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by Karen Tortora-Lee on April 4, 2011
Gay Plays for Straight People (and also gay people) is comprised of two plays which will play in rep brought to you by the new theatre company Purple Rep founded by playwrights Larry Kunofsky and Mariah MacCarthy. The plays - Kunofsky’s The Un-Marrying Project and MacCarthy’s The All-American Genderf*ck Cabaret – will run from April 8-30 at The Paradise Factory (64 East 4th Street between 2nd Ave and Bowery).
Larry and Mariah took some time to answer my questions and give me some straight answers (and also some not-just-straight answers) about what they’re passionate about, how they explore the fuckupedness of both genders, what it means, exactly, to be “un-married”, and how they intend to keep blending it all up in an effort to keep it Purple. Read on …
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by Karen Tortora-Lee on April 4, 2011
Linda Evangelista is the source of the oft-quoted line “I won’t get out of bed for less than $10,000 a day.” I’ve often paraphrased and said that I won’t get out of bed before six a.m. unless a number like that is mentioned. Yeah, well … how about a number like over 5 million?
Let me explain …
Horse Trade Theater Group (Erez Ziv, Managing Director, Heidi Grumelot, Artistic Director) learned today [March 30th] that 94. St. Marks Place, home to UNDER St. Marks Theater has been put up for sale at the market rate of $5,750,000.
Regular readers of The Happiest Medium know that UNDER St. Marks Theater is one of the theatres that I return to time and time again. It’s where I first laid eyes on Killy Dwyer and Kill The Band, it’s where Alex Bond did her staged reading of Late Nights With The Boys, it’s where Penny Pollak holds Penny’s Open Mic and where Gigi LaFemme holds Revealed Burlesque. It’s where I saw Heidi Grumelot make a sock puppet into something much more in Donnie and the Monsters. UNDER St. Marks is home to not only an army of downtown theatre artists but also to countless people who sit in the audience and shower them with love. People like … me.
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by Geoffrey Paddy Johnson on March 23, 2011
There are several occasions during Mimic when performer Raymond Scannell’s kohl-lined eyes look directly out into the audience and rake through the crowd with a malevolent glitter. The moments induce goose bumps, and a magnetic tug that would have you surrender all resistance and follow him willingly towards the heart of darkness he is hinting at in his self-penned monologue.
Seated at a gloss black piano, on a minimally dressed stage, Scannell dazzles with a torrent of language, effortlessly synchronized piano glissandi, and flashes of mimicry brilliance. Julian Neary, however, the character he is playing, the talented mimic of the title, is altogether a more anemic soul, and his audience attentiveness falters throughout a self-absorbed, self-dramatizing narrative. Julian’s eyes glaze over frequently as he recalls parts of his story, and he turns regularly away to face a mirror hanging alongside him. Given his prevailing narcissistic nature, and his present quest, after years as a successful entertainer, to separate a true self from his assumed characters, Julian’s self-absorption is perhaps appropriate. But an hour plus in the company of even the most diverting of narcissists can be taxing and, reflexively, an audience who fail to find anything that reminds them of themselves in that duration, are bound to get restive.
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by Karen Tortora-Lee on March 23, 2011
It’s rare that a six-degrees of separation type plot unravels as elegantly as Us vs. Them.
The play, written by Wesley Broulik and directed by Michelle Seaton, begins simply enough at a road side rest stop where two sisters have pulled over to take a break, stock up on some fortifying snacks, and continue to get reacquainted after an apparently long estrangement.
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by Karen Tortora-Lee on March 22, 2011
Looking back now, a movie like The Breakfast Club seems so innocent, but back when I was a teen, watching the movie with my friends in the actual movie theater, we were in awe of how “a brain, an athlete, a basket case, a princess, and a criminal” could find common ground one Saturday – linked by the shared tragedy of a day together in detention.
On Campus, written by Steve Sherman and directed by Marc Santa Maria is a much weightier tale set not in the halls of a high school but in the dorm rooms, class rooms and connecting paths of a college campus. And while the same familiar characters populate the story – the jock, the popular girl, the sensitive guy, the angsty artistic girl (with a few new faces thrown in: the funny Jason Segel-esque side kick and the studious, sweet Mexican girl) – the tale being told is far different. On this campus the stakes are higher, the choices are harder, and the tragedy is no longer as quaint as a Saturday spent locked up in the school library. No, here, On Campus, these kids are literally dealing with life and death.
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by Karen Tortora-Lee on March 18, 2011
I have to hand it to Emerging Artists Theatre Company‘s artistic director, Paul Adams – when putting together the program for the Spring EATFest he perfectly chose the one-acts that comprise the evening of theatre – they managed to tell three great stories and still have you out of the theatre in about an hour.
There are two series in this Spring’s offering; I attended Series A but can only imagine that Series B packs as big of a punch. If there could have been a theme for Series A it might have been called Behind the Platitudes – because each one-act was a beautifully crafted little gem of a story that, on the surface, could have been subtitled (respectively) “You Can’t Go Home Again” / “Out With The Old, In With The New” / “He Was Right There All Along”. But that’s the thing behind idioms and platitudes – really, they’re easily repeatable phrases that often boil down a much more difficult concept. Come to Series A of EATFest and you’ll get a trio of heartfelt stories that illustrate each of these ideas, some times with humor, some times with frustration, but always with heart.
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by Diánna Martin on March 9, 2011
When you were growing up, did you ever have characters from TV or film that you looked up to and felt that if you could be like them, you could do anything? Cyndi Freeman sure did, and she didn’t pick any run-of-the-mill hero…she picked THE woman…you know…the awesome chick in the invisible jet who could tie up any creep with her golden lasso and bounce bullets off of her groovy bracelets…all while wearing practically nothing in red, white, & blue. Wonder Woman: A How To Guide for Little Jewish Girls is part feminist hero worship and trivia; part life story of growing up more geek than hero with family dysfunction; and part tale of using the strength within to battle some of the scariest nemeses of all: life’s curve-balls.
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by Diánna Martin on March 9, 2011
A energetic and fascinating ensemble piece, Yippie! blends fact and fiction to create a behind-the-scenes look at the rise of Jerry Rubin’s Youth International Party of the 1960s. In a “what if?” take on the Chicago 1968 riots, writers/directors Randy Anderson and Harrison Williams look at the darker side of what happens when even flower children can take a life in the name of revolution, albeit perhaps unintentionally.
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by Diánna Martin on March 9, 2011
There Is No Good News featuring David Mogolov (Photo by Daniel Van Ackere)
From the moment you hear David Mogolov utter the words: “When I was seven years old my parents bought me a bullwhip,” the ice is broken, the walls immediately come down, and you are brought into a world of a hilarious, yet serious, one-man show that is There Is No Good News. I found myself laughing – no, guffawing, loudly – many, many times as we were presented with a glorious diatribe on everything from maniacal boys gone wild to Katrina victims; meth addicts with a purpose to job interviewers that have odd ways of selecting their candidates. But it’s not just a comedic piece; it’s razor sharp in its wit and cynicism in a manner reminiscent of David Sedaris, Dennis Miller, Brian Unger, and Bill Mahr.
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by Karen Tortora-Lee on March 7, 2011
So, what exactly is a FRIGID Hangover? Well, if you’re me, it’s the pounding headache you woke up with this morning after celebrating at the FRIGID Closing Ceremonies last night.
But if you’re one of the lucky ones a FRIGID Hangover means that – by popular demand – yours was picked as one of the shows to have an encore presentation. We’re thrilled that these wonderful performers get another chance to show off their stuff:
- Fate, Fury and Musical Theatre: A Kind of Cabaret
- Goodnight Lovin’ Trail
- Mendacity
- Paradise Lost
- Saving Tania’s Privates
- The Oregon Trail: Quest for the West!
- We Might Be Experimenting On You
- Wonder Woman: A How-to Guide for Little Jewish Girls
CONGRATULATIONS to all the shows!
FRIGID Hangovers will run March 7-13 at The Kraine & The Red Room (85 East 4th Street between 2nd Ave and Bowery).
Tickets ($18/$15 students & seniors) may be purchased online at www.FRIGIDnewyork.info or by calling Smarttix at 212-868-4444.
For more details about the shows, keep reading -
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