this week in theater

INCIDENT AT VICHY

Von Berg (Richard Thomas) and Lebeau (Jonny Orisini) discuss their fate in Signature revival of rarely performed Arthur Miller play (photo by Joan Marcus)

The Pershing Square Signature Center
The Irene Diamond Stage
480 West 42nd St. between Tenth & Eleventh Aves.
Tuesday-Sunday through December 20, $55-$85
212-244-7529
www.signaturetheatre.org

Arthur Miller’s 1964 play, Incident at Vichy, currently being staged in a stark, powerful production at the Signature Theatre, isn’t set in the Twilight Zone, but it shares that series’ atmosphere of postwar anxiety. In the classic 1961 Twilight Zone episode Five Characters in Search of an Exit, an existential drama that combines Luigi Pirandello with Jean-Paul Sartre, series creator and host Rod Serling announces in the beginning, “Five improbable entities stuck together into a pit of darkness. No logic, no reason, no explanation; just a prolonged nightmare in which fear, loneliness, and the unexplainable walk hand in hand through the shadows. In a moment, we’ll start collecting clues as to the whys, the whats, and the wheres. We will not end the nightmare; we’ll only explain it.” Adding a bit of Beckett and Kafka to that mix, Miller tells the story of nine men and one teenager who have been escorted off the streets of 1942 Paris and left to wait in a dank, dilapidated detention room (the set is by Jeff Cowie), where they contemplate who they are, why they have been brought there, and how — and if — they will get out. In the room are Lebeau (Jonny Orsini), an antsy, nervous artist who desperately wants to know what is going on; Bayard (Alex Morf), a Communist electrician who has heard frightening rumors; Marchand (John Procaccino), a businessman who wants this all over so he can attend an important meeting; a quiet, nervous teenage boy (Jonathan Gordon); Monceau (Derek Smith), an actor who refuses to believe that anything bad is going to happen to them; a waiter (David Abeles) who has served the Major (James Carpinello) in his restaurant and assures everyone that the German officer is a decent guy; a Gypsy (Evan Zes) laying on the floor and clutching a pot; an old Jewish man (Jonathan Hadary) holding tight to his ragged bundle; Leduc (Darren Pettie), a brave, bold psychoanalyst and army veteran who has faced the Major on the field of battle; and Von Berg (Richard Thomas), an effeminate prince from an Austrian royal family.

Why they have all been abducted remains a mystery for quite some time, as the nine men and the boy appear to have little in common, from age, status, and looks to wealth, education, and rank and, most important, religion. It takes until twenty minutes into the play for Von Berg to ask the question that has been on everyone’s mind, including the audience’s: “Have you all been arrested for being Jewish?” It’s a tribute to the skill of the writing and the strength of Michael Wilson’s direction that this line is so strong without being overly obvious; it also helps make the play that much more relevant in the twenty-first century. “You don’t get any . . . special flavor, huh?” Lebeau asks Marchand, who replies, “What flavor?” Lebeau says, “Well, like . . . some racial . . . implication?” To which Marchand states definitively, “I don’t see anything to fear if your papers are all right.” Incident at Vichy might ultimately be about Jews in occupied Paris, but it just as easily could have been about the communist witch hunt led by Sen. Joseph McCarthy in the 1950s; the exploits of the House Un-American Activities Committee, which resulted in the blacklisting of many Hollywood writers (Miller himself was called to testify in front of the commission in 1956 but refused to name names; perhaps not coincidentally, most of the character names are not used in the show itself but identified only in the program); as well as the current debate over how to treat Muslim immigrants and Syrian refugees.

Leduc and Von Berg (Richard Thomas) are at odds in INCIDENT AT VICHY (photo by Joan Marcus)

Leduc (Darren Pettie) and Von Berg (Richard Thomas) are at odds in INCIDENT AT VICHY (photo by Joan Marcus)

The second half of the intermissionless ninety-minute play does indeed get more didactic as the characters debate their fate, particularly Leduc and Von Berg, but the bulk of the play still holds up extremely well. The acting is exceptional throughout, with stand-out performances by Thomas (Race, The Waltons) as the gentle Von Berg, who finds Nazism to be “an outburst of vulgarity”; Morf (Of Mice and Men, War Horse) as the very serious Bayard; Carpinello (Rock of Ages, Xanadu) as the possibly conflicted Major; the always engaging Procaccino (Love and Information, Nikolai and the Others) as the self-centered, well-attired businessman; and Pettie (Strange Interlude; Detroit, This) as the heroic Leduc. Leduc delivers one of the most critical lines, explaining, “Jews are not a race, you know. They can look like anybody,” making us all potential victims of Fascism. AJ Cedeño is the police captain, while Brian Cross is Professor Hoffman, the mastermind behind the operation. The tale also serves as a microcosm of the Jewish response as Nazism took hold in Germany and spread through Eastern Europe. Wilson (The Old Friends, The Trip to Bountiful) guides it all with a firm yet respectful hand, adding occasional strobe flashes that signal it’s time for the next person to meet his fate. Miller, who died in 2005 at the age of eighty-nine, had considered reviving Incident at Vichy during his 1997–98 residency at the Signature, which has finally brought it back for the ongoing celebration of the centennial of Miller’s birth, with A View from the Bridge now on Broadway and The Crucible to follow in the spring. The play debuted on Broadway in 1964, was first performed in London in 1966 with Alec Guinness, Anthony Quayle, and Nigel Davenport, and was made into a 1973 TV movie directed by Stacy Keach. The play, which was never considered one of Miller’s best, was revived in 2009 by the Actors Company Theatre, but otherwise it has not been seen in New York City for fifty years, making the Signature revival not only a welcome revisiting of the work but a timely, relevant one as well. “Where are we? What are we? Who are we?” the Major asks in Five Characters in Search of an Exit. “None of us knows, Major,” the Ballerina answers. “We don’t know who we are. We don’t know where we are. Each of us woke up one moment and here we were in the darkness.” These are questions and answers that are in serious need of discussion in order to try to shed light on what is going on in today’s world.

A CHARLIE BROWN CHRISTMAS 2015

Macy’s holiday window display celebrates fiftieth anniversary of A CHARLIE BROWN CHRISTMAS (photo byt twi-ny/mdr)

Macy’s holiday window display celebrates fiftieth anniversary of A CHARLIE BROWN CHRISTMAS (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

Fifty years ago, on December 9, 1965, CBS broadcast what was to become an all-time holiday favorite, Charles M. Schulz’s A Charlie Brown Christmas. The twenty-five-minute animated program was directed by Walt Disney and Warner Bros. veteran Bill Melendez and featured a jazzy score by the Vince Guaraldi Trio that quickly became part of the national lexicon. The golden anniversary of the television show, which focuses on the noncommercial aspects of the Christmas season, is being celebrated with several special events this month, following the November release of the big-screen Peanuts Movie, in which Charlie Brown declares, “I just need to know the secret for doing something great.” A Brooklyn staple for seven years, A Charlie Brown Christmas Live is moving from the Lyceum to Redwood Studios in Gowanus, being performed December 11-13 and 18-20 ($12), with adults Justin Tyler as Charlie Brown, Gillian Smith-Esposito as Lucy, Susan Forman and Lauren Orkus as Snoopy, and Alden Ford, Doug Aho, and Sean Bradley as Linus; the show is directed by Mollie Vogt-Welch, with music by Stephanie Sanders on keyboards and Jon Shaw on bass. At the Metropolitan Museum of Art, you can catch A Charlie Brown Christmas in the Grace Rainey Rogers Auditorium on December 19 & 20 ($45-$80), with the big-screen projection accompanied by an inventive live musical score by the Rob Schwimmer Trio, followed by an audience sing-along of holiday tunes. Tickets include museum admission, so you can also check out the Met’s Christmas Tree and Neapolitan Baroque Crèche while you’re there.

Over at David Geffen Hall, the New York Philharmonic Principal Brass Quintet and the Canadian Brass join together again for the twentieth annual Holiday Brass concert on December 13 ($49-$69), consisting of tunes from A Charlie Brown Christmas as well as a Chanukah medley, Bach’s Bells, “Penny Lane,” “Joy to the World,” and other holiday songs, performed with the New York Philharmonic Percussionists. The festivities continue December 20 at the Carnegie Hall Family Holiday Concert, as music director and conductor Steven Reineke and the New York Pops play A Charlie Brown Christmas and sing-along favorites with the TADA! Youth Theater, Essential Voices USA, and members of the New York Theatre Ballet. But you don’t need any tickets to see Macy’s Herald Square Christmas windows, which depict six scenes, designed by Roya Sullivan, from the classic Charlie Brown Christmas show, with interactive elements that allow visitors to play Schroeder’s piano and to add their own character to the celebration. The windows will remain on view through January 4; you can see all the windows here.

ALLEGIANCE

Kei Kimura (Lea Salonga), her grandfather, Ojii-chan (George Takei), and brother, Sammy Kimura (Telly Leung), are relocated to an interment camp in ALLEGIANCE (photo by Matthew Murphy)

Longacre Theatre
220 West 48th St. between Broadway & Eighth Ave.
Tuesday – Sunday through February 14, $45-$149
allegiancemusical.com
www.shubert.nyc

Seventy-four years ago today, Japan staged a surprise attack on the U.S. naval base at Pearl Harbor, leading to America’s entry into WWII. It also led to one of the most shameful acts in U.S. history, as more than 120,000 Japanese Americans were forcefully removed from their homes and imprisoned in internment camps. The fictionalized story of one such family is told in the Broadway musical Allegiance, a timely, overly earnest, yet involving tale running at the Longacre Theatre. Allegiance tells the story of the Kimura clan, whose farm is seized by the U.S. government while they are marched to the Heart Mountain Relocation Center in Wyoming, where they live behind barbed wire, under strict rules — all because of their Japanese last name and ancestry. The family consists of elderly patriarch Ojii-chan (George Takei), single father Tatsuo Kimura (Christòpheren Nomura), daughter Kei Kimura (Lea Salonga), and son Sammy Kimura (Telly Leung). Sammy wants to join the U.S. Army, fighting for the right to defend the country in which he was born; meanwhile, his father, a Japanese native, refuses to sign a loyalty oath to America after the family’s internment, and Frankie Suzuki (Michael K. Lee), who also lives in the camp and has struck up a friendship with Kei, leads a protest when Japanese Americans suddenly become eligible for the draft. Caught in the middle is Mike Masaoka (Greg Watanabe), the real-life California-born national secretary of the Japanese American Citizens League, who is collaborating, in good faith, with the U.S. government over the treatment of the people in the camps.

Sam Kimura (George Takei) remembers where it all went wrong with his sister (Lea Salonga) (photo by Matthew Murphy)

As has been well documented, Allegiance was inspired by the true story of Star Trek veteran and social media sensation Takei, who was five years old when his family was forced at gunpoint to leave their Los Angeles home in 1942 and move first to a horse stable, then to the Rohwer War Relocation Center in Arkansas. The character of Sam Kimura, whom Takei plays as an old man at the beginning and the end — the main events are told in flashback — is based on not only Takei but also his father, Norman Takei, and war hero Ben Kuroki. The book, by composer and lyricist Jay Kuo (Insignificant Others), co-lead producer Lorenzo Thione, and Marc Acito (Birds of a Feather), is both passionate and predictable, trite and treacly, with underdeveloped subplots (primarily Sammy’s relationship with nurse Hannah Campbell, played by Katie Rose Clarke), and the songs are cliché-ridden and overzealous, featuring such giveaway titles as “Do Not Fight the Storm,” “What Makes a Man,” “Our Time Now,” and “Stronger than Before.” The cast is accomplished, led by Tony winner Salonga (Miss Saigon, Les Misérables), but Stafford Arima’s (Altar Boyz, Carrie) direction is fairly static and Andrew Palermo’s (The Other Josh Cohen) choreography lacks imagination. One wonders if the very urgent story would have been served better as a straight play instead of an overwrought, melodramatic musical. But the main reason the show exists is because of the tireless dedication of Takei, in his Broadway debut. Over the last several years, Takei, who played Lt. Hikaru Sulu on Star Trek for three years on television and then in six big-screen adventures, has become a leading figure in the battle over same-sex marriage (he married his longtime partner, Brad Altman, in September 2008) as well as other social causes (he has more than 9 million likes on Facebook and nearly 1.8 million followers on Twitter), and he was the subject of the 2014 documentary To Be Takei. Takei almost single-handedly has kept alive the truths behind the Japanese American internment camps, an issue that relates directly to the current controversy over Syrian refugees and possible databases of Muslim Americans. “These worrisome developments only strengthen my resolve to keep telling our story and remembering the past so we do not repeat it,” he notes on a handout that comes with the Playbill. Takei, with his big, welcoming smile, riotous sense of humor, and fearlessness in standing up for what he believes in, is an inspiring American, and it is heartwarming watching him in such an important, if not completely successful, Broadway production, one that will very likely have you teary as you leave the theater. For more on the show and Takei, you can follow his online “Trek to Broadway” here.

A NIGHT OF KYOGEN WITH MANSAKU NOMURA AND MANSAKU-NO-KAI KYOGEN COMPANY

Japan Society
333 East 47th St. at First Ave.
December 10-12, $55-$85, 7:30
212-715-1258
www.japansociety.org
www.mansaku.co.jp

A Living National Treasure of Japan, Mansaku Nomura brings the troupe founded by his father in 1957, the Mansaku-no-Kai Kyogen Company, to Japan Society for three nights of performances of the six-hundred-year-old art form known as kyogen, a uniquely Japanese take on satirically comedic theater that was a kind of alternative to the much more serious noh discipline. (UNESCO has declared both to be Masterpieces of Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity.) Mansaku Nomura will be joined by his son, Mansai Nomura, and Yukio Ishida, each of whom has been designated a Holder of Important Intangible Cultural Property: Nohgaku, in three short plays each evening. In the solo piece Nasu no Yoichi, based on a chapter from The Tale of the Heike, Mansaku Nomura, who has been acting since he was three years old, trained in kyogen by his father and grandfather, portrays the title samurai who fought bravely in the Genpei War, in addition to three other characters. Mansai Nomura, who is most well known for playing Abe no Seimei in the two Onmyoji films and is also the artistic director of Setagaya Public Theatre, stars in Akutaro (Akutaro Reforms) as a young rebel seeking repentance. (Mansai Nomura was previously seen in New York City in March 2013 in Sanbaso, Divine Dance, a collaboration with Hiroshi Sugimoto that was copresented by Japan Society at the Guggenheim.) And in Bonsan (The Dwarf Tree Thief), a not-very-successful robber is intent on stealing a dwarf tree even as he’s taunted by the master of the house. At the center of kyogen is a focus on human imperfection, approached from a comic angle. Each performance will be preceded by a 6:30 lecture by Dr. Carolyn Morley, professor of Japanese literature and theater at Wellesley College. The celebration of kyogen, which means “mad words” or “wild speech,” also includes a Kyogen Movement Workshop for Kids on December 12 at 10:30 am ($20) and the adult program Kyogen Workshop: Movement + Voice on December 12 at 2:00 ($55), led by Mansai Nomura.

A CHRISTMAS CAROL: A RADIO DRAMA

Who: Kathleen Turner, John Schaefer, Sean Rameswaram, Richard Hake, Jami Floyd, Jessica Gould, Brooke Gladstone, Jeff Spurgeon, Terrance McKnight, Annie Bergen, Julian Fleisher, Ira Flatow, and Payton Lusk
What: One-hour live radio drama inspired by Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol, adapted by Arthur Yorinks
When: Tuesday, December 8, $45, 5:00
Where: The Greene Space at WNYC & WQXR, 44 Charlton St. at Varick St.
Why: WNYC and WQXR are teaming up for the sixth annual live presentation of A Christmas Carol, featuring a cast of celebrities and on-air talent from both stations, in addition to sound effects by A Prairie Home Companion’s Fred Newman and music by pianist John Forster and violinist Martha Mooke, with direction by Elliott Forrest. The role of Ebenezer Scrooge will be performed by husky-voiced doyenne Kathleen Turner, who most recently directed and starred in John S. Anastasi’s off-Broadway play Would You Still Love Me If . . . , which dealt with gender identity. In past performances, Scrooge has been played by Mark Linn-Baker, Tony Roberts, Brian Cox, F. Murray Abraham, and David Hyde Pierce. Tickets are $45 and come with a sweet holiday treat and hot cider. [Ed. note: The above video is from 2013 but gives a good idea of what this presentation, taking place December 8, is all about.]

KING CHARLES III

Charles (Tim Pigott-Smith) wonders just who he is now that his mother is dead and he is king (photo by Joan Marcus)

Music Box Theatre
239 West 45th St. between Broadway & Eighth Aves.
Tuesday – Sunday through January 31, $37 – $159
www.kingcharlesiiibroadway.com

In the 2006 film The Queen, writer Peter Morgan and director Stephen Frears imagine what went on behind closed doors as Queen Elizabeth II (an Oscar-winning Helen Mirren) and Prime Minister Tony Blair (Michael Sheen) debate how to publicly handle the tragic death of Princess Diana. In the 2015 Broadway drama The Audience, writer Morgan and director Stephen Daldry re-create private weekly meetings Queen Elizabeth II (a Tony-winning Mirren) has had with prime ministers going back to Winston Churchill, imagining what they talked about in the sitting room. Both of those productions looked back at the past; in the Olivier Award-winning drama King Charles III, writer Mike Bartlett and director Rupert Goold delve into the near future, imagining an England in which the queen has just died and her son, Prince Charles (Tim Pigott-Smith), finally ascends to the throne. “I never thought I’d see her pass away,” Kate Middleton (Lydia Wilson) says, to which Charles drolly replies, “I felt the same.” Charles almost immediately flouts tradition when, at his first weekly audience with Prime Minister Tristram Evans (Adam James), he refuses to merely listen to what Evans has to say but instead decides to use his royal authority to seriously question the efficacy of a bill that would severely limit freedom of the press. Evans is especially upset at Charles’s response given what happened to Princess Diana. “I would have thought of all the victims you’d feel the strongest something must be done,” Evans boldly declares. “As a man, a father, husband, yes I do. But that’s not who we are when sat with you,” Charles answers. “In here, not just am I defender of the faith but in addition I protect this country’s unique force and way of life.” Charles also chooses to meet with opposition leader Mark Stevens (Anthony Calf) on a weekly basis as well, causing the two men to cross the aisle and strategize together, since every bill must be signed by the king in order to become the law of the land, and Charles is opting to use this ceremonial right to keep the monarchy relevant. Meanwhile, the wild Prince Harry (Richard Goulding) has fallen for Jess (Tafline Steen), a young radical he met at a nightclub. It all makes Charles’s longtime press secretary, the rather stoic and old-fashioned James Reiss (Miles Richardson), more than a bit frustrated. “What am I?” Charles wonders now that he is king.

Prince William (Oliver Chris) and Kate (Lydia Wilson) look at a future without Queen Elizabeth in royal Broadway drama (photo by Joan Marcus)

King Charles III arrived at the Music Box Theatre from across the pond with much fanfare (befitting royalty), but it turns out to be rather dry and ordinary, with a stiff upper lip that often gets in the way. As a tribute to old-time England, much of the dialogue is recited in blank verse, with Charles occasionally delivering brief soliloquies to the audience, but the Shakespearean elements (there are ghosts as well, among references to Macbeth and Hamlet) feel out of place, even on Tom Scutt’s medieval-style set, a castle room circled by fading portraits of previous kings. Perhaps part of the problem is that we are too familiar with the characters involved, which also include Camilla Parker Bowles (Margot Leicester); none of the actors completely capture who they are portraying, and the story is overly simplistic, particularly in its depiction of Charles’s sons, who have been real-life tabloid fodder since birth. Bartlett (Cock, Bull) and Goold (American Psycho, Macbeth) keep things too direct, not letting their imaginations go far enough, and they offer nothing new to the main argument over questions of personal and professional privacy when it comes to matters of the press. And Charles’s choice over whether to sign the bill is not exactly Paul Scofield’s Sir Thomas More searching his conscience over whether to sign the Oath of Supremacy to Robert Shaw’s King Henry VIII in A Man for All Seasons, but what is? The most interesting character is Jess, perhaps because she is fictional; maybe Bartlett and Goold would have fared better had they turned this into a roman a clef instead. Pigott-Smith (Educating Rita, Enron) is at his best when Charles is trying to figure out just where his responsibilities now lay, to both the royal family and England itself, but the story ultimately lets him down. King Charles III was an intriguing idea, but the execution, much like the real Prince Charles’s public persona, turns out to be rather dull and unsurprising.

SYLVIA

Greg (Matthew Broderick) and Sylvia (Annaleigh Ashford) seek solace in Central Park in Broadway debut of A. R. Gurney play (photo by Joan Marcus)

Cort Theatre
138 West 48th St. between Sixth & Seventh Aves.
Tuesday – Sunday through January 24, $32 – $147
sylviabroadway.com

Some men, when they reach their midlife crisis, get a fancy car, while others have a fling with a younger woman. In A. R. Gurney’s light and fluffy Sylvia, Greg (Matthew Broderick) decides on something a little different: He dedicates his life to a stray dog he finds in Central Park. The only problem is, Greg’s wife, Kate (Julie White), wants nothing to do with the pooch, which is named Sylvia (and played by the very human and extremely adorable Annaleigh Ashford). The empty nesters have two kids in college and have moved into the city from the suburbs, but while Greg grows increasingly frustrated with his job, Kate is finally flourishing as an English teacher with a predilection for Shakespeare after putting her career on hold to raise the children. Greg has been skipping out on his job, angry at his boss who has promoted him to trading currencies. “I told him to put me in something real,” Greg tells Kate, who replies, “Real? What’s real?” “Sylvia’s real, aren’t you, Sylvia?” Greg says. “I sure try to be,” Sylvia eagerly responds, leaping into Greg’s arms. Later, Kate admonishes, “I’ll tell you what’s real, Greg. The mortgage on this apartment is real. The kids’ tuitions are very, very real.” The conceit in the play — and it doesn’t always work smoothly, becoming particularly confusing when other characters, all played with panache by Robert Sella, show up — is that Sylvia can talk. She tells Greg how much she loves him, asks if she can jump on the couch or go out for a walk, and verbally expresses the familiar needs and habits of a dog. The communication is presented in clever ways: Her barks when there’s someone at the door or when the phone rings come out as “Hey! Hey! Hey!” instead of “Ruff! Ruff! Ruff!” (In an inspired moment the night we saw it, a cell phone went off during the show, and Ashford, sitting on a bench with Broderick, looked into the crowd and let out an improvised “Hey! Hey! Hey!” that had the audience, and Broderick, in stitches.) But the closer Greg and Sylvia grow, the more concerned Kate becomes. “I’m worried, Greg. I’m worried about your job, I’m worried about you, I’m worried about us,” she says. “I’m worried about Sylvia at the moment,” he responds. It makes for a rather different kind of love triangle.

Greg soon meets Tom (Sella), a fellow dog walker who warns Greg of the dangers of anthropomorphizing Sylvia. “Always remember that your dog is simply a dog. Always keep reminding yourself of that fact,” Tom tells him. “Not a person. Just a dog. Force yourself to think it.” But Greg is well aware of what he’s doing, insisting he knows the difference between human and animal. “Maybe it’s just the anxieties of middle age. Or the sense of disillusionment which goes with late twentieth-century capitalism,” he says to Sylvia, who answers, “I wish I could contribute something here, but I just plain can’t.” Is Sylvia a replacement for something missing in Greg’s life? Is she a stand-in for a would-be lover, or another child? Or is she really just a dog to him, an energetic young canine who worships the ground he walks on and considers him a god? That’s the heart of what Gurney is getting at, and he keeps us wondering till the very end.

Greg (Matthew Broderick) and his new dog (Annaleigh Ashford) bond in city apartment in SYLVIA (photo by Joan Marcus)

The main set, by David Rockwell (On the 20th Century, Hairspray), is a beautiful green section of Central Park, with the neighborhood skyline behind it. Greg and Kate’s apartment descends from above and glides in from the sides. Ann Roth (The Nance, The Book of Mormon) has a ball with Sylvia’s costumes, while Greg Pliska adds a trite, sitcom-like score. Tony-winning director Daniel Sullivan (Lost Lake, Orphans) keeps it all moving at a dog’s pace, from fast and furious, as when Sylvia runs down the aisles to commune with Tom’s dog, Bowser, to slow and easy, as when Greg seeks peace and comfort from her. Gurney (The Dining Room, The Cocktail Hour) has experienced a resurgence of late, with a three-play residency at the Signature Theatre (including the Drama Desk-winning revival of The Wayside Motor Inn) and the Broadway revival of Love Letters, but the Broadway bow (wow) of Sylvia might just be the pick of the litter; it’s certainly the most fun. Tony winners White (The Little Dog Laughed, Airline Highway) and Broderick (The Producers, It’s Only a Play) work well off each other as the middle-aged married couple, both filled with nervousness about the next stage of their life together, although White doesn’t quite get to strut her stuff (and the Shakespeare quotes told directly to the audience are completely unnecessary), while Broderick’s stiff-shouldered monotone remains steady throughout. Drama Desk winner Sella (Stuff Happens) excels as the aforementioned Tom, a gender-fluid therapist, and a friend of Kate’s from Vassar, but Tony winner Ashford (You Can’t Take It with You, Kinky Boots) is clearly Best in Show in a role originated off Broadway in 1995 by Broderick’s then soon-to-be wife, Sarah Jessica Parker (with Charles Kimbrough as Greg and Blythe Danner as Kate). Every so often Gurney tries to get deep, but it’s the lighthearted moments that make Sylvia a warm and cuddly charmer, a tasty kibble treat.