Michael Dale’s Theatre Crawl – Did Shakespeare Write It?

Tony Roach and Cara Ricketts in Arden Of Faversham (Photo: Carol Rosegg)

by Michael Dale

This week…

Arden Of Faversham presented by Red Bull at the Lucille Lortel Theatre through April 1. Tickets $77/$97/$112

Cocktail Magique presented by Company XIV at Cocktail Magique Theatre through August 20.  Tickets begin at $125.

This God Damn House at The Chain through April 8.  Tickets $30.

Inexpensive and Recommended…

Tennessee Rising: The Dawn of Tennessee Williams at AMT Theater through April 2.  Tickets $35/$45.

Overheard outside the Lucille Lortel Theatre, shortly before a performance of Red Bull Theater’s rousing production of Arden Of Faversham…

Passerby:  (reading front of house display)  Is this a movie or a play?

Bystander:  A play.

Passerby:  And they’re acting that out?  “A True Crime Thriller”?  Shit, good luck.

I don’t know how much luck was involved in putting together Red Bull’s top shelf return to live theatre productions, but not much was needed considering the talent assembled by the edgy company named for the Jacobean playhouse that illegally put on shows during England’s Puritan years.

First published in 1592, the authorship of Arden Of Faversham is unknown, though at times attributed to Christopher Marlowe, Thomas Kyd or William Shakespeare, with or without collaboration.  What’s known for sure is that its story is based on Alice Arden’s plot to murder her husband, successful businessman Thomas.

In Jeffrey Hatcher and Kathryn Walat’s new adaptation, Thomas (Thomas Jay Ryan) seems a genial sort and a loving husband, though much of his social time is spent with good friend Franklin (Thom Sesma), who desires more than friendship.  His wife Alice is portrayed as a lustful conniver by Cara Ricketts, who wants to off her spouse for the sake of enjoying uninterrupted trysts with her lover Mosby, a tailor, played with steely eyed sensuality by Tony Roach.

Mosby’s sister Susan (sweet and flirtatious Emma Geer) works as Alice’s servant and is being courted by both painter Clarke (foppish Joshua David Robinson), who assists the lovers in order to win favor for her hand, and adorably naïve Michael (Zach Fine) who unwittingly gets involved in the plot.

Alice also acquires the assistance of Widow Greene (Veronica Falcón), whose livelihood has been compromised by one of Thomas Arden’s dealings.  She’s assisted by a pair of bungling scoundrels, Big Will (David Ryan Smith) and Shakebag (Haynes Thigpen).

Given the real-life source of the play and a couple of spoiler moments in the plot I won’t go into, it’s my guess that whoever first concocted Arden Of Faversham intended it to be a bloody drama with some broad comic relief supplied by Bill Will and Shakebag.  And if played straight, Hatcher and Walat’s text would have been perfectly effective as a creepy thriller.  Designers  Mika Eubanks (costumes), Reza Bahjat (lights), Christopher Swader & Justin Swader (set) and Nina Field & Greg Pliska (sound) combine for chilling atmosphere the company describes as Elizabethan noir.

At first, director Jesse Berger’s cast plays on the level of romantic melodrama with a first act curtain that provides a real kicker of a twist.  But as schemes keep getting messed up and the wrong people keep getting killed, the desperation to get the deed done cranks up the proceedings to near farcical comic fare.

It may not be exactly what the unknown playwright intended, but Hatcher, Walat, Berger and the splendid Red Bull company have made Arden Of Faversham the most surprisingly funny bit of Elizabethan noir in town.

It gets embarrassing at times, me supposedly being a writer and all that, but I often think I’ve run out of superlatives to describe the latest creations of Austin McCormick and his outrageously charismatic cohorts of Company XIV…

The first time I wrote about the troupe was back in 2009, when The Judgement of Paris was a modest affair played in one of those black box talent incubators on East 4th Street.  I’m no dance expert, but I was taken with how director/choreographer McCormick stylized the Greek myth – wherein Paris, the Prince of Troy, selects Aphrodite as the hottest of all goddesses in exchange for the undying love of the Spartan Queen, Helen, prompting the Trojan War – into a genre-blending ballet evoking the Baroque era, Belle Époque Paris, Weimar cabaret and 1930s Hollywood.

I eventually learned the XIV in the company’s name refers to the erotically charged court entertainments during the reign Louis XIV of France.  Through the years I’ve accepted every gracious press invite the company has sent my way and have seen McCormick’s style evolve into an instantly recognizable blend of baroque, burlesque, pop music, opera and circus arts, with suggestively clad performers doubling as ushers and bartenders (preparing cocktails specifically curated for each show) and the seduction of the senses beginning as soon as you walk in and take your first whiff of frankincense permeating the house.

Bad luck had forced Company XIV to go nomadic for several years, before settling into Theatre XIV, an exquisitely plush palace of playful decadence located on a nondescript Bushwick side street, created by the company’s resident costume and scenic designer Zane Pihlström.

And last year, McCormick and Pihlström introduced a marvelous new venue into the New York nightlife scene, Cocktail Magique Theatre, located just a few blocks away from Theatre XIV.

This is a more intimate cabaret space with a long narrow stage that also serves as the bar.  There are only three rows of seating: individual chairs right up front, comfy couches for two, and high-top tables for six.  The décor has an art deco flavor with strings of lights above that remind me of Marie’s Crisis and a carnival style water fountain that provides a Coney Island-ish accent.

Kylie Rose in Cocktail Magique (Photo: Deneka Peniston)

In true Ziegfeld style, the premiere attraction at Cocktail Magique Theatre is titled Cocktail Magique, a wildly entertaining and very sexy salute to illusions and libations.  If you splurge for the couches for two, arrive early and be prepared to be pampered a bit, starting with a specialty cocktail as you enter.  The enchanting belly dancer Syrena treated my guest and I to a closeup view of her sleight of hand skills with a bit of card manipulation and then the mysterious Rosebud led us to a private room where she poured a special concoction into our teacups and gave a tarot card reading.

The onstage show is emceed with sexy vaudevillian moxie by Sam Urdang, who educates us on the naughty reason for the shape of the traditional French champagne glass before launching into several chorus of Die Fledermaus’ ode to the bubbly while pouring the vintage stuff into decanters for cast members to serve to all their guests.  (Wait’ll you see how our glasses are delivered to us.)  In keeping with the theme, Kylie Rose performs a strip tease while walking atop an row of upright champagne bottles and Em Stockwell, who exudes statuesque Hollywood blonde glamour with silly sense of humor, vamps the crowd with Jeanne Burns and David Saxon‘s “With My Champagne Taste (And Your Beer Bottle Pockets).”  Later on, for those who prefer something a bit stiffer down their throats, Gin Minsky dazzles with her sword swallowing routine.

The lavish fashions modeled by Tina Twirler with the kind of elegance and humor that bring to mind iconic images of Josephine Baker are highlights of Pihlström’s delightful costume designs, which also include an absurd takeout bucket getup for Gin Minsky to prance in while everyone is served chicken-fried ice cream.

While tickets for Cocktail Magique are a bit pricier than the attractions I usually promote in this column, most are on the same level as typical Broadway fare and, quite frankly, I’ve never been disappointed by a Company XIV production.  Every seat in this intimate space offers a closeup view of the immense talent, creativity and taste procured by the genius of Austin McCormick.

“She looks a lot like Shirley MacLaine,”…

…my theatre buddy noted while glancing at the company photo on the show card for Matthew McLachlan’s This God Damn House.  Up to then it had completely slipped my mind that the press release for the new family drama at The Crain did mention how cast member Sachi Parker is indeed the daughter of the woman whose career took off after filling in as Carol Haney’s understudy the night a Hollywood mogul attended the Broadway hit, The Pajama Game, making the phrase “pulling a Shirley MacLaine” a legendary part if Broadway parlance.

I was more excited about seeing the latest from director Ella Jane New, who did such a crackling job last summer with Sophie McIntosh’s macbitches.  (Bonus: We got to personally praise Marie Dinolan, who was working the box office, on her deservedly lauded performance in macbitches, as a seemingly naïve college actor with a sharper side.)

But back to Parker, whose engaging turn as a sort of lower-middle-class Florida version of Eugene O’Neill’s Mary Tyrone in Long Day’s Journey Into Night is the highlight of this premiere production of a play that I’d say is still in the developmental stage.

Sachi Parker, Kirk Gostkowski and Gabriel Rysdahl in This God Damned House (Photo: David Zayas Jr.)

Designer David Henderson’s living room set is packed top to bottom with assorted bric-a-brac to depict the home of Parker’s divorced family matriarch and extreme hoarder Angie, who insists she has been keeping up with mortgage payments, despite being pressured into early retirement from her teaching position, and has no idea why she was suddenly sent a 24-hour eviction notice.

Her younger son Danny (Gabriel Rysdahl) a successful New York playwright, has flown in to assist older brother Jacob (Kirk Gostkowski), who abandoned his dream of being an actor for marriage and fatherhood, to get as much out of the home as possible before the sheriff arrives to lock up the place the next morning.  Also helping out is Angie’s protective former teacher’s aide, Hannah, (Rica de Ocampo).

Naturally, the process of sorting through so many long-forgotten items springs up memories and sparks discussions of family conflicts, but so much of the first act is spent with the brothers loading items into an offstage truck that the first half of the play moves lethargically.  Things heat up in the second act with the inclusion of Jacob’s pregnant wife Allie (Christina Perry), who has an outsider’s view of how Angie manipulates her sons by feigning helplessness.  Parker makes an excellent transformation when the previously soft-spoken Angie is confronted and she drops the mask and fights back to protect her position of control.

Curtain Line…

“The more you go to a theatre and the more you hear stories you aren’t necessarily familiar with, the more open you become.” – Lynn Nottage