Sunday, April 02, 2006

Stuff Happens: 04/02/2006


David Hare’s Stuff Happens has finally come to New York. It is a self described “history play, which happens to center on resent history.” And it really is Shakespearian in its grandeur; its structure is episodic and it is briskly directed by Daniel Sullivan. The audience is divided in two parts both facing each other [like the currently running Fragment at CSC – which would make an excellent companion piece] and the action takes place in the space between. There are some exceptional performances, most notably Peter Francis James as Colin Powell and Jeffrey DeMunn as Donald Rumsfeld. Stuff Happens replaced a new work by Anna Deavere Smith that was originally scheduled for the Public’s season and has been postponed. And it struck me how similar this is to works by Deavere Smith and how I’d love to see her play all of the characters in Stuff Happens. Overall this is a great evening in the theater and 2 hours and 45 minutes never flew by so quickly.

For info: www.publictheater.org

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