Walkerspace

Happy Life

July 29, 2022

Ng has a far-reaching imagination and spins the many stories and characters of her "Happy Life" with admiral skill and abandon. But it is just too heavy-handedly, head-scratchingly abstruse, not to mention unnecessarily full of foul language that somehow doesn’t jibe with the characters. This is Theater of the Absurd put through the David Mamet grinder. [more]

Stew

February 16, 2020

In making her professional stage debut courtesy of Page 73, Zora Howard has written a powerful kitchen sink drama in 'Stew," as much about making a literal stew as about the emotional stew the four women in the Tucker family of Mt. Vernon find themselves in. While many of the elements are family, Howard combines them in new ways so that the play seems both new and true. With a terrific cast headed by Portia ("The Rose Tattoo," "Ruined," "Rinse Repeat," "Our Lady of 121st Street") as the family matriarch, director Colette Robert keeps the temperature continually simmering on a low boil until all of the secrets and events have been revealed. This is an American tragedy as well as a study in how we live in this era. [more]

Eureka Day

September 6, 2019

Jonathan Spector’s "Eureka Day" now having its East Coast premiere at Walkerspace is a blisteringly satiric and provocative play torn right out of the headlines. Ostensibly about how one progressive elementary school handles a case of mumps due to many anti-vaxxers, the play also tackles many other hot button topics. Ultimately, the play’s message is that with too much sensitivity and too much political correctness nothing can be accomplished. It is a wake-up call for all of us. [more]

Recent Alien Abductions

March 5, 2019

Devilishly enigmatic and culminating in an eerie denouement, playwright Jorge Ignacio Cortiñas' stylized warring brothers yarn "Recent Alien Abductions" confidentially veers tonally, seemingly goes off on tangents and holds interest for much of its off-kilter 90 minutes. [more]

The Naturalists

September 12, 2018

Ms. McCarrick’s appealing premise of redemptive romance is in fact subsidiary to the IRA angle as in the program she states that this event is the inspiration for her play. The two threads haven’t been skillfully fused together, resulting in a disjointed experience totaling 13 scenes. McCarrick packs in a great deal of backstory to her well-drawn characters and her effective dialogue is marvelously Irish in style with plenty of wit, eloquence and reflectiveness. [more]

Bachelorette

September 13, 2016

This comedy revival of Leslye Headland’s 2010 play, that was adapted for the 2012 film of the same name, "Bachelorette," is as caustic and outrageous as ever. While looking ahead to a wedding day is supposed to generate feelings of excitement and bliss as women band together to stand by their girlfriend as she prepares to say “I Do,” this is often times not the case with several different personalities in the same room. It can be a very stressful time as emotions heighten and feelings get hurt, and "Bachelorette" humorously and dramatically represents this experience as three girls meet up to celebrate the night before their friend’s wedding in a swanky hotel suite. [more]

On the Verge

July 6, 2016

As the women find themselves further and further in the future, it is how each reacts and is forever changed that give the play its emotional weight. Two manage to adjust quite well; one not so much. The whirlwind of mid-twentieth century America takes its toll on these intelligent travelers, outwardly in their clothing and inwardly on their attitudes toward life. The paths each takes at the end of "On the Verge"aren’t just theatrically satisfying—having been telegraphed subtly in many ways—but actually quite moving. Suddenly Overmyer, with the decided support of three fine actresses, ably directed by the astute Laura Braza, turns these silly, living cartoons into flesh and blood. And, that is the real journey of On the Verge. [more]

Tennessee Williams 1982

March 1, 2016

Under the umbrella title "Tennessee Williams 1982" (the year of both play’s composition the year as well as that of playwright’s death), The Playhouse Creatures Theatre Company is presenting the world premiere of “A Recluse and His Guest” (to be published this summer) and the New York premiere of “The Remarkable Rooming-House of Mme. Le Monde,” (included in the 2008 volume, The Traveling Companion and Other Plays.) Not only are these unfamiliar plays uncharacteristic of the writer’s other work (a fable and a Grand Guignol), they have been given a surrealistic production by director Cosmin Chivu who directed the 2013 provocative revival of "The Mutilated" which demonstrated the viability of that black comedy once consigned to the scrap heap. Both plays in this doublebill are unified by their cynicism and their dark view of the world. While the plays may not be to everyone’s taste, the doublecasting of the two plays demonstrates remarkable versatility on the part of the talented cast, which is at times uneven. [more]

In Quietness

January 16, 2016

Directed by Danya Taymor, 'In Quietness" excels in its exploration of intimacy. When dialogue is being spoken between two actors at a time, there are moments of silence that are loaded with implication. It is a credit to the director that more character development happens with nothing being said at all rather than when a character is speaking. Kristen Robinson’s set design is efficient enough—the whole stage is made to look like the inside of a chapel—though it is made much more effective by intelligent lighting design by Masha Tsimring and Caitlyn Rappaport. [more]

Enter at Forest Lawn

July 27, 2014

Author Roberts plays Jack, the megalomaniacal producer/writer of a TV hit about a charming, witty, womanizing uncle who runs off the rails regularly. [more]

The Qualification of Douglas Evans

July 25, 2014

Presenting himself thus, in the character of Douglas Evans, with such vigorous, non-stop awfulness, takes courage as well as rampant ego and a chilling comment on his, the actor/playwright's own life, which might well have been written and delivered with an ironic god-awful humor and given the audience something to care about but Ahonen sticks to his guns. [more]