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Category Archives: theater
“American Buffalo” on Broadway
In 2001, I served on a grand jury. At one point, an ADA played for us a recording from a wiretap. It was a conversation between two members of a violent drug gang. One was assigning the other to kill … Continue reading
Posted in Broadway, Chicago theater, drama, improvisation, playwriting, Second City, theater, Uncategorized
Tagged American Buffalo, David Mamet, Harold Pinter, Neil Pepe, St. Nicholas Theater
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SPACE DOGS and ENGLISH
It’s no surprise that American playwrights usually write plays set in America. It is a little surprising that three current off-Broadway plays by American playwrights are, in fact, set outside our borders. I wrote recently about Joshua Harmon’s Prayer for … Continue reading
Posted in drama, off-Broadway, playwriting, theater
Tagged Atlantic Theater, English, Laika, Manhattan Class Company, Nick Blaemire, Sanaz Toossi, Space Dogs, Stalin, Van Hughes
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Thoughts on “Prayer For the French Republic”
At a time when we’ve gotten used to tasty 90-minute hors d’oeuvres, it’s exhilarating to encounter a play with enough on its mind to hold the attention for three hours (including two 10-minute intermissions). Joshua Harmon’s Prayer For the French … Continue reading
“Long Day’s Journey Into Night” – sort of
The program that comes with the off-Broadway production at the Minetta Lane Theater says the play on offer is Long Day’s Journey Into Night by Eugene O’Neill. And it’s true that every word spoken on the stage is by O’Neill. … Continue reading
AUTUMN SONATA (2 Bergmans)
Just watched Ingmar Bergman’s Autumn Sonata again (with Ingrid Bergman and Liv Ullmann) for the first time in decades. There are things in it that drive me crazy. The characters explain stuff endlessly in the past tense, and that’s usually … Continue reading
Posted in Chekhov, New York, The Sea Gull, theater, Uncategorized
Tagged Anna Christie, Autumn Sonata, Ingmar Bergman, Ingrid Bergman, Jill Eikenberry, John Lithgow, Liv Ullmann, White Plains
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CULLUD WATTAH and CLYDE’S
My idea was to write a series of plays, each of which would take place in another American city. The stories would be specific to those towns, each arising organically out of the character and history of the location. And … Continue reading
Posted in Broadway, drama, New York, off-Broadway, playwriting, Pulitzer Prize, theater
Tagged All My Sons, Arthur Miller, Clyde's, contaminated water, Crystal Dickinson, Cullud Wattah, Detroit, Dominique Morissea, Edmund Donovan, Enemy of the People, Erika Dickerson-Despenza, Flint, Generl Motors, Henrik Ibsen, Kara Young, Kate Whoriskey, Lynn Nottage, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, pollution, Public Theater, Reading PA, Reza Salazar, Rick Snyder, Roger Ailes, Ron Cephas Jones, Rosebud, Ruined, Skeleton Crew, The Detroit Project, Uzo Aduba, What Playwrights Talk About When They Talk About Writing
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Review: “Morning’s at Seven”
Paul Osborn’s Morning’s at Seven (playing at St. Clement’s) is the most James Thurberish play I know and it isn’t by Thurber. Some people are charmed by Thurber. Some are immune. (Some have no idea who he was.) I am … Continue reading
Posted in New York, off-Broadway, playwriting, theater
Tagged Alma Cuervo, comedy, Dan Lauria, James Thurber, Lindsay Crouse, Morning's at Seven, Paul Osborn, small-town life, Tony Roberts
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Returning to the Scene
To be simultaneously separated by masks (I wear two) and joined in responding with laughter with hundreds of others is to experience the contradictions of going to the theater these days. Of course, you can’t see the mouths, but maybe … Continue reading
Posted in Broadway, drama, New York, off-Broadway, playwriting, theater
Tagged A Commercial Jingle for Regina Comet, Alex Wyse, Ben Fankhauser, Bridge Theatre, Bryonha Marie Parham, Charlotte Bydwell, covid, Dan Wagoner, Hal Prince, Jay O. Sanders, Lakawanna Blues, Martyna Majok, Maryann Plunkett, National Theatre, Porch, Prince of Broadway, Rhinebeck, Richard Nelson, Robert LePage, Ruben Santiago-Hudson, Stratford Festival, What Happened?
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Review: “Sanctuary City”
Movie trailers today mostly are constructed the same way – a line or two of characters yelling or a violent incident quick cuts to another violent incident or line or two of characters yelling. And accompanying each cut is a … Continue reading
Jeffrey Sweet--Making the Scene 