this week in theater

SHAKESPEARE IN THE PARK: MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING

Benedick (Hamish Linklater) and Beatrice (Lily Rabe) engage in a stirring battle of words in MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING (photo by Joan Marcus)

Central Park
Delacorte Theater
Tuesday – Sunday through July 6, free, 8:30
shakespeareinthepark.org

At the beginning of Jack O’Brien’s delightfully witty take on Much Ado About Nothing, the voice of Public Theater artistic director Oskar Eustis makes the usual announcements about rules concerning photography, cell phones, et al., mystifying members of the cast, who look around curiously, wondering where those sounds are coming from. That joke sets the stage for a playful evening that delves into the nature of love, romance, honor, and fidelity. In turn-of-the-twentieth-century Sicily, Don Pedro (Brian Stokes Mitchell) and his army stop by for a break at the home of Messina governor Leonato (John Glover). While soldier Claudio (Jack Cutmore-Scott) falls instantly in love with Leonato’s daughter, Hero (Ismenia Mendes), Leonato’s niece, Beatrice (Lily Rabe), engages in a heated battle of the sexes with soldier Benedick (Hamish Linklater), the words flying back and forth like an intimate swordfight. But when Don Pedro’s rascal of a brother, Don John (Pedro Pascal), who doesn’t believe in true love, purposely gets in the way, everyone’s loyalty is put to a severe test.

Hero (Ismenia Mendes) and Claudio (Jack Cutmore-Scott) contemplate a future together in new MUCH ADO in Central Park (photo by Joan Marcus)

Much Ado has been a Shakespeare in the Park favorite for more than forty years, previously featuring the all-star Benedick-Beatrice pairings of Sam Waterston and Kathleen Widdoes in 1972, Kevin Kline and Blythe Danner in 1988, and Jimmy Smits and Kristen Johnston in 2004. It takes a while for the heat to rise between Linklater (The Comedy of Errors, Twelfth Night) and Rabe (As You Like It, Steel Magnolias), who previously appeared together in Seminar and the Al Pacino-led Merchant of Venice that moved from the Delacorte to Broadway; Rabe is a firecracker from the start, but Linklater’s clownish approach didn’t start working until some brilliant ad-libbing following a second-act rain delay the night we saw the show. The production is anchored by an expert performance by Glover, mixing elegance with sly humor, along with solid support from a steadfast Stokes Mitchell, a doe-eyed Mendes, a cartoonish John Pankow as local constable Dogberry, and Zoë Winters as alluring lady-in-waiting Margaret. Original music by David Yazbek adds to the fun, as does John Lee Beatty’s set, which includes a vegetable garden, a balcony, and a magic wall; costume designer Jane Greenwood’s dresses for the women are much stronger than the more mundane clothing for the men. Three-time Tony winner O’Brien’s (The Coast of Utopia, Hairspray) Shakespeare in the Park debut is a light and frothy evening that is a whole lot more than nothing.

(In addition to waiting on line at the Delacorte to get free tickets, you can also enter the daily virtual ticketing lottery online here.)

THE KILLER

Michael Shannon stars as Eugène Ionesco everyman Berenger in TNA production of THE KILLER (photo by Gerry Goodstein)

Theatre for a New Audience, Polonsky Shakespeare Center
262 Ashland Pl. between Lafayette Ave. & Fulton St.
Tuesday – Sunday through June 29, $60-$100
866-811-4111
www.tfana.org

Michael Feingold’s new translation of Eugène Ionesco’s 1958 absurdist black comedy, The Killer, is a manic-depressive journey into such extremes as heaven and hell, life and death, and freedom and Fascism. Stage, screen, and television veteran Michael Shannon, who first starred as Ionesco everyman Berenger in a Chicago revival sixteen years ago, suggested doing a new production with Theatre for a New Audience, and it was a good call, a triumph from start to finish. As the three-hour, three-act play opens, Berenger, a schlumpy, shaggy-haired man in a long coat, scarf, and hat (and who would go on to appear in Ionesco’s A Stroll in the Air, Exit the King, and Rhinoceros), is in awe of a Garden of Eden-like paradise the Architect (Robert Stanton) is showing him. “I just knew that in the middle of our gloomy city, right in among all our sad, dark neighborhoods full of mud and dirt, I would find this bright, beautiful area, not rich or poor, with these sunny streets, these avenues streaming with light — this radiant city that you’ve built inside our city,” Berenger says, approaching the edges of the empty stage and reaching out as if the audience were colorful flowers there for the touching. While the Architect is pleased with Berenger’s reaction, he is also quick to note that he is merely a government official doing his job. “It’s all prearranged, all intentional,” the Architect explains. “Nothing can be left to chance.” But soon Berenger is lamenting another side of this heavenly area, which also features a hellish lagoon through a trapdoor where corpses are gathering, the handiwork of a mysterious murderer.

Michael Shannon and BOARDWALK EMPIRE colleague Paul Sparks attempt to get to the bottom of things in existential black comedy (photo by Gerry Goodstein)

The second act takes place in and around Berenger’s room, in a house run by a sarcastic concierge (Kristine Nielsen). “Don’t talk to me about philosophy,” she says. “I once got it into my head to take the advice of the Stoics, and look at everything in perspective. They didn’t help me one bit, not even Marcus Aurelius. In the long run he was no use to anybody, no better or worse than you or me. We’ve all got to find our own way out. That is, if there was one, but there ain’t.” Soon Berenger is met by his friend Edward (Shannon’s Boardwalk Empire colleague Paul Sparks), a creepy, ghostly man dressed all in black, clutching a briefcase in a dastardly manner. They discuss the radiant city, the killer on the loose, negligence, and indifference before deciding to take action. And in the third act, candidate Ma Piper (Nielsen) is stumping for votes, promising “free soup for everybody” and to “de-alienate humanity,” while Edward and Berenger search for the former’s missing briefcase until the police show up and chaos ensues, concluding with an impossibly long monologue delivered by Berenger, looking death in the face.

Kristine Nielsen gets a lift in second of two roles in THE KILLER (photo by Gerry Goodstein)

Shannon, who has been nominated for an Oscar for Revolutionary Road, won two Screen Actors Guild ensemble awards for his portrayal of Nelson Van Alden on Boardwalk Empire, and has been nominated for Lucille Lortel Awards for Bug and Mistakes Were Made, is mesmerizing as Berenger, ranging from ecstatic highs to deep lows as he contemplates joy and sadness, love and loss, and a complicated future. Director Darko Tresnjak, who just won a Tony for A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder, keeps things peculiar all the way, mixing in bits of German Expressionism, film noir, and Italian neo-Realism on Suttirat Larlarb’s sparse set (which holds several little surprises) as Berenger continues his search for answers that are not easily forthcoming. Nielsen (Vania and Sonya and Masha and Spike) moves eagerly from frumpy concierge to goose-loving political candidate, while Sparks is plenty strange as the plenty strange Edward. At its center, The Killer is a captivating, perplexing allegory structured from the idea of original sin that follows humanity’s fall from grace. It’s also the third triumph in a row (after Julie Taymor’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Michael Pennington starring in King Lear) for Theatre for a New Audience in its intimate new home, the shining Polonsky Shakespeare Center in Brooklyn, which has quickly fit right in as part of the growing Fort Greene Garden of Eden that also includes BAM, BRIC, and the Mark Morris Dance Center.

PUBLIC FORUM: SHAKESPEARE IN AMERICA

James Earl Jones, who played the title role in the 1964 Shakespeare in the Park production of OTHELLO, will be back at the Delacorte as special evening honoring the Bard’s influence on America

FREE PUBLIC FORUM
Delacorte Theatre
Monday, June 30, free, 8:00
Tickets available June 30 at 12 noon at the Delacorte and online lottery
www.publictheater.org

The latest free public forum hosted by the Public Theater takes a look at the lasting and still-evolving impact of the works of William Shakespeare on American culture. The special evening is inspired by the new book Shakespeare in America: An Anthology from the Revolution to Now (Library of America, April 2014, $29.95), in which President Bill Clinton writes in the foreword, “Shakespeare only had a fleeting acquaintance with America, judging from his work, which brushed up against the New World on only a couple of occasions. . . . Nevertheless, our engagement with him as been long and sustained: generation after generation of Americans has fallen under his spell.” Taking place Monday, June 30, at the Delacorte, where Shakespeare in the Park is currently presenting a rousing version of Much Ado About Nothing, the forum will include James Earl Jones reading a scene from Othello, fifty years after he starred in a production at the Delacorte; Alec Baldwin reading from Macbeth and other works; Kelli O’Hara and Renée Elise Goldsberry singing a number from Shakespeare in the Park’s Twelfth Night; Steven Pasquale handling the male part of the “Tonight” duet from West Side Story; along with presentations from Elizabeth Alexander, Billy Collins, Brian Dennehy, Colin Donnell, Michael Friedman, André Holland, Harold Holzer, Stephen Merritt, Bryce Pinkham, Caesar Samoyoa, Vijay Seshadri, Sarah Amengual, Colman Domingo, Cynthia Nixon, Annie-B Parson, and Michael Stuhlbarg. “In a nation wrestling with great issues,” Shakespeare in America editor and Public Theater Shakespeare scholar in residence James Shapiro writes in the book’s introduction, “Shakespeare’s works allowed Americans to express views that may otherwise have been hard to articulate – or admit to.”

TICKET ALERT: IT’S ONLY A PLAY

Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick will be back onstage together for updated revival of Terence McNally comedy

Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick will be back together onstage again for updated revival of Terence McNally comedy

IT’S ONLY A PLAY
Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre
236 West 45th St.
Previews begin September 4, opening night Thursday, October 9
Tickets on sale now, $72-$147
www.itsonlyaplay.com

Shortly after an early closing notice went out for Terence McNally’s Tony-nominated Mothers and Sons, starring a Tony-nominated Tyne Daly, tickets went on sale for the Broadway debut of an updated version of the four-time Tony-winning playwright’s 1982 comedy, It’s Only a Play. McNally (Master Class, Love! Valour! Compassion!), whose other recent works include And Away We Go and Golden Age, which go behind the scenes of theater and opera, respectively, takes the audience backstage for opening night of a new play in the revised revival, which features an all-star cast, including Matthew Broderick as the playwright, Nathan Lane as a television star, Megan Mullally as the producer, Stockard Channing as the leading lady, Micah Stock as a coat-check attendant, and F. Murray Abraham as a powerful critic. Original director and three-time Tony winner Jack O’Brien is back at the helm; O’Brien has previously directed McNally’s The Full Monty and Love! Valour! Compassion! and is currently directing Shakespeare in the Park’s Much Ado About Nothing. It’s Only a Play begins previews at the Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre on September 4 for an October 9 opening and will run through January 4.

JUST JIM DALE

Jim Dale waits for applause — of which there’s plenty — in new one-man show (photo by Joan Marcus)

Laura Pels Theatre
Harold and Miriam Steinberg Center for Theatre
111 West 46th St. between Sixth & Seventh Aves.
Tuesday – Sunday through August 10, $79
212-719-1300
www.roundabouttheatre.org

Jim Dale shares his love of the footlights in his charming new one-man show, Just Jim Dale. Over the course of one hundred minutes, the Tony- and Grammy-winning, Oscar-nominated British actor traces his life and career, from his birth in the small town of Rothwell, “the dead center of England — in every way,” to his more recent fame as the man who voices the Harry Potter audiobooks. Dale, who will turn seventy-nine in August, is a tall, lanky performer who took his father’s words to heart: “Learn how to move,” his dad told him when young Jim Smith, Dale’s real name, expressed interest in show business after they saw Me and My Girl. Dale recalls his early days as a dancer, a British music hall comedian, and a pop singer, including a very funny bit in which he re-creates a pas de deux he was supposed to do with his cousin Ruth in a ballet competition when he was about eleven, but she missed the bus and Jim did the duet himself. Accompanied by co-arranger Mark York on piano, Jim performs songs from Me and My Girl and Barnum, for which he won a Tony playing Phineas Taylor Barnum; sings the music hall standard “Turned Up” and songs that he wrote, including the pop hit “Dicka Dum Dum” and “Georgy Girl”; and tells lots of old, purposely groan-worthy jokes. (“I said, ‘Waiter, what’s this?’ He said, ‘It’s bean soup.’ I said, ‘I don’t care what it’s been. What is it now?’”)

Jim Dale looks back at his life and career in charming Roundabout production (photo by Joan Marcus)

Dale also recites the climactic scene from Noël Coward’s Fumed Oak; gives a tour-de-force lesson in quoting Shakespeare in contemporary language (“If you can’t understand an argument and you say, ‘It’s all Greek to me,’ you’re quoting Shakespeare.”); and performs the powerful opening moments from Peter Nichols’s Joe Egg, getting the audience involved. In fact, throughout the show, Dale interacts with the crowd, occasionally ad-libbing and making everyone feel comfortable and welcome. He’s an amiable fellow, so it’s easy to forgive some of the transitions that need tightening, the timeline that occasionally gets confusing, and a few of the bits that go on too long (the Fumed Oak scene, for example). Dale begins the show, which is directed by Richard Maltby Jr. (Ain’t Misbehavin’, Fosse), with “I Gotta Be Me,” in which he sings, “So I’ve got to be me / I’ve said it before / A juicieful actor / for folks to adore.” Just Jim Dale reveals the many surprising facets of this juicieful actor who is easy to adore.

RAISING THE ROOF

Topol will be among the participants in gala tribute to Sheldon Harnick FIDDLER ON THE ROOF, and the National Yiddish Theatre — Folksbiene

Topol will be among the participants in National Yiddish Theatre – Folksbiene gala tribute to Sheldon Harnick and FIDDLER ON THE ROOF

The Town Hall
123 West 43rd St. between Sixth & Seventh Aves.
Monday, June 9, $75-$500, 7:30
www.thetownhall.org
www.nationalyiddishtheatre.org

In the summer of 1964, a little show about a Jewish community struggling to survive in a Russian shtetl played in Detroit, of all places, and Washington, DC, before moving to Broadway in September, where it went on to make history, running for 3,242 performances, with numerous revivals in the decades since and another version expected next year. As part of the National Yiddish Theatre – Folksbiene’s centennial celebration, the longest continuously running Yiddish theater company in the world will pay tribute to the fiftieth anniversary of Fiddler on the Roof with a gala June 9 at the Town Hall. The evening will also honor the ninetieth birthday of lyricist Sheldon Harnick, who wrote the words to Jerry Bock’s music; the book was written by Joseph Stein, based on the writings of Sholom Aleichem, and the show was directed by Jerome Robbins. The gala will bring together the largest reunion ever of Fiddler on the Roof alumni, nearly four dozen men and women, including Topol, who played Tevye on Broadway and in Norman Jewison’s 1971 film and just performed the role at the Detroit Opera House, as well as Adrienne Barbeau, Fyvush Finkel, Liz Larsen, Rosalind Harris, Michèle Marsh, Neva Small, Andrea Martin, Austin Pendleton, Pia Zadora, Jerry Zaks, Karen Ziemba, and Louis Zorich. There will also be appearances by Ambassador Ido Aharoni, Bel Kaufman, Jewison, Jeffrey Lyons, Jackie Hoffman, Frank London’s Klezmer All Stars, Joshua Bell, Alisa Solomon, and a thirty-six-children choir. The event’s honorary cochairs are Frank Rich, Harold Prince, who produced the original Fiddler, and Harvey Fierstein, who played Tevye in the 2004 Broadway revival.

TWI-NY TALK: BRIDGET BARKAN / THE LOVE JUNKIE

Bridget Barkan plays multiple characters in THE LOVE JUNKIE, returning to Joe’s Pub on May 31

BRIDGET BARKAN IN THE LOVE JUNKIE
Joe’s Pub
425 Lafayette St.
Saturday, May 31, $15, 9:00
www.joespub.publictheater.org

Bridget Barkan is a practitioner of the healing power of music, having worked as a music therapist for special-needs children. The native New Yorker, a singer, actor, and Scissor Sisters regular who appeared on Sesame Street as a child and as an adult in such films as Sherrybaby and Everyday People and has a recurring role as a one-legged hooker on Law & Order: SVU, is doing some public healing of her own in her one-woman show, The Love Junkie. In the solo performance, returning to Joe’s Pub on May 31, the fiery redhead and self-described “douche bag magnet” — whose father, Mark, coproduced what might be the first psychedelic album, the Deep’s 1968 Psychedelic Moods: A Mind Expanding Phenomena — employs a mélange of musical styles and genres, including cover songs and originals, while portraying multiple characters to explore recovery from such intimate addictions as love and sex. Barkan, who has been busily posting short “Love Junkie Episodes” on her YouTube channel, recently discussed Times Square, the ’80s, gender roles, and hunting with twi-ny.

twi-ny: You were born and raised in New York City, where you started taking the subway by yourself to school when you were eleven. There are people today who would have your parents locked up for allowing such a thing. What was your childhood in the city like?

Bridget Barkan: Well, taking the subway wasn’t such a huge deal; kids younger than me did and still do. An old man once touched my ass when I was seven and I screamed bloody murder. New York was more edgy. I spent a lot of time going to play pinball or to the movies with my dad in the dirty Times Square, not the Disney version. One time, these two guys tried to mug my dad under some scaffolding, but he was raised in Brooklyn and ended up scaring the shit out of them. It was a very sexually vibrant city and I was excited about it all. It was also oozing with creativity. Sex and art come from the same place, so it makes sense. I think growing up here has given me a real love and connection to many different cultures and sense of openness. I live on the stage of life with no fourth wall.

twi-ny: You got fired from Sesame Street when you were six. What happened?

BB: Well, the rumor is that Bert and Ernie were having a fight in between takes and I came over and tried to fix the problem like I usually did with my parents. But then Big Bird stuck his big head in and Cookie Monster lost his cool. It got pretty messy and for the sake of the show, I took the fall.

No, the truth is, I was apparently bossing the older kids around and a parent complained. I was always an actress, but directing is my real passion . . . haha.

twi-ny: You have a special fondness for the style of the ’80s. What is it about that decade that appeals to you?

Bridget Barkan is looking for love in one-woman show

BB: Well, I grew up in NYC in the ’80s. Damn, I didn’t want to reveal my age, but oh well, I’m already an old hag in this industry anyway. You gotta be twelve years old but look thirty to be of any interest. I believe the ’80s was the last era of real unique expression. Everything that has come after seems to be regurgitated from the past. The ’90s definitely had some moments too. But to me, the real metamorphosis and discovery of hip-hop was a major game changer in the ’80s.

twi-ny: You recently tweeted, “I’ve always been more of the beast than the beauty.” What did you mean by that?

BB: I talk about this in the show, feeling like I’m a hunter. It’s rare that I meet a guy who is coming for my hide with a strong and ferocious intention. I’ve always had the instinct to woo men, shower them, serenade their hearts. Could be attributed to my growing up around three big brothers, having more testosterone. I generally played the boy when playing house or I was the evil witch. Never really the damsel in distress. Maybe I was a dude in my past life or maybe our gender role ideas and concepts are really screwed up. But I’m kind of a closeted hunter. I’ve realized I’m more afraid of going after men the way I used to. I dip my toes in it but I don’t go in for the full attack. I’m like a cowardly lion.

twi-ny: You’ve noted that you’ve wanted to do a one-woman show since you saw Lily Tomlin in The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe. What was it about that show that so deeply affected you?

BB: There was this amazing web of stories. They were all connected so magically, intertwined and mirroring one another. I’ve always loved movies and books that express and highlight how we are all connected. And how a life can be this pure explosion of seeing what other stars you are connected to in your constellation. At the end of the show, this giant mirror comes down, so the audience can see themselves. I was just in tears, and it has stayed with me ever since: The power of art that opens your heart, breaks it, then heals it again.

twi-ny: What was the genesis of The Love Junkie?

BB: I started writing many different one-woman shows over the past years and they were always about heartbreak and failed love. One show started where I played every guy I was with but I could never find an ending, because I kept doing the same thing over and over again. I needed to actually change something in my life so I could write the show I wanted to. I did just that, this time around. I ended a relationship and committed to the relationship with myself.

During the last two years on tour with Scissor Sisters, I researched every artist and show that I loved. I journaled, I wrote weird songs, made tracks, improvised for hours on my computer, danced, did solo photo shoots. I also got lots of advice from [Scissor Sisters] Jake [Shears], Ana [Matronic], Del [Marquis], and Babydaddy, in different ways. Just being who they were inspired me, but they also took time to let me share with them. But it was the actual doing that got me running. I tried out a different performance art piece once a month at an art party called ArtErotica, curated by Dinna Alexanyan. I found a spiritual comedy coach named Alicia Dattner, who guided me through some healing work. She also had been going through love pain as well.

twi-ny: You play multiple characters in the show. Do you have any particular favorites?

BB: I think my favorite character to play is the Old Me, the jaded, lonely, fat, sick, dying, washed-up me. Playing her with a fat suit, cigarette, and cane is a lot of fun. On a personal level it’s like I’m exorcising that idea from my head, that I won’t ever really become her.

twi-ny: You’ll be performing The Love Junkie on May 31 at Joe’s Pub. What are the plans for the show after that?

BB: I love Joe’s Pub; it’s become a real home to me. I would like to have a consistent run of it in NYC, maybe weekly, biweekly, then take it to L.A., London, and beyond! I am looking into spaces and always looking for people to help it grow. I’m excited to let it evolve. Not every show will be the same. It’s an organism in itself. I designed it to be a journey. Maybe this show will be the first step. There could be eleven more. It is a healing experiment for me. So I will walk the road to recovery and see where it takes me.