogue,
and, ably guided by director Stewart Fisher, Jerry Marino and
Aaron Vieira act the heck out of it.
Set in 1979, the store's proprietor (Marino)
passes on his earthy philosophy to Mikie (Vieira), whose mental
acuity is just on the plus side of "slow". Earl, 55 years old,
is resigned to his present and future as the manager of a sleazy
adult bookstore, but in his own way he functions above that
lowly station. He's a 'dese, dem and dose' guy, but in pithy
comments and brief anecdotes, he reveals a temperament, if not
hopeful, at least patient, and tolerant.
Mikie, already forlorn at 19, accepts Earl's
efforts to arrange a blind date with a coffee shop waitress.
The scenes leading up to the fix-up phone call, and the call
itself, are as comical as can be, but they don not lapse into
stand-up. The laughs don't come from quips; rather they come
from recognition of the awkwardness we've all experienced in
similar situations. Earl's advice regarding first-date behavior
might be blunt and sexist, but it's downright funny - and not
far removed from pseudo-scientific self-help manuals on the
same topic. Judging from "Adult Fiction," Mr. Mori is a writing
talent to watch.
Marino and Vieira are excellent. Their incisive
acting, with as much attention to listening as to speaking,
gets the most from the spare dialogue. Marino's Earl is paternal
without condescension, and Vieira's Mikie, though dull-witted,
is sweetly sensitive. Best of all, both actors make it look
effortless. Director Fisher makes sure the two don't overplay
the lingo, and the result is natural and realistic. So is the
bond of affection between the crude middle-aged sage and the
emotionally need young man. And casting Billy Stone as customer
Spike was a coup. Stone's physical appearance and his consummate
performance in a minor role serve the play well.
We're used to Andy Hall's fine set designs on
the small Lumia Theatre stage, and this one, the inside of a
tacky adult bookstore, is exceptional. Deede Ulanet's props,
displayed semi-discreetly, add to the illusion, and Jim Hultquist's
lighting design, with muted red neon blinking outside the front
of the shop, keeps us aware of Times Square.
"Adult Fiction" is not an optimistic play; its
theme is failed relationships. One such, barely hinted at, is
the key to the bond between Earl and Mikie. The hinted-at relationship
might be the most significant one in the play.
The play runs about 90 minutes, including an
unnecessary, even disruptive intermission. Good as it is, "Adult
Fiction" would be better in one act with two scenes: pre-Mikie's
date, and post-Mikie's date. And maybe Mr. Fisher and Mr. Marino
could work on keeping Earl unaware of his profundity right up
to the very end. Poignant as it is, the denouement should not
represent an epiphany.
There's some coarse language in "Adult Fiction",
but no more than is found in many mainstream movies. The language
is, in fact, a source of the synergy among the play's writer,
director and actors. There is no doubt that this is the way
Earl and Mikie talk, and rather than offend, the expletives
serve to punch up the humor and emphasize the emotions. These
are, after all, not articulate characters, and their blankety-blanks
are legitimate adjectives and adverbs. The indelicate language
doesn't descend into the gratuitous. Be not offended; be drawn
into the expressive writing, directing and acting of "Adult
Fiction"
|
Lusts of the flesh
Exploring matters of the heart in a porno bookstore
03/28/00
By Peter Filichia
STAFF WRITER
Where: New Jersey Repertory Company, 179 Broadway, Long
Branch When: Through April 16. Thursdays through Saturdays at 8 p.m.,
Sundays at 2 p.m. How much: $25. Call (732) 229-3166.
When theatergoers enter "Adult Fiction" at New Jersey Repertory
Company, they walk into a gritty re-creation of a pornographic
bookstore. Magazines abound, with such titles as "Jail Babies";
lines of videotapes display covers of naked couples. A mop and
bucket are placed near the screening booths. As the lights come up, it's somewhat surprising to hear Earl,
the store's manager, ask Mikey, his 19-year-old customer, "So
how's your mom?" Playwright Brian Richard Mori lets us know -- simplistically -- that
purveyors of porno and their customers are basically good-hearted
people with the same wants and needs as the rest of us. They
may use "adult" language (there's plenty in this 90-minute play),
but if we prick them, do they not bleed? The 55-year-old Earl views Mikey as the son he never had.
But Earl has all the wisdom of Archie Bunker, who, sad to say,
must have been Mori's model. The playwright includes malapropisms
worthy of Archie -- "hospital" for "hospitable" -- and if that
weren't enough, has him utter "whoop-de-doo," too. Earl secretly lusts for Ann, a waitress in a nearby coffee
shop, but knows he's too old for her. He calls her to see if
she'll date Mikey. That the young woman would take a recommendation
from a porno distributor may seem odd, but her reasons later
become clear. Theatergoers will assume the match won't work out because
Mikey -- a gullible nerd in a Led Zeppelin T-shirt -- is hardly
a catch. Aaron Vieira expertly shows us a kid who works hard
to keep up with the conversation, hoping that the comment he's
just thrown in registers. His face and squint constantly spell
confusion. He often casts his eyes down to the floor, and, when
he looks up, hopes that he'll see a kind and understanding face. Jerry Marino certainly gives Earl that face, though he isn't
above playing the lord of the manor to the other customers.
("This ain't no library!") He unfolds many layers of paternal
feeling, and forgives Mikey no matter how much the young man
disappoints him. Marino lets us sympathize with the man and
his wasted existence, especially deep in the play, when Earl
is forced to examine his life. Stewart Fisher's direction shifts smoothly from the first-act
laughs to the second-act poignancy. "Adult Fiction" is a competent
work that doesn't aim too high, but hits the mark it set for
itself.
|
'Adult
Fiction' plot needs fleshing out
Published in the Asbury Park Press 3/28/00
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
THEATER WRITER
The New Jersey Repertory Company in Long Branch has opened
its second season of main-stage plays with a work about two
misfits that takes place in 1979 at a pornographic book store
in Times Square.
The acting is terrific. The set by Andy Hall, a Monmouth
University professor, is a knock-out. Lights by Jim Hultquist
and original music and sound by Merek Royce Press are very good.
And Stewart Fischer's direction is right on the money.
ADULT FICTION
New Jersey Repertory Company
179 Broadway, Long Branch
WHEN: Thursdays through Sundays through April 16
TICKETS: $25
CALL: (732) 229-3166
|
The only down side is Brian Richard Mori's play, which is OK as far
as it goes, but doesn't go far enough.
His two-character drama, with comedy, centers on the relationship
between Earl (Jerry Marino), a middle-age man who manages the
porno book store, and Mikie (Aaron Vieira), a 19-year-old lost
soul with little common sense and even less brains.
The first act of this 85-minute play (with an unnecessary
15-minute intermission) centers on getting Mikie a date. The
second focuses on how the date doesn't work out. Within
this framework, we learn Mikie barely graduated high school,
has been laid off and lives with his single mother as he drifts
through life. Earl lives in a roach-infested apartment; he hates
working in a store, he hates eating his meals in a coffee shop
that he loves.
This slice-of-life play resembles a slice of apple pie that
has been sitting under glass on the counter of a coffee shop
all day. It's OK, but warm it up and add a scoop of vanilla
ice cream and it would be much better.
Mori offers the audience very little conflict and characters
we can pity, but not empathize with. Both characters are frustrated
with life -- aren't we all? -- but where are the revealing
monologues or seminal moments that help us better understand
why Earl and Mikie are the way they are?
Mori asks us to accept his two characters at face value and,
perhaps because the production values are so rich, the audience
expects richer, deeper characters.
Why has Earl loved and lost, and, although fatalistic about
life, is not bitter about the hand he has drawn? Is Mikie really
that naive, or is he perhaps mentally disabled, growing up in
a city where the school system has failed him? Why does he look
to Earl as a father figure, and is it the lack of a real father
that hindered his maturity?
Mori needs to give us more to better understand Earl and Mikie's
relationship with each other and society at a time that, the
producers point out, was one of uncertainty and disillusionment.
Could all of their disillusionment stem from their simple
exchange near the end of the play when Mikie, who has screwed
up yet one more time, says, "I wanna love somebody, y'know,
Earl? I just wanna love somebody."
And Earl's answer is, "I know."
They are looking for love. The porno shop customers are looking
for sex.
The audience needs to know more about Earl and Mike's
quest for love, for that is a sentiment we all can empathize
with, and one that could truly touch our hearts.
Published on March 28, 2000
|
Porn in the U.S.A.
Published in the Asbury Park Press 3/24/00
By
GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
Theater Writer
Brian Richard Mori
never dreamed the New Jersey Repertory Company would produce
his play "Adult Fiction" because it takes place in a pornographic
book store in Times Square.
ADULT FICTION
By the New Jersey Repertory Company
179 Broadway, Long Branch
Opens 8 p.m. Friday; continues 8 p.m. Thursdays through
Saturdays and 2 p.m. Sundays
Through April 16
$25-$35
(732) 229-3166
|
But the cutting-edge
troupe did, and at 8 p.m. today "Adult Fiction" opens the company's
second season of main-stage productions at the 70-seat Lumia Theatre
in Long Branch.
Mori said
his play was staged at the Geva Theatre in Rochester, N.Y.,
about 10 years ago. The rest of the Rep's five-play season are
world premieres.
"Part of
our mission is to do new plays and neglected plays and this
is a new, neglected work," explained the Rep's Artistic Director
SuzAnne Barabas, West Long Branch. "I think people who are offended
by (profane) language shouldn't come and see this, just like
they may choose not to see an R-rated movie."
Barabas
said the play may be a "turn-off" to some people, but to her
it's a "quite funny and very moving play" about human relationships.
The two-act,
two-character play takes place during the summer of 1979 --
in pre-Mayor Rudy Giuliani Times Square. It centers on Earl
(played by Jerry Marino of Edison), a man in his 50s who manages
a porn shop, and 19-year-old Mikie (played by Aaron Vieira of
Manhattan), a shy loner. It is directed by Stewart Fisher of
Brooklyn, who also directed "Ends" for the Rep.
Mori, 42,
of Manhattan, divides his time between writing stage plays and
screenplays while working part-time for the Ford Foundation.
He said he began writing as a high school student to express
himself since he was so shy.

MICHAEL
J. GOLDFINGER photo
Actors Aaron Vieira and Jerry Marino share
a laugh in a scene from "Adult Fiction." |
"Adult Fiction"
is semi-autobiographical, he said -- not that his father ever
worked in a porn shop or that Mori ever hung out in one, he adds
quickly.
"Earl is
so much like my Dad, who died shortly before the Geva production,"
Mori said. "He was not the brightest guy in world, but he was
a kind and decent man living on the margins and frustrated by
how his life had turned out.
"And there
was a time in my life when I was shy and lonely," Mori said.
"Dreaming of love and not sure how to go about getting it."
After his
mother and father split, Mori's father, like Earl, became a
coffee-shop junkie while living on the edge of society.
"He used
to take me to coffee shops when I was a kid," said Mori, who
was born in Pennsylvania and grew up in southern California.
"He became a regular and they were special to him, a way to
keep in touch."
The play
revolves around a blind date Earl sets up between Mikie and
a waitress from his favorite coffee shop. However, circumstances
prohibit Earl from returning to his favorite shop.
Now married
and living in Manhattan, Mori struggles to earn a living with
his writing. His play "Dream of Flight," published by the Dramatist
Play Service, "pays me unbelievably less than $5 bucks every
six months."
He rewrote
and polished parts of "Adult Fiction," which is the first play
he's worked on in about four years, he said. He said it has
been optioned several times for off-Broadway productions, but
the financing never comes together, he believes, because of
the play's milieu scares off backers.
"It's impossible
to make a living just writing plays," said Mori, whose first
New York production was in 1978. "This is my 20th production
and I've made less than $20,000 in all these years.
"I've had
a bunch of options on my screenplays, which pays me enough money
for six months," he explained. "But if this one screenplay I
have kicks in, it will give me enough money to write for two-three
years ... I dream of making a living at writing."
Published
on March 24, 2000
|
Two River Times January
15-22
Scene On Stage by Philip Dorian
The Plays Within The Plays Are The Thing At Two Theaters
INTENTIONALLY AWFUL PLAYS-within-plays are centerpieces
in two comedies that opened last weekend on New Jersey Regional
stages. "Noises Off", the 1983 farce by British playwright Michael
Frayn, is at Paper Mill Playhouse in Millburn, and "The Play's
the Thing," written sixty years earlier by Hungarian dramatist
Ferenc Molnar, plays through January 23 at New Jersey Repertory
Company in Long Branch. It may be stretching a point to claim
further similarities, but both are comedies about theater people
at work, and both New Jersey productions feature established
actors of note in leading roles. Experienced farceur Brian Murray
plays the director in "Noises Off", and Stuart Vaughan, a founder
of the New York Shakespeare Festival, plays a playwright in
"The Play's the Thing", and, in fact, directed the production.
Good things come in small packages.
NJ Rep, in its 65 seat Lumia Theatre, comes closer to realizing
the essence of its play than does Paper Mill, twenty times larger. The relative sizes of the venue serve to enhance the
one and weaken the other. "The Play's the Thing" becomes a charming
chamber frivolity in Rep's intimate space, while "Noises Off"
is blown up and amplified (literally) to something other than
the compressed frenzy it should be.
.......
If it's not a contradiction in terms, "The Play's
the Thing" is a mannerly farce. Clever word-play and mental
gymnastics take the place of physical action and slamming doors.
One theory of farce says that it harbors subversive qualities
and addresses unspoken urges; in Molnar's "putting on" of a
play writing, actors, critics, class distinction, elitism and
intellectualism, "The Play's the Thing" fits that description.
The adaptation by P.G. Wodehouse is remarkably close to the
original, and directed by Stuart Vaughan, the highly professional
production at NJ Rep is leisurely paced. As the plot thickens,
audience interest becomes amusement, and early chuckles grow
to robust laughter.
A young composer overhears his actress-fiancée
in a passionate exchange with another actor. To avert personal
and professional ruin, a playwright dashes off a short play
in order to convince the composer that all he heard was a rehearsal.
That's "The Play's the Thing" in a nutshell, but the essence
of the play is in the simplicity and lightness with which Molnar
has drawn the situation. Within the formality and elegance of
a luxurious Italian Inn, worldliness and wit prevail. There's
a propriety about the behavior of the older playwright and his
collaborators, but the earthiness of their instincts is not
far beneath the veneer. "No poetry in my soul, but a balance
in my bank account," says the playwright. But there is poetry
- and poetic license, as he writes the playlet and passes it
off as one by Sardou, whose melodramas had dominated the Parisian
stage in the late 1800's.
While it is generally unwise for an actor to
direct himself, this play might be an exception. (So might be,
for that matter, Stuart Vaughan.) The role of Sandor Turai,
the play wright based on Molnar himself, is at the hub of "The
Play's the Thing". Everything that happens, the other characters'
actions and reactions are at Sandor's instigation. It is perfectly
natural for him to control the tone of all else on stage. Mr.
Vaughan does it with aplomb. Looking dapper in formal attire
to leisure wear, his Sandor runs the show - literally, as well
as within the play.
AS Sandor's associate, William Shust is equally
at home with wordplay; Philip F. Lynch, as the composer, carries
callowness to an extreme. Angela Roberts is very good at capturing
shadings of worldliness under the fiancée's sunny disposition.
As the would-be seducer, Joseph Culliton's bombast is out of
sync with the rest of the play, but the actor does make hay
with the comic playing of the faux scene - it's broad reading
probably too much so, but funny nonetheless.
New Jersey Repertory producers Gabor and SuzAnne
Barabas have promised to produce neglected or infrequently staged
works. To start the New Year, they're off and running in high
style with "The Play's the Thing."
|
Atlanticville January
13 thru January 19, 2000
CurtainCalls
Review by Diana Moore
The
play-within-the-play's the Thing at NJ Rep
Adultery is
usually dangerous, but in Ferenc Molnar's "The Play's the Thing,"
now playing at New Jersey Repertory Company's Lumia Theatre in Long
Branch, it's downright humorous.
Set in an
Italian castle in 1924, Molnar's comedy (adapted by P.G. Wodehouse)
is directed by and stars Stuart Vaughan, who reigns supreme in the
role of playwright Sandor Turai, with a style reminiscent of Anthony
Hopkins and a relaxed approach to acting that makes his delivery
thoroughly believable. Opening with some sly commentary by the main
characters on theatrical clichés and conventions, the farcical situation
kicks off when Sandor, his longtime collaborator Mansky (William
Shust) and their young composer friend Albert (Philip Lynch) happen
to overhear the titillating sounds of erotic overtures coming from
the bedroom of Albert's "Prima Donna" (Angela Roberts) bride-to-be
and her former suitor and co-star Almady (Joseph Culliton). This
send the composer spiraling into a turbulent sea of despair, anger
and self-loathing; his fiancée sinks into her own frantic ocean
of woe when she discovers that her late-night rendezvous was overheard
by the man she truly adores.
So, can this
couple ever be stitched back together? Possibly - by way of a masterwork
of deceit conjured by the veteran dramatist, who seeks to turn this
tragedy into a "life imitates art" spectacular. The ingenious plot
involved disguising the salacious encounter as a play rehearsal,
in hopes that he'll believe it, she'll be forgiven and all will
be well again - or will it?
In addition
to Vaughan, William Shust radiates excellent stage presence as the
other half of the sardonic and sneaky pair of playwrights - and
if you aren't weak of heart, you will laugh till you have an aneurysm
when you watch Joseph Culliton drive everybody mad as the hilariously
hammy Almady.
This being
my first NJ Repertory experience, I was very impressed at not only
the talent of the cast of characters, but the way the set designer
Bart Healy and costume designer Juliet Ouyoung took an intimate
setting and turned it into a whole different and exciting world.
One word of advice to the readers: "Beware of thin walls." (You
would be surprised at what one can hear through soft paneling -
I know I am).
The
COASTER January 13-January 19
Review by
Robert F. Carroll
The
play-within-the-play's the Thing at NJ Rep
Ferenc Molnar's
turn-of-the-century --- that's the other century -- comedy,
"The Play's the Thing" is a funny, gentle, well-crafted play short
only on social relevance of "significance" that modern playwrights
seem to believe is demanded by modern audiences.
The Hungarian
Molnar's comedy (as adapted by P.G. Wodehouse, the English humorist),
is the current offering of the New Jersey Repertory Company at
its cozy Lumia Theatre on Broadway in Long Branch.
Stuart Vaughan,
the founding artistic director of the New York Shakespeare Festival,
directed and plays the lead in this classy production. Vaughan
is Sandor Turai, an elder playwright who has arranged a meeting
between his composer and protégé, Albert Adam (Philip Lynch),
on a new musical, and Ilona Szabo (Angela Roberts), who is to
play the lead in the show, to go over the details.
The meeting
is set in an Italian villa whose walls are paper thin, especially
the one between Turai's suite and Ilona's bedroom. So, of course,
Turai and Adam overhear Ilona and a former lover, Almady (Joseph
Culliton) conduct an incendiary assignation. This presents Turai
with a problem: How can he explain away the overheard conversation
to young, inflamed Adam, Ilona's fiancé?
It's a nice
plot, and Turai is up to solving it. The overheard conversation,
he explains, is dialogue from a new play the pair have been rehearsing.
How he goes about convincing everybody concerned takes the second
and third acts before everything is resolved to everyone's satisfaction,
including the audience.
Vaughan
is superb as the elder playwright - self-assured, in control and
accustomed to having his own way. He and Mansky (William Shust),
a fellow playwright and co-author of many years' standing, make
a marvelous pair, exchanging pleasantries and showbiz quips and
snips in the best Oscar Wilde tradition. John FitzGibbon, as the
waiter Dwornitschek, almost steals the show with his calculated
obsequiousness. Not far behind is Culliton as the fatuous Almady,
who strives to maintain his innocence via a hilarious third act
tete-a-tete with Ilona. Brenton Popolizio plays a superheated
major domo of the villa.
|
ASBURY PARK PRESS January 11, 2000
'Play's the Thing' well worth
the timeby Gretchen C. Van Benthuysen
"The Play's the Thing," which opened last weekend
at the New Jersey Repertory Company in Long Branch, begins its first
act with characters talking about the difficulty of beginning a play.
It ends its second act with a discussion on how to
leave the audience - as well as the critics - in suspense.
It's good this 1924 comedy by Ferenc Molnar has a
third act. because that's when this 2 1/2 hour play finally comes
alive, speeding along with humorous repartee. The time-honored theatrical
device of a play-within-a-play keeps the audience in stitches. All
seven characters are finally together in one room and we have dispensed
with all of that boring exposition that often causes plays to stumble
in their early stages.
After all, the play was introduced at a time when
artistic entertainment was found via three to five hours of live entertainment
on stage, not half-hour sitcoms in our living room. Audiences were
more willing to invest time in exposition.
By the end of "The Play's the Thing," we've forgotten
about the slow-moving first act and the somewhat stilted second. The
third act is well worth the wait, especially as it proves the play is indeed the thing.
Director Stuart Vaughan, who also plays the leading
character Sandor Turai (whom he said is based on Molnar), has assembled
a cast of marvelous actors that range from respected and experienced
William Shust, whose resume ranges from Broadway to the new Shakespeare
Globe Theatre in London, to newcomer Brenton Popolizio, who spent
last season in the George Street Playhouse's children's touring ensemble.
Molnar's look at theater people takes place in the
suite of an Italian castle owned by a baron we never see. Turai, the
eternal optimist, has arrived early with his writing partner, the
pessimist and lyricist Mansky (Shust). Their composer, the gifted
and young Albert Adam (Philip F. Lynch), also has just arrived, and
is looking forward to seeing his fiancée, Ilona Szabo (Angela Roberts),
a guest at the castle and also the star of the trio's new operetta.
They should have sent a telegram announcing their
early arrival, a warning that is oft repeated in the second act after
Ilona and her former lover and mentor Almady (Joseph Culliton) are
overheard in mid-tryst through her paper-thin bedroom walls.
The telegraph was invented, Turai philosophizes, so
women will never have to be surprised. Albert, of course, is devastated
to overhear his fiancée claim Almady was the only man to ever mean
anything to her. Mansky is worried the operetta now will never be
staged as Albert's broken heart will stand in the way.
But Turai - who believes all of life is theater -
sees a way out. After all, he says, what use is it being a playwright
if he can't use his craft to solve this problem. So he writes a play
and attributes it to Sardou because nobody remembers French plays
or their authors.
He also uses this instant play, "A Tooth for a Tooth,"
to make fun of French romances and playfully punishes Almady (who
is married with four children) for his lecherous feelings toward Ilona
that have made Adam so unhappy.
As Almady, Culliton sports a pencil-thin mustache
that would make Errol Flynn proud and a pair of the hardest working
eyebrows in show business. As he rehearses "Tooth," he becomes increasingly
frustrated as he stumbles over long French names with six hyphens
and complains Ilona has no long monologues to memorize. It's the technique,
Turai responds with a gleam in his eye, and actors around the world
groan with a "been-there" understanding.
Popolizio's kinetic secretary to the baron is memorable.
He does a lot with a character that only shows up in the final act.
He nicely balances John FitzGibbon's droll. deliberate butler who
gets the joy of saying the classic line - "Dinner is served" - that
closes the play. Not only does he deliver the line perfectly, it is
a perfect ending to this play about the theater.
|
For well-traveled stage vet, 'Play's the Thing' still
The Play's the Thing
01/07/00
By Peter Filichia
STAFF WRITER
Name a city, and there's a good chance that Stuart Vaughan has directed
a play there. He's shuffled off to Buffalo, Chicago, Providence, Denver,
Cleveland -- not to mention Seattle, New Orleans and Tarrytown, N.Y.,where
he established professional regional theaters. Right now, the 74-year-old actor-director is at New Jersey Repertory
Company in Long Branch, staging and starring in "The Play's the Thing."
It's P.G. Wodehouse's adaptation of Ferenc Molnar's Hungarian comedy
about a playwright who causes mischief among his friends just so he
can manufacture a good farce. "My very first professional job as an actor, back in 1946, was in Newark,"
Vaughan recalls. "I was cast as Jack Armstrong, an upstanding college
boy who, in the heat of his love and ignorance of his heart, had put
a girl in the family way. That's why the play was called 'Her Unborn
Child.'" Vaughan played the old Mosque Theatre in Newark (now Symphony Hall),
followed by stints in Baltimore and Norfolk, Va. -- before the less
than magnificent play shuttered without braving Broadway. "Notice," he says, "that we were traveling farther and farther away
from New York, and not getting any closer." Vaughan did eventually get there. In 1955, he met a man named Joseph
Papp, who envisioned an inner-city theater that would bring Shakespeare
to the masses. Vaughan directed the New York Shakespeare Festival's
first productions of "Julius Caesar" and "The Taming of the Shrew";
he cast Colleen Dewhurst in the latter. "We were successful because we used a popular approach," he says. "No
record exists how Shakespeare wanted his plays to be done. In fact,
many authorities think American speech is closer to the original pronunciation
than the kind of university English one hears in British productions
of Shakespeare." Vaughan then became artistic director of the Phoenix Theatre -- not
in Phoenix, but the one by that name in New York, which lasted through
the '70s. Nevertheless, it wouldn't be long before he left town to work
in and establish professional regional theaters: The Seattle Repertory
Theatre in 1962, Repertory Theatre of New Orleans in 1966, and the New
Globe Theatre in Tarrytown, N.Y., in 1981. The last he formed with actress Anne Thompson, whom he met and married
in Seattle in 1965. It was she who got him to New Jersey Repertory. Thompson was an evaluator for the New Jersey State Council on the Arts
when she was introduced to SuzAnne and Gabor Barabas, who were starting
a new company. She soon became their development director, and Vaughan
signed on to stage Kim Hunter and her husband, Robert Emmett, in "On
Golden Pond." "As much as I've been around the country," he says, "it was the first
time I worked in New Jersey since that time in Newark." (Though the
Newark engagement is one of the first adventures he mentions in his
1969 autobiography, "A Possible Theatre.") Says Barabas, the theater's executive producer, "After 'On Golden Pond,'
Stuart and I were chatting. I mentioned that I came from a Hungarian
background, which got us talking about Hungarian playwright Ferenc Molnar,
who's best known for writing the play 'Liliom,' on which Rodgers and
Hammerstein's 'Carousel' is based. Stuart knew that he'd written a number
of other worthy plays, too." "I've liked ("The Play's the Thing") since I first saw it in 1948 with
Louis Calhern, so when we established our Tarrytown theater in 1981,
we did it there," says Vaughan. "An actor named Joe Colliton played
the young lover then; now he's the older actor in this new production." Vaughan portrays the playwright. "The atmosphere is Noel Coward-like,
with European elegance and wit. Largely the humor is situational, but
it's not a farce because most of the jokes are verbal." While Vaughan is pleased at the growth of professional regional theater
in this country, he is chagrined that one important dream he had has
never come true. "I've always been interested in forming repertory companies,
a group of actors who work together for enough time to develop a method
of work, like the Berliner Ensemble in Germany and the Swedish Royal
Theater." But as long as people are going to the theater, he is gratified. "There
are still places in modern life where people come and sit together and
listen to language. Theater is a means of entertainment, but if a play's
thoughts are good, the theater is far more than just a means of passing
time."
|
Oldie but goodie: Long Branch theater stages
a witty work from the 1920s
Published in the Asbury Park Press and the Home News Tribune 1/07/00
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
Theater Writer
Just because something is older doesn't mean it isn't any good, says
director and actor Stuart Vaughan.
Was Rubens, a 17th-century Flemish painter, any less an artist
than Picasso, a 19th-century Spanish painter? No, Vaughan responds,
they're just different.
THE PLAY'S THE THING
By Ferenc Molnar
New Jersey Repertory Company
179 Broadway, Long Branch
Opens Friday at 8 and closes Jan. 23
$35 Friday, $25 all other performances
(732) 229-3166
|
Was turn-of-the-century Hungarian playwright Ferenc Molnar any less talented
than the contemporary Neil Simon?
Vaughan, 74, doesn't think so. And to prove it, he's directing and
acting in Molnar's comedy "The Play's the Thing," which opens tonight
at the New Jerey Repertory Theatre in Long Branch.
"There's nothing in art that says in every way, every day, things are
getting better," Vaughan said in an interview earlier this week prior
to rehearsals. "The human spirit hasn't changed since before the Greeks
and that's what real theater is about.
"I like to look for plays that speak to the human spirit -- couched
in great language from whatever period," he added.
"The Play's the Thing," Vaughan said, is a "great" play about backstage
shenanigans with a "great" translation by P.G. Wodehouse that is as
witty as a Noel Coward play. But it is basically a neglected piece,
he bemoaned.
Written in 1924, it centers on seven theater people spending a summer
working on a play at an Italian villa. The prima donna is engaged to
be married to the composer. An older actor, with whom she once had an
affair, arrives and the composer overhears the actor making love to
his fiance. Everybody tries to convince the composer it was only a scene
rehearsal.

SARAH MCCOLGAN
photo
"The Play's the Thing" director/actor Stuart Vaughan
and artistic director SuzAnne Barabas at the New Jersey Repertory
Company theater in Long Branch this weekend. |
Vaughan plays a character based on Molnar who got the idea for the play
when he overheard his actress wife professing to love someone else. Except
she wasn't really. She was taking a German lesson for a part in a play
that required her to say "I love you" in German.
Vaughan, who grew up in Indiana and earned bachelor's and master's
degrees in acting from Indiana schools, said he first started acting
in school plays when he was 6. Later, in Boy Scouts, he was always asked
to be the one to stand up front and talk, he said.
After school Vaughan came to New York and landed an acting job his
first week. He joined Actor's Equity in 1946 and made his Broadway debut
in 1953 in "The Strong are Lonely." He studied with Harold Clurman (1954-'56),
one of the founders of The Group Theater. Vaughan was a founding artistic
director of the New York Shakespeare Festival (1954), he said, directing
the company's first 14 plays. He has worked for regional theaters around
the country both as an actor and director and last summer directed the
New Jersey Rep's production of "On Golden Pond" with Kim Hunter.
Vaughan is drawn to plays in which language and ideas are paramount,
such as works by Arthur Miller, Noel Coward and Georges Feydeau "who
are doing real theater." Broadway and off-Broadway, he said, mostly
have abandoned real theater and thus lost traditional audiences. The
exception is the Roundabout Theatre Company, a subscription troupe that
continues to stage work for the thinking audience, he said. It currently
has "The Rainmaker" and "Cabaret" on Broadway with "Uncle Vanya" and
"The Man Who Came to Dinner" scheduled for later this season.
These are shows, Vaughan said, that are entertaining, not merely diversions
to pass the time. If you want that, he said, turn on the TV.
"Tragedy reconciles us, assures us of the worth of being alive; it
has some value even though none of us gets out alive as the death rate
is 100 percent," Vaughan said. "Comedy shows life's problems can be
reduced to human proportions and our problems can be endured through
laughter and can be solved with reason.
"That's why good comedies are reassuring and important," he added. Published on January 7, 2000
|
Atlanticville Nov. 11 thru Nov. 17, 1999
Memoir of a Divine Life on the Stage
The New Jersey Repertory Company is ending its first season
of mainstage productions with a presentation of Memoir by John
Murrell, directed by Drama Desk Award nominee William Martin.
The action centers on the island home of Sarah Bernhardt,
where the legendary actress is trying to write the second volume of her
memoirs with the assistance of her faithful, fastidious valet Georges
Pitou. Through the rich reminiscences of the stage legend and the promptings
of her loyal second, the play explores the "Divine" Bernhardt's early
life, as well as her relationships with her mother, sister and husband.
The role of Sarah is played by stage, screen and television
actress, Salome Jens, who brings all of her talents to bear upon the role.
The dialogue she is given is literate and stilted - perhaps the way the
real Ms. Bernhardt spoke - but Ms. Jens makes the role believable and
understandable, as she slides seamlessly from one character to another
in the life and times of this extraordinary woman.
As portrayed by Davis Hall. Georges Pitou fulfills the
various roles of friend, servant and other players in Ms. Bernhardt's
past. All of these characterizations are done with emotion and style,
even as each of them bears the unmistakable stamp of Pitou. The real Pitou,
meanwhile, is laid bare for all to see when the valet relates his story
about why he never married.
The lighting design by Jim Hultquist is masterful, simulating
late afternoon sun, dusk, starlight, and morning brightness. The subtle
changes set the mood for the action, and help to establish Ms. Bernhardt's
personality changes, from sadness to fear and then to optimism.
William Martin's direction keeps the action moving, allowing
the actors a generous amount of room as well as an ease of interaction,
whether addressing reality or fantasy.
It is worth spending an evening to see Salome Jens and
Davis Hall bring this historical sketch to life, as well as to get a peek
into the vibrant life of a woman whose name has become synonymous with
acting.
Memoir continues its run at NJ Rep's Lumia Theater
on Broadway in Long Branch, Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays
through November 21. For tickets or reservations, call 229-3166.
Paul Schlesinger |
Asbury Park Press Thursday, Nov 11, 1999
Bernhardt revisited in 'Memoir'
by Michael Kaabe
correspondent
In "Memoir," John Murrell's essay of how actress Sarah
Bernhardt lived out the last months of her life, the playwright depicts
Bernhardt's driving passion to come to terms with her life's agonies,
disappointments, mistakes and triumphs, so that she could die feeing and
believing that her life had meaning and purpose.
Set in the summer of 1922, the 75-year old Bernhardt writes
a book of memoirs with the assistance of her valet, Georges Pitou. She
orders Pitou to re-enact various episodes in her life by actually playing
the roles of her mother, a French Jew who abandoned her at a young age;
Oscar Wilde, for whom she had a fascination, and other characters in her
life.
Rather than using some of the great characters Bernhardt
played to fuel his drama - such as "Phaedra" or "Hamlet", Murrell uses
lyrical metaphors and visual imagery, thereby conveying a sense of immediacy
and reality.
Sitting on the veranda of her estate near Brittany, we
immediately see the connection between the flowers and espaliers with
which it is decorated, and this final journey that Bernhardt takes. People
and events from ages past creep up all over her.
"My mother was like a bunch of violets whose fragrance
was enhanced when they were crushed," she emotes. Georges knows what she
means. Like mother, like daughter? Years later when, due to the irresponsibility
of a stagehand, Bernhardt suffered a fall that required a leg to be amputated,
the actress continued to perform - and only got better.
Still, Bernhardt is written as an independent, realistic
character who benefits from self knowledge. "I'm like the sun," she tells
Pitou, "that brilliant star that has been shining for a billion years
- yet it knows that it's not immortal."
The New Jersey Repertory Company's production of "Memoir"
makes the most of Murrell's use of language and ideas, keeping the possibility
of boredom from the play's talkiness tucked away in the wings.
The two actors in "Memoir", Salome Jens as Bernhardt and
Davis Hall as Pitou, make a spectacular duo.
Although "Memoir" isn't for everyone, it is for those
who want to see an intimate, personal story, presented with a first-class
punch.
|
In role reversal, Salome to play Sarah Bernhardt
11/05/99
The Star-Ledger
By Peter Filichia
STAFF WRITER
Memoir Where: New Jersey Repertory Company, 179 Broadway, Long Branch When: Through Nov. 21. Thursdays and Fridays at 8 p.m., Saturdays at
2 and 8 p.m., Sundays at 2 and 7 p.m. How much: $24 Thursdays; $30 Friday and Saturday evenings; $26 for all
other performances. Call (732) 229-3166. The actress who created a sensation as Salome is herself being played
by another Salome. At New Jersey Repertory Company in Long Branch, Salome Jens is starring
in "Memoir," John Murrell's play about Sarah Bernhardt. She, of course,
was the illustrious 19th century French actress who so enchanted Oscar
Wilde that he wrote "Salome" especially for her -- in her native French. Jens has some pretty impressive theatrical credentials herself. She was
part of the original Lincoln Center Theatre Company in 1963, and appeared
in the world premiere of Arthur Miller's "After the Fall." For Shakespearean
impresario Joseph Papp, she played leads in "The Winter's Tale," "Macbeth"
and "Antony and Cleopatra." Those, though, occurred after her days in
the burgeoning off-Broadway movement of the late '50s. This wouldn't necessarily be expected from someone who spent her childhood
on a dairy farm in Wisconsin and attended to a one-room schoolhouse. But
once Jens' family moved to Milwaukee, she discovered modern dance. "And
though I took a little detour in becoming Miss Wisconsin, my sole goal
in life was to become a Martha Graham dancer," she recalls. Jens came to New York, met a number of would-be actresses, which spurred
her to study not only with Martha Graham, but also with noted drama teachers
Herbert Berghoff and Uta Hagen. They got her an audition with Lee Strasberg
at the Actors Studio. ''Strasberg always said, 'If you want to get in here, do a role that
you know something about that no one else does.' I had always liked Josie
in Eugene O'Neill's 'A Moon for the Misbegotten,' which, at the time,
no one else had really rediscovered. So I tried that, and I got in." She eventually did the play off- Broadway. "And I honestly believed I
helped its reputation," Jens says. "This is where (drama critic Walter)
Kerr decided that it was a major O'Neill play." Jens was then cast in the 1960 revival of Jean Genet's "The Balcony,"
which became off-Broadway's longest-running play revival. "It took place
in a brothel," she says, "and I was cast as 'The Pony Girl.' ''Don't ask," she adds with a laugh. "But after that, I knew I was dropping
the dancing and concentrating on acting." In "Memoir," Jens, now 64, plays Bernhardt in the last stage of her life,
after her leg was amputated. "So I've been working on perfecting a limp,"
she says. "I learned that she also positioned her furniture in a way that
she would always, always have something to lean on. So we've done that
in this production, too." The play also mentions Bernhardt's stint as Hamlet, considered a radical
notion at the time. ''What a commotion that made back then," says Jens, "when she said she
just didn't want to settle for Gertrude or Ophelia. She felt that Hamlet
lent itself to a woman's sensibility, that he had a dual nature that was
both feminine and masculine, and she could bring both elements to the
character. She knew it was extremely risky to do Hamlet in England --
and she got horrible reviews there, though Oscar Wilde thought she was
incredible." That led to his writing "Salome" for her. ''What I love about Sarah Bernhardt," she concludes, "is that she worked
right until the end. Two weeks prior to her death, she was on the set
doing a silent movie. What a way to go, eh?"
|
Resurrecting
Bernhardt: 'Memoir' to bring exceptional actor to modern audiences
Published in the Asbury Park Press
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
Theater Writer
Actress Salome Jens said she knows a good play when she sees it.
MEMOIR
New Jersey Repertory Company
179 Broadway, Long Branch
Through Nov. 21
$20-$30
(732) 229-3166
|
At age 64, Jens has had a successful career working onstage, in film and
on TV. She's seen many a script but rarely at this point in her career,
she said, does she get one as "beautifully written" as John Murrell's "Memoir,"
opening tonight at the 62-seat New Jersey Repertory Theatre in Long Branch.
"That kind of script doesn't come by you too often," said Jens from her
hotel suite in Eatontown where she is staying during rehearsals. The two-character
play concerns legendary French actress Sarah Bernhardt at the end of her
life as she struggles to write her memoirs with the help of her valet,
Pitou, played by Davis Hall.
"I love the play and I love doing it in this small, lovely, little theater,"
Jens said. "Gabor and SuzAnne Barabas (managing and artistic directors,
respectively) are extraordinary people and doing something quite heroic
and extraordinary in Long Branch."
Jens also knows extraordinary people when she sees them.
After growing up in Wisconsin, the daughter of Polish and German immigrants,
Jens attended two years at Northwestern University before dropping out
and heading for New York to study with modern dancer Martha Graham. At
the same time, she enrolled in acting classes with Herbert Berghof. She
also worked as a secretary in an advertising agency, using the secretarial
skills her Depression-era mother, also named Salome, insisted she learn.

JAMES J. CONNOLLY
photo
Salome Jens invokes the memory of the late great Sarah
Bernhardt in "Memoir." |
Two years later, she began working off-Broadway. A part in the Jose Quintero
directed 1959 production of "Deirdre of the Sorrows" was seminal.
"That's when my career really started to take off," Jens said.
That play landed her the title role in the 1961 movie "Angel Baby." Shortly
after that, she got accepted into the invitation-only Actor's Studio in
New York, where she studied with Lee Strasberg and Stella Adler. That
was followed by an invitation to become a charter member of an acting
company Elia Kazan was starting at Lincoln Center.
She also landed lead roles in such Joseph Papp-directed productions as
"The Winter's Tale," "Antony and Cleopatra" and "Macbeth." In 1966, she
landed what she considers one of her best film roles in "Seconds," which
co-starred Rock Hudson and was directed by John Frankenheimer.
Jens was a series regular on TV's "Superboy," "Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman"
and "Falcon Crest" and was a guest on "L.A. Law," "Gabriel's Fire," "MacGyver,"
"Cagney and Lacey" and "Star Trek."
She currently teaches acting to master's-degree candidates at the University
of California, Los Angeles, where she also lives. She shares an apartment
in New York with her brother-in-law Anthony Zerbe.
"I love doing it all," Jens said. "Theater is where I came from and certainly
where I received all my training.
"One of my goals was to be a fine actress and in order to do that I learned
primarily in the theater where the actor's art is most challenging," she
added.
One of the challenges she anticipates with "Memoir" is grabbing the audience's
attention early in the evening.
Bernhardt, who was half Jewish, delivered all of her performances in
French, including the ones she gave on a tour of the United States. Her
contemporary, playwright Victor Sardou, wrote: "If there's anything more
remarkable than watching Sarah act, it's watching her live."
But the actress, who lived from 1844 to 1923, is not well known today.
Her greatest parts were the title roles in Sardou's "La Tosca," Jean Racine's
"Phedre" and Alexandre Dumas' "Camille." Jens will re-create moments from
some of these during the show, as her character recalls bits and pieces
from the past that she demands Pitou write down. She also orders him to
impersonate characters from her life to jump-start her memory. The play
takes place during the weeks before she died.
"She was so mythological in so many ways -- and the myth was so enormous
-- yet she was a woman before her time, very independent," Jens said.
"She left the Comedie Francaise (the French national theater) and started
her own theater.
"Then she went to England and did Hamlet!" Jens said, adding it was the
first time a woman had stepped into the role. "She didn't take that lightly
and in her exploration of Hamlet she had some real insights into the male/female
side of that character which she felt she could fulfill in a unique way
...
"She was not just any actress," Jens added. "She was an actress who took
enormous risks, who changed the face of modern theater."
Published on November 5, 1999
Copyright 1997-1999 IN Jersey.
Use of this site signifies your agreement to the Terms of Service (updated 2/25/98).
Site design by IN Jersey.
|
TriCityNews 10.06.99
Playwrights' Voice Rings Rich and Haunting
by Nick Montesano
triCity Staff Writer
LONG BRANCH - From the outset, as writer sits typing. And typing. And
typing. Typing amidst a collage of images: a framed portrait of a mother
and daughter, a pile of books beside a makeshift wooden cot, a trunk draped
with a granny square quilt and barbed wire entrapping the scene.
The writer suddenly lifts the paper from the typewriter, crumples it,
and reaches for a stiff drink while trying to get past his loss of words.
Then from everywhere around him, the mother and daughter step out of the
painting, others appear, from under the quilt, and from around the wires
and walls. They beg the writer, "Find me a voice... Find me a voice...
Find me a voice, for those who speak no more."
What unfolds is not unlike that granny square quilt with its patches
of colors and beautiful patterns all tied together by a black thread.
In this case, the black thread is the horrors of the holocaust. It is
those patches of color, in the form of poetry and prose, that become the
New Jersey Repertory Company's finest production to date.
It seems fitting that NJRep founders and producers, Gabor and SuzAnne
Barabas have authored this masterful piece. "Find Me A Voice" plays rich
and haunting and beautifully lyric.
"Find Me A Voice", while never forgetting the six million victims of
one of the century's most unspeakable horrors, tells tales of very specific
individuals. A wise choice by the playwrights because though the vast
numbers are striking, the individual stories tear at the heart. And the
soul.
A conductor prepares a group of European Jews to sing a Catholic requiem
in Latin to German officials. A mother leaves her daughter in the safety
of nuns in hopes of saving her daughter's life, convincing the young girl
to renounce her Judaism. A woman recounts the horrors of her grandfather's
trip to the gas chamber. An Aryan youth presents a slide show to prove
that the entire holocaust was nothing more than a propaganda newsreel
created to make people believe in something that never happened. And on
and on.
Recurring themes and thoughts tightly connect the tales: "Monsters don't
look like monsters." "You must come back to remember." "By the time they
came..." Haunting words when framed by the events.
Ms. Barabas, who employs simple, yet effective theatrical conventions
to tie the pieces together, smartly directs the action. An actor physically
changes character when he puts on a hat. A book used in one piece is passed
to an actor who uses it in the next. Each action seems to say; "Now it
is your turn. Tell your story."
The ensemble cast is simply excellent.
Marian Akana, Susan G. Bob, Elisha Joy Gordon, Philip F. Lynch, Christine
Todino and Harlan Tuckman step into focus and stand back in support, clearly
knowing the importance of telling these stories as a group. They all shine
with remarkable craft.
Merek Royce Press has created original music for this production. The
music richly underscores the text, tender when needed, moving and properly
dramatic at times, yet wisely silent when the words make their own music.
Set designer Bryan Higgason, new to NJRep, beautifully render the aforementioned
collage, allowing the scenery to represent a wide variety of locales from
gas chamber to writer's studio to church. While you might expect a dreary
backdrop, Higgason creates the scene with remarkably vibrant browns, grays
and reds. The raked stage works well, especially when lit from behind
and underneath.
The producers smartly use the Broadway Gallery, the lobby and entrance
to the theater, to create a timeline of pictures and words recounting
the plight of the Jews through the 1930's and 1940's. A proper and enlightening
set up to the play.
"Find Me A Voice" plays through October 17th, 1999 at the Lumia Theater,
179 Broadway in Long Branch. Call the box office (229-3166) for tickets
and information.
"Find Me A Voice" is must-see theater. Take a loved one and count your
blessings. |
The horror and the
humanity
Published in the Asbury Park Press 10/08/99
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
THEATER WRITER
Photos by JAMES J. CONNOLLY
CHIEF PHOTOGRAPHER
FIND ME A VOICE
The New Jersey Repertory Company
179 Broadway, Long Branch
Through Oct. 17
$24-$36
(732) 229-3166
|
The New Jersey Repertory Company,
during its first year of existence, has devoted itself mostly to new plays
about controversial issues for adventurous audiences.
Now, in the final show
of its first season, the troupe is getting personal.
Or more precisely, Rep founders and
codirectors SuzAnne and Gabor Barabas are staging a play they wrote about
the Holocaust, "Find Me a Voice," which is being performed on the theater's
intimate stage in Long Branch through Oct. 17.
Running two hours, with an
intermission, it consists of 13 scenes. These range from "I Will Hide
This Bit of Potato," in which a little girl in Auschwitz agonizes over
having stolen some food; to the monologue "Geraniums," about a hospital
where children with mental disorders were exterminated but the flowers
were well tended; to "Requiem," concerning preparations by an orchestra
in the Terezin camp to play for visiting Nazi dignitaries.
The play is based on Gabor's
family rememberances and explores the spiritual aspects of the Holocaust
in prose, poetry and music.
His parents, both Hungarian
Jews, survived the Nazi concentration camps of World War II, but lost
many family members. His mother was at Auschwitz and his father at Mauthausen.
They met and married after the war and Gabor was born in 1948 and raised
as a Reform Jew. The family emigrated seven years later to escape an unsuccessful
Hungarian revolution against Communist dictators. They eventually settled
in Connecticut.
"For us, this is an important
story -- it is not a Jewish story," Gabor said. "It is a human story."
The play, with musical underscoring
by SuzAnne's brother, Merek Royce Press, was workshopped at the former
Meadow Theatre in Red Bank in April 1994. It premiered as a fully staged
production at the Ensemble Theatre of Cincinnati in March 1995. It later
was produced as an Equity Showcase in New York in 1997.
Gabor said this version is
the final version. There is less poetry and more prose compared to earlier
ones. There are now six, rather than five main characters, with the new
character acting as the writer struggling to find a way to give voices
to all the other characters.
"In a way, it is a new play,"
he explained. "We wanted the narrative to be stronger and smoother.
"I think at this point we
have the play the way we want it," he added. "I can't see any further
evolution to any significant degree."
The genesis of the piece,
Barabas said, was a poem he wrote 10 or 15 years ago concerning the subject
of Holocaust survivors. A writer of poetry since he was 8, it was the
medium he felt most comfortable in.
"I had some of these poems
published and done readings of them and SuzAnne felt it might be an interesting
undertaking to try to develop them into a play with a theme and prose
pieces," he explained. "She was also very involved in writing and developing
the play." Married to each other for
32 years, Barabas said he and his wife have collaborated on a number of
plays over the years and while there can be stress, they trust each others'
opinions -- no matter how honest or critical they may be.
The bigger problem with writing
the play, Barabas said, was the search for an appropriate language in
which to tell a story about the horrors.
"Sometimes I get the feeling
something as big as (the Holocaust) needs a new theatrical language, not
that the story can't be told in a linear fashion," he struggled to explain.
"I, myself, have listened to the stories my parents recounted about the
destruction of their family. I have come to feel the spirituality of God
does infuse everything. What form God takes I've not really reconciled
in my mind, but certainly in the play it takes some very specific forms."
Although the play is specifically
about the Jews, Barabas said most of the previous audiences have been
non-Jewish.
The exploration of evil, he
adds, is unfortunately a universal subject.
Published on October 8, 1999 |
Holocaust survivors inspire Long Branch show
10/01/99
By Peter Filichia
STAFF WRITER
Gabor Barabas still remembers how his father would constantly tell him
the stories. And how his mother never would.
''They weren't bedtime stories," admits the executive producer of New
Jersey Repertory Company, where his "Find Me a Voice" opens tonight. "They
were tales of the Holocaust."
Both of Barabas' parents were Hungarian Jews who were incarcerated in
World War II concentration camps. His father endured three years at Belsen,
where he witnessed the deaths of his father, younger sister and most of
his uncles and cousins. His mother saw her father, mother and two brothers
killed in Auschwitz.
''They met after the war," Barabas says, "when the survivors went back
to their villages to see if anyone would return. They both waited and
hoped, but realized after time that no relatives were coming back. I learned
none of this from my mother, who steadfastly refused to talk about her
experiences. But my father was always telling the stories, the same stories,
over and over. Every time he told them, though, I could see in his eyes
that it was as if he were telling them for the first time."
The stories prompted Barabas to learn more about the Holocaust. When
he was in medical school at the University of Cincinnati in the early
'70s, he happened upon a shocking piece of information.
''In the '30s, there was a famous German psychiatric hospital that was
used as a so-called 'euthanasia center,' where the doctors gassed handicapped
children, as well as adults who had psychiatric problems -- even problems
as minor as depression. Then they'd send letters to the people who had
entrusted their loved ones to them, saying that the patients had died
from pneumonia. What they were really doing was perfecting their gassing
methods in how to kill Jews."
Barabas discovered something more cruelly ironic. "They had pots of geraniums
in the killing rooms. Those were kept beautiful. How awful, I thought,
that they were giving such care to plants, but not to people." He eventually
wrote poems about this incident, as well as other Holocaust-related issues.
About 15 years ago, his brother-in-law, Merek Royce Press, liked the poems
enough to set them to music. "Just as an exercise for my freshman music
class at Rutgers," he says.
About 10 years ago, Barabas' wife Suzanne, a theater director, thought
that her husband's poems and brother's music had the makings of a good
theater piece. The two agreed, and eventually wrote "Find Me a Voice"
-- "about a writer," says Barabas, "who is haunted by the experiences
of six Holocaust victims and is trying to articulate for those who died.
'Find me a voice,' he implores, 'with which to speak for those who can
speak no more.' But I wouldn't include any of my father's stories," he
says. "I couldn't put him through those again when he attended."
Five years ago, the three collaborators rehearsed the show at the Meadow
Theatre in Red Bank. That led to a full production at the Ensemble Theater
of Cincinnati in 1995, and an intimate off-off Broadway production two
years ago. Says Barabas, "After seeing it in a big theater in Cincinnati
-- where they built scaffolding and a crematorium in hopes of making it
dramatic -- we really felt the power of the piece when it was in a small,
tiny space."
That should pose no problem at New Jersey Repertory, which has all of
62 seats.
''But something wonderful did happen in Cincinnati," says Barabas. "At
the time, the city was creating its own Holocaust museum. When representatives
came to see the show, they were especially taken with the writer's plea,
'Find me a voice with which to speak for those who can speak no more.'
That line is now carved into a stone at the museum's entrance." |
A streetcar named
success
BY GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
THEATER WRITER
Kim Hunter was puzzled.
ON GOLDEN POND
By New Jersey Repertory Company
179 Broadway, Long Branch
Through Aug. 29
Shows 8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays; 2 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays
$25
(732) 229-3166
|
She had performed this scene from "A Streetcar Named Desire" hundreds of
times during the run of the Tennessee Williams' drama that marked her Broadway
debut in 1948.
Two years later she was doing it again in Hollywood. And Elia Kazan --
"The best director, without question, that I ever worked with" -- once
again was directing.
Her character, Stella Kowalski, is in her bedroom sitting on the arm
of a chair talking to her sister, Blanche Dubois, played by Vivien Leigh.
Blanche is desperate to have the love of Mitch, played by Karl Malden.
"There was one take after another, after another, after another -- and
they all seemed fine," Hunter recalled. "So I finally went to Gadge (Kazan's
nickname) and said, 'Am I doing something goofy?
" 'No, no, no... It's going just fine. I'm just curious to see how many
times Vivien can drop a tear on exactly the same syllable," Hunter said.
"She was amazing."
Some people might say Hunter, 76, who is still recognized on the streets
of Manhattan where she lives, is pretty amazing.
Her career stretches across nearly 60 years. She begins previews Wednesday
in "On Golden Pond" at the New Jersey Repertory Company in Long Branch
with her husband of 48 years, Robert Emmett. The play also features Alex
Brumel of Marlboro in the role of their step-grandson.
It is directed by Stuart Vaughan. His wife, Anne, is director of development
for the theater and they are long-time friends of Hunter and Emmett.
Hunter began rehearsals for "Pond" the day after she got back from Ontario,
Canada, where she made a movie with James Whitmore and Ossie Davis called
"Old Hats." It also features Eric McCormack, who stars in NBC's "Will
& Grace."
"I am a little tired," admits the petite actress with the huge resume.
"But I'm happy with work in spite of it all."
Other than a slow time in the 1950s, when she was blacklisted as a communist
by the House Un-American Activities Committee, Hunter has worked steadily
since she made her stage debut at age 17 in her hometown of Miami Beach,
Fla., in a community production of "Penny Wise."
By age 21 she had been signed to a movie contract by David O. Selznick,
which he tore up after two years, telling the actress she could do better
on her own, she said.
She went to England and gained attention with the 1946 film "A Matter
of Life and Death," which was renamed "Stairway to Heaven" when it was
released in the United States. But nothing much was happening for her
in movies, she admitted.
"I had the opportunity to come back East to do 'Claudia' in summer stock
and I was happy to get back into theater," she said. "I was doing that
when I got the call to come in and audition for 'Streetcar,' which I got."
Sounds too simple.
The play is a classic. The movie is a regular on cable. Kazan just received
a lifetime achievement award from the motion picture industry. Marlon
Brando is an icon. And Hunter is the recipient of one of the most famous
lines of all time ... "STELLA!"
Hunter said excitement was building during the 4 1/2-week pre-Broadway
try-outs in Boston, New Haven and Philadelphia.
"Also, because Tennessee had made a name for himself with 'The Glass
Menagerie,' everybody was eager to know what's this one was going to be
like," she said. "It gave us a funny feeling, but most of us thought it
was a damned good play and we were just glad to be working in it.
"Kazan took us aside one day and said to pay no attention to all the
nonsense going on," she related. "He said: 'It's a little like oysters.
They're marvelous, but not everybody likes then.' "
The reviews were "incredible," she said. But not much changed in her
life. Except, she did locate permanently in New York and has lived the
past 46 years in the same apartment.
Hunter recalls how the Broadway cast of "Streetcar" was concerned that
their only cast member to be nominated for a Tony Award, Jessica Tandy
as Blanche Dubois, was not asked to be in the movie version.
"I think even Jessie understood that the producers were fairly sure they
had an artistic success, but they desperately wanted the movie to be a
financial success as well," Hunter explained. "Of course, Vivien played
in the London production of 'Streetcar' and she was infinitely better
known to movie audiences than Jessie was at that time."
Hunter found Leigh charming but noted she never seemed to sleep during
the filming -- dancing every night after shooting and, with husband Laurence
Olivier, hosting open-house parties every weekend.
"I shouldn't say this, but, well she was a little like The Rockettes
-- everything was absolutely organized," Hunter said. "She had that incredible
capacity for reading a script and figuring exactly what should be done
to make it come to life -- and do it!
"Her way of performing was a little bit mechanical," she added.
Hunter's way was not. She loved to rehearse, to discover all the nuances
a part could offer. She found a soul mate in Humphrey Bogart when she
played his former wife and he played a newspaper editor in "Deadline U.S.A."
in 1952.
"Working with Bogart was a joy and we even rehearsed by ourselves, in
his dressing room, without the director," she said. "'He was such a dear,
wonderful person ... a sheer joy to work with."
Hunter still works. She is awaiting the release of two other recent films
-- "Abilene" and "The Hiding Place" (with Timothy Bottoms) -- have been
shown at festivals but have no distributors, she said.
She is frequently asked to speak before groups about the restored version
of "Streetcar," which was rereleased in 1993 with four minutes of footage
originally censored that plays up the sexual tension between Blanche and
Stanley, and Stella's sexual attraction to her husband. But Hunter, who
said she's seen the film enough, usually goes to dinner while the movie
is being screened, returning for questions and answers afterward. The
Oscar she won for it sits on a bookshelf, she said.
And she showed up recently, along with Charlton Heston and Roddy McDowall,
for a festival sponsored by American Movie Channel celebrating the 30th
anniversary of "Planet of the Apes," in which she played Zira.
She becomes visibly upset when she talks about McDowall, her eyes filling
up with tears. "He was such as angel," she said. "I had only seen him
a few weeks before he died ... and he seemed fine.
"I couldn't believe it when, a week or two later, I learned he was that
ill," she said. "He was a dear human being, such a love."She is doing
"On Golden Pond" -- a project that has taken two years to get produced
-- for the same reason she has done movies, TV and radio dramas -- "It's
about the work."
"The characters in 'On Golden Pond' are very well rounded, not stereotypes
at all," she explained. "Everyone is a true human being and the story
is about how we all survive ... I just love it."
She accepted "Planet of the Apes" because "I loved the script."
"I thought it was marvelous and it was certainly fascinating," she said.
"I never dreamed what I would have to go through -- four hours of makeup
every day 4 a.m. to be ready for shooting at 8 a.m. and another hour and
a half to get it off -- they were long days."
Hunter does not consider herself a bona fide movie star.
"I was more like the girl next door than a jazzy movie-star type," she
said. "I wasn't a great beauty, so that wouldn't do it on its own ...
attractive enough, but not a pinup girl and nobody ever told me to take
my clothes off.
"But I did some fascinating roles, particularly 'A Matter of Life and
Death,' " she said.
Yet, if she had to give up all but one medium, "theater is what I would
keep."
She likes to rehearse and she likes a live audience. "These are very
much a part of the whole profession," she said.
|
Dysfunctional family values: Problems
don't take a holiday in New Jersey Repertory's 'North Fork'
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
Theater Writer
It was supposed to be a simple, Memorial Day weekend getaway at
the Beckle family's long-time vacation cabin on the north fork of the
Guadeloupe River in Central Texas.
NORTH FORK
By Mark Dunn
New Jersey Repertory Company
179 Broadway, Long Branch
8 p.m. Tuesdays through Saturdays, 7 p.m. Sundays, and 2 p.m. Saturdays
and Sundays through June 6
$15-$36
(732) 229-3166
|
This time, however, the family chose not to invite one daughter, who is
institutionalized. She makes her way to the cabin anyway ... with a hostage.
Another daughter arrives without her husband, or so she thinks.
A bossy daughter is even more bossy, now that their mother has died.
A fourth daughter, who has an eating disorder, devours cookie after cookie.
Their recently widowed father has taken to drink.
And Aunt Tammy is locked in the bathroom for most of the first act in
Mark Dunn's "North Fork," opening tonight at the New Jersey Repertory
Company in Long Branch.
Pathos and comedy have been the hallmarks of the professional troupe's
first main stage season and this, the third and last show of the season,
is no different.
Playwright Dunn, who grew up in Memphis but now lives in Manhattan, said
he is ashamed to admit he has written 22 full-length plays and a handful
of one-acts.
"It's the quality versus quantity thing," he explained by telephone,
taking a break from his job in the rare books and manuscript division
of the New York Public Library. "The perception is people should be sweating
it out with one play for two or three years."
His plays have been published in several catalogs of plays, including
five with Samuel French Inc. But he has yet to make a full-time living
from theater.
"I don't teach and I'm not a (Wendy) Wasserstein or (David) Mamet so
it's difficult to have a satisfying career," he said. "But I'm not giving
up."

MICHAEL RAFFERTY
photo
Director SuzAnne Barabas rehearses "North Fork" cast
members Yvonne Marchese, Meryl Harris and Dana Benningfield. |
That's just fine with SuzAnne Barabas, artistic director of NJ Rep and the
director of "North Fork." She said Dunn is a "wonderful" playwright to work
with.
"He listens to suggestions, makes changes when necessary, is incredibly
open, rewrites and rearranges," she said. "Some playwrights need to see
the work up there before they can make changes and are defensive.
"But Mark is a good writer and he can afford to be open," she added.
Dunn, 42, said his wife's family had a cabin in the Texas hill country
just west of San Antonio -- in what he said people call LBJ country, referring
to the area President Johnson called home. And his wife was one of four
daughters. But the resemblance ends there.
Dunn, whose original goal was to be a film composer and screenwriter,
said he is most comfortable writing what he calls "Southern comedy dramas."
In the South, he said, these are taken very seriously.
In "North Fork," as the Beckle family comes together that fateful holiday
season and things begin to unravel, there are times when the audience
doesn't know whether to laugh or cry. The heart of the issue is, so to
speak, the women's hearts.
"I feel real comfortable telling women's stories and a lot of women's
stories are not getting told," he explained. "We male playwrights oftentimes
talk about our own gender while women form the backdrops ... and I always
resented that."
He's written several plays with no male characters. This play has seven
cast members, only two are men and, in a nontraditional casting move,
the husband of one of the daughters is black. She is white.
"We open these plays up for whomever is the better actor," Barabas explained.
"The character of Michael, who is played by Johnny Kitt, was not an African-American
role.
"But he was in the staged reading, he was wonderful in it and had a wonderful
vulnerability," she said. "Mark was concerned at first because we didn't
want to stereotype the character either, but Johnny understood the lost-child
aspect in the character."
Dunn was a little hesitant about the casting move because he was concerned
the black character would be perceived as the only bad guy in the play
since he is an abusive husband.
"But as the play goes on, he suffers his own abuse at the hands of the
family and he becomes a sympathetic character to me," Dunn said. "He is
a lost child, just as the troubled sister is a lost child, and it does
reach a point where they step back and examine each other and we see absolutes
do not exist for them -- and that's a nice moment."
Source: Asbury Park Press
Published: May 21, 1999 |
. . . recently in Back Stage . . .
The New Jersey Repertory
Company, Long Branch, currently ending its first mainstage season
with Mark Dunn's North Fork, has slipped in a summer show. Kim
Hunter and husband Bob Emmet star in On Golden Pond, Aug. 13-29.
Stuart Vaughan directs at the 62-seat, inner-city theatre. Ross Giunta,
Christina Pabst, and Bob Lavelle round out the cast. |
Real-world drama: Playwright wants theater to reflect
human experiences
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
Theater Writer
Audiences are smarter than many Broadway producers give them credit for,
said Bryan Williams, who has a play opening tonight at the New Jersey
Repertory Company in Long Branch.
A WORLD I NEVER MADE
8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays; 7 p.m. Sundays, 2 p.m. Saturdays
and Sundays through May 2
$20-$36
(732) 229-3166
|
But instead of astute theatergoers, Williams said, Broadway tends to attract
professional theatergoers: over-educated, upper middle-class people who
buy pricey tickets to shows they heard were a must-see, at some cocktail
party.
"I'm probably digging myself in deep here," Williams admitted in an telephone
interview from his Manhattan apartment earlier this week. "I think a lot
of what passes as sophistication today is herd mentality.
"People want to see the latest Tom Stoppard masterpiece, but they don't
understand it," he explained.
Williams began writting plays 20 years ago in college and now is a playwright-in-residence
at New Jersey Rep. His play "In This Fallen City" was developed at the
O'Neill National Playwrights Conference and produced at Circle Repertory
Company in Manhattan. His screenplay "Night of Courage" won ABC's New
Drama for TV Award. And he has had numerous plays staged in Manhattan
and in small theaters around the country that often are followed by audience
discussions.
"The comments from the untutored audience are so much more perceptive,"
he said, than those he often gets from professional audiences, including
producers and directors, who tend to talk about a characters's arc or
some obscure theatrical convention.

KAREN MANCINELLI
photo
Dete (Brian O'Halloran) has Nell (Kendal Ridgeway) by
the throat in Bryan Williams' "A World I Never Made," opening tonight
at the New Jersey Repertory theater in Long Branch. |
Williams wants audiences willing to work, put themselves into the story,
allow themselves to be swept up for a couple of hours. He finds that in
off-off Broadway and small professional theaters outside New York, such
as New Jersey Rep, which tonight opens his two-act play "A World I Never
Made."
It's a three-character Greek tragedy that takes place in a bar frequented
by cops in a working class urban neighborhood from 1980 to 1987. A presentational
work, the bar's owner Nell (Kendal Ridgeway), her policeman brother-in-law
Evan (Steve Carroll), and small-time drug pusher Dete (Brian O'Halloran)
often turn and talk directly to the audience.
Directed by Arlene Schulman, the play centers on Nell, a widow, who is
in love with Evan, whose life is turned upside down when he finds marijuana
in his daughter's bedroom and tracks down her pusher, Dete. Evan's principles
and inflexibility destroys his family and a revenge plot nearly destroys
them all.
"This is a modern tragedy, but there is a lot of humor in it," Williams
said. "I believe in humor, it's always been very important to me, and
in this play it helps people with the difficult material.
"People who go to a small theater deserve a full theatrical experience
with all the elements like sets, lights and sounds," he said. "You are
asking people to see plays they've never heard of so even if they may
not be in love with the play, they'll get a first rate evening of theater.
"I'm so thrilled they do that at New Jersey Rep," he said. "The people
in charge have vision and enthusiasm very much like the early days of
off Broadway and regional theaters."
Don't get Williams wrong. He would love to have the money that goes with
a Broadway show. Currently, he supplements his theater income with public
relations and office services.
But he wants to see less pontificating and more story telling. Something
like the recent Broadway musical drama "Blood Brothers," which was a "life-changing
experience" for Williams.
"It had the guts to touch you and was incredibly searing emotionally,"
he said about the work that concerned twins separated at birth who grow
up to fulfill the prophecy they must die on the day they find out is their
heritage. "But it was intellectually sneered at."
Plays that grab you emotionally, he said, are swept aside by critics
as sentimental.
"If you let the audience know the characters, let them get involved in
the story -- I still do believe in story -- and touch those things that
make us human beings, we can disagree about what the play is saying,"
he said. "But at least we are part of a truly different experience at
each performance -- the one thing theater can still do that TV and movies
can't."
Source: Asbury Park Press
Published: April 16, 1999
|
Means to an 'Ends': Diversity is key to new
troupe's mission
Published in the Asbury Park Press
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
Theater Writer
Most of the time, actors want an audience to check its baggage
at the door, step inside a darkened space and go on a two-hour mini vacation.
ENDS
By David Alex
New Jersey Repertory Company
179 Broadway, Long Branch
Through March 28
$20-$30
(732) 229-3166
|
Not so with the world premiere of "Ends," the first
fully staged production at one of New Jersey's newest professional theaters.
After a yearlong series of play readings, this two-character play
by Chicago playwright David Alex launches the New Jersey Repertory Company's
main stage season, which opens in Long Branch tonight.
The play, which takes place in 1967, features Johnny Kitt as a
black man who has been living an isolated life for the past 18 years in
a remote mountain cabin hidden deep in the woods. During a snowstorm,
a white Vietnam veteran, played by Philip F. Lynch, stumbles to the cabin
seeking shelter.
The three-story theater owned and operated by West Long Branch
residents SuzAnne and Gabor Barabas, who are white and of Hungarian descent,
is deep in the business district of Long Branch, where blacks, Latinos
and Portuguese live in nearby houses.
Developing new and neglected plays that speak to the city's racial
diversity is New Jersey Rep's mission. About 80 actors, directors and
technicians based locally and in New York make up the troupe that will
operate with a letter of agreement so members of the Actor's Equity union
can appear on the local stage.

BOB BIELK photo
Philip F. Lynch and Johnny Kitt portray two men
with very different points of view who eventually stake out common
ground in "Ends." |
During a recent Saturday morning rehearsal for "Ends," the actors
and director Stewart Fisher talked about the burden and the joy of being
the first play that will help set the tone for things to come in the 50-seat,
black-box space.
"We know folks who come in here are going to have their own set
of prejudices, both great and small, their personal baggage," Fisher explained.
"To a certain extent, we're counting on that.
"You can't out-think an audience, but there will be a broad spectrum
of ideas coming to bear on how they perceive the show," he said. "The
beautiful essence of theater is they can all come together and take a
trip . . . while we mess with their minds."
This off-Broadway approach to theater is the company's signature.
"We want to challenge people's thinking," added Kitt, 29. "A lot
of entertainment is not challenging, doesn't ask you to think critically,
analyze situations, break stuff down, then take something away with you
to make you a better human being or at least make you look at something
differently."
That's not to say the play is a serious social history lesson.
It often is very funny as each man speaks English but, at first, can't
really communicate.
"In this highly political environment of the play, the play itself
is not about politics, or racism or even Vietnam," Fisher said. "It's
about two men who deal with those circumstances from very, very different
points of view and finding a common ground that allows them to move on.
"That's a fine line -- to bring truth to the issues without pounding
on them so there's a resonance and universality for everybody who is sitting
in the audience and living in this community," he added.
Ultimately, the play is about fathers and sons, according to Fisher.
Lynch, 30, who plays a 'Nam vet who hates his father, said it's
very important to him that he nails his character.
"I don't know why exactly, accept maybe that America has unconsciously
buried this war," he said. "The movies play up facts about the terrible
experience, but what it comes down to is we lost and this country hasn't
accepted that.
"It's a very personal play in a way and it's important to give
faces to our country's experience with that," he said.
Kitt plays a character who adores his father, a civil rights activist.
When the boy was 12, his father left him and his mother at the isolated
cabin for their own protection, saying not to venture far until he returned.
The mother soon died from fever and the father was killed during a demonstration.
For 18 years, the "boy" has been living in a book-lined cabin waiting
for his father to return.

BOB BIELK photo
Director Stewart Fisher (right) goes over a scene
from "Ends" at the New Jersey Repertory Company in Long Branch with
actors Johnny Kitt and Philip F. Lynch. |
Kitt, too, believes "Ends" is very important as much for what
it says as where it is being done.
"It's good that a play like this is in a little place like Long
Branch, New Jersey, because it needs to be out there," Kitt said. "People
need to see it wherever it can go because it is a very moving and important
piece.
"As far as it being the very first show here . . I really want
this theater to do well because when you see things being done the right
way, as they are here, you want to see it succeed and you want to stay
a part of it."
Fisher said most theaters in New York, in the course of their
history, have never achieved the level of commitment to the art as well
as the artists and community as New Jersey Rep has already.
"I know this play will be awesome," Kitt added. "While it's a
joke to New York people now that we're doing this in Long Branch, the
bottom line is it's not cheesecake, it's not cheap.
"It's powerful, it's good and it's real," he said.
"Ends" will be performed at 8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays
and 7 p.m. Sundays, with a 2 p.m. matinee on Saturdays and Sundays.
Source: Asbury Park Press
Published: March 12, 1999
Copyright ©1997-1999 IN
Jersey. |
New Jersey theater: More local
stages take a bow
12/28/01
BY PETER FILICHIA
STAR-LEDGER STAFF
Just as National Football League fans have been talking
a lot lately about parity -- that no team is dominant
and a disproportionate number of clubs are just as good
as others -- New Jersey theater fans could say the same
about the plays of 2001.
Last year, the McCarter Theatre in Princeton dominated
the Top 10 attractions with four entries, but this year
no New Jersey stage receives more than two nods in the
roundup. While such flagship theaters as McCarter and
the Paper Mill Playhouse in Millburn handily made the
list, three others made debuts: Luna Stage Company in
Montclair, New Jersey Repertory Company in Long Branch
and even the New Jersey Performing Arts Center in Newark.
Let's not think of this as our old reliable theaters
getting weaker, but that our smaller theaters are becoming
stronger. The 10 best, in alphabetical order:
"The Belle of Amherst"
New Jersey Performing Arts Center, Newark
Emily Dickinson once wrote, "We never know how high we
are till we are called to rise." And though audiences
have known for a half-century how wonderful an actress
Julie Harris is, how uplifting to have another opportunity
to see her as the reclusive poet in William Luce's play.
As it turned out, after Harris left NJPAC, she suffered
a stroke. She may never work again, so we were lucky to
have a chance to see her.
"A Chorus Line"
Paper Mill Playhouse, Millburn
In a year that saw "The Producers" win more Tonys than
any other musical, it's refreshing to be reminded about
the best musical of all time. This 1975 masterpiece about
the rigors of dancers who sweat through the audition process
received a carbon-copy staging of the original production
-- but it was a welcome sight after having been away from
us for more than a decade.
"Funny Girl"
Paper Mill Playhouse
They should have changed the name to "Funny Confident
Amazing Sensational Musical Girl" -- and she's a 23-year-old
powerhouse from Livingston named Leslie Kritzer. Going
up against the legend of Barbra Streisand wasn't easy,
but Kritzer created her own Fanny Brice -- and even had
a fresh take on "People." Robert Cuccioli, as her wayward
husband, provided able support.
"Getting in Touch with My Inner B*tch"
New Jersey Repertory Company, Long Branch
The asterisk couldn't possibly stand for the letter "i,"
for folksinger Christine Lavin showed herself to be a
good-natured charmer, full of inner beauty, in her original
one-woman show. Out of her protractor-shaped mouth came
witty songs that celebrate everyday life: spotting a celebrity,
dealing with nieces and nephews, entering the express
line in the supermarket when you've got more than 10 items.
It was such an entertaining bunch of numbers, audiences
were glad she got in touch with that inner batch.
"La Bete"
Two River Theatre Company, Manasquan
The always adventurous company went out on a limb --
and found something beautiful blooming out there with
David Hirson's comedy, set in 1654 France and written
in rhymed iambic pentameter. In it, a thinly-veiled Molière
must agree to the Prince's demand that he work with an
actor-playwright who can't stop talking. (No, really;
he goes on for 27 minutes before letting anyone else get
in a word.) But Two River got out the word that this was
one funny play that nevertheless had a great deal to say
about the making of art and artists.
"Lady Day at Emerson's Bar and Grill"
George Street Playhouse, New Brunswick
As superb as Suzzanne Douglas was last season when she
appeared at the George Street in "Wit," she trumped her
own ace when she portrayed Billie Holliday. Here she had
to sing as well as act. Did she ever, showing us a legend
on the wane who still had the power to mesmerize.
"My Children! My Africa!"
Luna Stage, Montclair
Athol Fugard's best play was a perfect fit for the cozy
confines of Luna's black box theater -- as three characters
took the audience into their confidence when delivering
their monologues. Eddie Aldredge as a high school teacher
in South Africa, and Jamahl Marsh and Nell Mooney as his
students, black and white respectively, delivered heartbreaking
soliloquies on the evils of apartheid.
"Ragtime"
New Jersey Performing Arts Center
While most touring productions that saunter into NJPAC
are second-rate affairs (the recent "Guys and Dolls" is
a perfect example), here was one -- finally -- that was
genuinely impressive. While it wasn't nearly as opulent
as the Broadway original, the songs, stories and performances
shone through in this tale of the intermingling of WASPs,
Jews and blacks in 1906 New York.
"Romeo and Juliet"
McCarter Theatre, Princeton
Director Emily Mann knows that youth must be served --
especially in a production about these star-crossed lovers.
As her leads, she chose Jeffrey Carlson, a recent grad
of the Juilliard School, and Sarah Drew, who was still
in college. Both young actors served Mann, themselves,
and Shakespeare.
"The Three Sisters"
New Jersey Shakespeare Festival, Madison
Director Bonnie J. Monte made Chekhov's 100-year-old
play seem wonderfully young. Not only did she turn in
a sterling job of direction, but she adapted the text,
too, in a version that managed to sound true to the period,
yet entertaining to contemporary ears. As for those sisters:
Laila Robins, Angela Reed and Caralyn Kozlowski all showed
the dreams they had, and the dreams they had shattered.
|
|
New Jersey theater: More local
stages take a bow
12/28/01
BY PETER FILICHIA
STAR-LEDGER STAFF
Just as National Football League fans have been talking
a lot lately about parity -- that no team is dominant
and a disproportionate number of clubs are just as good
as others -- New Jersey theater fans could say the same
about the plays of 2001.
Last year, the McCarter Theatre in Princeton dominated
the Top 10 attractions with four entries, but this year
no New Jersey stage receives more than two nods in the
roundup. While such flagship theaters as McCarter and
the Paper Mill Playhouse in Millburn handily made the
list, three others made debuts: Luna Stage Company in
Montclair, New Jersey Repertory Company in Long Branch
and even the New Jersey Performing Arts Center in Newark.
Let's not think of this as our old reliable theaters
getting weaker, but that our smaller theaters are becoming
stronger. The 10 best, in alphabetical order:
"The Belle of Amherst"
New Jersey Performing Arts Center, Newark
Emily Dickinson once wrote, "We never know how high we
are till we are called to rise." And though audiences
have known for a half-century how wonderful an actress
Julie Harris is, how uplifting to have another opportunity
to see her as the reclusive poet in William Luce's play.
As it turned out, after Harris left NJPAC, she suffered
a stroke. She may never work again, so we were lucky to
have a chance to see her.
"A Chorus Line"
Paper Mill Playhouse, Millburn
In a year that saw "The Producers" win more Tonys than
any other musical, it's refreshing to be reminded about
the best musical of all time. This 1975 masterpiece about
the rigors of dancers who sweat through the audition process
received a carbon-copy staging of the original production
-- but it was a welcome sight after having been away from
us for more than a decade.
"Funny Girl"
Paper Mill Playhouse
They should have changed the name to "Funny Confident
Amazing Sensational Musical Girl" -- and she's a 23-year-old
powerhouse from Livingston named Leslie Kritzer. Going
up against the legend of Barbra Streisand wasn't easy,
but Kritzer created her own Fanny Brice -- and even had
a fresh take on "People." Robert Cuccioli, as her wayward
husband, provided able support.
"Getting in Touch with My Inner B*tch"
New Jersey Repertory Company, Long Branch
The asterisk couldn't possibly stand for the letter "i,"
for folksinger Christine Lavin showed herself to be a
good-natured charmer, full of inner beauty, in her original
one-woman show. Out of her protractor-shaped mouth came
witty songs that celebrate everyday life: spotting a celebrity,
dealing with nieces and nephews, entering the express
line in the supermarket when you've got more than 10 items.
It was such an entertaining bunch of numbers, audiences
were glad she got in touch with that inner batch.
"La Bete"
Two River Theatre Company, Manasquan
The always adventurous company went out on a limb --
and found something beautiful blooming out there with
David Hirson's comedy, set in 1654 France and written
in rhymed iambic pentameter. In it, a thinly-veiled Molière
must agree to the Prince's demand that he work with an
actor-playwright who can't stop talking. (No, really;
he goes on for 27 minutes before letting anyone else get
in a word.) But Two River got out the word that this was
one funny play that nevertheless had a great deal to say
about the making of art and artists.
"Lady Day at Emerson's Bar and Grill"
George Street Playhouse, New Brunswick
As superb as Suzzanne Douglas was last season when she
appeared at the George Street in "Wit," she trumped her
own ace when she portrayed Billie Holliday. Here she had
to sing as well as act. Did she ever, showing us a legend
on the wane who still had the power to mesmerize.
"My Children! My Africa!"
Luna Stage, Montclair
Athol Fugard's best play was a perfect fit for the cozy
confines of Luna's black box theater -- as three characters
took the audience into their confidence when delivering
their monologues. Eddie Aldredge as a high school teacher
in South Africa, and Jamahl Marsh and Nell Mooney as his
students, black and white respectively, delivered heartbreaking
soliloquies on the evils of apartheid.
"Ragtime"
New Jersey Performing Arts Center
While most touring productions that saunter into NJPAC
are second-rate affairs (the recent "Guys and Dolls" is
a perfect example), here was one -- finally -- that was
genuinely impressive. While it wasn't nearly as opulent
as the Broadway original, the songs, stories and performances
shone through in this tale of the intermingling of WASPs,
Jews and blacks in 1906 New York.
"Romeo and Juliet"
McCarter Theatre, Princeton
Director Emily Mann knows that youth must be served --
especially in a production about these star-crossed lovers.
As her leads, she chose Jeffrey Carlson, a recent grad
of the Juilliard School, and Sarah Drew, who was still
in college. Both young actors served Mann, themselves,
and Shakespeare.
"The Three Sisters"
New Jersey Shakespeare Festival, Madison
Director Bonnie J. Monte made Chekhov's 100-year-old
play seem wonderfully young. Not only did she turn in
a sterling job of direction, but she adapted the text,
too, in a version that managed to sound true to the period,
yet entertaining to contemporary ears. As for those sisters:
Laila Robins, Angela Reed and Caralyn Kozlowski all showed
the dreams they had, and the dreams they had shattered.
|
A 'River' runs through
it: Long Branch troupe extends play
Published in the Asbury Park Press 11/23/01
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
Theater Writer
NAKED BY THE RIVER
Through Sunday
New Jersey Repertory Company's Lumia Theater
179 Broadway, Long Branch
(732) 229-3166
|
The New Jersey Repertory Company has held over its production
of "Naked by the River" and is offering theatergoers a
chance to include it in the cost of a season subscription.

Stephanie Roy and Duncan M. Rogers share
a smooch in the New Jersey Repertory's production
of "Naked By the River" in Long Branch. |
Michael T. Folie's play closes after the 2 p.m. Sunday matinee.
So, too, does the subscription offer to at least three of
the season's five plays at the theater at 179 Broadway in
Long Branch.
Subscribe to three or more plays for $25 a ticket. The
regular price is $30.
The season also includes: the New Jersey premiere of
"The Laramie Project" by Moises Kaufman, about the beating
death of gay student Matthew Shepard, Jan. 17 to Feb.
10; the world premiere of "Till Morning Comes" by Mark
McNease, about a couple married for 25 years, Feb. 21
-- March 24; the world premiere of "Panama" by Michael
T. Folie, a comedy about a man's search for the secret
of eternal life, July 11 to Aug. 11.
A fifth show running from May 2 to June 2 will be announced.
|
Undressing relationships
Published in the Asbury Park Press 10/30/01
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
THEATER WRITER
In Michael T. Folie''s last play staged at the New Jersey
Repertory Theater, Long Branch, "An Unhappy Woman," the
characters were worried about holding on to jobs they
hated.
In his latest work, "Naked by the River," now
playing through Nov. 25, the characters love their jobs.
NAKED BY THE RIVER
WHERE: The New Jersey Repertory Company, 179 Broadway,
Long Branch
WHEN: 8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays; 2 p.m.
Sundays through Nov. 25
TICKETS: $30
CALL: (732) 229-3166
|
As the romantic comedy progresses, however, Tim and Peggy
realize their love for each other has to outweigh their
love for work or they will never be truly happy.
The pursuit of happiness appears to be a common thread
in Folie''s works; at least the ones presented at the
NJ Rep, where the former Monmouth County resident is a
playwright in residence.
Much more accessible than the surrealistic "Unhappy Woman,"
Folie''s "Naked by the River" is down to earth, frequently
funny and often surprising -- especially that ending.
Peggy (Stephanie Roy) is a lawyer on the fast track when
she meets up with Tim (Duncan M. Rogers), a paralegal/secretary.
A mutual friend suggested she hire Tim to work on a case
that should help Peggy make partner in her law firm.
Tim sees straight through to Peggy''s insecurities and
coolly pulls out all her secrets. He remains an enigma
to Peggy, although she does discover he is a former lawyer
who walked away from a successful career. This, of course,
confuses her even more because she can not rationalize
why somebody would do that.
When she finds out he dumped law after an out-of-body
experience that suddenly made the meaning of life clear
to him, she is a nonbeliever. A nonbeliever, that is,
until she reads the book Tim wrote about the personal
experience. It, too, changes her life. When she finds
out, though, Tim plans to publish his tome on the internet
rather than land a lucrative book deal, she is flabbergasted.
What she does about that has dire consequences for both
of them.
Both Rogers and Roy turned in fine performances as two
people who are attracted to each other but not sure how
far to go in their relationship.
Liz Zazzi, as book publisher Gabriella, almost steals
the show in the second act. Her line delivery and comic
timing are right on the money. Her character is larger
than life and Zazzi takes full advantage of it.
Director Stewart Fisher keeps the pace of the play moving
along nicely and although some scene changes at last Friday''s
opening night were awkward, they didn''t hamper the play
too much. It may have been the first time since the NJ
Rep opened its doors a couple of years ago that the small
size of the performing space worked against a production.
|
New Jersey
stage: Leads make 'Naked' revealing
10/30/01
BY PETER FILICHIA
STAR-LEDGER STAFF
If there were
a yearbook for the 2001-2002 New Jersey theater season,
Duncan M. Rogers and Stephanie Roy would be unchallenged
as "Cutest Couple."
They are the two
important ingredients to the success of "Naked by the
River," the newest production at the New Jersey Repertory
Company in Long Branch. Playwright Michael T. Folie has
given them engaging dialogue, too, which masks the play's
one deficiency: a message that seems overly familiar.
Rogers plays Tim
Grant, a secretary-paralegal for junior associate Peggy
Ryerson, portrayed by Roy. But Tim's preoccupation in
his spare time is writing a book that will teach people
how to view the ordinary things in the world as really
quite extraordinary, and that they shouldn't get obsessive
over money and power -- as Peggy does.
Little by little,
Tim influences Peggy, and makes her question her ambition.
Not that the lawyer doesn't understand the simple things
in life; on vacation, she stood naked by the river and
felt the freedom.
Nevertheless,
old habits die hard, so Peggy tries to change Tim just
as much as he tries to change her. Who'll win in this
battle of the sexes and ideologies?
How it turns out
won't amaze theatergoers, but what will surprise them
is the chemistry between the couple. That's the hardest
quality for a director and performers to capture, but,
under Stewart Fisher's amiable direction, sparks fly between
Roy and Rogers. Some theatergoers may be so convinced
they're a couple, they'll search the program bios.
Roy wears a dress
that's utterly shapeless and a hairstyle that makes her
purposely sexless. Yet her face makes clear that beneath
her snooty look is genuine humanity. She lets on right
away that she likes her new employee, but cannot admit
it in order to keep control.
Rogers starts
off with a chip on his shoulder the size of a doorstop,
and a crooked smile that complements his always-askew
hair. He, too, must obfuscate what he's feeling, and does
a commendable job.
The third cast
member is equally proficient. She's Liz Zazzi, who portrays
Gabriella Rossini, a profane and pregnant book publisher.
Zazzi is one of the best in the state at delivering a
no-nonsense barb, and she certainly is up to her high
standard here, with the many laugh-getting zingers provided
by Folie. But give the actress a line replete with truth
-- like "You give birth first, and only later do you find
out what you made" -- and she infuses it with compassion.
From its delightfully
wacky first act, "Naked by the River" seems to be going
someplace special, so the second act is a bit of a letdown.
Ultimately, it's like a journey on which a traveler isn't
thrilled when he reaches his destination, but is still
glad for the friends he's made along the way.
|
November 2, 2001
Scene On Stage by Philip Dorian
MIDDLETOWN NATIVE'S NEW PLAY
PREMIERES
New Jersey Repertory Company Stages
Michael Folie's Naked by the River
It the mission of Gabor and SuzAnne
Barabas's New Jersey Repertory Company to encourage and
produce new playwrights. Among the best of their "finds"
have been Brian Richard Mori's Adult Fiction and Mark
Dunn's North Fork. Naked by the River,
by Middletown native Michael T. Folie, ranks right up
there with them.
At the beginning of Naked by the
River, when prim, uptight attorney Peggy (Stephanie
Roy) is forced by her boss to hire unkempt, raffish paralegal
Tim (Duncan M. Rogers), it's soon apparent that the two
will fall in love - or at least into bed. Sometime during
the first act, however, it also becomes clear that Mr.
Folie's play is much more than a predictable sex comedy.
It is a tightly written, intelligent, witty play about
two complex young people whose contradictory talents and
values bring them together, then pull them apart, and
then just maybe reconnect them after all.
It is more than Peggy's mannerly attitude
and Tim's arrogant sarcasm that separate the two. She's
grounded in her legal career, working toward a partnership
in a prestigious firm, while he's a seat-of-the-pants
sort of guy who appears to be just going along to get
along.
The attraction between the two is ignited
when Peggy reads a book Tim has written. While we never
learn much about the book, it is their divergent attitudes
toward its future that trigger the events of the play.
He wants to post it, gratis, on the web, and she envisions
conventional publication and a smash success. Whose concept
prevails - and does it work? - is the stuff of the play.
Once he gets past the over-the-top first
scene, Mr. Rogers eases comfortably into the role of the
would-be idealist. The character must choose: About his
book, he says he had a vision, "No", Peggy tells him,
"You had an idea." It is to the actor's credit that Tim
appears realistically torn between the two. He's a handsome
devil too, which lends credibility to the romance between
Tim and Peggy.
Not that Ms. Roy needs any help. This
actor is as much a find for NJ Rep as is the play. Peggy
isn't all veneer, but she does struggle with her professional
image, and Ms. Roy captures every nuance of this career
woman's dilemma. Her sensitive performance makes everything
Peggy says (and, it should be noted, does) exactly right
for the time and place. In Ms. Roy's playing, Peggy emerges
fresh and open and perfectly natural.
We have us a three-character play here,
and Liz Zazzi certainly does justice to the acid tongued
literary agent. Tough as nails and a real softy at the
same time, the character isn't easy, and they play would
be harmed if we didn't like her. But we do, thanks to
Ms. Zazzi's way with the wry bons mots Mr. Folie has written
for Gabriella. Not incidentally, she's realistically pregnant
in attitude as well as appearance. Writing her thus, and
carrying her to term before the final scene, is one of
Mr. Folie's most effective conceits.
The play depends on establishing the
personas of several people who never appear, and the playwright
accomplishes this adroitly. Peggy's boss, her parents
and an influential book publisher are fleshed out sufficiently
in dialogue that's not forced exposition, and their influence
on the on-stage characters is believable.
The message of Mr. Folie's play - does
success, like power, corrupt? - isn't new. How many new
messages are there anyway? What's important is communication
that message in an interesting voice, and that the playwright
accomplishes. If "interesting" sounds like faint praise,
try to remember the last time you were truly interested
in the lives portrayed in popular fiction.
It doesn't hurt one bit that it is acted
so sublimely by Ms. Roy, so commendably by Mr. Rogers
and so audaciously by Ms. Zazzi. No hindrance either is
Stewart Fisher's direction, sensitive as it is both to
character and situation. But from now through November
18 at New Jersey Rep, the play's the thing.
|
The Coaster
NAKED BY THE RIVER, LOVE VS. THE CORPORATE WORLD
By Robert F. Carroll
Michael Folie, a prolific young playwright, a native of
Middletown Township and something of an old hand at the
New Jersey Repertory Company in Long Branch, appears to
have a winner with his latest romantic comedy, "Naked
By the River." Folie's "An Unhappy Woman"
premiered at New Jersey Rep in February.
The new two-acter, which opened at the Lumia Theatre in
Long Branch last Friday, pits a headstrong young writer
against and ambitious young lady lawyer as they grope
their way to a romantic attachment.
In the play, paralegal Tim (Duncan M. Rogers) shows up
at a Manhattan law office staffed by Peggy (Stephanie
Roy). He's primed for a fight, having screwed up his former
job at a Cincinnati law firm. The reason: he's written
a book the product of a personal epiphany that changed
his life. Peggy, in a smart, smart-alecky exchange of
dialogue, is gradually drawn to the cantankerous young
man, attracted by both his idealism and his book which,
after a quick read, she finds enthralling.
But the road to true love gets exceedingly rocky in Act
Two. Peggy discovers she really likes her law career and
really wants Tim to market his book. But the true artist
in him rebels at publishing his life's work -- he doesn't
even want anybody to read it -- and it takes every bit
of her feminine guile to get him on board the corporate
express. Once convinced, Tim, alas, turns into a hard-nosed,
slick-haired, money-grubbing salesman.
It would be scurrilous to reveal how true love gets back
on track, suffice to say that Peggy's one lapse into impropriety
-- she once had her picture taken nude, by a river --
provides the key.
Rogers is a vigorously engaging Tim, always in charge
until Peggy brings him to heel. And Roy, as Peggy, is
a charmer, especially when she drops her office cool and
warms to Tim. Liz Zazzi makes a hilarious publicist who
informs Tim that what he's written is, God forbid, a sure-fire
sales manual -- and he's be a fool not to cash in on it.
Zazzi is a funny, funny woman, using a wit that's been
honed by any number of cabaret and television appearances.
Stewart Fisher directed "Naked By the River"
which runs Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays at 8 p.m.
and Sundays at 2 p.m. through November 18th Long Branch's
Lumia Theatre, on Broadway.
|
He said, she said: Playwright
finds himself in strong female characters
Published in the Asbury Park Press 10/26/01
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
Theater Writer
"Naked by the River," opening at 8 tonight at the New
Jersey Repertory Theatre in Long Branch, is the third
play from Michael T. Folie in which a strong woman character
is central to the story.
NAKED BY THE RIVER
By the New Jersey Repertory Company
179 Broadway, Long Branch
Opens at 8 p.m. Friday
8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays; 2 p.m. Sundays
(through Nov. 25)
$30
(732) 229-3166
|
"The woman in each play, in a way, stands in for me," Folie
said from his home in Rockland County, N.Y. "It's easier
for me to deal with issues if I have the character as far
away from me -- biographically -- as possible."
"Naked," receiving its first fully-staged production
here, features Peggy (Stephanie Roy), a rising young lawyer
at a New York City law firm, and Tim (Duncan Rogers),
an unpublished novelist who supports himself with temporary
work as a paralegal. Liz Zazzi plays the pregnant owner
of a small publishing company. Stewart A. Fisher, NJ Rep's
company manager and associate director, helms the two-act,
romantic comedy.
Folie, who is a resident play writer at NJ Rep, had his
"An Unhappy Woman" produced there in February. It is an
Orwellian-like look at the future when terrorism in the
norm, happiness is in short supply and the title character
trusts no one.
His third strong-woman play, "The Adjustment," centers
on a woman with a powerful personality who worked as a
lobbyist in a big city and falls in love with a married
man.

Actors Duncan Rogers and Stephanie Roy
go over a scene from Michael T. Folie's "Naked by
the River," opening tonight in Long Branch. |
All three of these plays were written within two years of
each other, said Folie, a 1970 graduate of what is now Middletown
High School North. Yet, he said, his dozen or so plays are
vastly different from each other.
"Naked by the River" came from Folie's personal experiences
as a temporary worker at a law firm during the 1980s when
making money - lots of money - was paramount. Although
he was living a somewhat bohemian actor's life, he hit
it off with a woman lawyer on the fast track to fame and
riches. If both had not been married to other people,
Folie said, they may have grown closer. That made him
think about the stresses such a relationship would encounter.
So he wrote a play about it.
"In the old days (on stage) parents kept (the lovers)
apart," Folie noted. "Now, in romantic comedies, the writer
has to bend over backward to find things to keep people
apart."
In "Naked by the River" the lovers, at first, can't physically
unite because each is involved with someone else. Later,
after moving in with each other, they are divided emotionally.
Each must sacrifice something they hold dear before their
relationship can truly be consummated.
When Folie sits down to write a play, he usually knows
how it will begin and end. The stuff in the middle emerges
after he writes pages and pages of improvisational, non-dramatic
chit chat, he explained.
" I have to do that in order to find the action and it
may be after 20 pages that I discover why a character
said what they said earlier," Folie said. "I know that
sounds psychotic . . . but it's the emergence of my subconscious
that causes these illuminations."
It's all about finding a good balance, he added. And
for serious writers, he said, the tragic events of Sept.
11 created a richer environment for writing. Of course,
Folie said, he would prefer the World Trade Center tragedy
never happened.
"It's nice to live in a safe and secure time," Folie
said. "But it's not good for the artist.
"It's hard for a serious playwright to make headway when
people are satisfied, content and secure, and don't feel
like questioning anything," Folie explained. "During dangerous
times people are more aware and it's a better time to
be an artist."
As examples of this, Folie cites George Bernard Shaw,
whose best plays were written between the two World Wars;
Anton Chekhov's major works were penned during the declining
days of the last Russian czar, and Shakespeare's plays
were born during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, which
saw the restoration of the Protestant faith, the defeat
of the Spanish Armada, at least one serious threat of
rebellion and a series of Parliamentary conflicts.
"It's a different world we live in now," Folie said.
"In some ways I feel mentally more prepared for that world
. . . that it's a rough place . . . and people might be
more responsive to plays that reflect that sense of danger
and, in a way, find they are doing OK."
Published on October 26, 2001
|
Actress
reveals her 'Secret' to theatergoers
09/07/01
BY PETER FILICHIA
STAR-LEDGER STAFF
Katharine Houghton is going to tell her best kept secret.
But she's doing it by way of the play she wrote and performs,
called "Best Kept Secret," opening Friday at
New Jersey Repertory Theatre in Long Branch.
In a way, some theatergoers will probably think that
Houghton herself is a bit of a secret: After she made
a much-heralded film debut in 1967 as the
daughter of Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy in "Guess
Who's Coming to Dinner?," she virtually disappeared
from the screen. Her next feature film,
"Seeds of Evil," was a long seven years later,
and her next, "Eyes of the Amaryllis," was an
even longer eight years after that.
Being reminded of this doesn't unnerve Houghton in the
least, as she sits in her dressing room. At 56, her hands
are prematurely gnarled and her face
somewhat lined. But time can do nothing to those high
cheekbones that remind a visitor that she is the niece
of Katharine Hepburn.
"I was put under a three-picture contact,"
she says, "but the films they offered me were all
B-pictures. I preferred to play great roles in regional
theater. Nina in 'The Seagull.' Hedda Gabler, Major Barbara,
Louka in 'Arms and the Man.' For seven years, I was a
company member of the Actors Theatre
of Louisville."
It wasn't the career she envisioned when she was majoring
in philosophy at Sarah Lawrence College. But events took
a turn after her sophomore year, when
she went to the Soviet Union. "Most young people
go to Italy or France," she says with a smile. "But
I was influenced by my grandmother (Hepburn's
mother), who was an ardent Communist."
Little did she know that she'd someday write a play about
her experiences there and the years that followed.
Houghton went to such big cities as Leningrad (now St.
Petersburg), Moscow and Kiev and smaller towns like Tashkent
and Yalta. There, one of the people
she'd met on the trip -- "(a New York University)
political science professor and a rabid Marxist,"
she describes him -- said that she should meet Andre,
a
young man who was passionate about politics.
"I was reluctant to meet any Russian," she
says, "because by then, we'd all had trouble with
KGB. They wanted to know to whom we were talking, were
we
giving them magazines and books, or preaching capitalist
propaganda?"
Yet she agreed to meet Andre -- "who turned out
to look like a Russian Liam Neeson," she says. "He
was irritating and challenging. His first question
was, 'Are you a disciple of Aristotle or Plato?' No hello.
No small talk -- and I come from a family where there's
no small talk, so this was very
interesting to me."
Houghton calls the four days they spent together a watershed
event in her life. "Not because of the sex, though
there was sex. He changed me from an
extremely shy person who had this feeling I was going
to die by the time I was 21 to someone who wanted to live."
Though they were together only four days before she returned
home, they continued to write. Four years later, Houghton
had big news. She'd
screen-tested for Carl Reiner's movie, "Enter Laughing,"
and while he didn't cast her, he kept her screen test
on file. When director Stanley Kramer told
Reiner that Samantha Eggar had dropped out of "Guess
Who's Coming to Dinner?" and he needed a young actress
who could convincingly play Hepburn and Tracy's daughter,
Reiner knew how to solve the problem.
Suddenly Houghton's letters to Andre told of her whirlwind
fame. Best of all, she'd be coming to nearby Czechoslovakia
for the Eastern European Film
Festival, and the two agreed to reunite there.
But during the première, as Houghton desperately
searched for him, he was nowhere to be found because he
couldn't leave the country, she recalls. "But
I didn't know that until I was home and got his next letter."
The letter writing continued. Houghton estimates there
were 200 correspondences between them, though some were
intercepted by censors.
Yet it would be 23 more years before Houghton and Andre
met again face-to-face in 1990. "That was very romantic,"
she says. "I'd had other
lovers during that time, of course, but I never married
because he was the love of my life."
Andre moved to America in 1993, but lived only two more
years.
"I told him that I would someday write our story
based on the letters," says Houghton. "Now I
have."
|
Center stage
08/16/01
'Secret' revealed
Guess who's coming
to Long Branch?
It's Katharine
Houghton, who a third of a century ago captivated moviegoers
as the daughter of Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn
-- and the fiancée of Sidney Poitier -- in "Guess Who's
Coming to Dinner."
Houghton -- who
actually is Hepburn's niece -- will star in her own play
at New Jersey Repertory Company. In "The Best Kept Secret,"
she writes of an American woman who falls in love with
a Russian man during the height of the Cold War.
Co-starring with
Houghton is Anthony Newfield, who appeared on Broadway
in "The Grapes of Wrath" and off-Broadway in "It's Only
a Play." Directing them is John Going, who staged Tony
LoBianco as Fiorello H. LaGuardia in "Hizzoner!" on Broadway.
"The Best Kept
Secret" plays Sept. 6-30 at New Jersey Repertory Company,
179 Broadway, Long Branch. Performances are Thursdays
through Saturdays at 8 p.m. and Sundays at 2 p.m. Tickets
are $27.50. Call (732) 229-3166.
|
Lavin
Lucky Star
by Pamela Murray Winters
"Cool" is hard to define,
for "coolness" is ever-changing; one minute you're
au courant, while the next minute the club kids
are laughing at you. But it's a safe bet that the
opposite of cool is a 49-and-a-half-year-old, moon-faced
folksinger twirling a pair of Day-Glo batons. "Look
at me," she laughed, mid-dance-step. "I'm like Britney
Spears' grandmother."
|
 |
That's
part of what's special about Christine Lavin — she's been
earning money as a musician since 1984 and shows no signs
of stopping, but she's never cut her musical consciousness
to fit this year's fashions. By being herself — only more
so — she's attracted a wide range of fans. And, with her
summer stint in a one-woman show on the New Jersey shore,
even more people have discovered her unusual blend of
music, theater, rhythmic gymnastics, astronomy lessons,
beauty pageantry, and even cosmetology.
Even before the batons came out, at one of the last shows
in New Jersey Repertory Company's Getting in Touch
With My Inner Bitch, one audience member, who'd grabbed
a last-minute seat for the sold-out performance and knew
nothing about Lavin, kept asking his neighbor, "Is this
considered normal for folk music?"
"It's been a real leap of faith," said Lavin about her
move to the stage. But it hasn't been a leap she's made
without checking her parachute. In 2000 she signed with
a new agent, Ann Patrice Carrigan of Poetry in Motion.
This agency, owned by actors Anthony Zerbe and Roscoe
Lee Browne, is "more theatrical in nature" than her previous
representatives, some of whom were unhappy that she was
doing much more onstage than merely singing. Poetry in
Motion recognizes Lavin's unique gifts, describing her
as a "full-service entertainer."
Seated comfortably in the living room of her producers,
Gabe and SuzAnne Barabas of New Jersey Rep, in a post-show
wind-down, Lavin was nevertheless adamant about making
certain statements, though her delivery was, as always,
gentle and demure.
"I've felt for a very, very long time, and this is one
of the things I'm determined, there are so many people
in folk music whose work would be so at home on the legitimate
stage. And there's such a need for good songs and good
songwriters for theater. There's just not enough. And
there's always room for people who are good.
"One of the people who's come to this run here at New
Jersey Rep is Jim Nicola. He runs New York Theatre Workshop,
which has been interested in me since 1994. I did a four-day
workshop in '94 with actors singing my stuff." Not much
came of this experiment; while Lavin worked in one room,
"in the next room over was Rent." But in the wake
of the success of Bitch, Lavin planned to talk
with Nicola about getting "a series of singer/songwriters
from all over the country and putting them in front of
the theatre world.
"When you're a solo performer, what you've been doing,
without thinking about it, [is] building a one-person
show that's very theatrical in nature. It's just you and
your instrument and your voice, and you're telling stories.
We're all storytellers." Being a singer/songwriter is
"just the simplest form, it's just stripped down — it's
entertaining, and it works."
Theater seems like a natural setting for the music Lavin
enjoys, as well as the music she makes. Getting folksingers
onto theater stages will "open that up for larger audiences
who turn their nose up at folk music 'cause it's in a
church basement or something. And also, as we get older,
we like cushier chairs!" she giggled.
Over the course of Bitch, which ran from August
9 to September 2, Lavin added new dimensions to the one-woman,
one-guitar setup. She judiciously used a foot-pedal-activated
device called a Boomerang to multiply her voice, creating,
in effect, her own girl group. With the audience's help,
she opened out a few of her songs as if she were a Hollywood
screenwriter pitching scripts: "Shopping Cart of Love:
The Play" was a natural for this treatment, as Lavin wove
out, with gusto, the tale of a woman's breakdown in the
supermarket express lane. And sometimes she brought her
audience members onto the stage. Never before has Lavin
drawn such enthusiastic male choruses for "Sensitive New
Age Guys." "I know a lot of guys come because they want
to be 'Sensitive New Age Guys'!" she laughed.
This is an excerpt from an article in Dirty Linen #97 (Dec. '01/Jan. '02).
|
CurtainCall:
No reason to b*tch about Christine Lavin
Published in the Islander 08/24/01
By
JACQUELINE DURETT
Staff Writer
A
few weeks ago, while driving home from Washington, D.C.,
I was at the Delaware/New Jersey border and had trouble
receiving radio stations.
I
ended up listening to some folk song that caught my attention
right away. It was a "disaster movie in a song," which
dealt with an office romance gone horribly wrong. The
words were so catchy that by the end I was singing along.
The singer had created an intensely vivid scene that was
incredibly easy to imagine, and comedy played an essential
role.
I
had forgotten the song until last week when I heard Christine
Lavin, who, as it turns out, was that voice on the radio,
perform that song as part of her performance, "Getting
In Touch With My Inner B*tch."
Don't
let the title fool you: "Getting in Touch With My Inner
B*tch," the show currently in its run at the New Jersey
Repertory Company in Long Branch, has nothing to do with
feminist angst. Instead, it's a fun sing-along -- an interactive
experience that is just plain enjoyable. While seeing
the show last week, I couldn't help but find myself laughing
and relating to the material Lavin sang about in her folk-music
drama/concert.
The
show takes participants -- who are truly that, participants
-- on an emotional journey through the serious, comical
and contemplative. Special effects abound at certain times,
and their purpose is clear, and well-planned.
Director
SuzAnne Barbaras has done a wonderful job guiding Lavin
in order for her to make the most of her performance space.
Watch Lavin's feet: She employs a Boomerang, an instrument
that echoes music and voice, during the show as an additional
effect, which she uses repeatedly to achieve different
moods. The capabilities of the instrument are amazing,
and Lavin's ensures the authenticity of the live sounds
it creates.
Lavin's
songs are as diverse as the Boomerang. In one song, a
couple of men were invited up on stage to help Lavin sing
a song about "sensitive New Age guys" who embrace Volvos
and women's feelings. And to demonstrate her range, another
song helps Lavin sort out her feelings about the Kennedy
assassination. And of course, don't forget about the "disaster
movie in a song."
Attendees
to last week's performance also had a special treat in
seeing Irvin Blake perform, in addition to Lavin. The
writer of such songs as "A Room Without Windows" and "Cuando,
Cuando," Blake wowed audience members with hits and stories
to accompany them.
There's
still time to join in the musical revelrie. "Getting In
Touch With My Inner B*tch" will run at the New Jersey
Repertory Company at 179 Broadway until Sept. 2. Tickets
are $25. For more information or to order tickets, call
(732) 229-3166.
from
the Islander
|
Get
in touch with Christine Lavin
Published in the Asbury Park Press 8/15/01
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
THEATER WRITER
Folk singer Christine Lavin is calling her new show,
"Getting In Touch with My Inner Bitch," but she can't
fool us.
She is about as nice, as generous and as fun
as one's favorite aunt in her one-woman show at the
New Jersey Repertory Company in Long Branch through Sept.
2. Her eyes sparkle with the same degree of clarity and
brilliance as her rhinestone eye glasses. (Could they
be a small tribute to her idol, Dame Edna?)
GETTING IN TOUCH WITH MY INNER
BITCH
The one-woman show is at the New Jersey Repertory
Company
179 Broadway, Long Branch
WHEN: 8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays; 2 p.m.
Sundays through Sept. 2
TICKETS: $25
CALL: (732) 229-3166
|
She says all her songs are based on some kind of reality
and since she lives in New York City, need we say more.
Her second song of the evening concerns the subway and
a woman crying for help because a dog is lying on the
tracks ... or is it? Another song is about Ray, a guy
who owns a store that makes copies on 72nd Street just
off Broadway. He has fallen in love with Linda Eder and
turned his store into a shrine to the singer who starred
in "Jekyll & Hyde."
Because Lavin tours the country much of the year, her
songs are not limited to Manhattan. She sings about her
reaction to encountering Harrison Ford, "The only living
movie star I adore," in the Rocky Mountains and how she
is so lucky he doesn't carry mace.
Then there is an out-of-world experience, a song about
the controversy of whether Pluto is a planet or a comet
or what?
This is Lavin's first time performing in one spot
for more than one night and working with a director. SuzAnne
Barabas, artistic director of the NJ Rep, has done an
excellent job setting the scene.
Lavin, with her acoustic guitar, roams the small stage.
Her feet, which push levers on an electronic device that
repeat her words and music, are almost as busy as her
hands. And as the seating is only three rows deep, she
makes frequent forays into the audience.
She plucks several men out to sing backup for her song,
"Sensitive New Age Guy." You know, the kind of man whose
dream car is a Volvo, his favorite song is "Puff, the
Magic Dragon," and he doesn't mind hyphenating his
last name. It's to die for.
The closest Lavin comes to being a bitch is a song about
a woman who is having the worst day of her life and finally
loses it in the 10-item line at the supermarket because
she has 13 items and the cashier won't check her out.
But even this story has a happy ending.
Lavin's show is a delightful oasis, especially for
baby boomers whose life experience may echo her own. And
she is sharing the stage with some musician friends who
will offer post-show performances. Scheduled are:
THURSDAY: Composer Ervin Drake, who authored
such hits as "It Was A Very Good year" for Frank Sinatra,
"I Believe" for Frankie Laine, as well as "Good Morning
Heartache" for Diana Ross.
SATURDAY: Singer and song writer Julie Gold,
who penned the 1990 Grammy Award-winning song of the year
"From a Distance," recorded by Bette Midler. Her songs
have been recorded by by Judy Collins, Kathy Mattea and
Patti Lupone. She tours with her own night club act.
AUG. 24-26: Singer and song writer Red Grammar,
who performed with the Limeliters from 1981 to 1991, but
best known as a successful childrens' musical performer.
AUG. 30-SEPT. 2: Folk singer and song writer
Tina Lear.
Published on August 15, 2001
|
New Jersey
stage: Letter perfect -- Christine Lavin is just too nice
for title of her play
08/14/01
BY PETER FILICHIA
STAR-LEDGER STAFF
That asterisk
in the title of Christine Lavin's play can't possibly
stand for the letter "i." Even though the folksinger calls
her show at New Jersey Repertory Company "Getting in Touch
with My Inner B*tch," she shows herself as a good-natured
charmer full of inner beauty.
The rotund, owlish-looking
Lavin may be dressed in basic black, but, unlike Masha
in Chekhov's "The Seagull," she's hardly in mourning for
her life. Occasionally she flashes a grin that shows impishness,
but never b*tchiness. For that matter, Lavin has gone
on record to say that she chose to use the asterisk because
"I don't want to offend." What does that tell you about
her potential to be a shrew?
Out of her protractor-shaped
mouth come perceptively witty songs that celebrate everyday
life. Accompanying herself on acoustic guitar, she sings
of the thrill of spotting longtime hero Harrison Ford
while she was vacationing in Colorado. She expresses relief
that her nephews don't have pierced navels or spiky purple
hair. Not only does she sing a loving tribute to a favorite
aunt, but she shows some sympathy for St. Christopher,
who was demoted from sainthood.
Does this fit
the profile of a difficult woman? Here's someone who tells
her audience, "You've got to leave something beautiful
in your wake" and "We all have beauty in our own way."
When the crowd responds with enthusiastic applause, she
coos, "You're so sweet!" Later, she gives a present to
the person who scored the highest grade in astronomy in
college. When someone in the crowd sneezes, she interrupts
her song to say, "God bless you." Then she sings a number
for audience members who have recently celebrated a birthday.
The closest Lavin
gets to validating her title occurs when she sings about
a contretemps with a cashier in the supermarket express
line who won't deal with 13 items. It's a veritable morality
play in which revenge is exacted. Another song ostensibly
has a sad ending, but after the applause, Lavin adds a
section that shows the tale had a happy ending after all.
That may be a bit devious, but it's nothing more severe
than that.
Indeed, Lavin
is capable of complaint. She grouses that she had to attend
the opera and later went skiing simply because her boyfriend
likes those activities. "Is there anyone here," she asks
her audience, "who's in love with someone you have nothing
in common with?" She knows the answer is yes, but she
isn't defeated by the reality.
Though she's sunny
in outlook, Lavin is no Pollyanna. At the end of the show,
she asks a tough question of herself and her audience:
"What can you do when it's clear to you that dreams will
not come true?" But even here, she avoids bitterness and
faces reality with a square jaw: "Adjust your dreams"
is her advice.
Maybe that asterisk
in "Getting in Touch with My Inner B*tch" really stands
for the letter "a" and Lavin is giving audiences a chance
to get in touch with her inner batch of feelings and songs.
It's a chance theatergoers should embrace.
|
Getting in touch with Christine Lavin
Published in the Asbury Park Press and the Home News
Tribune 8/10/01
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
Theater Writer
Christine
Lavin is doing things at the New Jersey Repertory Company
in Long Branch she's never done in her 17 years as a folk
singer and songwriter.
GETTING IN TOUCH WITH MY INNER BITCH
Starring Christin Lavin
New Jersey Repertory Company
179 Broadway, Long Branch
8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays, 2 p.m. Sundays;
through Sept. 2
$25
(732) 229-3166
or www.njrep.org
|
"I've
never worked with a set before," she said. "I've never worked
with a director before in my life and I've never performed
in one place so long."
SuzAnne
Barabas, artistic director of the NJ Rep, is directing
Lavin in a theatrical evening of song called "Getting
in Touch With My Inner Bitch," opening tonight. During
an interview on the first day of rehearsal, Lavin, 49,
sounded like a kid loving every minute of summer camp.
"Usually,
it's just been me and my guitar -- and I'm self-taught,"
said Lavin, who learned to play as a child by watching
a guitar teacher on a PBS TV series. "SuzAnne has already
given me some wonderful ideas that never occurred to me
to do, just because I'm so used to just standing there
and playing."
Although
Lavin has been "wireless" for three years, she still feels
tethered to a microphone and hasn't fully adjusted to
being mobile.
But
don't think her two-hour show is static.
"I
do things other folk singers don't do," she said.
No
kidding.
Besides
playing several acoustic guitars, she walks into the audience,
uses technology that reproduces her voice as her own backup
singer and twirls batons, glow sticks and ribbons.
"What
I always liked about folk music is it is a very inclusive
music," said Lavin, who counts Judy Collins, Bob Dylan
and Dave van Rack as influences. "And what I've felt for
a very long time is my work would be very at home in a
theater."
And
NJ Rep's intimate cabaret setting will make audiences
feel like Lavin is singing in their living room. She opens
each show by including the names of audience members in
her song. As the evening progresses, she'll ask some personal
questions relating to an upcoming song, all of which are
drawn from real life. As she gets older, Lavin noted,
she writes more for her peer group.
For
instance, "The Kind of Love You Never Recover From," her
most requested song, concerns the great love of one's
life that, for whatever reason, got away.
"Everyone
has someone in their background they never quite got over,"
she said about the song she wrote in 1990. "They may not
have talked about it in 30 years, but it's something they
carry with them."
Then
there's "Good Thing He Can't Read My Mind." It concerns
doing things one normally would not do just to make a
relationship work, she said.
"One
woman (in the audience) said she took country line dancing
for two years and you could tell by the way she said it
she hated every minute of it," Lavin related.
Then
there's "I Want to Make Friends With My Gray Hair." But
we won't go there.
"People
tell me it's like I'm writing a musical sound track for
their lives," Lavin said.
Also
at each performance, Lavin will be joined by some musical
friends who, following each show, will entertain about another
45 minutes "for people who don't want to go home," she said.
While
not exactly a household name, Lavin has recorded 13 solo
albums and produced 12 compilation records. She travels
the country, mostly doing one-night stands.
When
folk singers get air time on the radio, she said, it's
on the far left of the dial inhabited by college and public
radio stations.
"Pop
radio is locked in with the big record companies," she
said. "If (folk singers) sell 10,000 CDs, that's a successful
album that makes money.
"Big
record companies have to sell at least 100,000 CDs, because
their overhead is so different," she explained, adding
she thinks the music business is in a calamitous state
and songwriting by most pop artists is poor.
"People
like me are holding on for dear life, because we don't
get air play, we don't have sales anything near what the
big companies can do," she said. "I felt for a long time
if our music was put into a theatrical setting, it would
be a natural fit because . . . our songs tell stories
and that's what theater is all about -- story telling."
These
days she produces all of her own CDs and sells them at
concerts or on the Internet at www.christinelavin.com.
Each NJ Rep performance will be recorded live and a CD
burned that night will be auctioned off to the highest
bidder. The proceeds will go back to the nonprofit theater.
Published
on August 10, 2001
|
Folksinger
offers a one-woman musical
08/05/01
BY PETER FILICHIA
STAR-LEDGER STAFF
Folksinger-songwriter
Christine Lavin wants her club-hopping fans to know that
her one-woman show at New Jersey Repertory Company in
Long Branch is not her first gig in a "gen-u-ine theater."
In fact, when
she enters the spotlight to sing her songs in "Getting
in Touch with My Inner B*tch," it will be all of her second
appearance on the legitimate stage.
"Yes," she says
in a self-deprecating voice. "I've appeared onstage with
Julia Roberts, Joanne Woodward, Paul Newman and Nathan
Lane."
Though it wasn't
planned that way. Four years ago Lavin, who plays acoustic
guitar while singing her perceptive songs ("Blind Dating
Fun," "I Bring Out the Worst in You"), agreed to perform
her best-known composition, "Sensitive New Age Guys,"
at a benefit for Paul Newman's Hole-in-the-Wall-Gang Camp.
She was the opener for author A.E. Hotchner's spoof of
"Cinderella," starring Roberts as Cinderella, Woodward
as narrator, Newman as the Fairy Godfather and Lane as
the Fairy Godmother.
But three days
before the opening, Lavin was told that Sarah Jessica
Parker, cast as one of Cinderella's evil stepsisters,
canceled -- and would Lavin replace her?
"I'd never acted,"
Lavin says, with awe surging through her voice. "Never
anywhere, anytime. And this was going to be for 300 people
who paid $1,000 each to see real stars."
Yet she donned
a lime green plastic jacket, black leggings and a blue
rhinestone-studded beret. "And," she says, "when we got
to the scene before I go to the ball, where Julia Roberts
was to clean my shoe, I ad-libbed, 'You missed a spot.'"
She chortles with
glee. "Making her shine 'em again was, I guess, my inner
bitch showing."
Actually, a visit
with Lavin suggests that there's little "b*tchiness" to
be found in the stout songwriter with short-cropped locks
(a look that's prompted her newest tune, "I'm Becoming
Friends with My Grey Hair"). In her small New York apartment,
where CDs are piled in every corner and most of the floor,
Lavin, dressed in a plain black shirt and slacks, is quick
to laugh and talks a mile-and-a-half a minute.
While some of
her songs are complaints, they're usually benign whining.
"Oh, No" describes her problem of locating lost glasses
with less-than-optimum vision. "Big Bug" tells of an insect
of inordinate length who pays a visit to her apartment.
"Almost everything
I've written in the last 10 years is musical non-fiction
-- stories about real things or real people," she says.
What about the
song of a woman who misses her boyfriend's call and presses
*69 -- only to get a woman on the line who turns out to
be his wife? ("That happened to a friend," Lavin insists.)
"Waiting for the B-Train," in which subway commuters fear
an injured dog is on the tracks, but discover it's a wig?
("Oh, yes, that happened, too.")
While most of
her songs are funny or bittersweet, some take on weightier
issues. "The Sixth Floor" relates how the Texas School
Book Depository in Dallas has morphed into a Kennedy assassination
tourist trap.
"After I saw it,
I got on a plane and wrote the song with the pen I bought
there that said 'The Sixth Floor' on it," she says. "And
after I finished the song, I threw the pen away."
Last spring, SuzAnne
and Gabor Barabas, respectively the artistic director
and executive producer of New Jersey Repertory, saw Lavin
in concert in New York and asked her to appear at their
theater.
"I went down there
to see one of their shows, 'Immortal Interlude,' the same
week I went to see '42nd Street,'" Lavin says, "and I
thought their show was much better. So here I am."
Lavin cites an
unlikely influence in her desire to play a theater: Barry
Humphries' Dame Edna Everage, who appeared in "her" own
Broadway show last year.
"Seeing Dame Edna
totally changed my life," she says. "I saw it in previews
and walked out saying, 'This is the gold standard of performance.'
I went 25 times -- and at $65 a ticket, I almost went
broke. I had to go to a place where the price of soup
was cut in half at 5:30 p.m., and had dinner there just
so I could afford to see Dame Edna."
Dame Edna is a
confirmed Christine Lavin fan as well. "This girl has
got the goods," she relates. "There aren't many so-called
funny women who make me laugh, other than Joan Rivers
and Laura Bush, both for different reasons. When they
make a movie about my life and career, I've always said
I want little Christine Lavin to be me as a teenager --
only in nicer clothes."
The Peekskill,
N.Y. native, now "491/2," says that her parents encouraged
her -- to be a nurse. "Well," Lavin concedes, "I'm one
of nine kids, so I understood their need for practicality."
In high school,
she was a cheerleader, when it wasn't "as hard as it is
now." "Today, they throw these girls up in the air and
they sometimes get killed," she says, quieting her voice
in fear. "I'm glad I learned to twirl a baton, though,
because I use that in my show."
Lavin taught herself
guitar by watching educational television. "Years later,"
she recalls, "the TV teacher read this in an interview
and came backstage afterwards. She told me I was the best
guitarist in the show. It was so untrue!" she says, laughing
and slapping her knee. "She was just blinded by her pride."
No question that
Lavin is a maverick. How many performers have a nun for
an agent?
"Not an ex-nun,"
she emphasizes, "but a nun right now. All the money she
makes goes to support the convent. I tell all the presenters
to watch their language when they deal with her, but I
add that at least you know she's not going to lie to you."
Lavin is a favorite
of many songwriters, even those who write in a much different
vein. Ervin Drake, composer of "It Was a Very Good Year"
and the inspirational "I Believe," calls Lavin "a one-of-a-kind
social commentator."
"Somebody who
was writing an encyclopedia of important 20th century
songs called me to ask what should be in there, and I
immediately recommended 'Sensitive New Age Guys' because
it tells of the important changes in our society," he
says.
"My songs are
often the stories of the strangers I've met in my travels,"
Lavin explains. "Everyone has a fascinating story. If
you sit and talk long enough to them, you'll find it out.
I hope I get people to think differently about the cab
driver or the waitress, and maybe get them to talk to
each other."
To that end, Lavin
encourages mingling at "Getting in Touch with My Inner
B*tch." (The asterisk, by the way, is her idea: "It's
my Catholic upbringing.")
"Live theater
brings people together, but I'd like to see them make
a greater connection," Lavin says. "So we're setting up
a telescope in the parking lot, so people can meet each
other while looking at the nighttime sky."
Julie Gold, who
wrote the Grammy-winning hit "From a Distance" -- and
recently appeared with Lavin at the Bottom Line in New
York -- says, "For 25 years, I have seen the world through
Christine's eyes and have heard the world through her
songs -- and I'm happy to report that the world will never
be the same for me. But she's also one of the most generous
people in the business, helping her friends to succeed."
Lavin has presented
new songwriters' showcases on Martha's Vineyard. "People
think it's this altruistic thing," she says, "but to me,
there's room for everyone who's good. You don't have one
CD on your shelf, you have many-many.
"When I was younger
and heard someone really good, I used to be a little jealous,
but now that I have my foot in the door, I want to let
them in, too. Who knows? Maybe because of my eight brothers
and sisters, I just like to have a lot of activity around."
|
Say
'I do' to 'Harry and Thelma'
Published in the Asbury Park Press 7/17/01
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
THEATER WRITER
"Harry and Thelma in the Woods" is not unlike
"The Odd Couple" in Manhattan.
The new comedy by Stan Lachow, receiving its state premiere
through Aug. 5 at the New Jersey Repertory Company in
Long Branch, centers on a couple married for 25 years
who have outgrown each other. It is smoothly directed
by Mark Graham on a sylvan setting designed by Andy Hall
and nicely lighted by John Demous.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
HARRY AND THELMA IN THE WOODS
New Jersey Repertory Company, 179 Broadway, Long Branch
WHEN: 8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays; 2 p.m. Sundays
through Aug. 5
TICKETS:$ 25
(732) 229-3166
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In a series of one-liners, Harry (John Lombardi) tells
Thelma (Susan G. Bob) it's all over -- except for the
shouting. Their performances are flawless.
An author, Harry wants to write like Hemingway and publish
the "great American-Jewish novel." Instead,
he authors animal training books. Even that has become
difficult and depressing lately:
"I'm all bottled up," he tells Thelma.
"Ill pull the plug," she responds.
He blames his lack of literary greatness on the fact he
was born too late, causing him to miss all the great things
-- like the Depression and World War II.
"You're a rainmaker," says Thelma, who is prone
to sing songs to illustrate human emotions.
Thelma has put up with Harry's allergies. She had cooked
for him, cleaned for him, mended his clothes. As a matter
of fact, she has packed a gourmet picnic lunch and surprises
him by returning to the site in the woods where they first
made love.
Harry jumps back from the wooded clearing in horror:
"Site of the original sin!" he exclaims.
Soon afterward, Harry reveals he wants a divorce:
"I can't stand living with you anymore!" Harry
screams at Thelma.
"What else?" Thelma asks.
"That's it," he responds.
"You mean you're going to pick yourself up, dust
yourself off and start all over again?" Thelma inquires.
And he does. But with his girlfriend Choo Choo. She has
youth, golden legs and knows sexual positions not shown
in the movies, Harry says.
At the end of the first act of this two-hour show, they
arm-wrestle to decide if Harry will leave Thelma. He wins,
and he does.
This light comedy falters in the second act, mostly because
it is too predictable. We know Harry will never be happy
with Choo Choo. We know Thelma is too strong to just wither
away. But could there actually be people like Thelma,
who, after going through so much pain and humiliation,
instantly forgive the person who caused it all?
A year later, a whole new Thelma returns to the woods
to celebrate her liberation. She lost weight, restyled
her hair and wardrobe, read all those great novels Harry
always wanted to write and took singing lessons. She's
become such a good singer she is now a cabaret artist.
Harry also returns, but in a disheveled state, with a
bandage on his nose, a bad toupee on his head and gun
in hand to shoot himself.
Choo Choo left him. He realized dumping Thelma was a
big mistake. He still has writer's block and even the
suicide note pinned to his coat is badly written. Why
on Earth would Thelma want him back?
Nicely produced, wonderfully directed and performed,
"Harry and Thelma in the Woods" is one of the
better offerings at the New Jersey Repertory Company,
a professional troupe devoted to new works.
Published on July 17, 2001
|
Thelma & the leaves: Divorce gets comic
treatment in 'Harry and Thelma in the Woods'
Published in the Asbury Park Press 7/13/01
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
Theater Writer
Playwright Stan Lachow didn't exactly know where his
characters were going when he began writing "Harry and
Thelma in the Woods."
HARRY AND THELMA IN THE WOODS
New Jersey Repertory Company
179 Broadway, Long Branch
8 p.m. Thursdays through Fridays; 2 p.m. Sundays;
through Aug. 5
$25
(732) 229-3166
|
"I don't plot it out," he said. "I usually start with an
idea or a phrase that gets me thinking and I have a vague
idea of what's going to happen and how."
"Harry and Thelma," which is being staged at the New
Jersey Repertory Company in Long Branch, began as a serious
play. It's now a comedy, Lachow said, or maybe even a
farce.
The spark for the plot came from a friend who confided
what it had been like when he told his wife he wanted
a divorce.
"He said they were taking a walk in the woods and his
wife was pointing out the beauty of the day and he was
going in the bushes and throwing up because of what he
was going to do," Lachow said.
"Harry and Thelma," a two-character play, features John
Lombardi of Hoboken as Harry, a disillusioned author of
animal-training books who longs to write the great Jewish-American
novel. Susan G. Bob of Teaneck is a happy homemaker who
loves cooking, singing off-key and misquoting authors.
They have been married for 20 years. The play takes place
as the couple revisit the woods where they first consummated
their relationship.
Lachow, who grew up in Brooklyn and moved to the suburbs
in Rockland County, N.Y., to raise his family, now lives
in the West Village of Manhattan with his wife, a psychotherapist.
He has written five full-length plays, plus several one-acts.
He also works as an actor.
Lachow is still refining "Harry and Thelma," which previously
was produced in Florida.
He has been working closely with his director, Mark Graham,
who lives in Connecticut.
Both men came to theater later in life.

TANYA
BREEN photo
John Lombardi and Susan G. Bob portray
a couple who picnic while on the verge of divorce
in the comedy "Harry and Thelma in the Woods," premiering
in Long Branch this weekend. |
Lachow had written plays for his high school, but ended
up working in retail following his discharge from the Army
after the Korean War. He thought retail would be temporary.
But he couldn't quite figure out how to get back into theater.
He ended up as an executive. Eventually, he found a community
theater where he could do some directing and acting and
took the leap.
Graham previously had his own advertising agency and
worked as a marketing consultant.
Both men said theater has always been their passion because
of the process of preparing a work for public consumption.
Graham not only directs, he also produces.
"Producing, to me, has a tremendous amount of challenges,"
he explained. "For one thing, you really have to believe
in the show . . . it's not going to happen in a week.
"You are committing yourself to at least two years of
nurturing the play, finding the right production, getting
it published and looking at its future life."
Graham believes "Harry and Thelma" has a big future,
especially on regional and community stages. A one-set,
two-character play that enables mature members of an acting
company to shine are always in demand.
However, he added, there is more to it than that.
"Besides being a 'two-hander,' the characters have universality
. . . they are my mother and father, my aunt and uncle,"
he explained. "I see these people and recognize things
about them I see in my own marriage of 27 years.
"The show has something to say," Graham said. "It's reality-based
and I really think the audience can get into it."
Published on July 13, 2001
|
New
Jersey stage: Is operetta dead? No, it's 'Immortal' fun
05/04/01
BY
PETER FILICHIA
STAR-LEDGER STAFF
An
operetta? These days, it's a rare theater that dares to
tackle this antiquated form of entertainment.
But
SuzAnne and Gabor Barabas, who head the ambitious New
Jersey Repertory Company in Long Branch, have nevertheless
gone ahead and written "Immortal Interlude,"
the type of show that "they just don't write anymore."
SuzAnne
Barabas, who is the lyricist as well as co-librettist,
has written such lines as "What is this sensation?
I am all confused." Even her song titles are as florid
as those found in operettas of yore: "You Are Love."
"One Perfect Rose." "Is This Romance?"
Is
this entertainment? In fact, it is, in a modest way. Though
"Immortal Interlude" pales from not having nearly
enough happen during its two acts, Merek Royce Press'
music is lovely, with an occasional 21st-century twist
to keep it from being solely heavy syrup. He doesn't know
how to end a song so that an audience knows it's time
to applaud, but he still writes haunting melodies with
a new-age twist. Too bad the music has been prerecorded
and the performers sing along to a tape -- which certainly
didn't happen in the grand old days of operettas.
Though
the Barabases don't credit the classic "Death Takes
a Holiday" (a k a "Meet Joe Black") as
their inspiration, its premise was clearly on their minds.
They set their libretto in 1939 at a Newport, R.I., summer
home. Horace and Margaret Griffin are excited that their
lovely daughter, Grace, is marrying James Collier. Now
if only Grace could be equally enthusiastic.
Grace
is instead intrigued by a Count who happens to drop by
in black tie after she endures what should have been a
fatal riding accident. In most of his dialogue, the Count
drops quite a few hints that he's really Death personified.
Nevertheless, everyone on stage -- including other daughter
Pamela, Dr. Eisenstein and Katie the maid -- is pretty
slow to catch on.
By
the time all is sung and done, this Death doesn't take
a holiday as much as he takes to matchmaking. Most everyone
gets blissfully coupled, though the Barabases don't convincingly
show why any of these people should be united.
SuzAnne
Barabas does a decent enough job as director, except for
a lackluster first-act curtain. Her ensemble is accomplished,
with Ted Grayson perfectly cast as the Count. He has handsome,
dark, brooding looks that are both enticing and scary.
He's not death warmed over; he's hot.
Tricia
Burr is enchanting as Grace, with the insouciance of those
madcap heiresses of the '30s. Burt Edwards has smoking-jacket
elegance as her father; Leslie Wheeler amuses as her constantly
tipsy mother; and Kathleen Goldpaugh is fun as her cynical
sister. Clark S. Carmichael, as Grace's fiancé,
keeps his upper lip stiff with lines like, "It's
imperative that we have an upper class."
As
always, the Barabases have given their show a handsome
production, through Bryan Higgason's ornate set and Patricia
E. Doherty's true-to-the-period costumes.
Immortal
Interlude
Where:
New Jersey Repertory Company, 179 Broadway, Long Branch
When:
Through May 20. Thursdays-Saturdays at 8 p.m. and Sundays
at 2 p.m.
How
much: $30-$40. Call (732) 229-3166 or visit (www.njrep.org).
|
DEATH
ON HOLIDAY IN "IMMORTAL INTERLUDE"
The Coaster
Robert F. Carroll
Death as a stage character holds an irresistible attraction
for playwrights, including Gabor and SuzAnne Barabas,
authors and founder of the New Jersey Repertory Company
in Long Branch.
In their latest work, "Immortal Interlude",
some ten years incubating and now premiering at the Lumia
Theatre in Long Branch, the couple have written in Death
as a handsome, Hungarian count.
The Barabases said their play, with music, was inspired
by Alberto Casella's "La Morte in Vacanze,"
roughly translated as "Death Takes a Holiday,"
the title of a years-ago Hollywood movie version of the
Casella play.
In "Immortal Interlude," Count Ut-Vege (Ted
Grayson) turns up as Death, in tails and with a vibrant
tenor voice, as a weekend guest at the Griffin's luxurious
summer house in Newport, R.I., just before the start of
the Second World War. The mysterious count proceeds to
enchant young Grace (Tricia Burr), the Griffins' daughter;
Grace's sister, Pamela (Kathleen Goldpaugh), and ultimately
Katie (Cristin Hubbard), the Griffins' Irish maid.
Grace's flirtation with the count nettles her fiancé,
James Collier (Clark Carmichael), a simpering dandy, and
doesn't sit well with Grace's widower dad, Horace (Burt
Edwards). But Horace's sister Margaret (Leslie Wheeler),
a spinster and not-so-secret tippler, finds the mysterious
stranger alluring.
All eventually ends well, if death can be considered a
well ending. Along the way the count and Pamela get acquainted
in a rollicking tango, "Is This Romance?" The
three women musically explore the effect the count has
had on their lives, in "Changes," and in Act
2 the entire company chats each other up in the witty
"Small Talk".
Hubbard, as Katie the maid, is fetching as she blossoms
in the ballad "Go Where Your Heart Beckons,"
and as she and Collier discover each other in the wild
"Swing." John FitzGibbon, as Dr. Ben Eisenstein,
adds a tragic undertone as a Jewish doctor bound for Europe
to rescue family members as Nazi war clouds gather. But
he's buoyed by the affection he's set loose in Pamela.
All the music of "Immortal Interlude," which
operatically carries along and amplifies the action, is
the work of Merek Royce Press, brother of SuzAnne Barabas.
SuzAnne, who also directs and wrote the lyrics, and her
husband have co-written several other plays. The couple
were co-founders of repertory companies in Philadelphia
and Cincinnati before arriving in Long Branch several
years ago.
The Long Branch company, as Gabor reminds audiences before
each performance, is dedicated to new works by new authors.
"Immortal Interlude" is one audiences should
cherish.
|
IMMORTAL
INTERLUDE: WISH IT COULD LAST FOREVER
Atlanticville - Milt Bernstein
The latest news about New Jersey Rep, the adventurous
local theater company, on downtown Broadway in Long Branch,
is that the husband and wife team of SuzAnne and Gabor
Barabas are presenting a fascinating new musical authored
by themselves and featuring a score composed by Merek
Royce Press, SuzAnne's younger brother.
The musical, "Immortal Interlude", is all about
a weekend in the country - but with a twist. An unexpected
visitor appears, urbane and charming, who changes the
lives of everyone there in mysterious fashion. Who the
visitor really is becomes apparent at the end of the play,
but not before some very interesting transformations have
taken place.
With lovely songs and haunting musical background provided
by Merek Press, and excellent performances from the cast
of ten, the show sustains the viewer's interest right
up to the "happy" ending. (Several of the scenes
and ensemble singing put this viewer in mind of Steven
Sondheim's "A Little Night Music," a successful
musical in its own right).
The principal roles are played by Tricia Burr as Grace
Griffin, a central figure; Clark Carmichael as James Collier,
her intended; Kathleen Goldpaugh as her competitive sister
Pamela; Burt Edwards and Leslie Wheeler as her father
Horace and aunt Margaret respectively; John FitzGibbon
as a not-so-sympathetic family doctor; Cristin Hubbard
as Katie, a most saucy maid; and Ted Grayson (alternating
with Michael Gabinelli) as the charismatic visitor.
SuzAnne Barabas directed the play with a sure hand, and
the set design of a summer home in Newport, R.I., by Bryan
Higgason, was most attractive and evocative of the period.
For anyone looking for a most entertaining evening in
the theatre - and enjoying live performances of a musical
at a location much closer than that other Broadway - this show, which will run only through May 20, should
not be overlooked.
|
Death
takes a (tuneful) holiday
Published
in the Asbury Park Press 5/01/01
By GRETCHEN
C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
THEATER WRITER
"Immortal Interlude,"
the New Jersey Repertory Company's first musical, is a
family affair in more ways than one.
It was
written by wife-and-husband troupe founders SuzAnne and
Gabor Barabas, with music by SuzAnne's brother Merek Royce
Press. SuzAnne also directs.
IMMORTAL
INTERLUDE
New Jersey Repertory Company
179 Broadway, Long Branch
8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays and 2 p.m. Sundays
through May 20
TICKETS: $30-$40
INFORMATION: (732) 229-3166
|
"Immortal Interlude"
concerns the Griffin family, whose members are spending
the last weekend of the summer at their opulent "cottage"
in Newport, R.I., when Death, personified as Count Ut-Vege,
comes to call. It seems Death is taking his first holiday
in centuries and wants to learn all he can about humans,
including what it feels like to be in love.
If the plot
sounds familiar, it's because the story is similar to
the 1934 film "Death Takes a Holiday," which was remade
as a TV movie in 1971 and recycled again as the 1998 film
"Meet Joe Black."
The familiarity
of the story robs the musical of some of its mystery.
Press' music, however, is fresh and varied, from ensemble
numbers to ballads to lovely duets such as "One Perfect
Rose." There are 17 songs and three reprises during the
two-and-a-half hour show.
As usual at
the Rep, production values are high -- with a nice set
design by Bryan Higgason, good lighting by Jeff Greenberg
and some lovely dresses by costume designer Patricia E.
Doherty. SuzAnne Barabas keeps the musical flowing smoothly.
All eight actors
turn in fine performances, especially John FitzGibbon
as the doctor, Ted Grayson as Count Ut-Vege and Rep regular
Kathleen Goldpaugh as Pamela Griffin-Snowden. A seductive
tango between Death and Pamela is to die for, so to speak.
Although the
musical was 10 years in the making, the characters need
more to work with. Audiences need to know exactly why
Death has chosen this particular family at this time.
The one-dimensional characters need to be fleshed out
more in order to gain the audience's support, especially
at the end, when certain people unexpectedly turn up in
love. It has "A Midsummer Night's Dream" quality to it,
but there are no fairies or sleeping potions to blame
for such dramatic changes.
At the center
of the play is Grace Griffin (Tricia Burr), the youngest
and prettiest of two daughters, who has had a bad fall
from a horse as the play begins. With no pulse, she is
carried into the family's living room by her snobbish
fiance James Collier (Clark S. Carmichael).
With a sudden
inhalation of air, Grace returns to life. Enter Death,
through the French doors, wearing a white tie and tails,
which he wears for the entire weekend. Doesn't anybody
wonder why? A tuxedo is a bit formal for breakfast.
Death/Count
begins to charm not only Grace but her older, much-married
sister Pamela (Goldpaugh), her alcoholic aging Aunt Margaret
(Leslie Wheeler) and even the sassy Irish maid Katie (Cristin
J. Hubbard).
Death doesn't
fare so badly with the men either. Probably because of
the tuxedo, class-conscious family patriarch Horace Griffin
(Burt Edwards) accepts the Count. Dr. Ben Eisenstein (FitzGibbon)
is convinced to stay on rather than visit a patient in
a coma. Death assures the good doctor his patient will
survive. And he does, in one of dozens of instances during
the weekend when people survive various calamities, including
being submerged in water for hours or falling from tall
buildings and then walking away.
After all,
Death is on a holiday.
Published on
May 1, 2001
|
Birth of a musical: Death makes a visit in NJ Rep's
premiere play
Published in the Asbury Park Press 4/27/01
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
Theater Writer
It's never an easy sell at the New Jersey Repertory Theatre
in Long Branch.
IMMORTAL INTERLUDE
New Jersey Repertory Company
179 Broadway, Long Branch
8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays, 2 p.m. Sundays
$30 to $40
(732) 229-3166
|
With a mission dedicated to staging new works by unknown
playwrights rather than the tried-and-true, there isn't
much marquee value for attracting audiences to the intimate
60-seat space.
Undaunted, co-founders SuzAnne and Gabor Barabas, West
Long Branch, have decided to up the ante by producing
a musical, "Immortal Interlude," that they, along with
SuzAnne's composer brother Merek Royce Press, have written.
Musicals are major undertakings for small theaters, and
this one will cost New Jersey Repertory double what it
usually costs to stage a nonmusical play, said Gabor,
also the Rep's executive producer. While it is in keeping
with the theater's mission, "Immortal Interlude" also
broadens the scope of the repertory company because it
is the troupe's first musical.
"We do all these serious and dark works and people have
been asking, when are we going to do a nice musical,"
Gabor said.
How "nice" it will be is yet to be determined. According
to SuzAnne Barabas, the theater company's artistic director,
it will "follow in the tradition of old-time Broadway
book musicals."
But New Jersey Rep fans need not worry that "Immortal
Interlude" will be confused with, say, "Funny Girl."
The two-act, eight-character musical takes place in a
posh house in Newport, R.I., on the last weekend before
World War II breaks out in 1939.
The date is very important, SuzAnne explained. On that
fateful weekend, a mysterious stranger arrives at the
weekend house party and changes each of the other seven
characters lives. The stranger, SuzAnne said, is Death.
"Death has arrived in human form and is having a respite
before the war," she said. "Once the carnage starts, Death
will be very busy."
SuzAnne said she chose blue-blood territory for the show's
setting because it's such a different world. She said
she lived for awhile on Philadelphia's Main Line and had
a chance to observe people's lives.
"Some of the facts in the play come from people I knew
who would spend their summers in Newport and winters in
Philly,." she said.
Among the characters in the musical are a retired industrialist,
his sister, his two daughters, one of whom is engaged,
a Jewish doctor with family in Germany and a maid.
"Death takes on the persona of the other guest they all
were expecting," SuzAnne explained. "He wants to learn
about human emotions and why he is feared."
The Barabases and Press previously collaborated on the
World War II Holocaust drama "Find Me a Voice," produced
last year at the Rep. They also have written many children's
musicals.

MICHAEL
RAFFERTY photo
Left to right: Burt Edward, John Fitzgibbon
and Christina Hubbard rehearse a scene from "Immortal
Interlude," a world-premiere musical opening at the
New Jersey Repertory Theatre in Long Branch this weekend. |
SuzAnne said "Immortal Interlude" has been in the works
for 10 years.
"We almost staged it last year," said SuzAnne, who is
directing the play. "But we needed to do more work on
it.
"We feel at this point it is ready for a first production
as we continue its development," she added.
SuzAnne said when the project was born, her personal
life was filled with death.
"My mother, grandmother, a dear aunt and father had all
died somewhat close to each other," she said. "I was preoccupied
in a way with the acceptance of death."
But, SuzAnne is quick to add, there are many humorous
moments in the musical.
There is also some dancing, but not much since the stage
is small, she said. Size also meant no live musicians
to play the 20 songs, including reprises. The music is
computer generated, she said, which makes it harder for
the actors as they cannot take their cues from a conductor.
Press designs Web sites, scores music for independent
films and industrials and has written the underscoring
for most all 20 or so shows the Rep has staged in its
three years of performing. He writes the music first;
SuzAnne then writes the lyrics.
"We work better that way," she said.
Published on April 27, 2001
|
Of mothers and daughters
Published
in the Asbury Park Press 3/21/01
By MICHAEL
KAABE
CORRESPONDENT
About midway
through "Eleemosynary," a grandmother named Dorothea (Lindy
Regan), who is in the midst of a difficult conflict with
her adult daughter Artie (Yvonne Marchese), gives some
interesting if sardonic advice to her granddaughter Echo
(Laura Pratt): "Never have a daughter. She won't like
you."
ELEEMOSYNARY
On the Dwek Studio Stage
By the New Jersey Repertory Company
179 Broadway, Long Branch
WHEN: 8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays; 7 p.m.
Sundays through April 1
TICKETS: $18; $15 people age 65 and over, students
CALL: (732) 229-3166
|
Oddly,
that quote articulates the offbeat but insightful humor
of Lee Blessing's play, now being given a meticulous and
inspired second stage production by the New Jersey Repertory
Company in Long Branch. "Eleemosynary," which means charitable
or the giving of alms, takes place in 1985, the peak of
the era when co-dependence, toxic behaviors and relationship
addiction were buzz words of mental health counselors. The
play tries to convey how comedy ad tragedy mesh in a particular
case of family dysfunction, forcing the individuals involved
to realize their true potential. The only problem is that
since dysfunction and parental abuse is the only life these
Westbrook women had and will ever know, who knows what they
would have become under any other circumstances?
The play begins
in the present, when Dorothea has suffered a stroke. Her
granddaughter Echo, who has identified with her, tells
the story of how her mother Artie was repelled by her mother, Dorothea, and literally moved all over the country
just to avoid being near her maternal nemesis. In an early
episode in Artie's life, her mother buys her a pair of
plastic wings and makes a home movie of herself forcing
her daughter to lift herself off the ground. "I want my
daughter to fly!" emotes Dorothea. Artie flies, all right:
She avoids her mother like the plague, and when she has
a child of her own, she is so self-absorbed she gives
the child (Echo) to her mother to raise. Eventually, Artie
becomes a successful biochemist, and Echo becomes a national
spelling-bee champion and an honor student.
The production
is unique and invigorating because of two ingredients
that work together. One is Blessing's script, which is
full of pointed metaphors. For example, in a scene where
Artie moves to a strange city, she supports herself by
selling, of all things, luggage -- a symbol for travel.
The other ingredient is Michael R. Duran's fluid direction.
He presents the play in a way that makes the theater going
experience transcend the story line.
His three actors,
on bare platforms with virtually no props, paint a series
of vivid, colorful images using nothing more than words,
movements and emotions. We easily make friends with Artie
and Echo as they drive us through Dorothea's zany, intermission-less
mission.
"Eleemosynary"
is highly recommended.
Published on
March 21, 2001
|
The write stuff: Play offers love, laughs and urban
terrorism
Published in the Asbury Park Press 2/16/01
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
Theater Writer
When Michael T. Folie was going to school at what is
now Middletown High School North, the 1970 alumnus wanted
to become a writer like his idols James Joyce and Ernest
Hemingway.
AN UNHAPPY WOMAN
New Jersey Repertory Company
179 Broadway, Long Branch
8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays, 2 p.m. Sundays
Feb. 15 through March 11
$25 to $36
(732) 229-3166
|
Then, when he went to Rutgers University in New Brunswick,
he got involved as an actor in a student-written play that
ended up as a finalist in a festival at the Kennedy Center
in Washington.
Acting seemed pretty exciting, so he switched majors
and went for some post-college training at the famed HB
Studios in Manhattan. He got work and traveled around
the country performing in plays.
By the time Folie was in his 30s, though, he was tired
of his nomadic life. He decided to settle down and return
to writing . . . this time as playwright.
Now, 12 produced plays later, he is having the East Coast
premiere of his "An Unhappy Women" at the New Jersey Repertory
Theatre, Long Branch, less than a mile from Monmouth Medical
Center, where he was born 48 years ago. It opens at 8
p.m. today. Another of his plays, "Panama," is scheduled
for the Rep's fall season.
" 'Unhappy Woman' is a romantic comedy . . . a futuristic,
black romantic comedy," Folie said from the Rockland County,
N. Y., home he shares with his wife, Frances, a schoolteacher,
and children Brendan and Lizzie. "It's very traditional
in the sense two people love each other, they're perfect
for each other, but circumstances keep them apart.
"On another level, it's a political thriller, a biochemical,
mind-controlled, wacky, way-out comedy with men dressing
up as women," he added.

JOSEPH
J. DELCONZO photo
Brenton Popolizio (standing) and Brian
O'Halloran rehearse a scene from Michael T. Folie's
"An Unhappy Woman," opening this weekend in Long Branch. |
The play previously was produced in Los Angeles and is scheduled
to be staged next month at the Alleyway Theatre, Buffalo,
N.Y. Folie's play "The Adjustment," featuring Stephanie
Powers, toured England last spring. It also was staged off-Broadway
at the Jewish Repertory Theatre. "Lemonade," a comedy, was
translated into French for a Paris production.
Folie said all his plays are different.
"My plays are all over the map," he admitted. "They veer
back and forth between outrageous comedies to more traditional,
modern, urban dramas . . . but there is always comedy
in my plays, although the subject matter may be serious.
"I like to keep people on the edge of their seats," he
added.
"An Unhappy Woman" centers on Gayle, the title character,
who falls in love with Hank, a government employee. Pearl,
Gayle's roommate, is a very happy young woman. She is
in love with Gaylord, an urban terrorist. The play takes
place in the future, where people have identity bar codes
inserted under the skin, everybody carries a gun and a
trip from Dulles Airport to downtown Washington requires
crossing a war zone in an armored limousine.
Folie said this play began like most of his others.
"These people came into my head and started talking .
. . they wouldn't go away," he explained. "Sometimes they
do go away and I don't have to write about them."
Folie, who also is a free-lance speech and industrial
writer, is satisfied with his lifestyle.
"I like to spend long periods of time by myself writing
in my room . . . then I like to be with people," he said.
"Writing plays let's me do that."
Writing for TV or film would not let him do that, he
said, nor do they mesh with his technique.
"When writing plays, I don't know where I'm going . .
. it's like exploring a dream," he explained. "Sometimes
things don't work out, there are dead ends, it doesn't
make sense or it would never be viable on stage.
"Other times things fall into place," he said. "It's
like a partnership between my subconscious and conscious
mind, as if they are working in tandem."
When that happens, Folie is a very happy man.
Published on February 16, 2001
|
A
happy audience
Published in the Asbury Park Press 2/20/01
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
THEATER WRITER
In Michael T. Folie's futuristic play "An Unhappy Woman,"
which is having its East Coast premiere in Long Branch,
people still are worried about holding on to jobs they
hate.
Here, the unemployed are thrown into the "insecurity
zone," where it is every man, and woman, for his or her
self. It's a sort of hell where the have-nots are urban
guerrillas obsessed with ruining it for the haves.
AN UNHAPPY WOMAN
By the New Jersey Repertory Company
179 Broadway, Long Branch
WHEN: 8 p.m. Tuesdays to Saturdays ;2 p.m. Sundays
Ends March 11
TICKETS: $25-$27
CALL: (732) 229-3166
|
And the "haves"? They are obsessed with controlling others,
especially women controlling men.
For people who have no problems suspending their disbelief,
Folie will take them on a two-hour Orwellian ride where
a person's worth is measured by the size of their gun,
not their compassion.
Andy Hall's very functional set of gray stone walls
and benches, nicely lit by Jeff Greenberg, sets the tone
of the play -- the future is bleak. So bleak, in fact,
that genuinely happy people are extremely hard to find.
When government employee Hank (Brian O'Halloran) finds
Pearl (Gigi Jhong) he is thrilled. Pearl is Gayle's sister.
Gayle (Kittson O'Neill), the unhappy woman of the play's
title, trusts no one and when Hank proposes marriage within
hours of meeting her, she is very suspicious of his motives.
Hank wants Pearl to accompany him and Gayle back to
Washington so the government can run a few tests to discover
why Pearl is so happy. The three arrive at Newt Gingrich
Airport and on their way to secured downtown D.C., their
limousine is attacked and all three find themselves battling
for their lives in the insecurity zone.
This is where things go from strange to weird.
One of the guerrillas is Gaylord (Brenton Popolizio),
who wears a kilt with his army bootsand is the leader
of a group that prides itself on only doing stupid things.
After a chance meeting years earlier, Gaylord has pined
for Pearl's love.
Marjorie (Kathleen Goldpaugh) is a stand-in for the
First Lady and Hank's boss. She is in charge of the happiness
project and extracts so much "happiness enzyme" from Pearl
she resembles a nasty pit bull.
Then there is Manuela (Adin Alai), a Latin American
transsexual who dresses like June Cleaver, sews and bakes
cookies, carries a machine gun and answers only to Marjorie.
She/he is worth the price of admission. Without even trying,
Alai steals the show and he doesn't even show up until
Act Two. Oddly enough, his character is the show's most
believable and most realized.
Director Nick Montesano keeps the action moving despite
numerous blackouts and scene changes. He should, however,
have reined in Jhong's Pearl, whose "happiness" quickly
becomes annoying. She is more hysterical than happy.
Folie's romantic comedy, which borders on the surreal,
is for adventurous audiences. And that is exactly what
the New Jersey Repertory Company wants and gets. It should
make everybody involved happy indeed.
Published on February 20, 2001
|
Acting up: AIDS issue stays afloat with 'Raft of
the Medusa'
Published in the Asbury Park Press 1/26/01
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
Theater Writer
Playwright Joe Pintauro was walking around Greenwich
Village one night just over a decade ago when he stepped
into a bookstore.
A notice caught his eye: "Actors with AIDS in
search of scripts."
RAFT OF THE MEDUSA
Pearl and Solomon Dwek Little Theater
179 Broadway, Long Branch
Opens at 8 p.m. Friday
8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays; 2 p.m. Sundays
Through Feb. 11
$18
(732) 229-3166
|
Pintauro copied down the telephone number.
"I didn't want to promise a script and not deliver so
I started working on a play," Pintauro said from his New
York City apartment. "I started going to ACT UP (AIDS
Coalition to Unleashed Power) meetings on 13th street
at the gay and lesbian center and I was blown away.
"There were people there of all stripes and all sexual
persuasions hot on the issue of fighting to get recognition,"
he said. "I immediately thought of the painting 'Raft
of the Medusa.' "
His play, named after the painting, opens at 8 tonight
in Long Branch. It was never staged by the initial group
of actors because all of them had died from AIDS, Pintauro
said. Subsequently, it was staged in New York, England
and Germany, Pintauro said.
It centers on a diverse group of AIDS victims in a therapy
session. They discover one of them, a reporter, doesn't
have AIDS and is taping the session for an article. They
are offended and one victim stabs the reporter with an
infected needle.
The play runs 90 minutes long without an intermission.

Jimmy Blackman (reading), Michael Gabinelli,
Ian August and Leighann Lord rehearse a scene from
"Raft of the Medusa." |
The Medusa was a French passenger ship that hit a sandbar
in 1816 off the coast of Western Africa. Members of the
aristocracy took over the life boats while the lower classes
had to make crude rafts, which then were tied to the boats
so they could all row to safety. A storm hit and the lines
that held the ship's boats to the rafts were broken or cut.
Only 15 of the 149 people on the rafts survived.
A large painting by Theodore Gericault (1791-1824) depicts
the raft people, with one man waving a white shirt trying
to catch the attention of a boat far in the distance.
It hangs in the Louvre in Paris, Pintauro said.
Waving that shirt is a metaphor for how AIDS victims
felt at the time he wrote his play, Pintauro said. He
knew of the painting from a New Yorker magazine article
about the ship wreck he had read just months before.
"Gericault interviewed some of the survivors and painted
an heroic version of what it must have been like when
that ship came into view and either didn't see them or
purposely passed them by," Pintauro explained. "It perfectly
fit the scene I was trying to get into."
Ken Wiesinger of Queens is directing the play. He is
a member of the New Jersey Repertory Theatre, where the
play is being staged. Rep founder SuzAnne and Gabor Barabas
have encouraged their members to use the second stage
space.
Wiesinger said he acted in the play in 1993 and fell
in love with it.
"The rhythm of the play is like orchestrated chaos .
. . as the lives of these people in group therapy are
ticking away and they all want to be heard," Wiesinger
said. "They are basically looking at their world as if
it were coming to an end.
"Now, with more aggressive therapies, death is not as
immediate," he added. "Now there are options."
Pintauro said he has resisted suggestions he update the
play.
"To me, it's a snapshot of the time and more valuable
because of that," he said.
Published on January 26, 2001
|
Atlanticville
LEGENDARY "PIAF" LIVES IN NEW MUSICAL by Robert
F. Carroll
"Piaf in Vienna", an intimate, one-act play-with-music
by Brad Korbesmeyer, now in its world premiere at the
New Jersey Repertory Company in Long Branch, is a sparkling
little comedy spiced with an air of mystery.
The mystery, kind of a theatrical trompe l'oeil, extends
to the play's title. The Piaf of the title is actually
a young woman named Vienna Hauser who's obsessed with
the memory of the legendary Parisian cabaret singer and
drifts in and out of the Edith Piaf character during the
course of the evening.
Luckily for the playwright, Deborah Boily, who plays
Piaf, is an accomplished cabaret singer herself, having
created one-woman shows in French and English and performed
in Paris and London many Broadway musicals. From her opening
number, "La Vie en Rose", Boily/Piaf is right at home
in her role in the Korbesmeyer play.
The play is set in a room strewn with Piaf mementos.
When Boily answers the urge to sing, she's joined by a
mysterious piano player (John FitzGibbon), addressed alternately
as Charles and Guyan and who, on occasion, reverts to
a papier mache dummy. There's an equally mysterious Stan
(Burt Edwards), who turns out to be the faux Piaf's dad.
As the play comes to a close we learn that the young
woman's dementia apparently stems form an auto accident.
There's also a hint that, with her improving physical
condition, the young woman's Piaf obsession, sad to say,
may be disappearing.
|
THE LITTLE SPARROW IN LONG BRANCH
One Flew Over Vienna's Nest
In the title of the year sweepstakes,
"Piaf in Vienna" gets my vote. Contrary to first impression;
the new play is not about what might have occurred when
Edith Piaf visited the Austrian capital. No, Brad Korbesmeyer's
absorbing one-act play is about a delusional American
woman named Vienna who thinks she is the legendary Parisian
chanteuse. An enticing premise and a nifty title. While
the play doesn't quite live up to either, it is an interesting
work, and ideally suited to New Jersey Repertory Company's
stated purpose of producing promising new playwrights.
Vienna (Deborah Boily) spends her time
in the attic of the home she shares with her retired father
(Burt Edwards). She's suffering repercussions from a traumatic
event that the compact play reveals as it unfolds. Spending
most of her time alone, nested among typical attic relics
(Harry Feiner's set and Deede Ulanet's props are picture-perfect),
Vienna goes in and out of the character of Piaf, addressing
an imaginary audience in word and song. It is revealed
that Vienna has also been inhabited by other singers in
the past. By any measure she's mentally unstable, but
Edith Piaf and Rosemary Clooney are relatively harmless
alter egos.
The relationship between father and daughter
is well drawn in the situation and dialogue. Stan's (the
father) devotion to Vienna is clear, and the reason for
his indulgence is nicely interwoven into the play's exposition.
There are some inconsistencies - in two years Stan has
never come into the attic while Vienna is singing - that
weakens the characters, and the ending, a sudden metamorphosis,
is abrupt. But at 80 minutes the play has room for tweaking.
Edith Piaf (1915-1963) was an enormously
popular singer whose sentimental ballads, sung in a quavering,
throaty voice, earned her an adoring international audience.
Born Edith Giovanna Gassion, she was dubbed La Mome Piaf,
The Kid (more commonly Little) Sparrow, by a nightclub
owned who discovered her singing in the streets of Paris.
Mr. Korbesmeyer apparently wrote "Piaf in Vienna" as a
vehicle for Ms. Boily, whose cabaret turn features songs
in French and English.
The play is evenly balanced (as Vienna
is not) between spoken scenes and songs a la Piaf. Ms.
Boily proves an accomplished actress. Her rambling illusions
stop short of rants and she projects an appealing delicacy...
...Interplay between Vienna and her father
is heartfelt and amusing. Stan is very well written; in
a few short scenes we come to know him well. Mr. Edwards
plays him as naturally as can be; it's an impressive collaboration
between character and actor. There is also a third performer
in "Piaf in Vienna", a pianist with a split personality
that complements Vienna's. John FitzGibbon plays this
wordless accompanist sensitively, although in some scenes
he's rather stiff.
With the flick of a dimmer, Phil
Monat's splendid lighting design transforms Vienna's attic
to Piaf's cafe and back again. Under Peter Bennett's sensitive
direction, Ms. Boily and Mr. Edwards's characters' devotion
is never in doubt - their parrying dialogue is natural
and affectionate in the writing and the playing.
"Piaf in Vienna" is part family drama
and part Piaf retrospective. In both parts, Brad Korbesmeyer's
play succeeds - in part.
|
A woman's regrets
Published in the Asbury Park Press 12/13/00
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
THEATER WRITER
"Piaf in Vienna," a new play featuring Deborah
Boily, was written by Brad Korbesmeyer especially for
the cabaret singer.
Essentially, the 80-minute play stars Boily's voice.
She sings eight songs associated with the French chanteuse
Edith Piaf, including her signature songs "La Vie en Rose"
and "Je Ne Regrette de Rien."
PIAF IN VIENNA
New Jersey Repertory Company
179 Broadway
Long Branch
8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays, 2 p.m. Sundays
through Dec. 31
$25-$27
(732) 229-3166
|
Boily, who accurately describes herself as an actress who
sings, is luminescent in the role of a 40-year-old woman
who has been mentally unbalanced for the past 20 years due
to the death of her mother in a car accident. Vienna, so
named because she was conceived in Vienna, Va., was driving
the car and blames herself for the death.
She was institutionalized twice and has been under the
care of three different doctors. She refuses to take the
pills prescribed for her because, she tells her father
Stan (Burt Edwards) who discovers a full bottle, if she
takes the pills she can't sing. He's never heard her sing
and doesn't buy this excuse.
Sing Vienna must to survive, to not go completely mad.
She is in her Piaf phase now, having previously assumed
the identities of Patsy Cline and Keely Smith. When she
sings, she imagines her mother in the audience watching.
She also imagines Charles (John FitzGibbon) accompanying
her on her mother's beloved piano.
As Charles, who never speaks and is replaced by a dummy
whenever Stan comes into the room, FitzGibbon says a lot
with his facial expressions -- especially his eyebrows.
Stan, nicely done by Edwards, has never heard Vienna
sing. He only sees her pretending to be Piaf pretending
to have a hissy fit or pretending to be giving an interview
to a newspaper reporter.

Burt Edwards (left) and Deborah Boily
in a scene from "Piaf in Vienna," a drama premiering
in Long Branch. |
All of this happens in the attic, perfectly rendered by
set designer Harry Feiner and well lit by lighting designer
Phil Monat. Director Peter Bennett keeps the play moving
along.
What really worries the 70-year-old Stan is Vienna wandering
the streets, making a fuss at the library, hanging out
at pool halls and dating a criminal. This he knows must
stop for her own good as well as his and he wants Vienna
to go back to the hospital. She, of course, refuses, for
she will not be able to sing there.
The play certainly has conflict at its center. But Korbesmeyer,
who has been working on the play on and off for a decade,
needs to elevate the play's climax in order for the audience
to accept the ending. Vienna has to be purged of her guilt
for the healing to begin. She has to confront the car
accident head on, relive the horror for the audience as
well as her father, so we can accept she has been severly
crippled by this event for the past 20 years.
Instead, Korbesmeyer has Stan discover Vienna singing,
then screaming in fear at having been discovered. Stan
then decides not to insist Vienna receive more psychological
help because he now fears he will not hear her sing for
two years.
It's too pat. What about her wanderings? What about her
obvious delusions? These aren't going to go away and the
audience finds itself back where it was when the curtain
rose -- just with Stan being the one additional viewer.
Published on December 13, 2000
|
New
Jersey stage: 'Piaf in Vienna' is a play about neither
12/12/00
BY PETER FILICHIA
STAR-LEDGER STAFF
The biggest surprise
in Brad Korbesmeyer's new play turns out to be its title.
"Piaf in Vienna," the three-character play at New Jersey
Repertory Company in Long Branch, is not about the famed
French chanteuse on tour in Austria.
Instead, Vienna
is the name of a fortyish woman whose parents conceived
her in Vienna, Va. "Be glad it didn't happen in Indianapolis,"
her father tells her.
Since she had
a terrible car accident two decades earlier -- one that
killed her mother -- Vienna has holed herself up in the
attic, pretending to be somebody else. For a while, it
was Rosemary Clooney, then Patsy Cline. Now it's Edith
Piaf, whom she has allowed to take over her life (hence,
the title).
Vienna's long-suffering
father, Stan, tries to reason with her, to no avail. For
whenever he encourages her to face reality or seek help,
she adopts Piaf's diva persona and dismisses him as a
"simple man" and "an embarrassment." She orders him around
as if he's the least important lackey in her life ("You
can stay in the servant's quarters.") and the poor soul
puts up with it.
There's little
more to this 75-minute play. There are moments when Vienna
emerges from her madness, such as when the 72-year-old
Stan has a sudden attack from the many maladies that plague
him. But for the most part, she's unsympathetic -- especially
when Stan has a chance to find some happiness with a widow.
Vienna criticizes the woman on every occasion because
she can't lose her father's attention.
Korbesmeyer wrote
the play as a vehicle for Deborah Boily, a noted singer
of French songs. She's accompanied by able pianist John
FitzGibbon, who also bears the brunt of Vienna's abuse.
Boily's voice is both lovely and stirring, and her elocution
is impeccable. Costume designer Patricia E. Doherty makes
Boily look the part, too, by placing feathers in her streaked
hair, masking a faded elegant dress with a kimono, and
adorning ornate silver shoes with absurdly detailed buckles.
Under Peter Bennett's
taut direction, Boily is not doing a strict Piaf imitation,
nor does she need to. But she possesses the gestures characteristic
of so many French singers. When she extends her hand gently,
it appears to be resting on a cloud. Occasionally she
slowly pinches her fingers together to show that she's
working to capture the precise pronunciation of each word,
and the requisite feeling that accompanies it.
After the audience
applauds her stirring renditions of such songs as "La
Vie en Rose" and "Under Paris Skies," Boily smiles in
appreciation -- but wanly, to acknowledge that even now
she's still feeling the pain expressed in the lyrics.
So too, of course, is Vienna.
Boily steers the
lackluster play well, but equally impressive is Burt Edwards
as her father. Stan may be a craggy-faced Yankee, but
Edwards shows us a man who still desperately loves his
daughter, and will try most anything to help her, no matter
how many times she waves her hand at him in dismissive
disgust.
In an odd way,
Edwards' wonderful performance makes our exasperation
with Vienna even worse, for we wind up caring more about
him.
Piaf in Vienna
Where: New Jersey
Repertory Company, 179 Broadway, Long Branch
When: through
Dec. 31; Thursdays to Saturdays at 8 p.m. and Sundays
at 2 p.m.
How much: $25
to $36. Call (732) 229-3166.
|
A French connection
Published in the Asbury Park Press 12/03/00
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
THEATER WRITER
Actress-singer Deborary Boily doesn't mind being on stage
alone.
She's done it often enough as a cabaret singer
in Paris, London and the United States. She recorded two
CDs -- "The Song Remembers When" and "A French Collection"
-- based on cabaret shows she wrote and performed.
Still, given her druthers, she prefers company while
in the limelight.
She has that in the New Jersey Repertory Company's current
production of "Piaf in Vienna," a show written for Boily
by Brad Korbesmeyer.
"I do the one-person cabaret thing not for ego, but because
I have total control: I created it, I marketed it, I made
the choices and taken the risks," Boily, 51, said recently
during a rehearsal break. "It's really different when
you are the only one . . . I'm glad I've done it because
I know I can and to know that I alone was responsible
for the success or failure of this particular performance.
"But I love being on stage with other people in
an ensemble," she explained. "I love the interaction and
the dependence you have on other people and the dependence
they have on you.
"It is nice to have someone up there to share the burden,"
she admitted.
She will be joined by Burt Edwards, who plays her father,
and John Fitzgibbons, who plays her piano accompaniest.
Boily plays a woman named Vienna who blames herself for
her mother's death in a car crash. Vienna was driving.
The 90-minute production, directed by Peter Bennett, takes
place in the attic of her family's home. Vienna imagines
herself as the famous French chanteuse Edith Piaf.
"She's psychotic," Boily said bluntly. "She's on drugs
and pills the doctors think will help her.
"Her fantasy is to reconcile with her mother . . . and
she can keep her mother with her by imagining her mother
in the audience while singing Piaf's songs," Boily said.
"The one thing she has left of her mother is the piano
and her records so she uses those things to create this
other life."
One reason the role is tailor-made for her, besides the
fact she is diminutive like Piaf, her love of the French
people, Boily said with a slight accent she retains from
her childhood in New Orleans, La. She now makes her home
in Houston, Texas.
Her father, a commercial artist, also taught at an art
school on Bourbon Street. As a child she took classes
there as well and each Saturday morning, as they walked
to school, her father would comment on how the area reminded
him of the streets of Paris he'd seen as a soldier in
World War II.
Her mother's parents immigrated from France.
"Between the two of them, I developed this idea as a
young child that it must be really special to be French,"
she said. "They instilled in me a French pride."
Her father also helped Boily's interest in music by bringing
home a record player and she immersed herself in cast
recordings from the well known, such as "My Fair Lady,"
to the obscure, such as "Ben Franklin in Paris."
Boily graduated from Louisiana State University with
a degree in drama and music, married and moved to New
York to continue her studies and act. The couple eventually
returned south and the marriage didn't last.
Boily, who supplements her income working as a temporary
secretary, said she remains busy with theater and cabaret
appearences but it's not enough to live on.
A friend one day suggested she write a show about something
she knew well. She wrote "A Always Wanted to be French,"
a mixture of American and French songs. That went over
so well she next wrote "From Piaf to Brel and Beyond,"
which includes songs made famous by singers Gilbert Becaud,
Michel Jonasz, and Serge Lama, popular in France but unknown
in America. Next came "Ce Soir Cabaret."
|
A Professional
Troupe based in Long Branch
The passion of a Piaf in
Vienna actress is captured on film.
With excellent interpretations during regularly scheduled performances
at a local venue, the popularity of the NJ Repertory Company
is on the rise.
A quick glance at the biographies
of the men and women of the company clearly reveals the wealth of experience
that makes everything flow so smoothly on the stage under
the guidance of an equally well credentialed production staff.
Some of the popular past productions include:
- A World I Never Made
- North Fork
- On Golden Pond
- Voices Carry
The Lumia Theatre on Broadway
in Long Branch provides the main stage for productions
and will host the presentation of Piaf in Vienna by
Brad Korbesmeyer from December 7-31, 2000. See the NJ
Repertory Web site or call (732) 229-3166 for more
details on attending this and other productions.
The Perl and Solomon Dwek Little
Theater encompasses Stage II, allowing simultaneous productions
for a wider audience appeal; upcoming performances in
December are two comedies:
- Naked by the River
- Any Friend of Percy
D’Angelino is a Friend of Mine
The company is a nonprofit
professional theater organization that intends, in addition
to their primary mission quoted below, to be a part of
the revitalization of the neighborhoods in the Broadway
area of Long Branch.
The primary mission of
the theater is to develop and produce new plays with
diverse themes, with a special commitment to fostering
the works of minority playwrights. It is also devoted
to creating an atmosphere where classics can take on
a fresh look and forgotten plays can find a home.
The convenient location, coupled
with affordable ticket prices and excellent performances,
makes for an enjoyable night out while supporting the
local community.
Enjoy the show!
New Jersey
Shore
with Mark
Hessey
|
Standards-bred: Local singer returns to roots
Published in the Asbury Park Press 11/10/00
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
Theater Writer
Billy Stone admits it's a long way from writing English
lyrics for Japanese hard-rock band Loudness to singing
songs penned by George and Ira Gershwin, Cole Porter and
Richard Rodgers.
LOVE SONGS AFTER SIX
Billy Stone in Concert
Lumia Theatre
179 Broadway, Long Branch
8 p.m. Nov. 16 to 19
$10
(732) 229-3166
|
"In my younger days, I felt a strong need to prove myself
in the rock field," said Stone, now 42 and back living in
his hometown of Long Branch. "I think I really was always
influenced by the pop signers of the '50s and '60s - Sinatra,
Bennett, Ella Fitzgerald.
"But it just didn't fit right to sing 'Embraceable You'
in my 20s," he added. "Now I'm older and more mature I
can sing that comfortably."
Now that Stone has purged rock music from his system,
he feels he has come full circle. He will be singing for
four nights beginning on Thursday at the Lumia Theatre
in Long Branch in a concert billed as "Love Songs After
Six."
He also has returned to his roots. Stone, whose real
name is Billy Coughlin, was born in Long Branch in 1957
and lived here until 1974, when his family moved to Wyoming.
He would have been a member of the Long Branch High School
class of 1975.
Instead, he ended up graduating from a high school in
Cheyenne and earning a degree in theater with a minor
in psychology at the University of Wyoming. He tried his
luck in Los Angeles, fronting several rock bands, including
Pyramid Sky, and writing songs.
He returned east to be closer to his mother, a former
operating room nurse. An only child, Stone, whose stepfather
was a surgeon, said he would have entered the medical
field if he had not become an artist. Stone currently
earns a living as the managed care coordinator with Orthopedic
Sports Medicine and Rehabilitation Center in Red Bank.
But his first love remains the stage and recently has
acted in "Adult Fiction" and "Octet" produced by the New
Jersey Repertory Company in Long Branch. He considers
it fortuitous that the NJ Rep opened in his hometown two
years ago -- just when he returned.
Founders Gabor and SuzAnne Barabas recently opened a
second space in their theater and offered it rent-free
to company members, Stone said. He took them up on their
offer, although he must split box office proceeds with
them, and put together this act. He worked on it with
musician Merek Royce Press, the Lumia Theatre's house
composer. Stone hopes the project evolves into an album.
"Standards are the most expensive genre of music to record
as it needs strings, or an orchestra, with big production
values," he explained. "With rock, you just need a bass,
a drummer, a guitarist and singer to make a record.
"It's too costly to hire a full orchestra but with a
computer, Merek can take samplings and record tracks himself,
so all I have to do is press play."
Published on November 10, 2000
|
Applause,
applause
New Jersey
theaters thank those who helped to raise their curtains
11/01/00
BY PEGGY McGLONE
STAR-LEDGER STAFF
Thanks went to
airlines for giving free tickets, and to foundations for
their generous contributions. Thanks also were offered
to loyal staffers, Web site designers and concession-stand
workers.
These and more
public thank- yous were offered Monday night in New Brunswick,
when New Jersey's professional theater community gathered
for the 12th annual Applause Awards.
"The Applause
Awards are really about dedication, and this is an opportunity
to recognize that," said Angelo Del Rossi, executive producer
of the Paper Mill Playhouse in Millburn.
The New Jersey
Theatre Group, newly named the New Jersey Theatre Alliance,
organized the event, which began with cocktails at New
Brunswick's trendy Soho on George restaurant. Some 320
theater personnel, board members and honorees then paraded
over to the nearby George Street Playhouse, where the
90-minute awards ceremony was held. The evening ended
with coffee and dessert at Soho.
This year's honorees,
selected for their contributions and dedication to the
member theaters, ranged from volunteers to staffers to
corporate angels. Among the volunteers honored were Piera
Accumanno for her work with 12 Miles West Theatre Company
in Montclair and Lina Moccia for her efforts for the New
Jersey Repertory Company in Long Branch.
"Lina has single-handedly
painted our theater several times. She is a carpenter,
mixes and pours cement, and like an ant, she carries more
than her weight," said Gabor Barabas, New Jersey Repertory
Company executive producer, in his introduction.
Many theaters
saluted the contributions made by board members, including
Two River Theatre Company in Red Bank, which thanked Len
Pickell, president of the James Beard Foundation, for
his efforts as "gala impresario." American State Company
in Teaneck celebrated the contributions of James Coia
and his employer, Bloomingdale's.
Both the Paper
Mill and George Street Playhouse chose to honor veteran
employees. Paper Mill's director of education, Susan Speidel,
was honored for her work creating the Rising Star Awards,
a sort of Tony Awards for high school musicals that has
been replicated around the country. George Street applauded
business manager Karen Price.
"I'm very passionate
about theater," said Price, who accepted the award from
George Street artistic director David Saint. "David recognizes
that, as a numbers cruncher, I participate in the magic
of the theater."
George Street
Playhouse managing director Michael Stotts acknowledged
the evening's missing company, the embattled Crossroads
Theatre Company of New Brunswick, which canceled its 2000-2001
season and was not represented at the awards.
"It is our hope
that (Crossroads) will be back on the boards next year,
and that they will continue to build on their legacy as
the premier African-American theater in this country,"
Stotts said.
The evening concluded
with the presentation of the alliance's Star Award to
former NJTA chairman and board member John McEwen, who
earlier this year left Paper Mill Playhouse to take a
job at New Jersey Network. The Theater Alliance Singers
performed a medley of songs in his honor, highlighting
McEwen's work on behalf of disabled audiences, as well
as his fund- raising prowess.
Here are the theaters
and their Applause Award recipients:
12 Miles West
Theatre Company: Piera Accumanno
Two River Theatre
Company: Len Pickell
TheatreFest: Fleet
Bank
Pushcart Players:
Rabbi Norman Patz
Playwrights Theatre
of New Jersey: Leigh Pierson Conant and Richard Dalba
New Jersey Repertory
Company: Lina Moccia
Passage Theatre
Company: the Rev. Willie J. Smith and the Times of Trenton
Paper Mill Playhouse:
Susan Speidel
The New Jersey
Shakespeare Festival: Michelle Cameron and Len Muscarella
of Interactive Media Associates
McCarter Theatre:
Holly Williams and Vincent Iorio of American Airlines
George Street
Playhouse: Karen Price
The Growing Stage
Theatre for Young Audiences: John Mintz
The East Lynne
Company: Frank Smith
Centenary Stage
Company: Susan Riding
American Stage
Company: John Coia and Bloomingdale's
|
The 2000 Applause Awards
NEW BRUNSWICK, NJ -- Had a great
time, as always, at the Applause Awards, sponsored by
the New Jersey Theatre Alliance. But before you roll your
eyes, because you’re assuming I’m about to tell you who
was the Best Actor or lighting designer for the 2000 season,
let me say that you’re making the wrong assumption.
No, in New Jersey for each of the past
12 years, the professional theaters have given their
applause (and handsome plaques) to the person, persons,
companies or corporations who have made their lives
that much easier. Presto Printing, where the Forum Theatre
of Metuchen gets a break on its flyers. 3 Central Cafe,
which hosts Playwrights Theatre of New Jersey’s opening
night parties. Fat cats, too -- New Jersey Bell, Panasonic,
Bristol-Myers Squibb -- who wrote the checks that made
things happen. Even the Claridge Hotel Casino was applauded
in 1991, for helping South Jersey Regional Theatre.
This year, the awards took place at
the George Street Playhouse, which David Saint has revitalized
in two short seasons. He’s currently re-staging his
George Street hit of last season, Anne Meara’s Down
the Garden Paths, for off-Broadway -- at the precise
same time he’s starting rehearsals for his next George
Street show, The Spitfire Grill, a musicalization
of the recent film, with Beth Fowler in the lead. (At
the awards, we also heard a selection, "Wild Bird,"
as part of the entertainment. Pretty song.)
Saint showed that a new broom doesn’t
necessarily sweep clean (no matter what Johnny Johnson
told us in A Tree Grows in Brooklyn) by applauding
Karen Price, who’s been the George Street business manager
for 12 years. At the podium, Price apologized for shedding
some tears, but she showed more composure than have
many Oscar-winners.
The Paper Mill Playhouse made a brilliant
choice: Susan Speidel, the troupe’s director of education,
who six years ago went to executive producer Angelo
Del Rossi to ask if she could stage a Tony Awards for
kids. She admitted that Del Rossi thought she was crazy,
but he still green-lit the project. Thus were born the
Rising Star Awards, made of Tiffany glass. The first
year, a kid named Laura Benanti won for playing Dolly
at her high school. Yes, it’s the Laura Benanti who
would deservedly be up for a Tony only a handful of
years later.
There’s also the Alliance’s own version
of the Thalberg, called The Star Award. A couple of
years ago, it went to Larry Capo, who devised the Applause
Awards in 1988. This year, the Star was John McEwen,
who was Paper Mill’s director of development for 15
years, until he moved to New Jersey Network this year.
During his tenure, McEwen was a tireless advocate for
outreach programs and access services. As his reward
here, he was serenaded by Speidel (an astonishing performer,
by the way) and others in a medley of show tunes ("Johnny
One-Note") and lesser works ("Johnny Angel"), with saucy
lyrics tailored to McEwen’s many achievements.
And so it went. McCarter Theatre honored
American Airlines for flying in Lily Tomlin, Zoe Wanamaker,
Charles Durning, and many others. Passage Theatre of
Trenton saluted Dr. Willie J. Smith for so urging the
black community to see Welcome Home, Marian Anderson
that it sold out. The Pushcart Players applauded Rabbi
Norman R. Patz for his help on their Holocaust projects,
but the rabbi had to send his regrets. He was in Israel
on a peacekeeping mission, and though the Applause brass
would have liked him there, they understood that he
had put first things first.
Many of the theaters seized the chance
to applaud their in-the-trenches volunteers, the at-home
moms who put posters in the local stores, or the senior
citizens who sell candy at intermission. This year,
New Jersey Repertory Company applauded Lina Moccia,
a sixtysomething Italian immigrant. As she came to the
podium, at least 20 who bought tickets to support her
were in the back rows of the theater, yelling, "Lee-NAH!
Lee-NAH! Lee-NAH!" with the same intensity that Yankee
fans used to give to "Reg-GIE! Reg-GIE! Reg-GIE!" Moccia
responded by giving a speech in a thick Italian accent,
and wasn’t worried a whit that people might not understand
her. We caught up.
It was my second favorite Applause
Award Moment. First place goes to Ensemble Theatre Company
of Newark’s 1994 winner Lathan Salley -- the janitor
of the building where the troupe was ensconced.
Ensemble producing artistic director
Marvin Kazembe Jefferson said that there were plenty
of times when he needed something, and Salley matter-of-factly
provided him with it. On more than one occasion, Kazembe
had misplaced his keys, needed to get into the building,
and had to call Salley to come down to let him in. He
always did immediately, and without complaint.
And so, a black inner-city janitor
who had to be at least 75 got to put on a handsome suit,
stand in front of a roomful of people, and give his
thanks for Ensemble’s acknowledging him. It’s a safe
bet that he would have spent most of his life assuming
that something like that would never, ever happen to
him. But it did, and bless the Applause Awards for making
it a reality.
Shouldn’t there be an Applause Awards
in your theatre community, too? {:-)-:}
|
This
week's BackStage Regional Round-up
The New Jersey
Repertory Company launched its third season with Sandra
Perlman's "In Search of Red River Dog". The four-character,
one-set drama centers on out-of-work Ohio steel workers
and the women who love them. Wonderfully acted by Dana
Benningfield, Jeff Farkash, Betty Hudson, and Ross Haines,
Perlman's well-written piece captures the frustration
of men who see their jobs vanish and their women grow
stronger than themselves.
Sam Shepard-like
in its starkness, realism. and family dysfunction, Perlman,
nevertheless has a voice of her own. Under the direction
of Rob Reese, the NJ Rep once again has produced high
quality theatre with an edge in depressed, downtown Long
Branch. Artistic Director SuzAnne Barabas and Executive
Producer Gabor Barabas are pioneers. "In Search of Red
River Dog" closes on Nov. 5.
|
Superb
cast in drama that looks at life, lies
Published in the Asbury Park Press 10/17/00
By GRETCHEN C.
VAN BENTHUYSEN
THEATER WRITER
Men without jobs and the women who love them is
at the heart of Sandra Perlman's new drama "In Search
of Red River Dog," now playing at the New Jersey Repertory
Theatre in Long Branch.
Also at the heart of the matter are lies.
The lies told by the steel mill owners to its laid off
workers. Lies told by the garbage company that was illegally
dumping chemicals years ago that now have poisoned the
groundwater in Deerfield, Ohio, in 1978. And the lies
told between a husband and wife that, when revealed, undermine
the shaky foundation of their marriage.
IN SEARCH OF RED RIVER DOG
New Jersey Repertory Company
179 Broadway, Long Branch
8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays
2 p.m. Sundays through Nov. 5
$25-$27
(732) 229-3166
|
Superbly acted by all four cast members and directed by
Rob Reese, the play unfolds over 48 hours in the front yard
of a run-down trailer.
Sam Shepardesque in a stark, reality driven, highly emotional
way, the plot centers on Paulette (Dana Benningfield)
and Denny (Jeff Farkash), high school sweethearts who
married after she became pregnant.
Their young daughter has recently died and Paulette believes
the cause was poisoned water from leaky chemical drums.
Paulette's beloved dog Red also is sick, and she vows
that if he dies (which he ultimately does), she'll have
his remains analyzed to prove he was poisoned.
Meanwhile, Paulette has some unusual habits which leads
us to think she may be losing her grip on reality. She
sings nursery rhymes. Hangs laundry at night to dry. And
plants exotic spices she has no use for.
She also is very bright - brightest kid in school - who
married a football player who can barely put two words
together. Benningfield turns in a finely wrought performance
as the young wife who has to make some hard choices.
Her mother Bertie (Betty Hudson), who lost two children
to miscarriages before she got the family out of a beautiful
but deadly coal mining valley in West Virginia, loves
her daughter with a passion. But she does not want to
move again, and believes if Paulette stirs up trouble
with her theory about the poisoned water, they will never
work again and be forced to leave the area.
Hudson is excellent as the mother, particularly when
she is horrified at the circumstances surrounding Red's
death and what happened immediately afterward.
Her husband John (Ross Haines) is drinking himself to
death because he knows the steel mills will never reopen
and he can't even land a clerk's job at the local convenience
store because he can't work the computerized cash register.
It is the women who have the survival instincts. John
accepts this. Denny does not.
Farkash's portrait of a Denny that is insecure and terrified
his wife will leave him is nicely done. We want to feel
sorry for his predicament and do, up to a point. As his
fears overtake him, accusing his wife of infidelity and
lack of respect, he becomes pathetic. As always, it comes
down to sex and Denny resents not having any with Paulette,
just because a doctor said to give her time to recover
from their baby's death.
He finally takes his frustration out on her and nobody's
life will ever be the same.
At the end of this two-hour drama we realize Paulette
is the one who is facing reality and Denny is the one
who lives in an imaginary world.
Published on October 17, 2000
|
New Jersey stage: Tragedy, not trash,
in trailer park
10/19/00
BY PETER FILICHIA
STAR-LEDGER STAFF
In Search of Red River Dog
Where: New Jersey Repertory Company, 179 Broadway, Long
Branch
When: Through Nov. 5. Thursdays-Saturdays at 8 p.m.
and Sundays at 2 p.m.
How much: $25 on Thursdays and Sundays, $27 on Friday
and Saturdays. Call (732) 229-3166.
Are people who live in trailers necessarily "trailer
trash"? Playwright Sandra Perlman is out to refute the
stereotype in "In Search of Red River Dog," now at New
Jersey Repertory Company in Long Branch.
Though Paulette and Denny live in a "sardine can," they're
an eloquent and devoted couple, thanks to Perlman's fresh
dialogue. Not that the young marrieds don't have problems.
Denny's out of work, which doesn't help Paulette's dreams
of going to college. Worse, their baby has died of Sudden
Infant Death Syndrome. Their prospects have tarnished
in the few years since Denny nearly became the football
team's MVP, and Paulette almost won the title of the town's
Apple Butter Queen.
Fifty minutes into the play, though, Paulette suddenly
mentions that she believes their trailer is sitting in
the midst of severe environmental problems. Plants won't
grow, the water smells and their beloved dog, Red River,
is ill. Though a crisis seems imminent, it won't be mentioned
again. Perlman indicates that weighty issues occur to
these people, but they lack the resources to deal with
them.
The playwright spends the second act replacing the couple's
dreams of a better life with far less savory alternatives.
She suggests that there's no escape from such a lower-middle-class
life, and that poverty will eventually overwhelm even
the brightest minds. What makes this a genuine tragedy
is Perlman's ability to rouse sympathy for these two kids,
who had the raw material to succeed.
The sense of loss is made more acute because Dana Benningfield
and Jeff Farkash have a wonderful chemistry as Paulette
and Denny. In just a few, attention-getting minutes, they
exchange faint smiles that bear an edge of desperation;
their eyes show how much unhappiness pervades their lives.
The couple's brave front makes them all the more heartbreaking.
Benningfield gets the chance to be even more commendable
in the way she displays great devotion to her father.
He's at first played as a jolly drunk by Ross Haines,
until he faces the harsh realities of unemployment. "This
man don't bring home nothin', 'cuz this man don't work,"
Haines says, his voice full of defeat. As Paulette's mother
-- who does her best not to be overwhelmed by her job
of picking vegetables -- Betty Hudson is the salt of the
earth.
Director Rob Reese stages the play with the right pace
and mood. Once again, the New Jersey Repertory Company
proves itself to be a fledgling playwright's best friend,
consistently giving new plays most remarkable productions.
This is one of its better choices.
|
Playwright finds herself, in Long Branch
Published in the Asbury Park Press 10/12/00
By GRETCHEN C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
THEATER WRITER
Sandra Perlman has always been in love with theater.
She was in school plays while growing up in the Holmesburg
section of Philadelphia and later in Palmyra High School
in Cinnaminson.
As an adult, she acted at the Society Hill Playhouse
in Philadelphia and during the summer of 1968 did street
theater.
IN SEARCH OF RED RIVER DOG
Being presented by the New Jersey Repertory Company
179 Broadway, Long Branch
Previews at 8 p.m. Thursday
Opens at 8 p.m. Friday
Performances at 8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays
2 p.m. Sundays through Nov. 5
TICKETS: $25-$36
CALL: (732) 229-3166
|
But she never pursued a theater career until years later,
when she got mad at the innovative Polish director Jerzy
Grotowski, whose improvisational style focuses on the actor
who is physical, not intellectual.
In the early 1970s, Perlman attended a lecture given
by Grotowski at Kent State University in Ohio, where Perlamn's
artist husband Henry Halem taught and where they still
live.
"Grotowski announced there was no more need for playwrights,"
she said. "That made me so angry that I felt a real need
to write a play."
She taught herself by studying the works of playwrights
who had influenced her, including Tennessee Williams,
Arthur Miller and especially Anton Chekhov.
"It took me a few years, but I started writing plays
while also working and raising a family."
Now, at 56, she is a full-time playwright, a member of
the Cleveland Play House Playwrights' Unit and has had
12 plays produced. The Ohio Arts Council has granted her
two play-writing fellowships. Her work, "In Search of
the Red River Dog," opening tomorrow night at the New
Jersey Repertory Theatre in Long Branch, was a finalist
at the O'Neill Festival.
The two-act, four-character play emerged from her collective
experience as a teacher and TV producer.
The play, set in Deerfield, Ohio, centers on Paulette
and her husband Denny, an unemployed mill worker. Paulette's
mother Bertie and her father John, also an unemployed
mill worker, round out the cast.
The plot centers on the young couple whose marriage is
threatened by unemployment and the recent death of their
little girl, possibly due to environmental factors.
Perlman said she once had a student like Paulette, a
smart girl whose life was abruptly detoured by teen-age
pregnancy. And Perlman also produced a PBS TV program
about the loss of the steel mill industry in Ohio.
"This is a play about lying . . . a play about what happens
when you don't trust people to tell you the truth," Perlman
said. "The steel and rubber industry had been losing ground
for years, but no one was telling people that.
"Then one day these people woke up and there were no
jobs," she said. "Some people were able to pull together
and recover, like in Akron . . . but Youngstown never
recovered."
Many mill workers arrived via Route 77 out of the Appalachia
Mountains, Perlman said.
"They came from Virginia and West Virginia to find a
better life in Ohio," she said. "When the jobs disappeared,
they were caught in a quicksand . . . some became alcoholics
(like John in the play), others lose faith (like Denny)
and others develop survivor qualities (like Birdie and
Paulette).
"Like many women, Bertie is incredibly strong; able to
pick up and move even if it breaks her heart, just to
keep her family going," Perlman said. "Women bend and
adapt, men can't bend so they snap . . . or at least,
some do."
Denny is one who snaps.
"I'm inspired a lot by real people I've met and come
to know," she said. "I just love the idea of fictionalizing
that realness."
Published on October 12, 2000
|
A Rare Opportunity
The Murder
of Tchaikovsky:
"Improper Attention,"
by Diane Bairamian
In this age of work to
eliminate the very existence of hate crimes,
here is an indictment of hypocrisy that has been locked
in a closet for over 100 years. This is the little known
or suspected, story of the condemnation of the great
Russian composer Tchaikovsky, because he was gay. It
is the story of his Murder!

Review
by Richard Schiff
Playwrights
& Company, in association with New Jersey Repertory
Company in Long Branch, New Jersey, 179 Broadway Long
Branch, New Jersey 732-229-3166, an equity Theater,
mounted a production of "Improper Attention",
written by Diane Bairamian, and directed without
blemish by John Morrison. I was treated to a
previous production of this moving drama last year and
will never forget it as long as I shall live.
The play ran four nights last weekend to packed houses,
in the Solomon and Pearl Dwek Little Theatre.
Improper
Attention tells the story of the persecution and eventual murder
by proxy of the great Russian 19th century
composer Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, for having
had a gay relationship with the nephew of the Grand
Duke Stenbok-Fermor.
Jim Netis plays the part of Tchaikovsky with a brilliance not
seen on the stage for a long time. The agony and sensitivity,
the utter humanity he brings to the role is staggering.
The
play recreates a little known event in Russian history;
the convening of a group of the composer’s former classmates
from the Institute for Jurisprudence. Though the action
would take place in the late 1890’s, the show is done
in modern dress, on a bare stage with minimal props.
Now these former classmates are all middle aged and
defending their reputations. They are all known friends
of the composer, and a letter from the Grand Duke to
the Czar, has condemned Tchaikovsky for having had a
gay relationship with 18 year old Alexander Vladimirivich
Stenbok-Fermor. All of these men are attorneys.
Tchaikovsky had practiced law in his very early years.
At first, shocked
by the rude manner in which he had been literally dragged
to this meeting in the home of Nikolai Borisovich Jacobi,
played with cruel menace, by David A. Sussman who has a hidden agenda: he had a relationship with
Tchaikovsky back in their school days. Here we see the
vicious reality of men and women hiding their own dignity
when confronted with the mere whims of the Aristocracy.
The mere mention of royal disfavor has these men shaking
in their shoes.
We get a rare
glimpse of Royalty, in the person of the Grand Duke
Stenbok-Fermon. Stephan Caldwell, as the Grand
Duke, brings back the stuff of the Royalty that met
a disastrous end, just a few years later, in the Russian
Revolution. Even the internationally reknown and wealthy
Tchaikovsky is meaningless, and worthless to the arrogance
of landed nobility. Even Tchaikovsky is expendable.
The purpose of
this meeting is to extract from this "jury"
of Tchaikovsky’s friends, a verdict that will avoid
his being prosecuted in open court, by the law. That
would disgrace him and these so called "friends."
Jacobi has even more to hide than his past. His own
son is gay, and for appearances he will sacrifice anyone,
even the nation’s greatest composer, to hide this, and
keep favor with the ruling class. The hypocrisy is sickening.
The performances are brilliant.
Morrison is a
master of staging. He excludes the entire cast by having
them turn their backs to the audience. In these spaces
he has Tchaikovsky picnicking with young Alexander and
you swear you are in a flowery meadow in the height
of luscious Spring. The entire play is transcendent.
The pathos is enough to floor the most jaded critic.
The love that grows between the aging composer and the
young nobleman is beautiful and haunting. The sheer
tragedy of this great artist’s life was unknown to this
reviewer. The whole event was covered up by history,
and it is generally believed that Tchaikovsky died of
Cholera, like his unfortunate mother. And as this play
is no doubt going to re-emerge off-Broadway very soon,
I will not divulge the outcome. I urge you to contact
us to find out when next you will be afforded the opportunity
to see this play.. You will be thinking and talking
about it for the rest of your life. I guarantee you!
The cast included:
David A. Sussman, Jeff Taylor, Brian Fuorry, Sam
Angona, Jim Netis, Kevin Counihan, Jim Kuntz, Jim Watson,
John Newman, and Stephan Caldwell.
|
All about Anne
Published
in the Asbury Park Press 8/20/00
By GRETCHEN
C. VAN BENTHUYSEN
THEATER WRITER
The facts
of confessional poet Anne Sexton's life would lead one
to believe her's was a rather sad one. Especially when
you consider she was in therapy for years and committed
suicide in 1974 at age 45.
ABOUT ANNE
New Jersey Repertory Company
Lumia Theatre,179 Broadway, Long Branch
8 p.m. Thursday through Friday; 7 p.m. Sunday
$30
INFO: (732) 229-3166
|
Actress
Salome Jens sees Sexton's life differently. In her one-woman
play "...About Anne," Jens said she chose poems by the Pulitzer
Prize winner that offers a "prismatic view of her life through
her poetry."
"Anne liked
to do her poetry with rock bands -- what fun, I thought!
-- this is not a depressed woman," Jens said, speaking
from a Manhattan apartment she shares with her brother-in-law,
actor Anthony Zerbe. "Anne lived life to the hilt and
she wrote a wonderful letter to her daughter Linda tell
her to live to the top."
Sexton returned
to school and began writing poetry at age 29 at the suggestion
of one of her therapists. There she met and became good
friends with poet Sylvia Plath.
"Through their
creativity they both broke the (poetic) form and at a
very young age and in a world that was not very comfortable
for women," Jens noted.
Plath committed
suicide in 1963.
At the time
of the publication of "Anne Sexton: A Biography" in 1991,
Time magazine called Sexton "Ophelia all grown up and
turned into a suburban mother and basket case." Written
by Stanford University English professor Diane Wood Middlebrook,
the book generated controversy because Dr. Martin Orne
gave the author more than 300 audio tapes from his therapy
sessions with Sexton. Professionals called the move unethical,
even though Sexton's daughter had approved of the decision.
The book revealed
Sexton heard voices, had developed a fantasy personality,
was sexually involved one of her therapists and, during
episodes of rage, would physically abused her children.
"My sense
is Anne ... was someone who lived fully and was addicted
to drugs and alcohol," Jens said.
Jens, 65,
goes so far as to say in some ways Sexton saved her life.
"When I look
at her poetry ... she has all the aliveness, desires,
search for beauty and creativity that I have and that
is what I saw in her and that is what saved me," Jens
said. "In seeing what happened to her, I had the advantage
to take a look at what was chemically wrong with me.
"I thought
alcoholism was a moral issue but she made me see it was
physical ... and once I saw that, it seemed easier to
handle," said Jens, who has been sober for 19 years and
comes from a family with a history of alcoholism.
As a child,
Jens said she craved sugar and as she grew older she turned
to alcohol to satisfy "that terrible craving."
Along the
way, however, she established herself as a capable actress.
She studied with modern dancer Martha Graham and acting
teachers Herbert Berghof, Lee Strasberg and Stella Adler.
She become a charter member of an acting company Elia
Kazan was starting at Lincoln Center.
She also landed
lead roles in such Joseph Papp-directed productions as
"The Winter's Tale," "Antony and Cleopatra" and "Macbeth."
In 1966, she was cast in what she considers one of her
best films "Seconds," which co-starred Rock Hudson and
was directed by John Frankenheimer.
"...About
Anne" was developed about 20 years ago, Jens said, and
consists entirely of poetry. Some of the poems used are
"Rowing Toward God," "Red Shoes," "My Daughter," "The
Play," "The Dog's Neck" and "Daisies."
"It's something
I have in my back pocket," Jens said.
Last November,
Jens performed in the two-character "Memoir," about the
life of legendary French actress Sarah Bernhardt, at the
New Jersey Repertory Company. She said founding directors
SuzAnne and Gabor Barabas asked her to consider doing
"...About Anne" at their intimate theater in Long Branch.
"People who
don't know Anne will know her at the end of the evening,"
said Jens, adding it runs just over one hour long. "She
is talking about herself and her life in her poetry as
it is happening.
"And they
will know something about themselves they didn't know
that they knew when it is over," Jens said.
After this,
Jens will teach acting to master's-degree candidates at
the University of California, Los Angeles, where she also
lives.
And she'll
continue working on "the Marlene project," a two-character
play that was workshopped recently in Westport, Conn.,
and for which she has high hopes for future productions.
It concerns the life of German actress Marlene Dietrich
and takes place as she is developing the night club act
she took to Las Vegas and toured internationally.
"I just love
these strong woman," Jens said.
Published
on August 20, 2000
|
|
|
|
|