‘THE WANDERERS’: Eddie Kaye Thomas & Sarah Cooper. Photo: Joan Marcus.

THE WANDERERS
Written by Anna Ziegler
Directed by Barry Edelstein
Through April 2, 2023
Laura Pels Theatre
111 West 46th Street
(212-719-1300), www.RoundaboutTheatre.org

By David NouNou

The Wanderers is one of the season’s best new plays, on or off Broadway. Although the themes about relationships and the narrative are universal, it would help if audience members are Jewish (or know some common Jewish phrases) to appreciate the beautifully textured and nuanced Hebrew and Yiddish sayings, both of which can only be spoken and used in its original context.  However, the show has broad appeal and you don’t have to be Jewish to truly appreciate what a beautiful story it is, with outstanding performances by the cast.

There is a lot to process here. Starting with a Hassidic marriage where the groom, Schmuli (Dave Klasko) is embedded in the strict regimentation of the religion, while the bride, Esther (Lucy Freyer) is more worldly due to her reading of books and breaking the rules of how a Hassidic woman should behave. This marriage produces two daughters and a son, Abraham.

Abe (Eddie Kaye Thomas) is a Pulitzer Prize-winning author married to Sophie (Sarah Cooper), a frustrated and unsuccessful writer raising two children of their own. They grew up together, almost at birth. Abe’s mother, Esther was best friends with Sophie’s mom Rivka who had married a Black man from Mississippi and had been ostracized from the Hassidic community. Sophie was like Esther’s adopted daughter, Esther pushed for their marriage that she deemed it be basherts, the Yiddish word meaning “destined to be.”

The fifth character is the stunning Julia Cheever (Katie Holmes), a world-renowned actress who attended one of Abe’s seminars and is infatuated by his prose. She sends him an email explaining her admiration, and needless to say Julia represents the ideal shiksa for Abe. This starts an 18-month email correspondence that consumes Abe.

No more can be said, because once this groundwork is in place, the viewer has to navigate through the maze of intricacies playwright Anna Ziegler has created. Whether it is marriage, religion, infidelity, guilt, raising children, success or failure, ostracism or death, reality vs. fantasy, Ms. Ziegler has woven this play like a tapestry that has to be appreciated from every angle for every detail.

The ensemble performances by all are exceptional and gut wrenching. Eddie Kaye Thomas, as Abe, known for his role of Paul Finch in the 1999 – 2012 American Pie movies, the seducer of Stifler’s mother (Jennifer Coolidge), is excellent in this adult role. He shows depth and all the angst of midlife crises. No less effective are newcomers Sarah Cooper, Lucy Fryer and Dave Klasko.

The main attraction to the show is Katie Holmes as the elusive Julia Cheever. Ms. Holmes is nothing short of breathtaking from her first entrance in the gorgeous crème-colored outfit designed by David Israel Reynoso to her final navy-blue pantsuit, she exemplifies the ideal woman men fantasize about. She has so matured and is much more self-assured since her 2008 Broadway debut in Arthur Miller’s All My Sons.

Kudos should be given to director Barry Edelstein for navigating his cast through this human maze of human relations and emotions intersecting the past and the present. Ms. Ziegler and Mr. Edelstein have provided theatregoers one of the most absorbing must-see plays of this season.

Edited by Scott Harrah
Published February 24, 2023
Reviewed at February 23, 2023 performance.

‘THE WANDERERS’: Lucy Freyer & Dave Klasko. Photo: Joan Marcus.

‘THE WANDERERS’: Eddie Kaye Thomas & Katie Holmes. Photo: Joan Marcus.

‘THE WANDERERS’: The cast. Photo: Joan Marcus.

The post ‘The Wanderers’ is best new play of the season appeared first on StageZine.

‘APOLOGIA’: Hugh Dancy & Stockard Channing. Photo: Joan Marcus

APOLOGIA
Written by Alexi Kaye Campbell
Directed by Daniel Aukin
Through December 16, 2018
Roundabout at Laura Pels Theatre
Harold & Miriam Steinberg Center for Theatre
111 West 46th Street
(212-719-1300),www.RoundaboutTheatre.org

By David NouNou

Set in 2009 in an English countryside cottage, Kristen Miller (Stockard Channing) is awaiting the arrival of her two sons Peter and Simon, both roles played by Hugh Dancy, their girlfriends Trudi (Talene Monahon) and Claire (Megalyn Echikunwoke) and her gay best friend, Hugh (John Tillinger) to celebrate her 60-something birthday.

Kristen is a former 1960s and 1970s American activist, now living in England, believed what she was fighting for was fighting for a better world. She and Hugh were on a mission; she fought and he followed. Kristen, along the way, was divorced by her husband and he took away her two sons. In desperation, after her loss, she dove into her activism which led to her bohemian lifestyle. She has since become an art historian and has just published a book about her memoirs in which she totally neglects to mention her sons as if they never existed. And so this party from hell begins.

Of course, there is a lot of wine drinking, and a lot of blaming and a lot of recriminations and who did wrong to whom but there will be no apologies forthcoming. Kristen is still her stalwart strong-willed self and can dispense a sarcastic line to people she feels have not come up to the level she expects namely the two girlfriends Trudi, an evangelical Christian Nebraskan soon to be engaged to British-born Peter; and Claire, a soap-opera actress soon to break up with Simon due to his many psychological problems, now mostly stemming from his childhood.

Stockard Channing is a force of nature to be reckoned with. Even when the material is sub-par and not to her level of expertise, she still captivates you. There are very few stage actresses left of Ms. Channing’s caliber who can dazzle you from the first moment to last.

Hugh Dancy, who plays both Peter, the accomplished son, and Simon the unfortunate one, plays them with two distinctive personas and is quite good but here again his characters are both poorly fleshed out. John Tillinger comes off best as Kristen’s gay friend and defender with all the salty lines.

Unfortunately, director David Aukin doesn’t do much for the proceedings; he just lets the scenes ramble by themselves. An example: Beginning of Act II where Simon comes in after getting shards of glass in his hand. Kristen enters to take them out, and the stage is so dimly lit where you can hardly see the actors let alone a woman taking out shards of glass with a pair of tweezers It just seems so implausible. Did anyone forget to pay the electric bill?

In the end you are left with an unfulfilling drama, and stock characters that are not fully developed, but there is Stockard Channing. Watching her in any play is a night well spent, watching her cast her spell over an audience.

Edited by Scott Harrah
Published October 18, 2018
Reviewed at October 17, 2018 press performance.

‘APOLOGIA’: Stockard Channing. Photo: Joan Marcus

‘APOLOGIA’: (left to right) Hugh Dancy, Talene Monahan & Stockard Channing. Photo: Joan Marcus

‘APOLOGIA’: Stockard Channing. Photo: Joan Marcus

‘APOLOGIA’: Talene Monahan & Hugh Dancy. Photo: Joan Marcus

The post ‘Apologia’: Stockard Channing shines appeared first on StageZine.

‘THE HUMANS’: (left to right) Sarah Steele, Arian Moayed, Jayne Houdyshell & Lauren Klein. Photo: Joan Marcus

THE HUMANS
Written by Steven Karam
Directed by Joe Mantello
Through December 27, 2015
Laura Pels Theatre
111 West 46th Street
(212-719-1300), www.Roundabouttheatre.org

By David NouNou

Stephen Karam is one of the most promising and exciting new playwrights to have emerged in the last 10 years. So I was most anxious to see what his follow-up to the exquisite 2011 production of Sons of the Prophet would be, and true to form, he has lived up to his early promise with The Humans.

For The Humans, he has created a puzzle in which all the pieces should fit together seamlessly but amazingly all the pieces have imperceptible jagged edges where nothing fits. The puzzle might as well have the setting of a “The Twilight Zone” episode and the outer parameter of the puzzle is centered on one of the most iconic American holidays, Thanksgiving. The Blake family has driven all the way from Scranton, Pennsylvania to celebrate Thanksgiving dinner with their younger daughter in her new basement duplex apartment in lower Manhattan, NYC.

As in Sons of the Prophet, everyone here carries a heavy burden and each person carries their burden in silence…until that fateful moment. Eric (Reed Bierney) and Deidre (Jayne Houdyshell) Blake have come with their older daughter, Aimee (Cassie Beck), and Momo (Lauren Klein), their Alzheimer-riddled mother, in what appears to be celebrating Thanksgiving with their younger daughter, Brigid (Sarah Steele) and her boyfriend Richard Saad (Arian Moayed) in what most any family would deem as a happy get-together and that’s all you’re going to get out of me.

I say this because I truly believe that each viewer has to formulate his or her own opinion when first viewing a new piece of such magnitude. It is unfair both to the playwright and the audience to divulge more information because it hinders the experience and the layers that the writer has imbued in this piece.

As directed by Joe Mantello, he extracts excellent performances from each of his cast members; however the veterans Reed Bierney and Jayne Houdyshell are standouts. In the wrong hands, this could have been a maudlin evening, but in Mr. Mantello’s hands, he keeps his cast and things moving at a fast-pace. I have to add that David Zinn’s set is a visual treat. His duplex anchors the show and all that is about to unfold.

This is a theatrical experience that is most enjoyable in a small, almost claustrophobic venue, so I urge you to see it at the Laura Pels Theatre. For this particular Thanksgiving dinner, you have to be a guest and not an audience member.

Edited by Scott Harrah
Published October 29, 2015
Reviewed at press performance on October 28, 2015

‘THE HUMANS’: (left to right) Cassie Beck, Arian Moayed, Reed Birney, Jayne Houdyshell, Lauren Klein & Sarah Steele. Photo: Joan Marcus

‘THE HUMANS’: (clockwise from top) Sarah Steele, Cassie Beck, Arian Moayed, Jayne Houdyshell & Reed Birney. Photo: Joan Marcus

The post ‘The Humans’: Thanksgiving meets ‘Twilight Zone’ appeared first on StageZine.