Part of the fun of the Brits Off Broadway Festival at 59E59 Theaters each June are the new plays that Sir Alan Ayckbourn sends us periodically with the original casts from his Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough, England. This year he has sent us three running in repertory – two new plays in their world premiere productions (Arrivals &Departures and Farcicals: A Double Bill of Frivolous Comedies) and a revival of his 1992 Time of My Life, making its New York debut. [more]
Then you begin to see the chasm Joanna feels hating the child that took her from the job she loved and how in the world do we mend that? Then you begin to see that Robert's self-worth is built on shards of something that took off in the wrong direction. Then you begin to see with the young eyes of Stella and wonder what she's going to make of her future and if she's alone in her clear eyed-ness? And Jake? He's insulated himself. Don't we all. [more]
The trouble with British playwright David Rudkin's stage play, "The Love Song of Alfred J Hitchcock," is that it started life as a radio play and it hasn't escaped very far from the radio studio. Still a play for voices, Rudkin's script has a great many introspective monologues by the iconic director but not much action, a strange choice for a story of a director whose movies are loaded with incident. The play assumes a great in-depth knowledge of the director's work: such movies as "Marnie," "Vertigo," "Strangers on a Train," "Psycho," "The Birds" and "Frenzy" are referred to tangentially but remain unnamed. It would take a film historian to track down all the references but apparently the play is expected to stand on its own which will confuse many theatergoers. [more]
