this week in theater

COCK

Kathryn Tkel, Randy Harrison, Scott Parkinson, and Alan Wade star in virtual adaptation of Mike Bartlett’s Cock (photo by Annabel Heacock)

Studio Theatre
Through April 18, $37-$65
www.studiotheatre.org

I’ve had several opportunities to see Mike Bartlett’s play Cock, which ran at the Duke on 42nd St. as well as a Spanish version at the Producers Club, but for one reason or another I passed. I’m sorry I did, now that I’ve seen Studio Theatre’s sizzling virtual adaptation, streaming through April 18.

Originally staged by James Mcdonald at the Royal Court Theatre in 2009,
Cock uniquely approaches questions of identity by exploring personal responsibility, love, and sexuality. John (Randy Harrison), a nice guy who lacks the inner strength to make important decisions, is living with M (Scott Parkinson), an acerbic, irritable stockbroker, but has surprisingly fallen for W (Kathryn Tkel), a sweet-natured young divorcee. While M endlessly belittles John, W appreciates him for exactly who he is, even if John’s not exactly sure what that is. When M and W meet, neither one is about to give up, ready to fight to be with John. John is soon put into a position where he must choose either M or W, so his longtime partner enlists the help of his father, F (Alan Wade), a working-class man who wants the two men to stay together.

Directed by David Muse (The Remains, The Effect), the play was filmed with three cameras in one day following Covid-19 protocols by video director Wes Culwell at Studio Theatre, on a large dirt-filled circle surrounded by a rope, evoking a wrestling ring where the four characters, barefoot, wearing everyday clothes, engage in conversation and do verbal battle. Scene changes are indicated by a dimming of the octagonal light fixture dangling above and a sharp sound, as if another round in a championship fight has concluded; the lighting is by Colin K. Bills, with sound by James Bigbee Garver. Bartlett was inspired to write the play after watching Mexican cockfights; the title refers to roosters, the male organ, and several other American and British usages, from moving a part of one’s body to getting a gun ready to fire to a slang term for a friend and nonsense.

Film director Wes Culwell, artistic director David Muse, and lighting designer Colin K. Bills collaborate during Cock rehearsal (photo by Annabel Heacock)

The actors remain at least six feet apart at nearly all times. There are no props, no costume changes; activities such as eating, drinking, and removing clothes are mimicked by the actors. Culwell often uses split screens, putting characters in their own vertical boxes, which can be confusing, since they are acting together onstage at that moment, not Zooming in from wherever they are sheltering in place. It takes us out of the rhythm of the play, which is otherwise brilliant. Early on, when John is telling M that their relationship might be ending, he tries to keep them physically apart. M reaches out, but John rebuffs him. “No. Don’t. Just stand over there,” John says, motioning for M to stay away. M walks a few feet back, then says, “An illustration, showing me the distance between us. . . . But you’re not showing me the distance. You’re creating it. You put me over here, put that thing there between us.”

Bartlett’s (Love, Love, Love; King Charles III) writing is sharp and intuitive, sexy and funny. The cast is uniformly excellent; Harrison (The Habit of Art, Cabaret), who earned a Helen Hayes nomination for his performance as John in Studio Theatre’s original 2014 production, displays a cautious, tender vulnerability as John. Parkinson (The 39 Steps, Our Town) is a bundle of energy as M, his body, head, and hands in near-constant motion, while Tkel (An Octoroon, Jefferson’s Garden) is alluring and affecting as the positive-thinking W, and Wade (Choir Boy, Scenes from an Execution) is stalwart as a father who just wants his son to be happy. John — the only character with a full name but the one who least understands himself — isn’t really deciding on whether he’s gay or straight; his conundrum could be about any one of us, faced with choices about who we are and who we want to be. “Him and me, we must both be stupid,” W tells John, who is not necessarily such a great catch, for a man or a woman. “What is it about you?” It’s a question we’ve all asked at one time or another, and Bartlett and Muse are not about to offer any easy answers.

GEORGE STREET PLAYHOUSE: FULLY COMMITTED

Maulik Pancholy stars in George Street Playhouse’s virtual production of Fully Committed (cinematography by Michael Boylan)

FULLY COMMITTED
George Street Playhouse
Twenty-four-hour stream available on demand through April 11, $33
georgestreetplayhouse.org

In my review of the 2016 Broadway premiere of Becky Mode’s Fully Committed at the Lyceum, in which Jesse Tyler Ferguson portrayed a struggling actor taking phone reservations at a hot New York City restaurant as well as forty other characters, I wrote, “It might work in small, intimate theaters, but on Broadway it feels more like an interesting comedy sketch that never ends.” The one-person show has now found just the right table setting in the George Street Playhouse’s tasty virtual adaptation, running online through April 11.

One of the most produced plays in America since its debut in 1999 at the Vineyard Theatre and subsequent long transfer at the Cherry Lane, Fully Committed requires an immensely talented, intrinsically likable actor, and director David Saint has found that in Maulik Pancholy, who embodies the protagonist, Sam, as well as dozens of other characters, including the hotheaded chef; Sam’s coworker, Bob, who is supposed to be helping him on the phones but is stuck in traffic; such demanding VIP customers as Bunny Vandevere and Carolann Rosenstein-Fishburn; Bryce, Gwyneth Paltrow’s assistant, who is arranging a special party with unusual requests; and his friend Jerry, who is often up for the same parts as Sam. He also portrays his own father, who desperately wants him to come home for the first Christmas the family will celebrate after the loss of Sam’s mother, although Sam is scheduled to work that day. For each character, Pancholy, wearing a headset and a blue zippered sweatshirt over a button-down shirt, adopts a different voice as well as body movement, shifting back and forth smoothly.

The ninety-minute show takes place in a cluttered, messy downstairs office filled with file cabinets, trashcans, a coat rack, a Boston Red Sox pennant, music posters, and Broadway memorabilia, which in 2021 reminds us what we are all missing. (The appropriately crowded art direction is by Helen Tewksbury.) It was shot by cinematographer and editor Michael Boylan in the basement of George Street Playhouse board member Sharon Karmazin’s home on a lake in New Jersey; the company also filmed its previous online play, Theresa Rebeck’s Bad Dates, in the house, as well as its next production, Nia Vardalos’s Tiny Beautiful Things, streaming May 4-23.

Boylan’s camerawork provides an intimacy and connection that was lost in the Broadway staging. Pancholy, who has appeared in such television series as 30 Rock and Weeds and on Broadway in Grand Horizons in addition to writing the award-winning middle grade novel The Best at It (for which I served as managing editor), is seen in closeup and longer shots that help define the claustrophobia and loneliness Sam is experiencing, from his mother’s death and his breakup with his boyfriend to his inability to snare a quality acting job and the abandonment of his colleague, Bob, who has left him all by himself to handle crisis after crisis. Although the play has not been rewritten to incorporate a much more significant crisis, the coronavirus, the pandemic hovers in the dank air, particularly at a time when restaurants are only just opening up for indoor dining and actors are hoping to get back to work now that some venues are beginning to experiment with limited-capacity in-person shows.

Fully Committed might not satiate your hunger for food — the chef’s complicated “molecular gastronomy” doesn’t sound very appetizing — but the play will quench your thirst for high-quality theater in these difficult times.

RED BULL THEATER RemarkaBULL PODVERSATIONS: EXPLORING FALSTAFF WITH JAY O. SANDERS

Who: Red Bull Theater company
What: Conversation about William Shakespeare character Falstaff
Where: Red Bull Theater website, YouTube, and Facebook Live
When: Monday, April 5, free with RSVP (donations accepted), 7:30
Why: The last hand I shook was the large paw of Drama Desk Award–winning actor Jay O. Sanders, following his performance in the Broadway show Girl from the North Country at the Belasco on March 10, 2020, two days before the pandemic lockdown shuttered the city. With most theaters and the Great White Way still closed, Sanders will take part in Red Bull’s next online RemarkaBULL Podversation, “Exploring Falstaff,” on April 5 at 7:30. In the free virtual event, streamed live on Facebook and YouTube, the Austin-born actor and activist will perform an excerpt from Act 2, Scene 4 from Henry IV, Part 1, in which the bearish Sir John Falstaff tells Prince Hal at the Boar’s Head Tavern: “Shall I? content: this chair shall be my state, / this dagger my sceptre, and this cushion my crown. / Give me a cup of sack to / make my eyes look red, that it may be thought I have / wept; for I must speak in passion.”

After the speech, Sanders will discuss the character, who appeared in both parts of Henry IV and The Merry Wives of Windsor before being eulogized in Henry V, with Red Bull associate producer Nathan Winkelstein. The conversation will include several questions from the audience as well. Sanders (Uncle Vanya, the Apple Family plays) has portrayed such Shakespearean figures as Titus Andronicus, Marc Antony, Macbeth, Toby Belch, Caliban, Petruchio, and Bottom and has the record for most appearances at the Public’s Shakespeare in the Park presentations at the Delacorte, so he knows what of he speaks. Up next for Red Bull’s ambitious lockdown programming is a Zoom benefit reading of Paradise Lost on April 12 and 26; you can watch previous RemarkaBULL Podversations with André De Shields, Kate Burton, Patrick Page, Elizabeth Marvel, Michael Urie, Chukwudi Iwuji, Stephen Spinella, and others here.

[hieroglyph]

New play explores sexual violence, toxic masculinity, and systemic abuse (photo copyright Jessica Palopoli 2021)

San Francisco Playhouse / Lorraine Hansberry Theatre online
Through April 3, $15-$100
www.sfplayhouse.org
www.lhtsf.org/shows

Trauma and PTSD hover over all four characters in the world premiere of Erika Dickerson-Despenza’s searing drama [hieroglyph], streaming in a filmed, fully staged production from San Francisco Playhouse and Lorraine Hansberry Theatre through April 3. Inspired by the true story of the kidnapping and rape of nine-year-old Shatoya Currie, known as Girl X, [hieroglyph] stars Jamella Cross as Davis Despenza Hayes, a thirteen-year-old girl who has moved to Chicago with her hardworking father, Ernest (Khary L. Moye), two months after being displaced by Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, where her mother stayed behind. Davis is hiding a dark secret that slowly emerges as she excels in art class, taught by Ms. T. (Safiya Fredericks), who harbors a secret of her own. Meanwhile, Davis’s best friend, Leah (Anna Marie Sharpe), is more open and positive about life, until something goes wrong.

[Hieroglyph], the real title of which is an inarticulate symbol, is beautifully written by Susan Smith Blackburn Prize–finalist Dickerson-Despenza (ocean’s lip/heaven’s shore, shadow/land) and intimately directed by Lorraine Hansberry Theatre artistic director Margo Hall (Barbecue, Red Velvet) on SFP artistic director Bill English’s circular stage, which revolves from the classroom to Davis’s bedroom to the Hayes living room. A screen in the back shows Davis’s compelling drawings, works by Harlem Renaissance painter Ernest Crichlow, abstract videos of Davis’s nightmares, and a window to the outside world. Regina Y. Evans’s sharp costumes further define the four characters, portrayed by an outstanding cast led by a moving performance by Cross and a powerful turn by Moye, who represents those who want to do the right thing but don’t have the facility to wholly understand. Although some of the camerawork and editing can get a bit shaky at times, Hall’s staging makes it feel like you’re watching a play, not a film, with superb lighting by Kevin Myrick, sound and interstitial music by Everett Elton Bradman, and projections by Teddy Hulsker. I can’t wait to see [hieroglyph] in person.

Part of the playwright’s planned ten-play Katrina Cycle, [hieroglyph] is a harrowing exploration of the systemic abuse of the Black woman’s body; it’s about shame, racism, and sexual violence, about boys and men taking advantage of the vulnerability of young girls, and about trying to take back the power. “Can’t nobody take something from me that I give up. If I’m in control, if I give it away, can’t nobody take it,” Leah tells Davis.

In a program note, Dickerson-Despenza writes, “This play is for girls who suffer & survive in silence. It’s for the women & girls of New Orleans who courageously tell their stories of sexual assault in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina & the Flood. This play is for Black fathers navigating their own toxic masculinity & role in perpetuating rape culture. . . . This play is for Black women who hold the vestiges of Black girlhood joy in our muscle memory through bounce, juke parties, & other sacred Black cultural formations. It’s for the Black girl friendships & art that holds & heals us. This play is for all of the survivors. & me too.” And now it’s available for everyone to see. Don’t miss it.

BROADWAY BACKWARDS 2021

Who: Chasten Buttigieg, Ariana DeBose, Debra Messing, Sheryl Lee Ralph, Tony Shalhoub, Ben Vereen, Stephanie J. Block, Deborah Cox, Lea Salonga, Amy Adams, Debbie Allen, Matt Bomer, Brenda Braxton, Len Cariou, Glenn Close, Loretta Devine, Jesse Tyler Ferguson, James Monroe Iglehart, Cheyenne Jackson, Cherry Jones, L Morgan Lee, Raymond J. Lee, Aasif Mandvi, Eric McCormack, Michael McElroy, Debra Messing, Ruthie Ann Miles, Brian Stokes Mitchell, Jessie Mueller, Javier Muñoz, Kelli O’Hara, Karen Olivo, Jim Parsons, Bernadette Peters, Eve Plumb, Roslyn Ruff, Sis, Elizabeth Stanley, Tony Yazbeck, Anderson Cooper, Don Lemon, Robin Roberts, Robert Creighton, Danyel Fulton, Eileen Galindo, Sam Gravitte, Sheldon Henry, Diana Huey, Aaron Libby, Nathan Lucrezio, Melinda Porto, Shelby Ringdahl, Vishal Vaidya, Blake Zolfo
What: Benefit for Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS and the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Community Center
Where: Broadway Cares and YouTube
When: Tuesday, March 30, free, 8:00 (available on demand through April 3)
Why: Mayor DeBlasio has announced that he expects Broadway to reopen in September, but that doesn’t mean the forty-one official theaters will be hosting shows come the fall. In the meantime, we have to keep quenching our thirst with Zoom readings, filmed stagings, and virtual gala celebrations. Next up is “Broadway Backwards,” premiering March 30 at 8:00 and available on demand through April 3. The benefit for Broadway Cares and the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Community Center in New York City, which honors gender diversity and love, began in 2006, raising $7,325, rising each year until it reached $704,491 in 2019; the 2020 edition, scheduled for March 16, was canceled because of the coronavirus.

It has now returned with a vengeance, featuring clips from previous shows (Tituss Burgess, Len Cariou, Carolee Carmello, Darren Criss, Cynthia Erivo, Andrew Keenan-Bolger, Debra Monk, Andrew Rannells, Chita Rivera, Lillias White, more), appeals from Chasten Buttigieg, Ariana DeBose, Debra Messing, Sheryl Lee Ralph, Tony Shalhoub, and Ben Vereen, and new performances from such major names as Stephanie J. Block, Amy Adams, Debbie Allen, Glenn Close, Jesse Tyler Ferguson, Cheyenne Jackson, Cherry Jones, Eric McCormack, Brian Stokes Mitchell, Jessie Mueller, Kelli O’Hara, Karen Olivo, Jim Parsons, and Bernadette Peters. This year’s edition is centered around Jay Armstrong Johnson portraying a lonely New Yorker navigating the Covid-19-riddled city with the help of a late-night TV host played by Jenn Colella. The show is written and directed by event creator Robert Bartley, with Mary-Mitchell Campbell as music supervisor, Ted Arthur as music director, and Eamon Foley as director of photography and video editor. It’s free to watch, but donations will be accepted to help members of the LGBTQ community and others who have been significantly impacted by the health crisis and pandemic lockdown.

THE JACKSON C. FRANK LISTENING PARTY W/ SPECIAL GUESTS

59E59 Theaters: Plays in Place
New Light Theater Project
March 29 – April 11, pay-what-you-can (suggested donation $15)
www.59e59.org
www.newlighttheaterproject.com

In addition to watch parties, where people from around the world gather online to experience streaming content together, from old TV shows to theater productions and Zoom cast reunions, listening parties have taken off as well. One of my favorites is Tim Burgess’s Twitter edition, in which he spins classic records, sometimes joined by members of the band who talk about the making of the album. Melding that idea with Kanye West’s 2018 Wyoming media listening party for Ye, New Light Theater Project and 59E59 Theaters have teamed up for The Jackson C. Frank Listening Party w/ Special Guests, a virtual show running March 29 to April 11, an interactive listening party for Jackson C. Frank’s eponymously titled 1965 record, which was produced by Paul Simon. Written by Michael Aguirre and directed by Sarah Norris, the eighty-minute show is hosted by Allen, who is still upset that he could not make it to Kanye’s party, so now he is putting on an event to outshine all others, while also sharing the story of his missing brother. The cast includes Aguirre as Allen, Bethany Geraghty as Mom, Dana Martin as Grandma Woodstock, and Sean Phillips as Simon, with film and sound editing by Hallie Griffin.

After purchasing your ticket, you’ll receive a link to download the record and instructions on how to make the official event cocktail, Hippie Juice. The folk album, originally released in 1965, features ten songs remastered in 2001, from “Blues Run the Game,” “Don’t Look Back,” and “Kimbie” to “I Want to Be Alone,” “Just Like Anything,” and “You Never Wanted Me.” It was the Buffalo-born Frank’s only record during a tragic life; when he was eleven, he suffered severe burns across half his body in a fatal fire at his elementary school, was given a guitar while being treated at the hospital, and later recorded Jackson C. Frank in England in six hours. He lost a child, was shot in the eye by a pellet gun, was homeless, and battled debilitating mental health issues; he died in Massachusetts in 1999 at the age of fifty-six, having never released another album (although a box set of his complete recordings came out in 2014). Despite his influence on many musicians, he has faded away into history, now to be resurrected at a virtual, interactive listening party, using his intimate songs to explore contemporary society.

THE GLORIOUS WORLD OF CROWNS, KINKS AND CURLS

The Glorious World of Crowns, Kinks and Curls takes on sociopolitical and -cultural issues by exploring reactions to Black women’s hair (photo by Diggle)

Baltimore Center Stage
Through April 18, $15-$40
www.centerstage.org

There are two critical takeaways from Baltimore Center Stage’s world premiere of Kelli Goff’s extraordinary virtual play, The Glorious World of Crowns, Kinks and Curls. The first, as declared in unison by the trio of performers: “Don’t ever touch a Black woman’s hair without her permission!” The second: There is great theater happening all over the country, not just in New York City, as the pandemic has introduced me to wonderful companies in California, DC, Ithaca, Texas, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Maryland, Florida, Illinois, Michigan, and other locations, where I have never had the privilege of seeing them in person.

In the ninety-minute play, filmed onstage in Baltimore without an audience, Emmy nominee, journalist, and NAACP Image Award winner Goff tackles the issue of how Black women are treated because of their hair. In a series of monologues and scenes with two or all three of the actresses, Stori Ayers, Awa Sal Secka, and Shayna Small, each portraying multiple characters, share more than a dozen stories about how their hairstyle has impacted their lives, and usually not for the better, as they are either judged negatively by others or seen as some kind of doll that can be touched, ogled, and thrown away.

The work opens with a woman auditioning for a play based on a book called Scars. “Even if you don’t have physical scars, all of us have scars that we carry with us, and within us,” she says, explaining how much she identifies with the script, implying not only the fictional one but Goff’s. “I mean, for me, I’ve mostly dealt with weight and body image stuff for years, and, well, I just know what it’s like to walk through the world and have people not see you but look right through you. And the stories in this play are fundamentally about women who want to be seen for who they are. Not dehumanized for who they are or judged for who we are or how we look. I mean they, how they look.”

After the actress explains that she would do anything, within reason, to get the part, the casting director asks, “Would it be possible for you to change your hair?” The producers want the actresses to look “as natural as possible,” but even when the woman auditioning explains that her curls are natural, the casting director adds, “You’re just so talented. I’d hate for something as silly as how you choose to wear your hair to hurt your chances. I mean, this show could change your whole life. And after all, it’s just hair.”

Seamlessly directed by Bianca LaVerne Jones and filmed and edited by Dean Radcliffe-Lynes and David Lee Roberts Jr., the vignettes that follow detail how Black women’s hair affected their job, dates, friendships, and family relationships. A mother is appalled when her daughter chops off her hair on her wedding day. A Black man running for president of the Black Graduate Student Association is furious when his Black girlfriend straightens her hair, making her seem less Black. An up-and-coming lawyer gives up a Caribbean vacation with her partner in order to be at an important meeting, but her Black woman boss is appalled that she has shown up in cornrows. A young biracial girl and her Black mother are taunted because they don’t look like parent and child. A politician refuses to make her hair an issue but acknowledges that a woman has to prepare for public appearances differently from how men do; she’s not going to worry about how she’s perceived by others just to get more votes because of her hair, although she understands that “representation does matter.”

And girls named Amaya and Claire, only their hands visible, clasped over a drawing of African symbols (which can also be seen on several props used in other scenes), speak to G-d. As they mention various objects, the items magically pop up in their hands as they talk about their hair, with a striking final twist that speaks of legacy and the future.

Stori Ayers is one of three actresses portraying multiple characters in Baltimore Center Stage world premiere (photo by Diggle)

Ayers, Secka, and Small — who never touch one another and are always at least six feet apart — are terrific switching from role to role, each requiring significantly different clothing, makeup, accents, and hair. Jones (Armed, Feast: A Yoruba Tale) and Goff (The Birds & the Bees, Reversing Roe, Being Mary Jane) have assembled an outstanding crew of Black women, including two-time Tony-nominated set and costume designer Dede Ayite (A Soldier’s Play, Slave Play) and hair and wig designer Nikiya Mathis, whose creations run the gamut, giving each character an individuality that speaks volumes. (The sound is by Twi McCallum and lighting by Nikiya Mathis.) The set is anchored by a large, glittering, abstract hair sculpture reminiscent of the work of artist Mickalene Thomas.

The Glorious World of Crowns, Kinks and Curls is a superb example of what theater can accomplish even during a pandemic lockdown, using technology to make the most of the online nature of presentation, telling a story that is fresh and of-the-moment, particularly now that America has a Black and brown vice president, while also taking on racial, gender, and wealth inequality. It’s about personal and cultural identity, about imagery and messaging, about bigotry and racism, about love and respect, about who we are as a nation and what we can be. It’s about all of us, in 2021 and beyond. And, because of the Covid-19 health crisis, it is available to everyone to experience for ourselves, no matter where, or who, we are.