5 Things To See In March 2013

1. THE (*) INN

The shtetl turns uncanny in Hirschbein’s 1912 classic of Yiddish life, continuing Target Margin Theater's two-year exploration of Yiddish Theater. You might be expecting the farm life, the chicken-plucking and the arranged marriage, but not the S&M lust and the body-snatching wedding guests. The ( * ) Inn was an early touchstone for experimental theater in Yiddish, a sensation in Vilna, in London and in a 1917 New York production. This play is a perfect example of why Target Margin Theater believes Yiddish drama is as innovative and challenging as any in the world. It’s Tevye on drugs. Watch out. The incomparable) David Greenspan stars.

Target Margin Theater presents
The (*) Inn
by Peretz Hirschbein
Directed by David Herskovits

March 6-30, 2013

Abrons Arts Center
466 Grand Street
New York, NY 10002

Tickets: Click Here

2. POCAHONTAS, AND/OR AMERICA

With over 400 years of history, legend, and pop culture as its sources, Little Lord reconstructs the American myth of Pocahontas in their fifth full-length stage work, Pocahontas, and/or America. Taking up the mantle of the early 19th-century dramatists who invented the American theater, Pocahontas, and/or America recreates our country’s origins through the lens of the immortal Indian princess, belle sauvage, Pocahontas. Using contemporary historical accounts, 19th-century melodramas, YMCA Indian Guides, archaeological research, and more, Little Lord digs into disputed histories to find out if it’s still even possible to make a patriotic piece of theater. Part historical pageant, part roadside attraction, Little Lord corrupts over 400 years of fact and fiction to grant America the founding myth we all deserve.

The Bushwick Starr and Little Lord Present:
Pocahontas, and/or America
Written and adapted by Michael Levinton and Laura von Holt
Associate Producer / Dramaturg: Sarah Bishop-Stone
Directed by Michael Levinton

March 5-23

The Bushwick Starr
207 Starr Street
Brooklyn, NY 11237

Tickets: Click Here


3. ROGERANDTOM

One hour of mind-bending head-scratching, meta-meta-quasi-romanti-tragi-dramedy.
Question the characters.
Question the actors.
Question yourself.
Penny is Penny.
But Richard is William.
And you are just a member of the audience.
Or are you?
Just how impenetrable is the fourth wall?

Personal Space Theatrics and HERE Arts Center present
ROGERANDTOM
By: Julien Schwab
Directed by: Nicholas Cotz

March 1 - 23

HERE
145 Sixth Ave. (enter on Dominick Street)
New York, NY 10013
Tickets: Click Here


4. CLOWN BAR

When Happy’s junkie brother Timmy is found dead, Happy returns to his old clown life to ask a few questions. But can he go home again without getting sucked into the seedy clown underbelly of vice and violence?

Pipeline Theater Company presents
Clown Bar
Written by Adam Szymkowicz
Music & Additional Lyrics by Adam Overett
Directed by Andrew Neisler


March 1 – March 23, 2013

Parkside Lounge
317 E. Houston Street
New York, NY 10002

Tickets: Click Here

5. SHAHEED: THE DREAMS AND DEATH OF BENAZIR BHUTTO

Writer/performer Anna Khaja illuminates the lives and historical forces surrounding slain Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, who was assassinated in 2007 while attempting to reunite a nation bitterly divided over the ideals of Islam and democracy. Through the monologues of eight characters that take place in the minutes before Bhutto's death--including Condoleezza Rice and Bhutto herself--we see how Bhutto's life and death resonate far beyond the boundaries of Pakistan, reshaping the world's struggle to reconcile the precepts of Islam with those of democracy.

Culture Project's Women Center Stage presents
Shaheed: The Dream and Death of Benazir Bhutto
Written and Performed by Anna Khaja
Directed by Heather de Michele

Culture Project
45 Bleecker Street
New York NY 10012

March 8 — April 1

Tickets: Click Here

A Conversation with Nicky Silver

The Drama Book Shop will present A Conversation with Nicky Silver, who will discuss and read from his work, including his newest black comedy, The Lyons, which premiered Off-Broadway at the Vineyard Theatre before moving to Broadway – to great acclaim – last spring. Joining Mr. Silver will be Sarah Stern, Co-Artistic Director of the Vineyard, who will moderate a discussion to be followed by a Q+A and book signing.

Date: Tuesday, February 26, 2013
Time: 5-7 PM
Place: THE DRAMA BOOK SHOP
          250 West 40th Street
          New York, NY 10018
Price: FREE!

Another One Bites The Dust: RIP Red Room

The tiny, third-floor red box space aptly named Red Room (part of the Horse Trade Theater Group that also includes The Kraine and UNDER St. Marks) will be closing in March. We always find if rough when a theater space closes, but we're taking this closing especially hard for several reasons, but most of all because we assumed it would always be there after surviving so many other theater closings in the past. We think NYC in general and theater in particular will be a less interesting place after March 2013...

Here's the (probably less than comprehensive) list of theater closing in the past dozen years or so, to which we will have to add Red Room:

29th Street Rep: 212 West 29th Street
The Belt: 336 West 37th Street
Bouwerie Lane Theatre: 330 Bowery
Bowery Poetry Club: 308 Bowery
Center Stage: 48 West 21st Street, 4th Floor
Century Theater: 111 East 15th Street
Collective Unconscious (on Church Street): 279 Church Street
Collective Unconscious (on Ludlow Street): 145 Ludlow Street
Currican Theatre: 154 West 29th Street
Expanded Arts: 113 Ludlow Street
Flatiron Playhouse: 119 W. 23rd Street, 3rd Floor
GAle GAtes et al: 37 Main Street, Brooklyn
Greenwich Street Theater: 547 Greenwich Street
Grove Street Playhouse: 39 Grove Street
House of Candles: 99 Stanton Street
Jane Street Theatre: 113 Jane Street
John Houseman Theater: 450 W 42nd St
Manhattan Ensemble Theater: 55 Mercer Street
Nada 45: 445 West 45th Street
Oasis Theatre: 230 East 9th Street
Ohio Theater (on Wooster Street): 66 Wooster Street
One Dream: 232 West Broadway
Pantheon Theater: 303 West 42nd Street, 2nd Floor
Pelican Studios Theatre: 750 8th Avenue, 6th Floor
Perry Street Theater: 31 Perry Street
Piano Store: 158 Ludlow Street
Playhouse 91: 316 East 91st Street
Present Company Theatorium: 198 Stanton Street
Prometheus Theatre: 239 East 5th Street
Provincetown Playhouse: 133 MacDougal Street
Surf Reality: 172 Allen Street,2nd Floor
Theater 3: 311 West 43rd Street, 3rd Floor
Theater Four/Julia Miles Theater: 424 West 55th Street
Todo con Nada: 167 Ludlow Street
Tribecca Playhouse:111 Reade Street
Variety Arts Theater: 110 3rd Avenue
Westside Repertory Theatre: 252 West 81th Street
Worth Street Theater: 33 Worth St
Zipper Theater: 336 West 37th Street


PS: we are hearing constant rumors about Union Square Theater becoming something other than a theater. 

UPDATE: Just a short time after we posted this entry, The New York Times uploaded their review of the new Living Theater piece, ironically titled: Here We Are, and noted that this will be there last production in their current space on Clinton Street.  A new home has not been yet been secured.  You may read the entire review  HERE

Discount Tickets: Belleville @ NYTW

 

We've already chosen Amy Herzog's Belleville at New York Theater Workshop as on of our 6 Things To See in February.  Now here's a discount code to further entice you:

Code: 

BV22

Prices:  

$45 tickets (reg. price $70) for performances between 2/12 and 2/24

$55 tickets (reg. price $70) for performances between 2/26 and 3/31

Call:

212-279-4200

Online:

www.ticketcentral.com

FILM: Richard Foreman's Once Every Day

The legendary theater auteur, Richard Foreman, returns to film - some thirty-something years after the brilliant Strong Medicine (which can be viewed here). ONCE EVERY DAY will have its premiere theatrical run (after its world premiere at the NY Film Festival in October) at Anthology Film Archives for one week.

ONCE EVERY DAY
Directed by Richard Foreman
Anthology Film Archives
32 Second Avenue (at 2nd Street)
New York, NY 10003 February 8th - 14th, 2013

Below is a Q & A with Amy Taubin after a screening at NY Film Festival: 

6 Things To See in February 2013

1.  THE GOOD PERSON OF SZECHUAN

Can we practice goodness and create a world to sustain it?  In Brecht’s comic and complex play, this question is raised by one of his most entertaining characters — Shen Tei the good-hearted, penniless, cross-dressing prostitute, who is forced to disguise herself as a savvy businessman named Sui Ta so she can master the ruthlessness needed to be a “good person” in a brutal world. A Foundry Theater production at LaMama.

The Foundry Theater and LaMama, ETC present
THE GOOD PERSON OF SZECHUAN
Directed by Lear deBessonet
With Taylor Mac as Shen Tei, Annie Golden and Lisa Kron
Music by César Alvarez with The Lisps
 
LaMama - Ellen Stewart Theatre 
66 E 4th Street
New York, NY 10003

Tickets: $35 Adults/$30 Students + Seniors

February 1 – February 24, 2013

Info + Tickets: Click Here

*****

 

2. Moose Murders (Shamelessly Revised)

The most infamous flop of Broadway history, the farcical murder mystery MOOSE MURDERS closed on opening night to some of the most scathing reviews in history. Beautiful Soup Theater Collective revives it for the very first time in NYC.


Beautiful Soup Theater Collective presents
MOOSE MURDERS
by Arthur Bicknell
Directed by Steven Carl McCasland

Connelly Theatre
220 East 4th Street
New York NY 10009

Tickets: $25.00 - $30.00

January 29, 2013 - February 10, 2013


Tickets + Info: Click Here

*****

3. The Lying Lesson 

In a remote seaside village in Maine, a woman who may or may not bea legendary movie star shows up to buy the home of an elderly couple.Escorted by a young local woman who appears never to have heard of her,“Ruth” stakes a claim on her distant past, and plays a relentless game ofcat and mouse with her new “assistant.” This hilarious and unsettling homage to the films of Hollywood’s GoldenAge is directed by Pam MacKinnon. 

Atlantic Theater Company presents 
The Lying Lesson 
by Craig Lucas 
directed by Pam MacKinnon 

Atlantic Theater Company/Linda Gross Theater 
336 West 20th Street 
New York, NY 10011

Tickets: $70

February 6 - March 17, 2013 

For Info + Tickets: Click Here

*****

  

4. The Revisionist

David arrives in Poland with a crippling case of writer’s block and a desire to be left alone. His 75-year-old second cousin Maria welcomes him with a fervent need to connect with her distant American family. As their tenuous relationship develops, she reveals details about her complicated post-war past that test their ideas of what it means to be a family.  This is a rare chance to see Vanessa Redgrave in on off-Broadway space.

Rattlestick Theater presents
The Revisionist
With Jesse Eisenberg and Vanessa Redgrave
Directed by Kip Fagan

Rattlestick Theater
Cherry Lane Theatre
38 Commerce Street, New York, NY 10014
 
Tickets: $85.00
 
February 15, 2013 - March 31, 2013

For Tickets + Info: Click Here

*****

5. Belleville 

BELLEVILLE the newest drama from acclaimed playwright Amy Herzog (4000 Miles, After the Revolution) and director Anne Kauffman (Detroit, This Wide Night), is a chilling, Hitchcockian, look at the limits of trust, truth, deception and dependency in a world where both love and loss can be pathological and cathartic.This is the NYC premiere after debuting last year at Yale Rep.

New York Theater Workshop presents

Belleville

by  Amy Herzog

directed by Anne Kauffman

New York Theater Workshop
79 East 4th Street 

(between Bowery and 2nd Ave)


Tickets: $70

February 12th - Mar 31st, 2013

For Tickets + Info: Click Here

***** 

 6. Set in the Living Room of a Small Town American Play

After being denied the rights to several works by American playwrights of the 1930s and 40s based solely on Theater Reconstruction Ensemble's standing as an experimental company, their resident playwright Jaclyn Backhaus, the creative mind behind TRE's The Three Seagulls, or MASHAMASHAMASHA!, has taken on the challenge of writing her own take on an American realism play of the 40s and 50s, utilizing the basic archetypal characters we've been running into in various workshops of iconic American plays, and creating a storyline that reflects what we've learned about the genre as a whole.    

February 21 - March 10, 2013

Theater Reconstruction Ensemble presents
Set in the Living Room of a Small Town American Play
by Jaclyn Backhaus
directed by John Kurzynowski

Walkerspace
46 Walker Street
(Between Broadway + Church Street)
New York, NY 10013For tickets + Info: Click Here
 

  

LCT3: Luck of the Irish Tickets on Sale

When an upwardly mobile African-American couple wants to buy a home in an all-white neighborhood of 1950's Boston, they pay a struggling Irish family to "ghost-buy" a house on their behalf. Fifty years later, the Irish family wants "their" house back. Moving across two eras, LUCK OF THE IRISH explores racial and social issues and the universal longing for home.

LCT3 offers all tickets at $20, making it another great theater value in NYC.  And at $20, the tickets go fast, so book now: HERE