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THE BEDWETTER

Zoe Glick is delightful as a young girl with an embarrassing problem in world premiere musical at the Atlantic (photo by Ahron R. Foster)

THE BEDWETTER
Atlantic Theater Company
Linda Gross Theater
336 West 20th St. between Eighth & Ninth Aves.
Tuesday – Sunday through July 10, $111.50 – $131.50
866-811-4111
atlantictheater.org

Sarah Silverman is a superhero comedian, actress, and activist, and the new musical The Bedwetter is her origin story — and it’s more fab than we could ever have hoped, no mere trickler.

In her 2010 memoir, The Bedwetter: Stories of Courage, Redemption, and Pee (HarperCollins, April 2010, $19.99), Silverman detailed how she dealt as a child with nocturnal enuresis, mixing comedy with heartfelt poignancy as she openly and honestly examined the shame she suffered through. While the world premiere musical, which opened Tuesday night at the Atlantic for a limited run through July 3, also has its tender, emotional moments, it’s mostly a jubilant, hysterically funny tale about a unique young girl (Zoe Glick) and her dysfunctional family as she begins fifth grade in a new school.

Sarah’s parents have recently divorced. Her severely depressed mother, Beth Ann (Caissie Levy), spends all day and night in bed, watching her favorite movie and TV stars, never venturing outside. Sarah’s philandering father, Donald (Darren Goldstein), is the owner of Crazy Donny’s Discount Clothing Store and loves telling Sarah and her older sister, eighth grader Laura (Emily Zimmerman), dirty jokes utterly inappropriate for children. Meanwhile, Sarah’s beloved nana (Bebe Neuwirth) speaks without a filter, smokes like a fiend, and has Sarah regularly mix her Manhattans.

“I’m just really really fucking excited to be here!” Sarah cries out in class on her first day of school, angering her teacher, Mrs. Dembo (Ellyn Marie Marsh), who says, “Sarah! We don’t use language like that!” Sarah responds, “Sorry, Mrs. Dembo! I know that’s an ‘at home’ word.” Well, not at most suburban homes with young kids.

Sarah is a happy-go-lucky girl who manages to smile through all her family weirdness; she is ridiculously cute in her tight black bangs and shiny eyes. (The hair and wig design is by Tom Watson.) When she tries to make friends with a trio of mean girls — Ally (Charlotte Elizabeth Curtis), Abby (Charlotte MacLeod), and Amy (Margot Weintraub) — she has an unusual take on their verbal attacks on her.

“Your arms are so hairy!” Ally sings. “I couldn’t agree more! You should see my back!” Sarah responds. “Your teeth are enormous!” Abby declares. “I couldn’t agree more! To keep them this yellow takes extra plaque!” Sarah joyfully admits. “You’re short and dark and strange and eww-y!” the three girls say. “I know what you mean! I’m totally Jew-y!” Sarah replies with a big grin.

Sarah Silverman (Zoe Glick) and her father (Darren Goldstein) visit the doctor in The Bedwetter (photo by Ahron R. Foster)

At school, Laura prefers to ignore her little sister, but Sarah can’t help but stick around her. Laura explains, “Like do you know the type of person that like wants to smell all the bad smells? Like when the milk goes bad she’s like let me smell it and you say why would you want to and she says she just ‘wants to know’? Or like . . . do you know the type of person that’ll wake you up at 1 am and say, ‘Laura, does the pee come out the baby hole, or its own hole? . . . And how many holes do we have?’” To which Sarah says, “Yeah! And like, do you have a period hole now?”

But as with all superheroes, she has her own personal Kryptonite, in this case the severe shame of wetting the bed every night. When one of her worst nightmares comes true, Sarah’s father takes her to see a hypnotist, Dr. Grimm, then a pill-crazed screwball, Dr. Riley (both played by Rick Crom), but that only makes matters worse as she struggles, like any preteen, to fit in. She tries to find solace in her own superhero, Bedford native Jane Badler, aka Miss New Hampshire (Ashley Blanchet), who shows up at various times as a goddess of perfection, offering tidbits of wisdom in her beauty-pageant costume.

The Bedwetter is a sparkling adaptation of Silverman’s memoir, ready, willing, and able to pull no punches and hold nothing back. It might be about a ten-year-old, but it is most definitely not for kids; a group of children were sitting around us, and they looked rather uncomfortable through much of the show, particularly during Donald’s “In My Line of Work,” in which he proudly proclaims numerous times to several kids, “I fucked your mom!” It’s reminiscent of Silverman’s innovative cable sitcom The Sarah Silverman Program, which ran from 2007 to 2010 and approached her life with a wicked sense of humor as she brilliantly, and often controversially, complete with ferociously funny cringe-worthy moments, faced such issues as racism, anti-Semitism, abortion, and same-sex marriage. (It was a family affair, as her older sister, Laura, portrayed her younger sister.)

A nontraditional musical that brings to mind Fun Home, The Bedwetter features a jaunty pop score by three-time Emmy and Grammy winner and Oscar and Tony nominee Adam Schlesinger (Cry-Baby, “That Thing You Do!”), a founding member of Fountains of Wayne (Utopia Parkway, “Stacy’s Mom”) who died of Covid-19 complications in April 2020 at the age of fifty-two; the playful lyrics, which toy with genre cliches and regularly go to unexpected places, are by Schlesinger and Silverman, set to perky orchestrations by David Chase.

Nana (Bebe Neuwirth) has some choice advice for Sarah (Zoe Glick) in rousing musical (photo by Ahron R. Foster)

But it’s the book that really glows, written by Silverman and Joshua Harmon, one of today’s best playwrights; his recent work includes the extraordinary epic Prayer for the French Republic, the dazzling black comedy Bad Jews, and the moving relationship drama Significant Other. Harmon and Silverman tell the story with charm, incorporating just the right amount of tsuris. And only Sarah Silverman could get away with saying, “Oh, John Lennon. This might sound weird, but your senseless murder has made one little girl very happy.” Bedwetting becomes instantly relatable, resonating with any shame anyone in the audience may be holding inside.

Obie-winning director Anne Kauffman (The Nether, Mary Jane) has a firm grasp of the unusual material, unfolding on Laura Jellinek’s graceful sets, which morph from bedrooms to school hallways to doctors offices. Byron Easley’s choreography nearly brings the house down in a number involving dancing pills.

Glick (Frozen, Les Misérables) is a delight as young Sarah, bursting with confidence in a challenging role; she’s actually fourteen, so it’s a little easier to accept many of the words and ideas that come out of her character’s mouth. Goldstein (The Little Foxes, Continuity) and Levy (Frozen, Caroline, or Change) make a fine pair of dueling exes, while Neuwirth (Chicago, Cheers) is like a queen holding court as Nana. Crom (Urinetown, Merrily We Roll Along) nearly steals the show as the doctors (among other minor roles) when Blanchet (Waitress, Beautiful) isn’t taking center stage as the cryptic Miss New Hampshire. [Ed. note: Jessica Vosk will play Beth Ann and Elizabeth Ward Land will take over the role of Nana from July 5 to 10.]

But mostly, The Bedwetter is about discovering and accepting who you are, making necessary changes as you grow, and becoming part of the world around you. As Phyllis Campbell (Marsh), Amy’s mother, says to the kids at her daughter’s birthday party, “May all your dreams come true! Mine did not!” In The Bedwetter, Silverman dares us to face our fears, and beat them silly.

PARADISE SQUARE

Races and dance styles mix it up in Paradise Square (photo by Kevin Berne)

PARADISE SQUARE
Ethel Barrymore Theatre
243 West 47th St. between Broadway & Eighth Ave.
Tuesday – Sunday through July 17, $39 – $250
www.paradisesquaremusical.com

Paradise Square gets off to a rousing start, with exciting choreography by Bill T. Jones, a fabulous set by Allen Moyer, a terrific cast led by Joaquina Kalukango, splendid period costumes by Toni-Leslie James, historical projections by Wendall K. Harrington and Shawn Boyle that establish the time and place, and thrilling music by Jason Howland and Larry Kirwan. But once Nathan Tysen and Masi Asare’s lyrics and the book, by Christina Anderson, Craig Lucas, and Kirwan, kick into full gear, the whole thing falls apart, leaving us to wonder what could have been. Not even two-time Tony-nominated director and National Medal of Arts recipient Moisés Kaufman can put it back together.

It’s 1863, the middle of the Civil War, and Nelly Freeman (Kalukango) is running the (fictional) Paradise Square pub in Five Points, at the corner of Baxter and Worth Sts., what she proudly calls “the first slum in America!” It’s a place where everyone, regardless of race, gender, or religion, can come for a “little bit of Eden.” As she sings, “All we have is what we are / Inside here we all feel free / We love who we want to love / With no apology / If you landed in this square / Then you dared to risk it all / At the bottom of the ladder / There’s nowhere left to fall.”

Nelly is married to Willie O’Brien (Matt Bogart), an Irishman who is captain of the Fighting 69th Infantry. Willie’s right-hand man is Lucky Mike Quinlan (Kevin Dennis); Nelly runs the saloon with Willie’s sister, Annie (Chilina Kennedy), who is married to the Reverend Samuel Jacob Lewis (Nathaniel Stampley). Willie and Mike are about to head back to the war. “We’ll be back before ya blink,” Mike promises. “On me word, Nelly. I’ll bring him to ya with all his workin’ parts still workin’.”

Annie’s nephew, Owen Duignan (A. J. Shively), arrives, looking to make a fresh start in a new land where the streets are supposedly paved with gold. Also showing up is Washington Henry (Sidney DuPont), an escaped slave seeking shelter until he is reunited with his wife, Angelina Baker (Gabrielle McClinton), who was separated from him in the woods. Meanwhile, a drunk piano player named Milton Moore (Jacob Fishel) comes in looking for a job; Nelly does not realize that he is actually Stephen Foster, who has already written some racist anthems (and who really did live — and die — in Five Points).

Broadway musical looks at slavery, immigration, war, and personal sacrifice (photo by Kevin Berne)

Keeping a close watch on everything that happens at the Paradise is uptown party boss Frederic Tiggens (John Dossett), who wants to close the establishment because it is the center of Black and Irish anti-South and anti-business voters, “a haven of social depravity and political ascension.” He confronts Nelly, calling her “a facilitator of prostitution, gambling, and drunken mayhem.” She humbly replies, “I am just one woman who runs a saloon.” He bites back, “Don’t play coy. A degenerate who somehow wields power in New York politics doesn’t get to be coy.” To which she responds, “But enough about you —.”

It all devolves quickly once Nelly decides to hold a dance-off in which the winner will get three hundred dollars, the exact amount needed to buy one’s way out of President Lincoln’s newly implemented draft for the Union army. “Three hundred dollars?! That’s more than a year’s wage!” an Italian longshoreman declares. “I won’t go,” a German longshoreman adds. “If you do not go, you will be considered a deserter and a criminal,” a provost marshal explains. “This is a rich man’s war that the poor and immigrant will have to fight,” an Irish longshoreman says. When two Black longshoremen are ready to sign up, the marshal tells them, “No coloreds. Only citizens and immigrants.”

The contest and its aftermath turns what was a compelling drama about immigrants, slavery, poverty, and war into a cliché-ridden narrative that will leave you exasperated, as Tiggens becomes more and more like cartoon villain Snidely Whiplash and the lines between good and evil might as well be drawn with a giant crayon, eliminating any nuance or subtlety. It really is a shame, since so many of the individual elements are outstanding; Anderson, Lucas, and Black 47 leader Kirwan don’t have enough faith that the audience will be able to weave its way through a more complex and realistic story, instead opting for the lowest common denominator. I nearly screamed at a plot development late in the show that still has me seeing red.

Two-time Tony nominee Kalukango (Slave Play, The Color Purple) is almost reason enough to see Paradise Square, but I had to wonder whether the showstopping standing ovation she received for her blazing solo “Let It Burn” was genuine or was at least partly egged on by an excerpt of a review on the theater’s facade that highlights the standing O from the Chicago production. The song includes such mundane lyrics as “I know why you have come here / What you want to erase / But I know that our spirit / Is bigger than this place.”

Paradise Square wants to make serious statements about issues that are still relevant a century and a half after the Civil War, but it can’t stop stepping on its own toes, unable to leap beyond the obvious.

WORLD SERIES OF DARTS

Peter Wright is among the throwers seeking the darts championship at the Hulu Theater

Who: Peter Wright, Michael van Gerwen, Gerwyn Price, Gary Anderson, Jonny Clayton, James Wade, Michael Smith, Rob Cross, Jose De Sousa, Dimitri Van den Bergh, Fallon Sherrock
What: World Series of Darts
Where: Hulu Theater at Madison Square Garden
When: June 3-4, $37.50 – $250
Why: The Professional Darts Corporation (PDC) is making a bull’s-eye for the Hulu Theater at MSG for the Bet365 US Darts Masters and Bet365 North American Championship. Among the sharpshooters going after the trophy are reigning world champion Peter Wright, 2021 world champion Gerwyn Price, Michael van Gerwen, Gary Anderson, Jonny Clayton, James Wade, Michael Smith, and Fallon Sherrock. The US Darts Masters takes place on June 3 at 7:00, followed by the North American Darts Championships on June 4 at 1:00 before concluding the masters that night at 7:30.

BLACK DOLLS

Topsy-turvy doll, mixed fabrics, paint, 1890-1905 (photo by Glenn Castellano)

BLACK DOLLS
New-York Historical Society
170 Central Park West at Seventy-Seventh St.
Wednesday – Sunday through June 5, $6-$22
www.nyhistory.org

The New-York Historical Society explores the sociocultural history of black dolls, particularly in regard to slavery and racism, in the revelatory exhibit “Black Dolls,” on view through June 5. The show features more than two hundred items, including more than a hundred handmade dolls dating back to the 1840s. Cynthia Walker Hill’s “Doll representing an enslaved man” depicts a fugitive slave with a slave collar still around his neck. There are several dolls crafted by Harriet Jacobs, author of Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl: Written by Herself, for the children of white author Nathaniel Parker Willis. There are several topsy-turvy dolls, a Black figure on one side, a white figure on the other; an old advertisement makes a clear distinction between the two.

A row of Black dolls forming a family are lined up in front of photographs of girls with dolls of a different color. Disturbed at seeing two Black girls playing with a white doll, Sara Lee Creech worked with Eleanor Roosevelt and Zora Neale Hurston on a line of Black dolls with positive images, not stereotypes, but they didn’t sell well. In 1908, Richard Henry Boyd and his National Negro Doll Company began manufacturing “Negro Dolls for Negro Children.” In the 1990s, American Girl introduced Addy Walker, a Black doll with her own, smaller Black doll.

“While the names of the women who created these dolls are largely unknown, every stitch that they sewed into place is invaluable evidence of their lived experience, as well as a reflection of the larger historical forces of slavery and its legacy,” New-York Historical Society president and CEO Dr. Louise Mirrer said in a statement. There’s a folk-art quality to the dolls, reminiscent of story quilts, each one forming its own narrative.

In its landmark 1954 decision Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, the Supreme Court cited Dr. Kenneth Clark’s doll tests, in which he asked questions of Black and white children between the ages of three and seven to find out which doll they felt represented them and which were the good ones. The results were a window into how kids viewed racial stereotypes and their own self-esteem; most of the children preferred the white dolls. “To separate [Black children] from others of similar age and qualifications solely because of their race generates a feeling of inferiority as to their status in the community that may affect their hearts and minds in a way unlikely ever to be undone,” Chief Justice Earl Warren wrote in the opinion. The exhibit demonstrates more than a century and a half of quiet efforts to resist that damage and the resilience of the Black community and a few allies in the ongoing fight to represent themselves.

There will be guided gallery tours on May 29 and June 1 at 1:00. While at the museum, be sure to check out such other exhibits as “Title IX: Activism On and Off the Field,” “Picture the Dream: The Story of the Civil Rights Movement Through Children’s Books,” and “Scenes of New York City: The Elie and Sarah Hirschfeld Collection.”

HUMAN CONDITIONS: THE FILMS OF MIKE LEIGH

The career of Mike Leigh is celebrated in Lincoln Center retrospective

HUMAN CONDITIONS: THE FILMS OF MIKE LEIGH
Film at Lincoln Center, Walter Reade Theater
165 West 65th St. at Amsterdam Ave.
May 27 – June 8
www.filmlinc.org

For more than fifty years, British auteur Mike Leigh has been making character-driven films set in working-class worlds, anchored by memorable performances: Katrin Cartlidge in Career Girls, David Thewlis in Naked, Sally Hawkins in Happy-Go-Lucky, Jim Broadbent and Timothy Spall in Life Is Sweet, Marianne Jean-Baptiste in Secrets & Lies, Imelda Staunton in Vera Drake. His famed style involves the actors immersing themselves in their roles months and months ahead of shooting, resulting in stories steeped in reality, and humanity.

Film at Lincoln Center is honoring the seventy-nine-year-old director with the two-week retrospective “Human Conditions: The Films of Mike Leigh,” consisting of all fourteen of his features and two of his shorts (A Sense of History and The Short and Curlies), ranging from 1973’s Bleak Moments to 2018’s Peterloo. Leigh will be at the Walter Reade Theater for Q&As following the May 27 screening of the 4K restoration of Naked, the May 28 screening of a new restoration of Secrets & Lies, and the May 29 screening of a new restoration of his Gilbert & Sullivan biopic, Topsy-Turvy. Below are select reviews.

A pair of sisters contemplate their miserable lives in Mike Leigh’s first film, Bleak Moments

BLEAK MOMENTS (LOVING MOMENTS) (Mike Leigh, 1971)
Friday, May 27, 4:00
Saturday, May 28, 9:00
Friday, June 3, 1:00
www.filmlinc.org

British master filmmaker Mike Leigh’s feature debut, 1971’s Bleak Moments, is just that, a series of grim scenes involving five main characters who are not exactly the most scintillating of conversationalists. But slowly, the dark, dreary opening evolves into a wickedly funny black comedy about different sorts of relationships (familial, sexual, professional), comprising episodes that help define the film’s alternate title, Loving Moments. It would be hard for Sylvia (Anne Raitt) to live a more boring life. A typist at an accounting firm, she spends most of her free time at home taking care of her sister, Hilda (Sarah Stephenson), who suffers from a kind of autism. Hilda works with Pat (Joolia Cappleman), a strange bird obsessed with movies, Maltesers, and Hilda. Meanwhile, teacher Peter (Eric Allan), who seems terrified of people, shows interest, if you can call it that, in all three women. And Norman (Mike Bradwell), a wannabe singer-songwriter, has moved into Sylvia’s garage, where he plays music that intrigues Hilda. Over a short period of time, the three women and two men sit around, go for walks, eat, drink, and, mostly, say very little to one another, their tentativeness palpable, each one terribly frightened in his or her own way of what life has to offer, of connecting. But Leigh isn’t making fun of them; instead, Bleak Moments is a lovingly drawn story of real life, where people don’t always know exactly what to say or do or how to react in various situations.

Peter (Eric Allan) and Sylvia (Anne Raitt) go on a date to remember in Bleak Moments

Originally mounted as a stage production, Bleak Moments transitioned to the big screen with the financial help of Albert Finney. As became his trademark, Leigh had the actors first embody the roles in rehearsals and preparation, giving the film a believability despite the absurdity of it all. The overwhelming despair and hesitation demonstrated by the characters becomes painfully funny, especially when Peter takes Sylvia to a Chinese restaurant and, afterward, she tries to ply him with sherry.

In January 2013, Leigh discussed Bleak Moments with the Guardian, at first comparing it to watching paint dry and acknowledging that some people thought it was “the most boring film in the world” while also explaining, “From this distance, I cautiously feel I’m allowed to feel a touch of paternal pride in my young self. With such brief life experience, did I really invent this painful, tragic-comic tale of a beautiful but suppressed young woman, tied to her elder, mentally challenged sister? I guess I’m astonished at the maturity and sophistication of my achievement, not to mention its pathos and irony. . . . I’ve tried to vary my films considerably, but I would have to admit that Bleak Moments remains, in some ways, the mother of all Mike Leigh films. And I’m very proud of it.” As well he should be.

Sally Hawkins is unforgettable in Mike Leigh’s Happy-Go-Lucky

HAPPY-GO-LUCKY (Mike Leigh, 2008)
Sunday, May 29, 9:00
Friday, June 3, 3:30
www.filmlinc.org

Mike Leigh’s Happy-Go-Lucky is the most charming of all his films. Sally Hawkins gives a career-making performance as Poppy, the most delightful film character since Audrey Tatou’s Amélie (in Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s 2001 French comedy Le Fabuleux Destin D’amélie Poulain). Poppy is a primary school teacher who has an endearing, seemingly limitless love of life; she talks playfully with strangers in bookstores, teases her sister (Kate O’Flynn) and best friend (Alexis Zegerman) with the sweetest of smirks, takes a flamenco lesson on a whim with a colleague, and, when her bicycle is stolen, simply starts taking driving lessons.

However, her driving instructor, Scott (Eddie Marsan), is a tense, angry man with endless chips on his shoulder, trying to sour Poppy at every turn. But Poppy is no mere coquettish ingenue; when she senses a problem with one of her students, she is quick to get to the bottom of the situation, with the appropriate serious demeanor. As with most Leigh films, much of the dialogue is improvised (following long rehearsal periods), adding to its freshness. But also as with most Leigh films, there are dramatic turning points, but even those can’t wipe away Poppy’s — or the audience’s — endless smile.

British painter J. M. W. Turner (Timothy Spall) and his devoted housekeeper, Hanna Danby (Dorothy Atkinson), pause for a moment in biopic

MR. TURNER (Mike Leigh, 2014)
Sunday, June 5, 2:00
Wednesday, June 8, 3:30
www.filmlinc.org

Timothy Spall was named Best Actor at the Cannes Film Festival for his compelling portrayal of British artist Joseph Mallord William Turner in Mike Leigh’s lovely biopic, Mr. Turner. Spall, who played Peter Pettigrew in the Harry Potter series and has appeared in such other Leigh films as Topsy-Turvy, All or Nothing, Life Is Sweet, and Secrets & Lies, portrays Turner as a gruff, self-involved painter who grunts and growls his way through life. At his home studio he is assisted by his aging father, William (Paul Jesson), and his devoted housekeeper, Hanna Danby (Dorothy Atkinson), who he occasionally shags when in the mood. Turner carries his sketchbook wherever he goes, always on the look-out for a beautiful landscape or winter storm that could become the subject of his next painting. With that in mind, he rents a room in a small seaside inn run by Sophia Booth (Marion Bailey), who eventually becomes more than just his landlady. An artist well ahead of his time, Turner becomes frustrated with the men at the Royal Academy of Arts and lisping art critic John Ruskin (Joshua McGuire), who don’t appreciate his work properly, especially when he starts heading toward abstraction.

J. M. W. Turner (Timothy Spall) is always on the look-out for a subject to paint in Mr. Turner

Leigh does not paint the kindest portrait of J. M. W. Turner, who turned his back on his former mistress, the shrill Sarah Danby (Ruth Sheen), and their two daughters (Sandy Foster and Amy Dawson); doesn’t have the nicest things to say about such contemporaries as John Constable (James Fleet) and Benjamin Haydon (Martin Savage); and won’t listen to the stern warnings of his doctor (David Horovitch). Turner is an artist first and foremost; everything else takes a backseat in his life. Despite being based on actual events, the film was made in Leigh’s usual style, with the actors improvising within set scenes; Spall, who studied painting for two years in preparing for the role, takes full advantage of the opportunity, often refusing to articulate, grunting and growling as he deals with other people who dare share their thoughts and opinions with him. It’s a very funny conceit that helps define a rather unusual character.

As befits a story about a masterful painter, cinematographer Dick Pope, who has shot most of Leigh’s films, beautifully photographs the sun rising and setting over vast landscapes, capturing its glowing light cast over the sea. Leigh keeps the narrative subtle, as when Turner and Sophia sit for a daguerreotype; almost nothing extraordinary happens in the scene, but from a few groaned questions and Spall’s expression, viewers can sense Turner realizing the changes that photography will bring to realist painting, spurring his controversial switch to more abstract canvases. It is not shown as a eureka moment but just another part of Turner’s development in becoming one of the most important and influential artists of the nineteenth century. And then there are the paintings themselves, glorious works that are always a joy to see, especially in a film that is a work of art itself.

LOWER EAST SIDE FESTIVAL OF THE ARTS: ARTISTS EMBRACE LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL

Who: Nearly two hundred performers
What: Lower East Side Festival of the Arts
Where: Theater for the New City, 155 First Ave. at Tenth St.
When: May 27-29, free (donations accepted)
Why: The twenty-seventh annual Lower East Side Festival of the Arts, a wide-ranging, indoor and outdoor celebration of the vast creativity of the neighborhood over the decades, will feature nearly two hundred performers, at Theater for the New City and on Tenth St. Taking place May 27-29, the festival, with the theme “Artists Embrace Liberty and Justice for All,” includes dance, spoken word, theater, music, visual art, and more from such familiar faves as David Amram, the Thunderbird American Indian Dancers, Shakespeare in the Parking Lot, James Rado, La MaMa, Akiko, Folksbiene National Yiddish Theater, Malachy McCourt, KT Sullivan, Eduardo Machado, Austin Pendleton, the Rod Rodgers Dance Company, Melanie Maria Goodreaux, Chinese Theater Works, New Yiddish Rep, Eve Packer, 13th Street Rep, and Metropolitan Playhouse.

The event will be emceed at the various locations by Crystal Field, Robert Gonzales Jr., Danielle Aziza, Sabura Rashid, David F. Slone Esq., and Joe John Battista. There will also be vendors and food booths and special programs for children curated by Donna Mejia and hosted by John Grimaldi, film screenings curated by Eva Dorrepaal, a “poetry jam with prose on the side” curated by Lissa Moira, and an art show curated by Carolyn Ratcliffe. Select performances will be livestreamed here.

THE SKIN OF OUR TEETH

Thornton Wilder looks at the history of the world through the Antrobus family in The Skin of Our Teeth (photo by Julieta Cervantes)

THE SKIN OF OUR TEETH
Vivian Beaumont Theater at Lincoln Center Theater
150 West 65th St. between Broadway & Amsterdam Ave.
Tuesday – Saturday through May 29, $49-$225
212-362-7600
www.lct.org

“The theatric invention must tirelessly transform every fragment of dialogue into a stylization surprising, comic, violent, or picturesque,” Thornton Wilder wrote about his Pulitzer Prize–winning play The Skin of Our Teeth in a 1940 notebook. Over the years, many productions have attempted to capture that spirit, with varying degrees of success. In 2017, TFANA staged an exemplary version under Arin Arbus’s direction, almost making sense of Wilder’s complex story involving the Antrobus family — their name means “human” — who have experienced it all but keep on keeping on, as if it’s all in a day’s work.

Mr. Antrobus (James Vincent Meredith) is the inventor of the multiplication table, the alphabet, and the wheel. He’s been married to Mrs. Antrobus (Roslyn Ruff) for five thousand years, and they have two children, Gladys (Paige Gilbert) and Henry (Julian Robertson). Their maid, Sabina (Gabby Beans), runs the household and lets the audience know just what she’s thinking, breaking the fourth wall not only as Sabina but as the actress portraying her. “I hate this play and every word in it,” she tells us. “Besides, the author hasn’t made up his silly mind as to whether we’re all living back in caves or in 1950s Jersey, and that’s the way it is all the way through.”

Massive sets dominate Lincoln Center revival of The Skin of Our Teeth (photo by Julieta Cervantes)

Over the course of three acts and nearly three hours, they are surrounded by melting polar ice caps, a raging war, a refugee crisis, a coming flood, and other key moments of world history. The setting shifts from their suburban home in Excelsior, New Jersey, to the bustling Atlantic City boardwalk. Large-scale pet dinosaurs enter their living room and walk around. A fortune-teller (Priscilla Lopez) offers a stern warning. Sabina flirts with Mr. Antrobus. Everyone worries when he’s not home from work one night. Sitcom meets disaster movie with biblical implications in a choppy narrative that has been significantly tweaked by Branden Jacobs-Jenkins (Everybody, An Octoroon), adding modern-day Black references that often feel out of place alongside old-fashioned newsreels. It’s all too much of a good thing.

Adam Rigg’s set is endlessly imaginative and often awe-inspiring, but at times you’ll find yourself distracted by it. The dinosaur puppets stay onstage too long. Sabina’s complaints grow tiresome and repetitive. Immensely talented Obie-winning director Lileana Blain-Cruz (Fefu and Her Friends, Marys Seacole) has overstuffed the show; it ends up working best in the third act, when the pace slows down and we get into the heart of the play. Wilder invited surprise, but too many surprises can get overwhelming; sometimes it really is best to stop and smell the roses, thorns and all.