Beverly Friend Produced by Theater Wit North Shore Center for the Performing Arts By Joshua Harmon Directed by Jeremy Wechsler Bad Jews Makes Good Theater For the first time in its 11-year history, Theater WIT has transferred a play to a larger venue to continue its outstanding run. Bad Jews, a brilliant, scathing comedy, opened its Chicago … Read more
One good reason for having children is that it gives parents and grandparents an excuse for attending great performances. However, Seussical is such an outstanding production — in staging, costumes, music, and acting — that it would be a shame to limit it to small fry. Adults should not miss it. You don’t have to be accompanied by offspring, and in fact, you don’t even have to have any prior knowledge of the works of Theodor Geisel (better known as Dr. Seuss), to thoroughly enjoy the experience.
What a unique and charming expedience to enjoy this one-man — no really one-puppet — show, purportedly covering the last 12 hours in the life of Moses (in real time). The task is no more outrageous than the clever cavorting of the crotchety puppet narrator who — although he has been told he looks Jewish — assures us that he is not made of kosher cardboard. One puppet plus one bare table creates an entire dramatic world.
Certainly, Duras lived a colorful life, born in 1914 in Gia-Dinh, French Indochina (now Vietnam), where her widowed mother struggled to bring up Marguerite and her two brothers. She chronicled these early years in several books which detail the plot of the play, candidly exposing her dysfunctional family. Her mother preferred her oldest to the younger children (resulting in a vicious elder brother who tyrannized the whole family). She engaged in an incestuous relationship her younger brother, and later had a memorable love affair with the spoiled young son of a wealthy Chinese merchant.
Groener captures every facet and emotion of this complex and highly sympathetic figure. In a virtuoso performance, he reaches the heights and depths of Cyrano’s passion for his cousin, the lovely Roxanne (Julie Jesneck) and brings us to agony as we empathize with his torment in ghost writing love letters for his handsome, inarticulate rival Christian (Nick Dillenburg).
Herzog drew from her own family members for inspiration, stating that elderly Vera Joseph is based on her feisty grandmother, Leepee Joseph– whom she describes as funny, dry, sassy and devastating at 93. Her struggling, hippie grandson Leo is based on a young cousin who –like Leo — had faced the traumatic loss of a dear friend.
The musical version is funny, but not consistently funny enough. The plot appears fragmented, uneven and sometimes clunky, painted with strokes so broad that they obscure the cleverness of the original. Unfortunately, the exaggerated, two-dimensional characters fail to come to life — or seem worth caring about. A shining exception is the villain, heartless Franklin Hart, Jr. played with great verve by James Moye as a callous, lecherous boss.
Shrek: The Musical—based on the 2001 smash hit film from DreamWorks, in turn based on the picture book by William Steig—is a hot property. Book and lyrics are by Pulitzer-prize winning playwright David Lindsay-Abaire, the adrenalized pop score comes from composer Jeanine Tesori, and taking the realm as director/choreographer is Chicago’s own Rachel Rockwell. The 2008 Broadway premiere clocked in at two and half hours, but Rockwell’s leanly fashioned 75 minute version doesn’t feel rushed, and will serve antsy children and their parents well.
The magic tricks — dazzling as they may be (palming cards, disappearing/reappearing objects, walking on glass, and the like) — are balanced by this exploration of a man who wanted to defy death and who — if not immortal, was at the very least invincible in his craft. It is a life story retold through the magician’s most famous tricks and escapes. Allen’s skillfully paced story of Houdini’s struggles gathers intensity until it ultimately touches the heart as well as the imagination.
The charming, witty script of I Love You, You’re Perfect Now Change remains as fresh and apt today as in1996! Only a few minimal tweaks update the original musical comedy — like using a cell phone instead of an answering machine. This deservedly is the longest running off-Broadway smash hit! (1996-2008 for over 5,000 performances.)