this week in theater

WAR PAINT

Elizabeth Arden (Christine Ebersole) and Helena Rubinstein (Patti LuPone) battle it out during the war effort in War Paint (photo by Joan Marcus)

Nederlander Theatre
208 West 41st St. between Seventh & Eighth Aves.
Tuesday – Sunday through September 3, $65-$179
877-250-2929
www.warpaintmusical.com

War Paint is everything it should be and more. Inspired by Lindy Woodhead’s 2004 book and Ann Carol Grossman and Arnie Reisman’s 2009 documentary, The Powder & the Glory, this knockout Broadway musical pits not only fashion doyenne Helena Rubinstein against Elizabeth Arden but Tony-winning divas Patti LuPone, as the former, against Christine Ebersole, as the latter. And everyone wins, especially the audience. Rubinstein (1872-1965) and Arden (1878-1966) were fierce rivals in the cosmetics industry, bringing a new conception of feminine beauty to America while also breaking barriers for women entrepreneurs. The show, which takes place between the late 1930s and the early 1960s, focuses on how sharply different each was from the other, although they both sought the same things: power in a man’s world, as a woman. Rubinstein was a tough, gruff Jewish immigrant from a Polish shtetl, while the blonde Arden hailed from an impoverished Canadian farm. While Rubinstein made such proclamations as “There are no ugly women; only lazy ones,” Arden made such demure statements as “Remember, girls! Every woman has a God-given right to loveliness!” In the show, they battle over new products, secret ingredients, location, Senate investigations, and even sales managers; at one point, Elizabeth’s husband, Tommy Lewis (John Dossett), feeling neglected, jumps ship to work with Helena, so Helena’s right-hand man, Harry Fleming (Douglas Sills), is quickly snatched up by Elizabeth. David Korins’s darkly bold changing sets include a wall of glowing cosmetic bottles, a movable red door representing Arden’s lush salon, portraits of Rubenstein done by famous artists, and a restaurant where both women dine and where they reveal many of their fears. Catherine Zuber’s costumes are exuberant, as are David Brian Brown’s wigs and Angelina Avallone’s makeup, while Christopher Gattelli’s choreography has ravishing moments of razzle-dazzle; all of those elements come together for a terrific number about Helena and Elizabeth’s involvement in the war effort (“Necessity Is the Mother of Invention”) as well as such other fun songs as “Behind the Red Door” and “Back on Top,” featuring the talented ensemble, who all play multiple roles, including such standouts as Mary Ernster as the Society Doyenne, Joanna Glushak as Magda, Barbara Marineau as the Grand Dame, Angel Reda as the Heiress, Mary Claire King as Miss Beam, and Erik Liberman as Charles Revson.

Elizabeth Arden (Christine Ebersole) and Helena Rubinstein (Patti LuPone) pause for a rare quiet moment in their lavish yet complex lives (photo by Joan Marcus)

The book, by Doug Wright (I Am My Own Wife, Hands on a Hardbody), does an excellent job of condensing the story into a fast-paced two and a half hours, giving equal time to each side of the conflict. The music, by Scott Frankel, and lyrics, by Michael Korie, who previously collaborated on such shows as Far from Heaven, Doll, and Happiness and teamed up with Wright on Grey Gardens, are fanciful and exhilarating, propelling the story while allowing the stars to shine, and shine they do; LuPone (Gypsy, Evita), Ebersole (Grey Gardens, 42nd Street), Dossett (Gypsy, Giant), and Sills (The Scarlet Pimpernel, Little Shop of Horrors) are the fiercest foursome on Broadway today, chewing up the colorful scenery and spitting it out with verve and style, although the show, of course, belongs to the women. Early on, Harry suggests to Helena, “Perhaps this time you’ll drop by the Red Door and introduce yourself? Maybe even make nice?” to which Helena responds, “The Ford should meet the Studebaker? The Macy’s should take tea with the Gimbel’s?” In real life, Helena Rubinstein and Elizabeth Arden actually never met; thank goodness this show brings them together for posterity.

SIX DEGREES OF SEPARATION

Paul (Corey Hawkins) charms Ouisa (Allison Janney) and Flan (John Benjamin Hickey) in Broadway revival of Six Degrees of Separation (photo © Joan Marcus 2017)

Barrymore Theatre
243 West 47th St. between Broadway & Eighth Ave.
Tuesday – Sunday through July 16, $49 – $149
sixdegreesbroadway.com

In 1983, David Hampton talked his way into several apartments owned by wealthy New Yorkers, claiming to be the son of Sidney Poitier. Award-winning playwright and screenwriter John Guare heard the story from friends of his, Inger McCabe Elliott and Osborn Elliott, who were among those who took in Hampton, and turned the true tale first into a 1990 play, which premiered at the Mitzi E. Newhouse at Lincoln Center and moved upstairs to the Vivian Beaumont for its Broadway debut, and then a 1993 film, directed by Fred Schepisi. It is now having its first Broadway revival, and it’s as sharp and delightful as ever, skewering white liberal guilt, societal racism, and the child-rearing of the wealthy with glee and wit to spare. Six Degrees of Separation is set in an elegant Fifth Avenue apartment, where private art dealer Flan (John Benjamin Hickey) and his chi-chi wife, Ouisa (Allison Janney), have just gone through a traumatic experience. They relate in flashback, often addressing the audience directly, precisely what happened to shake them up so much. Flan and Ouisa, who are both in their forties, were enjoying an evening with their friend Geoffrey (Michael Siberry), a wealthy South African businessman whom they plan to wine and dine into an art investment deal. When asked why he stays in South Africa, where apartheid is still in effect, Geoffrey, who employs seventy thousand black workers in one of his mines, explains, “One has to stay there to educate the black workers, and we’ll know we’ve been successful when they kill us.” When Geoffrey asks Flan and Ouisa to visit him in South Africa, she opines, “But we’d visit you and sit in your gorgeous house planning trips into the townships demanding to see the poorest of the poor. ‘Are you sure they’re the worst off? I mean, we’ve come all this way. We don’t want to see people just mildly victimized by apartheid. We demand shock.’ It doesn’t seem right sitting on the East Side talking about revolution.” Their evening is interrupted when the doorman (Tony Carlin) brings in a young man who bleeding from a recent attack in Central Park. Paul (Corey Hawkins) claims to be friends with Ouisa and Flan’s children (they have two kids at Harvard and one at Groton) as well as being the son of famed actor Poitier. The three white people see this as an excellent opportunity to help a black man, so they take him in, getting particularly excited when Paul promises that they can appear in the movie version of Cats, which his father is directing. But later that night they find out a whole lot more about Paul that is not quite so comforting.

John Guare revival is set in a luxurious Fifth Avenue living room (photo © Joan Marcus 2017)

Guare (The House of Blue Leaves, Atlantic City) does an expert job exploring the racial divide, one that hasn’t changed all that much in America since 1990. “I never knew I was black in that racist way till I was sixteen and came back here,” Paul explains about his return to the States after being raised in Switzerland. Although Guare didn’t come up with the Poitier reference — that was done by the real Hampton — it allows the playwright to subtly pontificate on the boundary-breaking actor so beloved by black and white audiences. “Your father means a great deal in South Africa,” Geoffrey points out, while Dr. Fine (Ned Eisenberg), who treated Paul at the hospital, calls Poitier “a matinee idol of my youth. Somebody who had really forged ahead and made new paths for blacks just by the strength of his own talent.” Also getting involved are Flan and Ouisa’s friends Kitty (Lisa Emery) and Larkin (Michael Countryman) and several of the adults’ less-than-happy children, including Woody (Keenan Jolliff), Doug (Cody Kostro), Tess (Colby Minifie), and Ben (Ned Riseley), who have some terse words to share with their parents. “There are two sides to every story,” Dr. Fine tells his son, Doug, a theme that also relates to the painting Flan and Ouisa have hanging in their living room, a two-sided Kandinsky described thusly by Guare: “One side is geometric and somber. The other side is wild and vivid.” There are plenty of both sides in the play.

Corey Hawkins takes on role previously played by James McDaniel, Courtney B. Vance, and Will Smith (photo © Joan Marcus 2017)

Seven-time Emmy winner and two-time Tony nominee Janney (The West Wing, A View from the Bridge) and Tony winner and Emmy nominee Hickey (The Normal Heart, The Big C) portray the quintessential East Side couple — previously played onstage by John Cunningham and Stockard Channing and on film by Channing and Donald Sutherland — with grace and skill, masterfully blending humor and irony. Hawkins (Hurt Village, 24: Legacy) is a worthy successor to previous Paul portrayers James McDaniel off Broadway, Courtney B. Vance on Broadway, and Will Smith on film; he keeps the audience guessing just as he does the gullible characters. The show is smoothly directed by Obie winner Trip Cullman (Significant Other, Punk Rock), moving back and forth between the past and the present, although the red scrim in the back of Mark Wendland’s set is confusing. “I read somewhere that everybody on this planet is separated by only six other people,” Ouisa says. “Six degrees of separation. Between us and everybody else on this planet. The President of the United States. A gondolier in Venice. Fill in the names. I find that A) tremendously comforting that we’re so close and B) like Chinese water torture that we’re so close. Because you have to find the right six people to make the connection.” This revival of Six Degrees of Separation, continuing at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre through July 16, makes quite a connection itself.

DEAD END

Local kids plot their next move in rare revival of Sidney Kingsley’s Dead End (photo by Pavel Antonov)

Axis Company
One Sheridan Sq. between West Fourth & Washington Sts.
Wednesday – Saturday through May 20, $15-$30, 8:00
866-811-4111
www.axiscompany.org

Axis Theatre Company artistic director Randy Sharp transports audiences back to depression-era New York to depict gentrification and income disparity in a dark and intimate revival of Sidney Kingsley’s 1935 Broadway hit, Dead End. The play, which ran at the Belasco for nearly two years, and the subsequent Oscar-nominated 1937 William Wyler film, starring Humphrey Bogart, Sylvia Sidney, Joel McCrea, and Claire Trevor, focus on a group of poor adolescent ruffians, originally played by the Dead End Kids (Leo Gorcey, Huntz Hall, Bobby Jordan, Gabriel Dell, Billy Halop, and Bernard Punsly, most of whom went on to become part of the Bowery Boys movie franchise), who hang out on dock pilings on the far east side of Manhattan. Virtually penniless, they goof around, making fun of one another in their thick accents (“Soich ’im,” “Hay’s fer hawses,” “What ah ya? A boy or a goil?”), and direct their scorn at just about anyone else who passes through their turf. When construction forces the wealthy people in a riverside luxury building to use the back door, where they come into contact with the tenement kids, a local hooker, and other undesirables, various conflicts ensue, illuminating the sharp contrast between the rich and the poor. “I’d rather see this from a distance,” the well-connected Griswald (Spencer Aste) tells his doorman, Jones (Brian Parks), upon seeing the “hoodlums.” Griswald’s prissy son, Phillip (Jake Murphy), then incites the boys. After Phillip brags to Jones that he spoke to his father in French, finishing with “Oui, oui,” Tommy (Jon McCormick) immediately jumps on that, declaring, “WEE WEE!!! He’s godda go wee wee!!” T.B. (Lynn Mancinelli), so-called because he has tuberculosis, challenges Phillip to swim in the East River, but Phillip refuses to go into the filthy water, preferring the indoor pool in his building. “Whassa mattah? Yuh scared yuh git a little doit on you?” Spit (Regina Betancourt) razzes him. They also pick on new kid Milty (Emily Kratter), a Jewish boy who wants to join their gang. Meanwhile, fellow resident Gimpty (George Demas), who went to college to become an architect but can’t find a job, recognizes an old fellow gang member, Baby Face Martin (Brian Barnhart), now a murderer on the run from the law who has returned home to visit his aging mother (Laurie Kilmartin) and his lost love, Francey (Katie Rose Summerfield). The only one with any sense, trying to do the right thing, is Tommy’s older sister, Drina (Shira Averbuch), who is raising Tommy by herself and wants to keep him out of trouble. But trouble knows how to find these unfortunate souls.

Angel, also known as T.B. (Lynn Mancinelli), makes a point in expressionistic drama at the Axis Theatre (photo by Pavel Antonov)

Lighting designer David Zeffren maintains a threatening darkness through most of the eighty-minute play, during which all of the actors congregate on Chad Yarborough’s spare set, which consists of pilings at stage left and a bed at the center back. Beat cop Mulligan (Phil Gillen), the doorman, and the Griswalds keep to stage right, attempting to stay away from the ruffians. Sharp (Last Man Club, Hospital) gives the production an expressionistic feel with elements of black humor while making it clear that not much has changed in the eighty-two years since the play debuted. The male and female actors playing the male gang members, all dressed in Karl Ruckdeschel’s black costumes with tight-fitting headpieces like an alternate version of nuns’ habits, have developed an infectious kinship, and Sharp effectively averts turning them into sympathetic victims or mere criminals. The heart of the story is the relationship between Gimpty, an architect unable to build anything (literally or metaphorically), and Kay (Britt Genelin), Phillip’s girlfriend, who has a soft spot for Gimpty and wants to help him, but rich and poor do not mix well in this world. “The place you live in is awfully important,” Gimpty tells Drina. “It can give you a chance to grow, or it can twist you. When I was in school, they used to teach us that evolution made men out of animals. They forgot to tell us it can also make animals out of men.” They also forgot to tell them that it’s not easy getting out of that dead end, in 1935 or 2017.

INDECENT

Indecent takes audiences behind the scenes of controversial drama GOD OF VENGEANCE (photo by Carol Rosegg)

Cort Theatre
138 West 48th St. between Sixth & Seventh Aves.
Tuesday – Sunday through August 6, $39 – $129
indecentbroadway.com

In late 1922, Sholem Asch’s controversial 1907 Yiddish play, God of Vengeance, premiered in an English-language version at the Provincetown Playhouse in the Village. On February 19, 1923, it moved uptown to the Apollo Theatre on Broadway. On March 5, the cast and producer were indicted on obscenity charges. (The play closed on April 14.) Ninety-three years later, on April 27, 2016, Paula Vogel and Rebecca Taichman’s Indecent, about the making of God of Vengeance, opened at the Vineyard Theatre by Union Square Park. The following April, it moved uptown to the Cort Theatre on Broadway. On May 3, the show received three Tony nominations, including Best Play (Vogel, in her Broadway debut) and Best Director (Taichman). How times have changed. I was moved by Indecent when I saw it at the Vineyard last June. However, since then, I caught the New Yiddish Rep revival of God of Vengeance, and the new U.S. administration has clamped down on immigration while anti-Semitism is on the rise around the world. Those aspects have led me to fall in love with the Broadway version, which is bigger and better at the Cort. Richard Topol again stars as Lemml, an immigrant who is so taken with Asch’s (Max Gordon Moore) play that he becomes the stage manager for the show as it travels through Eastern Europe and ultimately to New York City; he also serves as the narrator, addressing the audience directly as he shares his memories — although he cannot remember how it all ends. (The audience, however, is unlikely to forget the elegiac, haunting conclusion.) In the play within a play, Yankl (Tom Nelis), a devout Jewish man, is running a brothel in his basement in order to be able to afford a better life for his daughter, Rifkele (Adina Verson), as well as a new Torah, which he hopes will protect her virtue. Much to his chagrin, however, Rifkele falls in love with Menke (Katrina Lenk), one of the prostitutes. Nelis is also Rudolph Schildkraut, the famous Austrian actor who headlined and directed the show. The famous lesbian kiss from God of Vengeance, one of the most romantic moments I have ever seen onstage, is handled beautifully by Pulitzer Prize winner Vogel (How I Learned to Drive, The Baltimore Waltz) and Taichman (How to Transcend a Happy Marriage, Familiar), as is the entire production.

Menke (Katrina Lenk) and Rifkele (Adina Verson) share a beautiful moment in Indecent (photo by Carol Rosegg)

As you enter the theater, the cast is already seated in a row of chairs at the back of the stage. There is a slightly raised platform in the center, where most of the action takes place. (The dark, ominous stage design is by Riccardo Hernandez.) Most of the dialogue is in English, with Tal Yarden’s projections explaining what language is actually being spoken. The play features several surreal elements, including the dispensation of sand from the characters’ sleeves, a clever use of suitcases, and sudden breakouts into joyous klezmer songs and Jewish folk dances during which a trio of musicians (clarinetist Matt Darriau, violinist Lisa Gutkin — who gets a bonus surprise — and accordionist Aaron Halva) gets involved. The choreography, which ranges from playful to portentous, is by David Dorfman; Christopher Akerlind’s stunning lighting is virtually a character unto itself. Much of the excellent cast is the same from the Vineyard, with standout performances by Topol (The Merchant of Venice, The Normal Heart), who is both observer and participant, and the sultry, sexy Lenk (Once, The Band’s Visit), who can set the hearts of men and women aflutter. The exhaustively researched Indecent, which was inspired by Taichman and Rebecca Rugg’s 2000 The People vs. The God of Vengeance at Yale, raises questions of freedom of speech, immigration, the suppression of art, homosexuality, and faith, as well as the power of theater itself. With all that’s going on in the world today, the play also serves as a warning that this could all happen again if we’re not careful.

HELLO, DOLLY!

Bette Midler eats up the spotlight in Hello, Dolly! Broadway revival (photo by Julieta Cervantes)

Shubert Theatre
225 West 44th St. between Broadway & Eighth Aves.
Wednesday – Sunday through January 14, $59-$229
hellodollyonbroadway.com

The new production of Hello, Dolly!, which is breaking house records at the Shubert Theatre, is everything that is wrong with Broadway. The fourth revival of the hit musical that debuted on the Great White Way in 1964 is, more than ever, a star vehicle with more than its share of glitz and glamour masking an old-fashioned story that is mediocre at best and downright embarrassing at worst. Grammy, Tony, and Emmy winner Bette Midler, who has also been nominated for two Oscars, has taken over a role she was seemingly born to play, a part most identified with Carol Channing but also portrayed by such other prominent leading ladies as Ginger Rogers, Martha Raye, Betty Grable, Pearl Bailey, Phyllis Diller, and Ethel Merman onstage and by Barbra Streisand in Gene Kelly’s 1969 film. Now seventy-one (Channing was forty-three when she originated the role), Midler has charm and energy to spare, if not quite the pipes and the moves; her every utterance and shuffle are met with wild cheers of delight from the worshipful audience. And Midler plays off the crowd to the hilt, posturing and preening for maximum effect even as we hope she manages to avoid the long, narrow opening to the unseen pit orchestra below. The show, directed by four-time Tony winner Jerry Zaks (Guys and Dolls, Lend Me a Tenor) and choreographed by Warren Carlyle (After Midnight) — Gower Champion was responsible for both in 1964 — is chock-full of razzle-dazzle, including fabulously colorful costumes by Santo Loquasto, who also designed the sets, which range from the glamorous Harmonia Gardens Restaurant to the homey Vandergelder’s Hay and Feed shop in Yonkers.

Minnie Fay (Beanie Feldstein), Barnaby Tucker (Taylor Trensch), Irene Molloy (Kate Baldwin), and Cornelius Hackl (Gavin Creel) have an unusual night on the town in Hello, Dolly! (photo by Julieta Cervantes)

But this version is really more of a cabaret-circus variety show than a fully fledged Broadway musical; Michael Stewart’s book, based on Thornton Wilder’s The Matchmaker, boasts a silly narrative that is not exactly a boost to the fight for women’s equality, and Jerry Herman’s music and lyrics are rather dilapidated all these years later. Midler stars as Dolly Gallagher Levi, a widowed matchmaker trying to convince fussy, sort-of-wealthy widower Horace Vandergelder (David Hyde-Pierce) to let his whiny niece, Ermengarde (Melanie Moore), marry starving artist Ambrose Kemper (Will Burton) while also laying a trap to get Horace for herself while introducing him to young and beautiful milliner Irene Molloy (Kate Baldwin) and the very odd Ernestina Money (Jennifer Simard). Heading off to New York City for a parade, Horace leaves his two clerks, Cornelius Hackl (Gavin Creel) and Barnaby Tucker (Taylor Trensch), in charge of the store, but they decide it’s time for them to get away as well, sneaking off to New York, where Cornelius falls for Irene and Barnaby takes a liking to Minnie Fay (Beanie Feldstein), Irene’s assistant.

Bette Midler and David Hyde-Pierce search for chemistry in Hello, Dolly! (photo by Julieta Cervantes)

In the big city, much zaniness ensues, from run-of-the-mill slapstick comedy (Cornelius and Barnaby hiding from Horace in Irene’s shop) to a long, cringeworthy scene in Harmonia Gardens that plays off the rich vs. poor theme with a series of unfunny sight gags. And “The Waiters’ Gallop,” in which the talented ensemble gets caught up in ever-more-precarious situations, boasts creative props and terrific costumes, but it’s a real showstopper in both senses of the word; not only does the crowd go gaga over it, clapping again and again and again, but it brings the narrative to a screeching halt. It’s merely an excuse for everyone to show off, and show off they do, even though it has little to do with the story. It certainly doesn’t help that there’s zero chemistry between any of the potential love matches, particularly, and most egregiously, Dolly and Horace; at times it’s like Midler (I’ll Eat You Last) and Hyde-Pierce (Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike), who does his fair share of flaunting, are in two different shows. Through it all, though, there’s Bette, who never really inhabits the role but plays herself playing the character while basking in the unending attention, the love bursting forth from the audience at her every knowing smirk; the Shubert practically explodes when she emerges in her glittering red dress for the title song, but it’s Bette who’s being celebrated, not Dolly. For many, that appears to be more than enough. And that’s really too bad, because by then, the parade had already passed by. (Donna Murphy will play Dolly on Tuesday nights beginning June 13 and for select performances through the run of the show; it should be intriguing to see how it holds up when the Divine Miss M is not front and center.)

GENTLY DOWN THE STREAM

Beauregard (Harvey Fierstein) shares his fears and desires with younger lover Rufus (Gabriel Ebert) in Martin Sherman’s Gently Down the Stream (photo by Joan Marcus)

Martinson Theater, the Public Theater
425 Lafayette St. at Astor P.
Tuesday through Sunday through May 21, $95
212-539-8500
publictheater.org

Philadelphia-born, London-based playwright and screenwriter Martin Sherman recounts the often unspoken history of gay life over the last century through the memories of an expat cocktail pianist living and working in London in the moving and very funny Gently Down the Stream, making its world premiere at the Public Theater. Four-time Tony winner Harvey Fierstein returns to the stage for the first time in six years as Beauregard, a former piano player for gay icon Mabel Mercer who now tickles the ivories in a local club. It’s 2001, and the chunky sixty-one-year-old Beau, who speaks in a raspy southern drawl that mixes New Orleans with Brooklyn, has just had an assignation with slim twenty-eight-year-old mergers and acquisitions lawyer Rufus (Gabriel Ebert), who found Beau on an internet dating site. “You’re so young you make me feel like a priest,” Beau tells Rufus, who wants to stick around a while and hear some of Beau’s stories, not only about Mercer, but about his experiences as a gay man. “If it was a love that daren’t speak its name, it was only the name itself that was unspoken; everything else had just been expressed rather eloquently by this rather large, elderly lady with over-pronounced vowels sitting in an old, comfortable chair,” he says, referring to Mercer. Beau is hesitant at first to open up — “I thought I had arranged for a fuck, not an interview,” he complains — but soon he is sharing tales about Mercer, James Baldwin, and, in long, poignant monologues, former companions George, Kip, and Sam, whose lives sum up decades of gay history. “You’re turning me into Grey Gardens. The past is dead,” Beau argues, but he keeps talking, occasionally sitting on a stool, directly addressing the audience. The cynical and jaded Beau is not looking for a relationship, even as Rufus begins moving in. “Why do you think everything ends badly?” Rufus asks. “Because it always does,” Beau responds. Beau’s unwillingness to commit to Rufus leads to the arrival of performance artist Harry (Christopher Sears) and the formation of a rather modern family.

Beauregard (Harvey Fierstein), Harry (Christopher Sears), and Rufus (Gabriel Ebert) form a modern-day family in play that explores gay history (photo by Joan Marcus)

Gently Down the Stream takes place between 2001 and 2014 in Beau’s spacious living room, elegantly designed by Tony winner Derek McLane with floor-to-ceiling bookcases (but no ladder to reach the highest tomes!), comfy couches, and a piano. Fierstein is such a natural for the role that it’s hard to believe that the part was not specifically written for him but was director Sean Mathias’s suggestion to cast him. Fierstein is brilliant as Beau, displaying a wide range of strong emotions and opinions about nearly everything; he doesn’t even like the windows to be open to let in fresh air, as if he feels safer locked away from the rest of the world in his apartment. Of course, Fierstein himself brings his own personal history as an LGBTQ writer, actor, and activist who has seen it all. When Beau references gay playwright Larry Kramer, whose groundbreaking The Normal Heart debuted at the Public Theater in 1985 — only a few years after Fierstein’s seminal Torch Song Trilogy became a hit in the Village — there’s an added dimension of real life. In fact, Fierstein recently donated his papers to Yale because that’s where Kramer’s archives are held. Tony winner Ebert (Matilda the Musical, Thérèse Raquin) goes toe-to-toe with Fierstein, turning Rufus into a formidable lover/opponent for Beau, not afraid to back down when faced with a challenge. (Ebert played Jonathan/Miranda in Fierstein’s 2014 Broadway play, Casa Valentina, about a private resort that caters to men who enjoy dressing up as women.) The show also features several songs by Mercer, a mixed-race cabaret performer who often had coded gay signals in her lyrics. Mathias (Waiting for Godot / No Man’s Land), who directed the screen version of Sherman’s Bent, creates a welcoming environment for the audience, inviting us into these characters’ private lives over a period of thirteen years, during which Rufus is obsessed with the past, Harry is happily centered in the present, and Beau is concerned about the future if the newer generations of LGBTQ people don’t understand where they came from, the battles that were fought and those that lay ahead down that stream. Pulitzer and two-time Tony nominee Sherman (Rose, The Boy from Oz) has written an engaging romantic comedy that uses clever subtlety to make its important points, a lovely play with a stirring performance by a theater legend making a triumphant return to the stage.

PEN WORLD VOICES FESTIVAL: GENDER AND POWER

pen world voices

Multiple venues
April 30 – May 7, free – $35
www.worldvoices.pen.org

The thirteenth annual PEN World Voices Festival of International Literature turns its attention to a hot-button issue in America and around the world, taking a hard look at gender and power. The festival runs April 30 to May 7, featuring panel discussions, lectures, readings, plays, Q&As, film screenings, literary pub crawls, and more. The curators for this year’s festival, which explores bigotry, misogyny, and xenophobia as well, are Susan Bernofsky, Jennifer Finney Boylan, Kim Chan, Ram Devineni, Mona Eltahawy, Marlon James, Saeed Jones, Meg Lemke, Valeria Luiselli, Paul Morris, Chinelo Okparanta, Steph Opitz, Clarisse Rosaz Shariyf, and Andy Tepper, chaired by Rob Spillman. “PEN America launched the World Voices Festival after 9/11 at a moment when the U.S. was becoming cut off from the rest of the globe,” PEN America executive director Suzanne Nossel said in a statement. “Amid visa bans and an America First foreign policy, World Voices is now an important antidote to an America at risk of only talking to itself, fanning baseless fears, and damaging relations with allies and people around the world. This year’s festival will center on both celebration and mobilization, rallying around PEN America’s mission to defend free expression and enable the breadth of voices vital to an open marketplace of ideas.” Below is one highlight for each day; also among the more than 150 participants from 40 countries are Carrie Brownstein, Patti Smith, Salman Rushdie, Laurie Anderson, Rita Mae Brown, Jessica Hagedorn, José Emilio Pacheco, Eileen Myles, Trevor Noah, Eiko Otake, and Ani DiFranco.

Sunday, April 30
Festival Prelude! A House Divided, the Great Hall, the Cooper Union, free with advance reservations, 3:00

Monday, May 1
World Voices: International Play Festival 2017, featuring Patricia Cornelius’s Shit (4:00), Natal’ya Vorozhbit’s Take Out the Rubbish, Sasha (6:00), and Mîrza Metîn’s Hungry Dogs (8:00), CUNY Segal Theatre, free

Tuesday, May 2
Exposure: Politics, Sex, and Power, with Rokudenashiko, Ali Asgar, and Mohsen Namjoo, moderated by Alexandra Munroe, Dixon Place, $15, 7:00

Wednesday, May 3
Portraying Gay Male Life Today, with Tobin Low, Andrew Solomon, Garth Greenwell, Ali Asgar, and Edouard Louis, the Greene Space at WNYC, $15, 7:00

Thursday, May 4
Gender, Power, and Authoritarianism in the Dystopian Age, with Marge Piercy, Alice Sola Kim, Namwali Sperwell, and Basma Abdel Aziz, New School Auditorium, $15, 6:30

Friday, May 5
Pen vs. Sword: Satire vs. the State, with Mo Rocca, Abdourahman Waberi, Aleksandar Hemon, Masha Gessen, and others, moderated by Elissa Schappel, St. Josephs College, $10, 7:00

Saturday, May 6
Women in Ink, with Roz Chast, Liana Finck, Rayma Suprani, and Emily Flake, moderated by Liza Donnelly, Dixon Place, $20, 12 noon

Saturday, May 6
and
Sunday, May 7
The Arthur Miller Freedom to Write Lecture: Masha Gessen and Samantha Bee, the Great Hall, the Cooper Union, $35, 6:00

Sunday, May 7
Unapologetically Afro-Latina, with Dr. Marta Moreno Vega, Nancy Morejon, Magdalena Albizu, and Amanda Alcantara, Apollo Theater, free with advance reservations, 4:15