Discover Top Posts Tagged with #off-off-broadway

"Welcome to the Theatre": Diary of a Broadway Baby

A Midsummer Night's Dream

I've come to the conclusion that the best way to experience Shakespeare is a low-budget black-box production where everything from the costumes to the props to the actors look like they've been grabbed off the curb ten minutes prior (affectionate). I sat in one of the seats that was basically part of the action, and let me tell you, I am so here for a 60-something Hermia. A cast of six took on the many roles with aplomb, and the impish joy they took was so palpable. The oldest actor on stage was on-book and did have to basically be led from mark to mark. And you could tell that he was such a talented actor in his heyday but the shade was already falling. It's lovely and sad and I'm glad he got to do this. I do wonder about job opportunities for these seasoned veterans of the stage. Four of the six members were over sixty and had storied careers, but they're here in this off-off-Broadway show that costs twelve bucks a ticket and still wasn't even half full. And the program was designed using AI (boo), and the theatre in some basement three stories deep. They deserve better than that.

Verdict: A Lovely Night

A Note on Ratings

#welcome to the theatre: diary of a broadway baby #off-off-broadway #shakespeare #a midsummer night's dream #shakespeare is best done when in the hands of the people in affordable theatre #not $800+ seats to see famous people recite lines

"Welcome to the Theatre": Diary of a Broadway Baby

The Pushover

This is on me for getting suckered by an ad with women kissing in a vaguely psychosexual way. John Patrick Shanley's new play might one day be relatively decent, but it's impossible to tell with the current cast and budget restrictions. The cast had a major downgrade from the NY Stage and Film workshop, and in its current iteration, the acting is overblown, amateurish, and frankly difficult to watch. If this were community theatre, I might give it a pass, but these are AE professionals. What are we doing here? I'm so mad. Shanley couldn't have held out for a company with a more established and well-funded presence? We could have had Cindy Cheung and Florencia Lozano. Those women can act, dammit.

Another victim of the budget includes the worst wig I've seen in a long while. It needed to be powdered to cut down on the shine cheap wigs often have. And would it have killed props to give the actor a tictac to swallow when she takes a Tylenol but is not even putting her hand to her mouth? I got very little chemistry between the two actresses playing erstwhile lovers, and the above photo is leagues beyond the passion they acted out in that same scene last night. It looked like they barely wanted to touch each other. Not even an ass-grab or a hand up a blouse. Get handsy, ladies.

The script still needs more in all facets. More worldbuilding, more backstory, more justification for literally anything that is happening on that stage. I hope it goes back to development and has another run. It's not everyday we get messy dyke drama on stage.

Verdict: A Long Slog to Curtains

A Note on Ratings

#welcome to the theatre: diary of a broadway baby #theatre #off-off-broadway #the pushover #they should've fucked right there in the dingy takeout place

"Welcome to the Theatre": Diary of a Broadway Baby

The Thousand and One Nights

I had previously seen a wonderful theatrical adaptation of this source material eight years ago in a Brooklyn warehouse and it remains one of my favorite show to this day, so my standards on this were high. This production put on by Al Hakawati Production much more effective in its direction than in its sometimes clunky writing. Now, we have to be mindful that this is experimental theatre by emerging artists and a workshop to boot with a simplified set from what is seen in the image above, so I won't nitpick too much. But the story is slow to get on its feet. Much of act one is quaint and earnest, with perhaps a little too much time spent on the framing device. It runs overlong and has more than a few places where one would expect the intermission to start. But act two moves further away from the source material to become an extended and direct allegory to Palestine. Here, the direction shines and the emotional core reveals itself. The cast is made up of a plethora of backgrounds, and the actors often speak in their native tongues. It's such an extensive mix that it would be a surprise if there was ever an audience member who could understand everything. One of the performers was Vietnamese and I think this must be the most I have ever heard of that language. I wept.

Throughout the show, the cast had been pulling out various costume pieces from a well structure made of clothing. Occasionally, a piece would be placed on the floor with a name and age, and it's done sparingly and subtly enough that it isn't until the climax that it becomes apparent that these are the names of people who have been killed in the genocide. The coup de théâtre comes when the cast dismantles the entire well of what must be more than a hundred items of clothing to pay tribute to each name, and hands out articles to the audience and asks them to join in. A pair of bootcut jeans belonging to a seventeen-year-old girl; little pink leggings from a six-year-old; a jacket from an eighty-seven-year-old man. At the bottom of the well, there is a mirror. And after all the clothes have been laid out, an actor comes on with another bundle. And another. And another. No words. Only more and more clothes with names written on the tags. And this goes on long after the show ends and the audience files out. And that piece of direction is one of the most evocative I have seen in a long time. There's an off-Broadway run supposedly coming next year, and I look forward to seeing how this can be tightened and refined further.

Verdict: A Lovely Night

A Note on Ratings

#welcome to the theatre: diary of a broadway baby #off-off-broadway #lamama theatre #the one thousand and one nights #theatre

"Welcome to the Theatre": Diary of a Broadway Baby

Right Before I Go

I'm just sitting here in disbelief after checking my recording, because there was no way this reading was *just* an hour long. It felt like an eternity. As a piece meant to tackle the taboo subject of suicide, I think it does what it intended to do. The writer/narrator is clearly using the piece to work through his own grief over losing a close friend. Four actors join him and recite public suicide notes from well-known and ordinary people. And none of it really worked for me. I found the talkback after with an expert and a survivor far more impactful, especially with the audience participation. The show itself followed a writing style more appropriate for a book than a live performance, and some of it was just awkwardly worded. The writer is more of a comic, so I think he sometimes struggles with heavier subjects, especially something so personal. (And I don't want to think about how it would come off if it was an actor portraying him.) But I think the purpose of the play is noble and would be effective for those either struggling with mental health, or who have lost someone, or may be in danger of losing someone. He tours the show across the country, and takes it to schools. All of that is great.

Verdict: Artistically Amazing; Personally, No Thanks

A Note on Ratings

I think the most evocative part comes from Patrick Page's bully portrayal. It was harrowing. The deep voice really sells it. And just looking at the lineup of other actors doing the show in the coming weeks, I don't see how fucking Charles Fane (Ward Horton) himself is going to pull off something that chilling.

#welcome to the theatre: diary of a broadway baby #theatre #off-off-broadway #right before I go #would it affect me more if I were someone who struggled with my mental health?#or would my critical standards still outweigh my emotional response?#either way there's still sympathy and basic human compassion

"Welcome to the Theatre": Diary of a Broadway Baby

No Exit

This is on me. I should have known better than to go to a $10 off-off-Broadway venue to see a group of non-union actors put on this play. But I like No Exit and unfortunately I am easily lured by pretty middle-aged women. And I get that there wasn't a lot of money here, but come on, if the set is so specific about three sofas of varying colors, why are you shoving three black boxes in a straight line? At least put them in a proper configuration and drape some colored felt. But look, at a certain point, I just gave up and accepted that I was basically watching community theatre and to give the actors some slack. They're fifty-somethings that have not made it, and never will, yet they're still acting for the love of the game in some horrible old building that should be condemned. I respect that.

Verdict: Enjoyable, But Left No Lasting Impression

A Note on Ratings

#welcome to the theatre: diary of a broadway baby #off-off-broadway #no exit

"Welcome to the Theatre": Diary of a Broadway Baby

Upside Down

I need to stop going to AMT theatre altogether. I hated every single moment of this musical. Do you all remember that youtube video from the early 2010s(?) where it was like "what if the whole world was gay and straight people were oppressed?" Yeah, that's this written as a shitty musical. Just abysmal and contradictory worldbuilding abound. The music is what you'd expect of a teenaged songwriter just starting out. It's bad. It's so bad that I'm not even having fun talking about what a disaster this was. But you got to hand it to them. It takes real audacity to write a musical where women rule and gays are the majority, and still have it be steeped in early 2000s misogyny.

Verdict: Someone Put This Dumpster Fire Out

A Note on Ratings

#welcome to the theatre: diary of a broadway baby #musical theatre #off-off-broadway #upside down #a half-empty theatre full of comped tickets? yikes

"Welcome to the Theatre": Diary of a Broadway Baby

The Six Paths

A Vietnamese play about the Buddhist belief in, what else, the six paths. This took place downtown in a very small, very cold, blackbox theatre. So. Well. You can imagine the shoestring budget here. I think it unfair to be a harsh critic of these smaller, less experienced endeavors. I want to support Vietnamese theatre for obvious reasons. From a creative perspective, the story was compelling, and the design accomplishments with that two-dollars-and-a-paperclip budget impressive. But it wasn't a well-crafted narrative or staging. The play lagged tremendously and had so much dead air and repetitive, stunted dialogue. It's the playwright's first full-length play, apparently, and it showed. I don't take pleasure in taking an elitist position here, but I do think that it is extremely rare to find truly well-written, well-directed, and well-acted works in the off-off-Broadway sphere. Maybe you get one of the three; two if you're really lucky. This one only ever succeeded in being fine for all three. And there's just no funding. No space to improve. No way to make a living and make art. I hate that we're living in that circumstance, and that these spaces are the only ones so many creatives of color have access to. This could be a good play, but it needs time and money. And that's not what it can get here.

Also, I know Buddhism can be practiced by many people, but why would you cast a white actor in your Southeast Asian play? Especially given how...not great said actor was? It was a relief when her parts were mostly non-speaking, and mean as that is to say, I do take a bit of pleasure in that. Maybe she's a close friend of the company, but dammit, put a Southeast Asian body on that stage. We get so little as is. I'm glad to have supported Vietnamese theatre. I wish I had seen it and had some kind of...I don't know...cultural epiphany.

Verdict: Well...I'm Glad I Saw It

A Note on Ratings

#welcome to the theatre: diary of a broadway baby #theatre #off-off-broadway #the six paths