The hilarious one-man show "My Name is Gideon" was worth the trek to The Brick performance space in Williamsburg. Normally, Gideon Irving does the show in peoples' living rooms and spends the night. He has taken the show across Australia and now plans to take it across the U.S. on horseback. Does he ride? Well... he's a Jew from New York so ... But he is holed up in Utah on a Mormon ranch, as I write, learning how to ride. The show, a lifetime's work for this 32 year old, is a mix of song, magic, slapstick and narration with a grab-bag full of props, set pieces and musical instruments. He engages the audience often and with the uncanny ability of not making this critic feel stupid while participating. Still, most of the songs are his own and I longed to hear him burst into a Sondheim with his marvelous voice.
Heather Raffo's "Noura" directed by Joanna Settle at Playwright's Horizons is a Christmas tale of sorts. A Christian Iraqi family in New York are celebrating the holiday, the wife Noura (echos of "A Doll House") yearning for the Iraq she knew, her doctor husband wanting to forget the past and their very assimilated teenage son happy playing video games. Also present are Noura's childhood Muslim best friend and a young woman recently arrived from Iraq who they are sponsoring. There's a mystery at the heart of the play that is ultimately devastating for all.
At BAM Steven Berkoff's "Greek," a retelling of Oedipus set in present day Tuffnell Park, North London, has become a delightfully strange opera composed by Mark-Anthony Turnage and adapted by Turnage and Jonathan Moore with a libretto by Berkoff. I have to give a nod to the bright modernist set by Johannes Schultz and the wacky costume design by Alex Lowde. But it's the four singers who do the work, each playing a variety of roles except for Alex Otterburn who has his hands full with Eddy (Oedipus). They are by turns raunchy and affecting and all-together entertaining. Turnage forges his own "operatic path between modernism and tradition, by means of a unique blend of jazz and classical styles."
"Strange Window: The Turn of the Screw" at BAM Harvey is unbelievably amateurish. Adapted from the novella by Henry James by James Gibbs and directed by Marianne Weems the Builder's Association production makes for an excruciatingly tedious evening at the theatre. While there are some interesting visual affects none of the actors are very good so it's hard to stay engaged. In addition, the multimedia show forces us to watch closeups of the actors onstage via huge screens which are not always in sync. I suggest you see the 1961 Deborah Kerr film instead.
Another dud at the BAM Harvey is David Rousseve's homage to Billy Strayhorn which is neither interesting as a dance piece nor a memorial to Strayhorn. I don't want to fault the dancers. Their choreography is minimal and they are often forced into narration in order to move the story along, something dancers are not often equipped to do. Rousseve also throws civil rights footage up on screens whenever possible. Unfortunately his footage is often not from the periods he is portraying from Strayhorn's life on stage. Strayhorn deserves a better hommage than this uneven and disjointed production offers.
Best for last: As with a glass of fine Kentucky Bourbon, Elaine May in Kenneth Lonergan's "The Waverly Gallery" at the Golden Theatre gives a performance to savor. In her 80's Ms. May still has what it takes and then some. She is the aging matriarch of a neurotic New York family who still runs a largely unsuccessful gallery just off Washington Square. I was reluctant to see the play having been less than awed by Lonergan's recent revival of "This Is Our Youth" on Broadway and "The Medieval Play" at he Signature. However, I couldn't resist the opportunity to see May in what may be her last turn on the stage under the direction of the always fine Lila Neugebauer who most recently directed an outstanding production of Albee's "At Home at the Zoo" at the Signature. The story is slight and on the surface not very interesting, an elderly woman slipping into senility is attended to by her grandson, daughter and son-in-law as well a young and seemingly untalented artist who talks her into a last show at the gallery and becomes her part-time care-taker. It's an all star cast with Lucas Hedges, Joan Allen, David Cromer, and Michael Cera but, really, there is no play without May who hasn't lost any of her chops since her early days with Nichols and May so if you're lucky enough to snag a ticket while it's still on Broadway, do so.
