Trinity Rep 2010-2011 season

Providence's Trinity Repertory Company has announced the lineup for its 47th season. Here's the 2010-2011 schedule along with the description from the news release:

Camelot
Lerner & Lowe
Sept. 10 - Oct. 10

King Arthur has everything – peace, prosperity and a happy marriage… but will the arrival of the handsome, brash Sir Lancelot change Camelot forever?

Absurd Person Singular
Alan Ayckbourn
Oct. 15 - Nov. 21

It’s a dark and stormy night – perfect for a festive holiday party! This hilarious comedy romp follows three married couples through three disastrous Christmas parties, as they drink, frolic, and fight their way to… holiday cheer?

It's A Wonderful Life: A Live Radio Play
Joe Landry
December

This unique stage adaptation is performed as a radio play, broadcast on Christmas Eve, 1946. Everyman George Bailey gets the chance to see what the world would be like if he’d never been born.

The Crucible
Arthur Miller
Feb. 4 - March 13, 2011

Fear stalks the people of Salem, Massachusetts. Is it the work of the devil? Or has hysteria, malice, and one young woman’s lust started a chain of events that will undo a whole community? (This is the centerpiece of the Project Discovery program that brings students to the theatre and actors into classrooms.)

Yellowman
Dael Orlandersmith
Feb. 25 - April 3, 2011

Growing up in a small South Carolina town, Eugene and Alma find friendship, solace, and even love in each other. But he is light-skinned, and she is dark. Can their love survive the weight of the world?

Steel Magnolias
Robert Harling
April 15 - May 15, 2011

On her wedding day, Shelby is a vision in pink – two lovely shades! Her mother and friends gather at Truvy’s Beauty Salon to prepare for the big day. Still, beauty, hairspray, and all the pink in the world can’t protect this young woman from what lies ahead.

The Completely Fictional - Utterly True - Final Strange Tale of Edgar Allan Poe
Stephen Thorne
May 6 - June 5, 2011

Edgar Allan Poe has been missing for seven days. And that’s just the beginning of a journey that leads him to the bizarre, the macabre, and the sublime. Where is Poe going? To hell, to heaven… and back. (Thorne is a member of the acting company and this is his first play.)

So, what excites me the most?

Well Camelot, definitely, since I love the movie and I've never seen the musical onstage. Trinity Rep's artistic director Curt Columbus says, "We will be stripping away all of the expected trappings of traditional knights and fair maidens to focus on the complicated love triangle set in a world of political intrigue.''

I'm looking forward to British playwright Alan Ayckbourn's farce Absurd Person Singular. He's become a favorite of mine since I saw The Norman Conquests on Broadway last summer. The three plays were hilarious and together, they were one of my favorite theatergoing experiences.

I'm intrigued by the idea of presenting It's A Wonderful Life as a 1940s radio play. As someone who's not really into the annual production of A Christmas Carol, it's nice to have an alternative.

And the subject of Dael Orlandersmith's Yellowman, a 2002 Pulitzer Prize finalist, sounds interesting. In the New York Times, Ben Brantley called the play "a hard and piercing drama about intraracial prejudice."

Dick Van Dyke returns to Mary Poppins

I can't even imagine how thrilling it must have been for the audience at the Ahmanson Theatre in Los Angeles when Dick Van Dyke made a cameo appearance in the Jan. 22 performance of Mary Poppins!

Of course he played Bert, the chimney sweep, in the 1964 movie with Julie Andrews.

Here's a clip from Entertainment Tonight:

Gamm Theatre 2010-2011 season

It's the most wonderful time of the year - when theatre companies announce their new season.

First up is the Gamm Theatre in Pawtucket, which I think has a very promising 2010-2011 planned.

There's a North American premiere, a couple of plays I missed in New York that were fairly well-received, a classic of 19th century drama and a 20th-century play that seems all-too suited to our current economic woes.

The theatre is an intimate space, only 137 seats, and it's one I should get to more often. I saw a terrific production of The Elephant Man there in 2007.

Here's the schedule:

Glengarry Glen Ross
David Mamet
Sept. 2 - Oct. 3

Mauritius
Theresa Rebeck
Oct. 21 - Nov. 21

A Doll's House
Henrik Ibsen
Jan. 20 - Feb. 20, 2011

Paul
Howard Brenton
March 17 - April 17, 2011

Why Torture is Wrong and the People Who Love Them
Christopher Durang
May 5 - June 5, 2011

Even though I was disappointed by the two David Mamet plays I've seen on Broadway, Speed-the-Plow and Race, I do like the film version of Glengarry Glen Ross and I'm eager to see it on stage. Be aware that there's plenty of Mamet's trademark profanity in this 1982 play about small-time real-estate agents desperate to make a sale.

Theresa Rebeck's play is about half-sisters battling over the family inheritance - a rare stamp collection - premiered on Broadway in 2007 and drew some comparison to Mamet's work. So it'll be an interesting follow-up. Steve on Broadway called Mauritius "surprisingly thrilling and highly entertaining" in his review.

Christopher Durang's play premiered off-Broadway in 2009 at the Public Theater. It has an intriguing, convoluted plot about a woman who wakes up after a hangover and finds herself married to man who may be a terrorist. The New York Times review called Why Torture is Wrong a "hilarious and disturbing new comedy about all-American violence."

A Doll's House, a domestic drama written in the 19th century by Norwegian Henrik Ibsen, is considered a seminal work because of its focus on the lives of the middle class and on the position of women in society. The protagonist, Nora, is an intense, physically demanding role, one of the most challenging dramatic parts for an actress.

Paul, by British playwright Howard Brenton, is about St. Paul's conversion to Christianity. The play caused some controversy at London's National Theatre in 2005. But it also won praise as "a compelling study of faith and of the human need for stories that explain the world and inspire action." The Gamm production will be its North American premiere.

Xanadu

Gratuitous Violins rating: ** out of ****

It's taken me awhile but my year of living theatrically, 2010 edition, is finally off the ground. Yesterday, I took in the tour of Xanadu at the Providence Performing Arts Center.

The musical is based on the 1980 movie with singer Olivia Newton-John. She plays a muse, Clio (aka Kira), who comes down from Mount Olympus to inspire a struggling artist in Venice Beach, Calif., named Sonny Malone. Sonny dreams of creating a roller disco at the site of an abandoned theater.

On the tour, Elizabeth Stanley plays Clio/Kira and Max von Essen is Sonny. Larry Marshall is Danny Maguire, the hard-nosed businessman who wants to tear down the building and turn it into condos.

Stanley, from the Broadway musical Cry-Baby, is pretty funny with her faux Australian accent. She spends most of the musical on roller skates, not an easy thing to do I imagine. Von Essen is sweet and goofy and so cute in his short shorts.

And I loved the two wisecracking sister muses who are extremely jealous rivals of Clio, played by Annie Golden and Amy Goldberger. I was especially excited to see Golden, who was in the movie version of Hair. They did a great rendition of Electric Light Orchestra's "Evil Woman."

I have to give book writer Douglas Carter Beane credit for the way he weaves in a refresher course on Greek mythology. He also takes some witty swipes at the current state of musical theatre but they got kind of tepid applause. Maybe they worked better on Broadway?

Xanadu has a score of catchy pop tunes that I really enjoyed, like the title track, "Magic," "Alive," "All Over the World" and "Have You Never Been Mellow?" After seeing more than a few overblown musicals, I like the fact that this is kind of an intimate show that doesn't take itself too seriously.

But I have to admit the plot of Xanadu felt kind of stretched out and while I laughed, I didn't think it was uproariously funny.

Part of it is, the musical may simply work better in a smaller venue. On Broadway, it played in the 597-seat Helen Hayes Theatre. PPAC has 3,000 seats. Sometimes you pick up on the enthusiasm of the people sitting around you, but the energy felt too dissipated in a big house.

Also, there was a major irritation that affected my enjoyment to the point where I'm knocking down Xanadu by half a star.

When I entered the theatre, I was so excited about my fourth-row orchestra seat that I didn't think about the row of speakers set up across the front of the stage. They hid the actors' feet.

Xanadu has tap dancing and roller skating - I wanted to see feet. As it was, I saw the top of Stanley's leg warmers. Dan Knechtges' choreography was lost on me.

Afterward, I spoke to a crew member who told me that the speakers were put on the stage so those of us in the first few rows could hear better. Maybe so but I never remember having my view of the stage blocked like that before.

The tour runs through the beginning of May and the next stop is Pittsburgh's Benedum Center. I don't know what the setup will be like in other cities but this is one show where you might want to sit a little farther back.

So overall, Xanadu was a fun and frothy way to spend 90 minutes on a chilly February afternoon, not a bad way to start off my year of theatergoing. And best of all, it's only the beginning!

Revivals and revivals and revivals

The New York Times has a great spring/summer theatre preview today. What caught my attention was an article examining why familiar plays and musicals are being revived more frequently on Broadway.

Two of this season's revivals mentioned in the story are the musical La Cage aux Folles, which begins previews April 6 and the play A View from the Bridge, which runs through April 4.

I thought these comments were very sobering:

“One reason the wait time is getting shorter is that there are fewer and fewer great plays,” said Sonia Friedman, the London-based producer of La Cage aux Folles. "Many plays written in the last 10 to 15 years are on a smaller scale or too tied in to the zeitgeist.''

"Anthony LaPaglia, who won a Tony Award in the last View From the Bridge and stars this spring in Lend Me a Tenor (previously on Broadway 20 years ago), concurred: 'The talent pool is very thin, the generations of writers who stayed with theater has passed. Now they get the call for Hollywood and are gone.' "

Okay, maybe there's a kernel of truth. I don't doubt that the lure of Hollywood is a strong one. It always has been. Both William Faulkner and F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote for the movies. Shakespeare would have, too, if he'd had the chance.

Certainly, writers who concentrate on movies today would have been writing for the stage a couple generations ago. But I think Friedman's and LaPaglia's comments seem awfully dismissive of the current crop of playwrights.

What we ought to do is encourage writers to move among genres, like Martin McDonagh, who started in theatre, won an Oscar and is back on Broadway this spring with A Behanding Spokane.

Up

With two weeks to go until the Oscars, I've finally seen one of the 10 nominees for Best Picture. Yeah, I'm a little behind.

I know some of them are way too violent for me. And frankly, a lot of movies work fine on a small screen. So I simply add them to my Netflix queue and wait for the dvd to arrive in the mail.

But every once in awhile there's one I really wish I'd seen in the theater, or at least bought that 46-inch flat-panel plasma TV I've been thinking about.

Up, from Disney/Pixar, is definitely in the latter category. It's sweet and funny and visually stunning and it's a thrilling adventure story.

Like all Pixar films, it works on two levels - lots for the kids to enjoy and some witty references the adults might pick up on.

First, it's a buddy movie about a lonely widower, Carl Fredricksen (Ed Asner), and an eager little boy, Russell (Jordan Nagai), who yearns for some paternal attention.

But before they meet, there's a sequence introducing Carl that is simply masterful. Like the beginning of Wall-e, it's done without dialogue, yet conveys everything we need to know about his life. And it's so poignant, I was crying at the end.

Asner is in his Lou Grant mode, fiercely independent and a bit cranky. Nagai's Russell, the first Asian-American character in a Pixar movie, is so cute as a Wilderness Explorer who shows up on Carl's doorstep, trying to earn his final merit badge for "assisting the elderly."

Carl and Russell travel to an exotic location, make new friends, including a very energetic golden retriever, find themselves in hair-raising situations and match wits with a wily villain (voiced by Christopher Plummer). Some of the animation seemed so realistic, it was breathtaking.

In fact, Up reminded me of the best parts of the Indiana Jones movies. (If only Indy 4 had been this good!)

Up is only the second animated film, after Beauty and the Beast, to be nominated for Best Picture. This is one I should have gotten up off the couch and gone to the theater to see.

Homophobia in theatre reviews

I could not believe what Bloomberg News theatre critic John Simon wrote in his review of The Pride, a production of off-Broadway's MCC Theater.

In discussing his reaction to the play by Alexi Kaye Campbell, which examines gay relationships in 1958 and 2008, Simon writes "Another problem is men kissing each other ..." Then he quotes this bit of dialogue:

Oliver: The blonde one’s had his tongue in the other one’s ear since we got here.
Philip: Yummy.
Oliver: They’re sweet.

He ends the review by remarking, "I wonder how mainstream audiences will take to Campbell’s tongue in their ears."

Wow. John Simon, if you think that two men kissing is "a problem" then you clearly have "a problem" with gay people. If you can't leave your homophobia at the entrance to the theatre, then you should not have reviewed this play.

I mean, imagine the outcry if a critic had written about the musical Memphis, which features an interracial love story, "Another problem is a white man kissing a black woman." We would be outraged - and justifiably so.

At Parabasis, blogger Isaac Butler has gotten the discussion going. And apparently, Simon isn't the only theatre critic who has trouble keeping his prejudices in check. (Thanks to the West End Whingers for pointing out the following item.)

Christopher Hart penned this line in his review of Plague Over England in the London Sunday Times: “There’s also quite a lot of men kissing. I can cope with most things on stage — rape, torture, the plays of David Hare — but I still have to lower my gaze at men kissing.”

So you can put up with viewing rape and torture on stage but the sight of two men kissing forces you to avert your eyes from the horror? Unbelievable. Viewing violence against women is palatable to Hart but a display of affection between two men sends him over the edge.

I don't know whether this is simply a generational thing - Simon is 84. Or whether it's a matter of two male critics trying to prove their bona fides lest they be considered a little less than straight.

Whatever the excuse, both reviews are offensive. The stories of gay men and lesbians deserve to be told and their relationships deserve to be treated with respect. It should be that way in theatre reviews and in real life as well.

Personally, I have no problem with two men or two women kissing and being affectionate with each other. I think it's sweet. They're part of "the mainstream" and so are the rest of us who consider them friends, family, coworkers, neighbors.

The "problem" as I see it is letting the bigots control the conversation. Their voices shouldn't be the only ones that get heard.