this week in music

THE SITE WHERE IT HAPPENED: HAMILTON SING-A-LONG AT THE OLD STONE HOUSE

Fans can sing along to the Hamilton movie at the place where the Battle of Brooklyn happened

HAMILTON SING-A-LONG
Old Stone House & Washington Park
336 Third St., Brooklyn
Thursday, August 14, free with RSVP, 7:30
theoldstonehouse.org

Every summer, the Old Stone House commemorates the August 27, 1776, Battle of Brooklyn, the first military engagement following the signing of the Declaration of Independence on August 2 at the Second Continental Congress in Philadelphia. This year the historic site will be hosting “Revolutionary Brooklyn,” including walking tours, a short theatrical farce, a remembrance ceremony, a Constitution handwriting session, and a screening of the 2020 film Hamilton, a live stage recording of the smash 2015 Broadway musical that won eleven Tony Awards and is still running at the Richard Rodgers Theatre.

Directed by Thomas Kail and written by Lin-Manuel Miranda, the film features Miranda as Alexander Hamilton, Leslie Odom Jr. as Aaron Burr, Phillipa Soo as Eliza Hamilton, Renée Elise Goldsberry as Angelica Schuyler, Christopher Jackson as George Washington, Daveed Diggs as Marquis de Lafayette and Thomas Jefferson, Anthony Ramos as John Laurens and Philip Hamilton, Okieriete Onaodowan as Hercules Mulligan and James Madison, and Jonathan Groff as King George III. On August 14 at 7:30, fans can come to Washington Park and sing along to such favorite numbers as “My Shot,” “Non-Stop,” and “The Room Where It Happens.” Attendees can bring their own lawn chair or blanket and party on the exact place where the Battle of Brooklyn happened 249 years ago; admission is free with advance RSVP.

[Mark Rifkin is a Brooklyn-born, Manhattan-based writer and editor; you can follow him on Substack here.]

HEAVY METAL THUNDER: LIGHTNING DOESN’T STRIKE IN VIETNAM WAR JUKEBOX MUSICAL

A game cast battles through a perplexing book in Rolling Thunder at New World Stages (photo by Evan Zimmerman for MurphyMade)

ROLLING THUNDER VNM: A ROCK JOURNEY
New World Stages
340 West Fiftieth St. between Ninth & Tenth Aves.
Wednesday – Monday through September 7, $48-$140
rollingthunderus.com
newworldstages.com

In 2008, the jukebox musical Rock of Ages opened at New World Stages on West Fiftieth St., a hugely entertaining fictional story based on classic hits of the 1980s by Journey, Night Ranger, Twisted Sister, Foreigner, Pat Benatar, and others. The production moved to Broadway, was adapted into a 2012 film, and continues to be produced around the world.

This summer, in the same theater, the Australian Rolling Thunder VNM: A Rock Journey is making its US premiere, a by-the-numbers, cliché-ridden story set during the Vietnam War, featuring classic hits of the 1960s and 1970s by Bob Dylan, the Rolling Stones, Curtis Mayfield, the Animals, and others. It’s highly unlikely that it will move to Broadway or be made into a movie.

The two-hour, two-act musical — which has nothing to do with the 1977 film about a soldier returning home from the Vietnam War, the annual motorcycle rally for POWs/MIAs, or Dylan’s 1975–76 Rolling Thunder Revue tour — follows four men who are sent overseas to fight the North Vietnamese. Johnny (Drew Becker) is a Nebraska farm boy who has made his father proud by enlisting, although his mother is unhappy about his decision. “I’ve been thinking about my one big chance for adventure, to see a bit of the world while I could,” he tells the audience. Johnny writes regularly to his high school sweetheart, Linda (Cassadee Pope), and his mother; Linda writes back, bursting with love and affection, but Johnny hears nothing from his mother. Describing his dreams as “Technicolor nightmares,” Johnny admits to Linda, “Your letters keep me sane, amidst the mortar and machine gun fire, when praying you won’t get killed.”

Johnny is in the same unit as his friend Thomas (Justin Matthew Sargent), who convinced him to sign up. After seeing a marine in uniform, Tommy was quick to enlist. “I thought, ‘That’s how I want to look. I’m going to be a marine!’” he says. “I pray I can be a leader among men.” Tommy, who was born into a military family, writes letters to his beloved, Lauren (Courtnee Carter), who, upon going to college, becomes interested in the antiwar movement and one of its school leaders, Jimi (Deon’te Goodman). “The campus in Lincoln is like stepping into a whole new world,” she writes to Tommy.

Andy Johnson (Daniel Yearwood) has been drafted but is clearly not cut out for battle. “I felt sick in the stomach. Go to war or go to prison. What choice did I have?” he opines. Andy gets advice from his buddy from home, Mike (Goodman), who has already been deployed. “Don’t worry, I’m keeping my eye on Andy,” Mike assures Mrs. Johnson.

Meanwhile, Nurse Kelly (Carter), whose two brothers are in Vietnam, keeps the audience informed about the increasing tragedy. “I’ve lost count of the young soldiers in body bags. In this job there’s no time for tears,” she explains.

The characters’ experiences play out in melodramatic, predictable fashion as the war goes bad, protests spread across America, and relationships get complicated.

Four soldiers try to survive the Vietnam War in jukebox musical (photo by Evan Zimmerman)

Wilson Chin’s bold set consists of multiple television sets that initially display lighthearted sitcoms (I Love Lucy, My Three Sons), then shift to archival news footage. Conductor and keyboardist Sonny Paladino, guitarists Aurelian Budynek and Sherrod Barnes, bassist Yuko Tadano, and drummer Grant Braddock perform on platforms in front of screens on which Caite Hevner projects news clips, shots of Saigon streets and Vietnamese jungles, whirring helicopters, and groovy color fantasies. (The musicians sometimes appear to morph into the background scenes, which can be disarming.) The standard costumes are by Andrea Lauer — three actors play multiple roles, and it’s not always immediately clear who they are — with flashy lighting by Jake DeGroot and propulsive sound by Mike Tracey.

Director Kenneth Ferrone is limited by Bryce Hallett’s confusing book, which has little sense of time or place, and the musical numbers often feel like way too much of a stretch. For example, the June 1968 assassination of Bobby Kennedy is followed by Walter Cronkite’s February 1968 entreaty for the US to end the war, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s April 1967 “silence is betrayal” speech, and Richard Nixon’s November 1969 “silent majority” declaration.

Several songs fit in well with the narrative — Edwin Starr’s “War,” the Rolling Stones’ “Gimme Shelter,” which was written at least in part about the Vietnam War, Steppenwolf’s “Born to Be Wild” and “Magic Carpet Ride,” which captured the zeitgeist of the era — but too many are forced and dull the proceedings, including Roberta Flack’s “Killing Me Softly with His Song,” Kris Kristofferson’s “Help Me Make it Through the Night,” and, most egregiously, Simon and Garfunkel’s “Bridge over Troubled Water.”

The songs are not in chronological order, adding to the befuddlement, and the script credits one particular version of each song without mentioning the composer or original performer. Thus, “The Letter” is linked to Joe Cocker, not the Box Tops or Wayne Carson, who penned the tune; Jimi Hendrix is listed with “All Along the Watchtower,” not the composer, Dylan; and Santana is credited with “Black Magic Woman,” not the originators, Peter Green and Fleetwood Mac. Even though the soldiers would be more familiar with those versions, credit should be given where due. Alternately, P. F. Sloan is credited with “Eve of Destruction,” which he wrote and recorded, but the song is more closely associated with Barry McGuire, who scored a hit with it.

The ensemble cast is excellent, despite being hamstrung by the material, and the band kicks out the jams, playing Chong Lim and Sonny Paladino’s mostly faithful arrangements and orchestrations. The highlight is Goodman’s spectacular rendition of “Eve of Destruction,” in which he hauntingly sings, “My blood’s so mad feels like coagulatin’ / I’m sittin’ here just contemplatin’ / You can’t twist the truth, it knows no regulation / And a handful of senators don’t pass legislation / Marches alone can’t bring integration / When human respect is disintegratin’ / This whole crazy world is just too frustratin’ / And you tell me / Over and over and over again, my friend / Ah, you don’t believe we’re on the eve of destruction.” [ed. note: I used the actual lyrics as written and sung by Sloan; the script has certain words incorrect that appear to be transcription mistakes, not specifically intended changes.]

Rolling Thunder concludes with a fun encore sing-along, but most of what came before it is not a rock show for the ages.

[Mark Rifkin is a Brooklyn-born, Manhattan-based writer and editor; you can follow him on Substack here.]

FREEDOM FROM THE YOKE OF LANGUAGE: THE MUSICIANS

Astrid (Valérie Donzelli) is determined to stage a special one-of-a-kind concert in The Musicians

THE MUSICIANS (LES MUSICIENS) (Grégory Magne, 2024)
Cinema Village
22 East 12th St. between University Pl. & Fifth Ave.
Opens Friday, August 8
212-529-6799
www.cinemavillage.com
www.outsiderpictures.us

“Music is alive. To play it, you need to live it,” composer Charlie Beaumont (Frédéric Pierrot) says in Grégory Magne’s beautiful French comedy-drama The Musicians, a cinematic symphony not just for classical music lovers.

The film opens with a pan of what appears to be a regular-size interior wooden room but turns out to be the inside of a cello, soon confirmed by luthier François (François Ettori) to be the cherished Stradivarius San Domenico, which is up for auction. Determined to carry out her deceased father’s longtime wish, Astrid Carlson (Valérie Donzelli) wants to acquire the instrument to add to the two Stradivarius violins (including the 1713 Wodyka) and viola the family already owns and organize a concert in which four of the best musicians in the world will perform a specially commissioned piece as a kind of one-time-only string quartet supergroup, to be broadcast live around the world from a relatively undistinguished church chosen by her father. Her brother (Nicolas Bridet) is against it from the start, claiming the foundation cannot afford the cello and should instead be selling off the other three instruments, but Astrid won’t take no for an answer.

She pursues violinist George Massaro (Mathieu Spinosi), a lone wolf who plays by his own rules; blind second violinist Peter Nicolescu (Daniel Garlitsky) and cellist Lise Carvalho (Marie Vialle), who have a past that might prevent them from teaming up; and violist Apolline Dessartre (Emma Ravier), a sexy young social media starlet. The four instruments may have been made from the same tree, but that doesn’t mean it will be easy for Astrid to get the musicians on the same page. Things go so poorly at first that she tries to enlist Charlie for help; the reclusive, dour composer is initially not interested but eventually comes around, although he has his doubts from the start that this is a good idea.

A temporary classical supergroup faces professional and personal challenges in symphonic film

Although the four musicians are exceptional, the concert is primarily about the Stradivari. At one point, when the quartet is off to a rehearsal, Charlie is surprised to see a motorcade pulling away. “A car for each musician . . . Quite a heavy carbon footprint,” he says. Astrid responds, “They can’t travel together. Request from the insurance companies.” Charlie ponders, “Just like royalty. Two heirs should never fly on the same flight.” To which Astrid clarifies, “I meant the instruments.”

Over the course of one week before the concert, egos clash and tempers explode, making it seem like this impossible performance might indeed be impossible.

The Musicians features a marvelous original score by Grégoire Hetzel, who has composed music for films by Arnaud Desplechin, Mathieu Amalric, and Kiyoshi Kurosawa, cowrote the opera La Chute de Fukuyama, and penned the novel Le Vert Paradis. The soundtrack is supplemented with pieces by Mozart, Bach, Fauré, and Lead Belly.

French actress, director, and screenwriter Donzelli (Martha . . . Martha, The Queen of Hearts) is tender and vulnerable as Astrid, the emotional center of the narrative; everything is seen through her eyes. But César-nominated French film, television, and theater star Pierrot is sensational as Charlie, a deeply conflicted man who is uncomfortable in his own skin. “I started making music to free myself . . . from the yoke of language,” he says poetically even as he appears trapped. (His character is perhaps named after jazz saxophonist Charlie Beaumont, as Pierrot is a jazz aficionado who plays the clarinet, and there are elements of jazz in the way Charlie approaches his music.)

Moscow-born violinist and pianist Garlitsky (Paul and Paulette Take a Bath, Chez Maupassant), French equestrian, mezzo-soprano, and violinist Ravier (Two Sons, A Private Life), French violinist Spinosi (La Mélodie, Les Souvenirs), and French theater director Vialle (Julie est amoureuse, La parenthèse enchantée) form a wonderful, fully believable foursome, each of them a classically trained musician in real life; the youngest of the group, Ravier, is in fact active on social media, posting photos of herself in a bikini, just like her character does in the movie, upsetting the more private George.

Magne (Vingt-quatre heures par jour de mer, Perfumes) conducts the proceedings with expert precision, using his experience making fiction films and documentaries to give the film a naturalistic air. Lovingly photographed by Pierre Cottereau and intricately edited by Béatrice Herminie with exquisite sound design by Nicolas Cantin, Daniel Sobrino, Fanny Martin, and Olivier Goinard, The Musicians is a mellifluous, affectionate, sweet-natured tale that encourages audiences to free themselves from the ever-present yoke of language.

[Mark Rifkin is a Brooklyn-born, Manhattan-based writer and editor; you can follow him on Substack here.]

HARLEM PRESENTS: OPERA EBONY IN MARCUS GARVEY PARK

Who: Opera Ebony
What: The Harlem Opera Festival
Where: Richard Rodgers Amphitheater, Marcus Garvey Park, Fifth Ave. at 124th St.
When: Saturday, July 26, free (advance RSVP recommended), 7:00
Why: Now in its fifty-first season, the nonprofit Opera Ebony is the longest continually operated Black opera company in the world. Founded in 1973 by bass baritone Benjamin Matthews with mezzo-soprano Sis. Elise Sisson (SBS), music director Wayne Sanders, and conductor Margaret Harris, the troupe has staged works around the globe, from Carmen, Aida, and La Traviata to Porgy & Bess, Faust, and Cosi Fan Tutte in addition to such original pieces as Frederick Douglass, Sojourner Truth, The Meetin’, and O’Freedom.

As part of Harlem Presents, Opera Ebony is holding a pair of concerts prior to the Classical Theatre of Harlem’s production of Will Power and Carl Cofield’s Memnon at the Richard Rodgers Amphitheater in Marcus Garvey Park. The forty-five-minute concerts start at 7:00, the play at 8:30; arriving early to see the music has the added benefit of garnering you an excellent seat for Memnon, as the amphitheater fills up pretty quickly.

On July 19, baritone Shavon Lloyd sang “Silvio’s Aria” from Pagliacci, the spiritual “Ride on King Jesus,” H. Leslie Adams’s “Prayer,” and “Make Them Hear You” from Ragtime, while mezzo soprano Daveda Browne performed “Seguidilla” from Carmen, “Mon Coeur” from Samson and Delilah, “When I Am Laid” from Dido and Æneas, and the spiritual “Wade in the Water.” They were both accompanied by pianist Kyle P. Walker; the program for July 26 will feature soprano Linnesha Crump and tenor David Morgans performing pieces by Wagner, Bizet, Puccini, Cilea, and Gershwin and duetting on William Still’s “Calm as the Bayou Waters.” Be sure to check out the pop-up market with community outreach booths, fashion and beauty boutiques, and food and drink from Creole Soul, Lizzy’s Treats, Kiki’s Cookies, Greensicle, Campbell & Carr, and Bee Favored. (The preshow music and market will be different on July 25 and July 27.) The concert and play are free; advance RSVP is recommended.

[Mark Rifkin is a Brooklyn-born, Manhattan-based writer and editor; you can follow him on Substack here.]

LEGACY, MEMORY, AND IMPERMANENCE: CELEBRATING MEREDITH MONK AT IFC

Meredith Monk looks at her past, present, and future in Billy Shebar’s celebratory and deeply affecting documentary

MONK IN PIECES: A CONCEPT ALBUM (Billy Shebar, 2025)
IFC Center
323 Sixth Ave. at West Third St.
July 24–31
www.ifccenter.com
monkinpieces.com

Near the beginning of Billy Shebar’s revelatory documentary, Monk in Pieces, composer Philip Glass explains that Meredith Monk “was a self-contained theater company. She, amongst all of us, I think, was the uniquely gifted one — is the uniquely gifted one.” It’s an important correction because Monk, at eighty-three, is still hard at work, creating live performances and films that defy categorization.

While several of her earliest projects were met with derision in critical circles, today she is revered for her remarkable output, although it is still impossible to put her into any kind of box. At one point in the documentary, a chorus of Monk scholars sings her praises; one says, “She’s achieved so much, has received so many accolades, and yet she’s this unknown,” a second notes, “She kind of falls through the cracks of music history,” and a third admits, “We don’t know how to talk about her.”

Written, directed, and produced by Shebar — whose wife, coproducer Katie Geissinger, has been performing with Monk since 1990 — and David Roberts, Monk in Pieces does a wonderful job of righting those wrongs, celebrating her artistic legacy while she shares private elements of her personal and professional life. Born and raised in Manhattan, Monk details her vision problem, known as strabismus, in which she is unable to see out of both eyes simultaneously in three dimensions, which led her to concentrate on vocals and the movement of her physical self. She studied Dalcroze Eurhythmics: “All musical ideas come from the body; I think that’s where I’m coming from,” she says. All these decades later, her distinctive choreography and wordless tunes are still like nothing anyone else does.

Meredith Monk shares a special moment with her beloved turtle, Neutron

Unfolding at a Monk-like unhurried pace, the ninety-five-minute documentary is divided into thematic chapters based on her songs, including “Dolmen Music,” “Double Fiesta,” “Memory Song,” “Turtle Dreams,” and “Teeth Song,” while exploring such presentations as Juice (1969), the first theatrical event to be held at the Guggenheim; Education of the Girlchild (1973), in which a woman ages in reverse; Quarry (1976), a three-part opera about an American child sick in bed during WWII; Impermanence (2006), inspired by the sudden death of her partner, Mieke von Hook; and her masterwork, Atlas (1991), in which the Houston Grand Opera worries about her numerous requests and production costs, whether the piece will be ready in time, and if it even can be considered opera. There are also clips from Ellis Island, Book of Days, Facing North, and Indra’s Net, her latest show, which was staged at Park Ave. Armory last fall. In addition, Monk reads from her journals in scenes with playful animation by Paul Barritt.

Monk opened up her archives for the filmmakers, so Shebar, Roberts, and editor Sabine Krayenbühl incorporate marvelous photos and video from throughout Monk’s career, along with old and new interviews. “It was her voice that was so extraordinary, not only the different kind of sounds she could make, but the imagination she was using in producing the sound . . . totally individual,” Merce Cunningham says. WNYC New Sounds host John Schaefer gushes, “I don’t know when words like multimedia and interdisciplinary began to become in vogue, but Meredith was all of those things.” Her longtime friend and collaborator Ping Chong offers, “She had to fight to be acknowledged in the performing arts world because critics were saying that what she was doing was nonsensical, was crazy, was not serious; in a way, it’s a fight to survive. Pain is where art comes from. . . . Art has to come out of need. And now she’s an old master.”

And Björk, who recorded Monk’s “Gotham Lullaby,” touts, “Meredith’s melody making is like a timeless door that’s opened, like a gateway to the ancient is found. It definitely affected my DNA. . . . Her loft that she has lived in for half a century is an oasis in a toxic environment.” Among the other collaborators who chime in are longtime company member Lanny Harrison; composer Julia Wolfe; and David Byrne, for whom she created the opening scene of his 1986 film, True Stories, and who says he learned from Monk that “you can do things without words and it still has meaning, it still has an emotional connection.”

Some of the most beautiful moments of the film transpire in Monk’s loft, where she tends to her beloved forty-two-year-old turtle named Neutron, puts stuffed animals on her bed, meditates while staring at windows lined with Tibetan prayer flags, composes a new song, looks into a mirror as she braids her trademark pigtails, and sits at her small kitchen table, eating by herself. Surrounded by plants and personal photographs, she moves about slowly, profoundly alone, comfortable in who she is and what she has accomplished, contemplating what comes next.

“What happens when I’m not here anymore?” Monk, who received the 2014 National Medal of Arts from President Barack Obama, asks while working with director Yuval Sharon, conductor Francisco J. Núñez, and performer Joanna Lynn Jacobs on a remounting of Atlas for the LA Philharmonic in 2019. “It’s very rare that anybody gets it.”

Monk in Pieces goes a long way toward rectifying that, filling in the cracks, helping define her place in music history.

Monk in Pieces runs July 24-31 at IFC Center; there will be Q&As following the 6:45 screenings on July 24 with Monk, Shebar, and producer Susan Margolin, moderated by Schaefer; on July 25 with Monk, Shebar, and Margolin, moderated by violist Nadia Sirota; and on July 26 with Shebar.

[Mark Rifkin is a Brooklyn-born, Manhattan-based writer and editor; you can follow him on Substack here.]

MEMNON: THE MISSING BATTLE OF THE TROJAN WAR

Eric Berryman resurrects a Greek hero in Classical Theatre of Harlem’s Memnon (photo by Richard Termine)

UPTOWN SHAKESPEARE IN THE PARK: MEMNON
Classical Theatre of Harlem
Richard Rodgers Amphitheater, Marcus Garvey Park
18 Mt. Morris Park W.
Tuesday – Sunday through July 27, free (advance RSVP recommended), 8:30
www.cthnyc.org

Writer Will Power and director Carl Cofield follow up their 2021 Richard III reimagination, Seize the King, with Memnon, a bold antiwar missive about a key battle in the legendary fight between the Achaeans and the Trojans about eight hundred years ago.

Presented by the Classical Theatre of Harlem at the Richard Rodgers Amphitheater in Marcus Garvey Park through July 27 at part of its Uptown Shakespeare in the Park series, Memnon zeroes in on the little-known title character, an Ethiopian king, in the mold of Black Panther, who appears in some ancient texts (Virgil’s Aeneid, the extant Aethiopis) and on cups, vases, and mirrors. Priam (Jesse J. Perez), the king of Troy, is mourning the death of his son Hector, a warrior who was killed by Achilles (Jesse Corbin). Priam believes that Hector was “Troy’s last hope,” while Polydamas (David Darrow), Priam’s trusted adviser, declares, “So now without him, our hero gone, our men / Soon slaves to Hades or other men / Our wives violated / And children’s bones crushed by boots.”

But then Polydamas suggests that Priam turn to his nephew, Memnon (Eric Berryman), who self-exiled to Ethiopia many years before under mysterious circumstances. “Never will I call this man of which you speak. Never, I say! / He is us only in lineage, not in spirit / No, his treacherous soul belongs to others / And he has proven that,” Priam argues vociferously. “He is nothing to me!”

Helen (Andrea Patterson), the queen of Troy, entreaties Priam to reconsider; she left her husband in Sparta, abducted or of her free will, as various tales have it, with Paris, Hector’s brother, and the Greek cuckold’s furor led to the Trojan War. “In Troy Helen is Helen at home Helen is hell / In Troy Helen has choice at home no free will / So the place that is home may be truly foreign / And the new place foreign may be true indigen,” Helen says, adding, “Caught up you are in who is foreign / And who is citizen. / Why not who is true and what false?”

Priam eventually relents, and, though hesitant at first, Memnon arrives with his army, although he first speaks of a peaceful resolution to the war. “In Ethiopia, able we are / To speak through disagreements and sidestep bloodshed,” Memnon explains. Priam wants to know how many enemies he has killed, and by what methods, but Memnon tells him, “We didn’t kill we captured to calm them. . . . Once I slaughtered two hundred men myself, in one single battle / Not proud of that.”

Soon Memnon is facing off with Antilochus (David Darrow), son of Nestor (Jesse J. Perez), the king of Pylos. “Your father Nestor, an old man in a young man’s game / He should not be here at war, and neither should you / I see through your brave mirage, men should not slay boys,” Memnon, holding a shield made by the god Hephaestus, warns Antilochus. “Vacate now as I will not attack but, if you should be so bold / To use sword, javelin, and shield against me / Young man, no choice will I have but to end you / Think on this, Antilochus, and think well.”

He doesn’t think well enough.

Next, Nestor appeals to Achilles to fight Memnon, not only to defend the Achaeans, but to seek revenge for his childhood friend Patroclus, who was killed by Hector. Achilles initially does not want to get involved. “To kill again I could easily do, summon the dark and blanket battle fields / With slumbering, lifeless men. But to what end, Nestor?” Achilles asks. “I despise not the Trojans, but gods that play chess with souls of men / These devilish immortals are set on us as their light amusements.” However, Nestor convinces Achilles to take up arms against Memnon, so the two heroic figures, neither of whom wants to shed more blood, are face-to-face in heated battle.

Memnon (Eric Berryman) and Helen (Andrea Patterson) consider their fate as battle awaits (photo by Richard Termine)

Told in iambic hexameter, Memnon is laced with references to immigrants that ring true with what is happening in America today. In response to Helen’s statement about who is foreign and who is citizen, Priam answers, “Is this a man true who loves Troy? That makes the citizen.” Polydamas notes, “Helen became not foreigner but blood to us.” And Memnon, when deciding whether to return to Troy and join his uncle’s cause, considers, “Now times there were when reminded I was / That Troy and I were not the same, that I / Was Troy but not fully Trojan, kin and / Not kin, still would I tuck feelings away. . . . I am of the east and yet / This Troy still calls. I cannot abandon her fully / Though I have tried. / It makes no sense, to fight for that which has proven / Time and time again that you will forever be other.”

Riw Rakkulchon’s set is a multilevel crumbling castle with stairs leading to platforms within scaffolding. Yee Eun Nam’s projections are primarily atmospheric abstractions that morph from black and white into color. Frederick Kennedy’s sound and music has to contend with loud noises in the park but ultimately prevails. Celeste Jennings’s costumes range from regal to battle armor to Memnon’s African-influenced garb, accompanied by white sneakers. The lighting, by Alan C. Edwards, adjusts to the setting sun and the shifts in narrative style, from extended dialogues to rousing dance interludes choreographed by Tiffany Rea-Fisher and performed by Jenna Kulacz, Madelyn LaLonde, Alyssa Manginaro, Caitlyn Morgan, Erik Penrod Osterkil, Tiffany “2Ts” Terry, and Travon M. Williams.

Berryman (Primary Trust, Get Your Ass in the Water and Swim Like Me) is captivating as Memnon, a thoughtful man, strong in mind and body, who favors peace but is thrust into war. His diction is initially heavy with broken English but becomes smoother as he spends more time with Priam and Helen. Perez (Party People, Informed Consent) moves smoothly between Priam and Nestor, both of whom speak loudly, fathers seeking revenge no matter the cost. Patterson (cullud wattah, Confederates) makes the most of her moments as Helen, while Darrow (All Is Calm, the Revival) excels as Polydamas and Antilochus, with several of his longer scenes receiving well-deserved exit applause, and artist, musician, and fitness trainer Corbin (The Lion . . . & the Wardrobe) shows off his muscles as Achilles.

The play unfurls almost too rapidly, with a few plot holes and a lot of exposition that at times makes it feel like something is missing, and some of the contemporary language sticks out like a sore thumb — for example, when Memnon says, “We will always be a nation sliced apart / Haves and have nots, belongs and kind of belongs.” But Power (Flow; Fetch Clay, Make Man) and Cofield (The Bacchae, King Lear) have done Greek tragedy a service by resurrecting a true hero with a unique understanding of glory.

[Mark Rifkin is a Brooklyn-born, Manhattan-based writer and editor; you can follow him on Substack here.]

HIDDEN GEMS: BED-STUY STooPS SUMMER FESTIVAL

STooPS 2025 SUMMER FESTIVAL
Stuyvesant Ave. & Decatur St., Brooklyn
Saturday, July 26, free (advance registration recommended), 1:00 – 7:00
www.stoopsbedstuy.org
www.eventbrite.com

The twelfth annual STooPS Arts Crawl and Block Party takes place on July 26 on Decatur St. between Lewis and Stuyvesant Aves. in Brooklyn, with live music and dance, workshops, and visual art on the stoops and shared spaces of Bedford–Stuyvesant. This year’s theme is “Echoes of Greatness: Celebrating Bed-Stuy’s Hidden Gems,” honoring the lesser-known treasures in the neighborhood. The festivities begin at 1:00 with a block party lasting until 7:00, hosted by Koku with ToniBNYC, a Kiddie Korner by Bridges: A Pan-Afrikan Arts Movement, collaborative visual art by Ovila Lemon/Mut’Sun, and healing workshops by Akika Flower Essences & Apothecary and Essence of Ase. There will be art crawls at 1:30 and 4:00, led by Shanna Sabio of GrowHouse NYC, with Carmen Carriker, Courtney Cook, Ariana Carthan/Wukkout!, Brooklyn Ballet, Qu33n Louise, Nia Blue, and Púyaloahí. Kendra J. Ross Works and Soul Science Lab headline the show. This year’s awardees are Ovila Lemon, Richard Cummings, Valerie Ferguson, Monique Scott, Larry Weekes, and Damon Bolden.

“The summer festival is more than a celebration — it’s a bridge between Bed-Stuy’s past and its future,” STooPS founding director Kendra J. Ross said in a statement. “By bringing art to the stoops, we make space for neighbors to connect across generations and experiences. In a time of change, this is how we honor what’s been while shaping what’s next — together.”

All events are free but advance registration is recommended.

[Mark Rifkin is a Brooklyn-born, Manhattan-based writer and editor; you can follow him on Substack here.]