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      ‘Touching the Void’ Review: Choices That Shape a Life on the Edge

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      This Bristol Old Vic production, based on the harrowing story of the British mountaineer Joe Simpson, tracks the spiral of decisions behind human exploits.Many movies, books or shows are metaphorical slogs. The play “Touching the Void” is about a literal one: the slow, agonizing crawl of the British mountaineer Joe Simpson as he tried to return to his base camp after sustaining a gruesome injury on an Andes peak.The Bristol Old Vic production, which is streaming live, then on demand, from Britain (and is presented by N.Y.U. Skirball as part of a “digital tour”), starts off with Joe’s wake in a Scottish inn. Since the show is based on the best-selling book Simpson published in 1988, three years after his ordeal, it’s not much of a spoiler to reveal that he somehow survived.The playwright David Greig came up with this narrative device mostly to introduce the character of Joe’s sister, Sarah (Fiona Hampton), who acts as the audience’s proxy. This means that Sarah needs to be told, over and over, what could possibly drive some people to risk their lives to reach mountaintops. She is angry as all get out and hates climbers, those adrenaline junkies with their “endless [expletive] stories about how they nearly died,” she tells Joe’s climbing companion, Simon Yates (Angus Yellowlees, with fetching two-tone hair). “Blah blah epic blah.”From left, Angus Yellowlees, Patrick McNamee and Fiona Hampton in the play, a Bristol Old Vic production presented by N.Y.U. Skirball.Michael WharleyMuch of the first act explores the friendship between Joe (Josh Williams) and Simon, and their ambition to make a mark by pioneering an unclimbed route, on the 20,000-foot Siula Grande in Peru. They work on the logistics of the ascent and, much more complicated, the descent.As staged by Tom Morris (the co-director of “War Horse”), the production, which premiered in 2018, remarkably evokes the physicality of scampering across rugged terrain or hanging by a thread off a snowy, freezing, windy face with just some low platforms and an apparatus halfway between a latticed scaffold and monkey bars. (This is the kind of show where the set designer Ti Green and the sound designer Jon Nicholls should be above the title on the marquee.)But as is often the case with human exploits, the most dramatically compelling parts of the story, and the play, are not so much the historical background, the practicalities of the expedition or even Simpson’s survival feat. Instead it’s the spiral of decisions, some technical and some ethical, that surround the events — just like how Jon Krakauer’s classic account of an Everest disaster, “Into Thin Air,” is made so engrossing by the human errors and the hubris. “There is always a choice,” Joe and Simon say.Williams, left, and Yellowlees on the scaffolding that represents the mountain.Michael WharleyComing down the peak, Joe falls down an ice cliff and breaks his leg (the snapping sound is especially horrifying). Simon is confronted with a terrible dilemma: stay and possibly die as well, or leave and try to at least save one life, his own.Simon leaves, thinking there is no way his friend could survive — only he does.Sarah’s heated interactions with her brother, Simon and, to a lesser degree, the comic-relief figure of the backpacker Richard (Patrick McNamee) dominate Act I, which has a genuine urgency as it deals with those pesky human issues.But after intermission, the show focuses on Joe’s journey back to safety and bogs down as he spends minutes at a time pulling himself along and yelling in excruciating pain — admittedly, streaming undercuts much of the impact those scenes likely would have in a theater, just like “War Horse” was much more effective live. The overuse of 1980s songs becomes distracting (Simpson’s real-life favorite, “This Is the Day,” plays during a scene in a crevasse and — just, no), and it eventually it starts feeling as if Greig can’t figure out how to end the show. Fortunately, real life gave him a good way out.Touching the VoidThrough May 29; on demand June 2-8; bristololdvic.org.uk More

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      Venues: The Bread and Roses Theatre

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      As theatres begin to re-open everywhere, we thought what a good time to actually dig a little deeper into some of the wonderful fringe venues hidden away throughout London, and the people who make them tick.

      First up then is The Bread and Roses Theatre. The theatre can be found above the pub of the same name, right in the heart of Clapham. It’s just a short walk from both Northern line and Overground stations, so there really is little excuse for not checking it out.

      Need further reasons you should go? Well, we thought why not ask someone right at the heart of what they do to tell us more.

      Hello there, shall we start with introductions?

      Hello, I’m Velenzia Spearpoint, the Artistic Director of The Bread and Roses Theatre

      Ok, we know where to find you, but what’s the size and layout style of your space?

      We’re an intimate, 40-60 seat venue above the Bread and Roses Pub in Clapham. We have a flexible auditorium so productions can be staged end-on or as a thrust. For I and the Village (showing at the time of the interview), it’s in a thrust. Currently, we’re opening a reduced capacity welcoming 20-25 people each night, so it will be slightly different, but we very much hope you’ll come on this adventure with us. 

      What type of shows do you usually put on? 

      For the shows we produce ourselves, we choose from our Bread and Roses Playwriting Award every two years, after reading through around 500 submissions by talented writers. You can find out more here

      The play we’re reopening with, I and the Village, sheds light on the Direct Provision System, for Refugees and Asylum Seekers in Ireland. It sheds light on life behind years of waiting, unable to work or make any personal progress. I and the Village explores the consequences of long term confinement in a system designed to be flawed. A story of longing, survival and hope.

      For all other shows, they are produced by visiting companies and we share the risk by offering a transparent box office deal. Artistic quality and representation of our societies’ real diversity are at the heart of the theatre’s programming with a focus on new writing, underrepresented voices, distinctive work and the development of new work and opportunities. If you’re interested in bringing a show, find out more here. 

      What can people normally expect to pay to see a show with you?

      We are always aiming to keep prices as affordable as possible, for work in progress shows and our Clapham Fringe Festival, it can start from as little as £5, for full length show it tends to be a maximum of £15. 

      You’re above the pub, would you recommend it as a nice place to come pre-show for a drink and bite to eat? And post show to chat about what you’ve just watched?
      The kitchen is ran by the Uk’s first gourmet corndog company ‘Twodogs Down‘, American comfort food at its best. The pub has two beer gardens front and back and plenty of space inside to enjoy pre-show drinks. With happy hour Monday to Friday between 4pm and 7pm, it’s £4 on selected beers and wines. The pub also offers free live music on weekends, with genres ranging from blues, folk, reggae and more. 
      We’re sold, we’ll get our order in now.

      Any particular highlights from your past shows? Any actors or shows start here that are your “they played here first” stories you tell everyone about? 

      Jamie Beamish who’s gone on to work in big tv shows, such as Bridgerton and Derry Girls bought his Cat The Play, co-written with Richard Hardwick, to us in the first year we were open in 2015. 

      What are the plans for the coming months then, what exciting shows have you got lined up for us?

      So apart from our very own playwriting award winner 19/20, I and the Village by Darren Donohue opening on the 25 May 2021, we’ve got an exciting line-up for the months ahead, highlights include:Stray Dogs by an aspiring up & coming Producer Justin Treadwell.There’s a trio of improv events, including where you can see Pippa Evans: And many many more, check out the full programme here & follow us on social media to be the first to hear.

      So tell us just why we should all come along to see a show at The Bread and Roses? What’s your unique selling point? 

      As we briefly mentioned, we want to champion theatre-makers at all stages of their career and are one of the very few venues in London that operates in the business model (box office splits with no hidden fees) that we do. Obviously, we all still know far too well that starting out in theatre-making is very challenging, but audiences can come in the knowledge theatre-makers are being nurtured and supported as much as possible in the process.

      Finally, and quite possibly the most important question of all, how comfy are your seats?

      Haha, good question

      Thanks, we thought so too, we’re going to ask everyone this in the future.

      They’re okay, all chairs rather than stalls, so should be fairly comfy. 

      Our thanks to Velenzia for her time to chat about the theatre. If you’d like to see shows we’ve previously reviewed at the venue, you can find them via the below link. Please do also give the theatre a follow on their social media channels, it really does help. You can find them all below as well. More

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      ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ Onstage. A Nightmare Off It.

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      Shakespeare’s Globe survived Elizabethan plagues. Today’s version got through the coronavirus pandemic, but tough times lie ahead.LONDON — At the Globe theater in London one recent Thursday was a sight Shakespeare could have related to: 11 actors larking about onstage rehearsing “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” while beneath them stood the director Sean Holmes, looking furious.“Listen please, everyone,” Holmes said. “Can we do the scene again, even if it’s a bit of a car crash?”Everyone stopped joking and got into place. Then Peter Bourke, playing the fairy king Oberon, started singing: “Now until the break of day, through this house each fairy stray.” Soon, the rest of the cast took over, and everyone crept offstage through two huge doors, getting quieter and quieter, as if trying to lull onlookers to sleep with their song.The performance was perfect. But Holmes didn’t look happy. That day’s rehearsal, he said, wasn’t about the onstage action, but ensuring the 11 actors could get off, change costumes quickly in a small backstage area, then get back on, all while staying two meters (about six and a half feet) apart to maintain social distancing.If they got it wrong, he’d have to do it again, and again, until they found a solution.“It’s been the hardest thing,” Holmes said. “I think it finally broke me today.”When the coronavirus pandemic shut Britain’s theaters last March, Shakespeare’s Globe, as it is officially known, might have been the one institution expected to survive.An audience member being checked before admission into “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”Adama Jalloh for The New York TimesIt’s one of the world’s iconic theaters, with supporters worldwide drawn to the idea of a modern recreation of Shakespeare’s stomping ground on the banks of the Thames, complete with a thatched roof open to the elements.In Shakespeare’s time, his Globe was repeatedly closed as the plague hit London, especially between 1603 and 1613, though the Bard kept writing even during the closures. If the original Globe survived that, surely its updated version could manage Covid-19?But within weeks of coronavirus hitting Britain, the Globe — heavily reliant on tourism (17 percent of its audience are international tourists, many American) and without the public subsidy that goes to venues like Britain’s National Theater — was losing 2 million pounds, about $2.8 million, a month.The 180 freelance actors and crew who were on its books at the time, some in the final days of rehearsing a new “Romeo and Juliet,” had to be let go, Neil Constable, the theater’s chief executive, said in a telephone interview. He also had to furlough 85 percent of his permanent staff, meaning the British government paid most of their wages. On top of that, he canceled a multimillion-dollar refurbishment project.Even with those moves, Constable was soon having to consider mothballing the theater entirely. “We’d have had to shut to 2023,” he said.In May, he submitted a document to British politicians pleading for emergency funding. Without it, “we will not be able to survive this crisis,” it said. That would be “a tragedy for the arts, for the legacy of England’s most famous writer, but also for the country.”The news made headlines, including in The New York Times. A few weeks later, Oliver Dowden, Britain’s culture minister, went to the Globe to announce a $2 billion arts bailout package. The government eventually gave the theater almost £6 million, about $8.5 million, of that money.That didn’t stop need for further cost saving, Constable said. Staff took salary cuts, up to 50 percent.But the bailout money did mean one thing: The theater could finally reopen this month, if only to a socially distanced audience of 400, rather than the normal 1,600. Audience members would also not be allowed to become “groundlings,” the term for people who stand in the pit beneath the stage, like normal. Instead they’d have to sit on shiny metal outdoor chairs.The “Midsummer Night’s Dream” production features Mardi Gras-style music.Adama Jalloh for The New York Times“It doesn’t make financial sense to do this, but it’s important,” Constable said. “It’s what we’re here for.” He hoped British tourists would make up for the shortfall of international visitors.At the rehearsal, Holmes — who is also the Globe’s associate artistic director — said the theater had decided to reopen with a revival of his 2019 production of “Midsummer” precisely because it was cheaper than doing a new show.The onstage social distancing was also as much for financial as health reasons, he said. Under the British government’s rules, if one person gets ill in a theater, everyone they’ve been in close contact with also has to isolate, so keeping people apart prevents that. “We have to protect the show,” he said, adding it’d be “incredibly damaging financially” if they had to pull it.A play about mistaken lovers turned out to be surprisingly easy to stage in the age of distancing. “There’s passion and extremity in the language,” Holmes said, “so you don’t need as much physical action.”He still had to make some changes. In one scene, four of the play’s many lovers fall asleep in a wood. In 2019, they did so “piled on top of each other,” Holmes said. Now, they each got a corner of the stage to themselves (one lover, Lysander, gets a blowup mattress at one point, much to his lover Hermia’s annoyance).A scooter driven by Titania waits for its moment in “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”Adama Jalloh for The New York TimesThe biggest challenges all involved keeping people apart offstage. At one point in the rehearsal, Holmes went through a scene where the actors run onstage — all playing the fairy Puck — then fire blow darts at one another. Shona Babayemi kept missing her cue.“Is there a reason you’re always late?” Holmes asked. “There were, like, seven, eight people in the way,” Babayemi replied. “Oh, God,” Holmes said. “Sorry!”Last Wednesday night, Holmes and the cast were back at the Globe for their first performance in 14 months.The mood in the lines outside was ecstatic, despite London being cold and damp even by the standards of a British summer. There were groups of drama students waiting to get in, as well as a fishing society and a mother and daughter celebrating a birthday.None were foreign tourists, but several attendees said they had traveled over an hour to get there, suggesting the Globe may not have to worry too much about attracting people from outside London.“I’ve got six tickets already for this year,” said Peter Lloyd, 61, who’d journeyed from Brighton on England’s south coast. “It’s the only authentic Elizabethan theater in the country, it feels so close to Shakespeare’s time,” he added. Was he OK with distancing in the plays? “Oh, I didn’t know about that,” he said, worried. “Are they wearing masks, too?”Shona Babayemi, who portrays Helena, awaits her entrance in the show.Adama Jalloh for The New York TimesInside, the eager atmosphere didn’t let up, helped by Holmes’s carnivalesque staging of the play — with Day-Glo costumes and a band playing almost constant Mardi Gras-style music. At one point, Titania, the fairy queen, wove in and out of the audience on a scooter (the cast pulled up masks sewn into their costumes whenever offstage). A bemused-looking audience member was even roped into the play, made to read out lines and ride on an exercise bike (it helped power the production), much to his partner’s apparent amusement.The Globe depends heavily on international tourists.Adama Jalloh for The New York TimesOn the few occasions that coronavirus rules intruded into the staging, the cast played the scene for laughs. When two characters had to stab themselves with the same knife, the actor playing Flute pulled an antiseptic wipe from his sock, then cleaned the blade, before plunging it into his chest.The play ran without an intermission — another effort to reduce risk — but few people left to use the bathroom or buy a drink. When it finished, to cheers, about 30 audience members even stayed behind, forming a polite queue to take selfies on the ramp leading up to the stage.Holmes stood nearby, watching. He looked as annoyed as during rehearsals. “That’s clearly just my resting face,” he said, with a laugh.“It’s just great we’re back and people are hungry for it,” he added. “We can’t sustain at this level of audience by any means,” he said of the theater being only a quarter full, “but I’m feeling optimistic.”Then, without the frown disappearing, he headed toward the crew, to find out if the distancing had worked as planned, after all. More

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      Playlist: ET radio show 26 May 2021

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      Author: Everything Theatre

      in Radio playlist

      27 May 2021

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      Shows Mentioned

      Links are for reviews, unless noted otherwise.

      Podcasts

      https://twitter.com/lprpod – Listening Party Revelations podcast. Hear everyday people chat about their love of music, based around the #TimsTwitterListeningParty’s

      Interview with Brian Penn

      Part 1 – Abba Mania review

      Part 2 – Eurovision Song Contest conversation

      Part 3 – Brian’s favourite shows

      Music Playlist

      Sugarcubes – BirthdayTanita Tikaram – Twist In My SobrietyPenfriend – Exotic MonstersPrefab Sprout – When The AngelsBoo Radleys – Wish I Was SkinnyAbba – Mamma MiaBryan Ferry – Let’s Stick TogetherTears for Fears – Mad WorldLloyd Cole and the Commotions – Perfect SkinOMD – Joan of ArcGrandaddy – Hewletts DaughterJesus Jones – International Bright Young ThingTrampoline – Imagine Something YesterdayAztec Camera – ObliviousFontains DC – Roy’s TuneFrank Turner – Little ChangesThe Icicle Works – EvangelineGlasvegas – GeraldineThe Staves – Don’t Let Me DownBon Iver – Skinny LoveDoves – There Goes The Fear More

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      London Theater's Reopening: 'Flight,' 'Herding Cats' and 'A Midsummer Night's Dream'

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      One “play” uses only voice-overs. Another features a main actor only on video. And under Covid rules, an 11-person Shakespeare cast counts as an army.LONDON — Theaters here are gradually reopening for business, but not in ways you might expect. Take the astonishing 45-minute installation at the Bridge Theater, “Flight.” A story of Afghan refugees crossing Europe to start a new life, this collaboration between the directors Candice Edmunds and Jamie Harrison uses diminutive claylike figures in revolving boxes to chart the journey of two boys, Kabir (a plaintive Nalini Chetty) and Aryan (Farshid Rokey), from Kabul to London.You learn of their quest via headphones (Emun Elliott is the adroit narrator) as you sit in a booth to which you’ve been led by a member of the staff. Although the project, from the Scottish company Vox Motus, seems an explicit response to coronavirus restrictions, “Flight” was in fact conceived before the pandemic and played at the Edinburgh Festival in 2017 before traveling widely, including to New York in 2018.The Bridge had scheduled a return engagement in collaboration with the Barbican in December, only to have it halted by a five-month lockdown. The current return offers an unmissable opportunity to experience something that may not technically qualify as theater — it’s just as much a shifting cyclorama — but speaks with piercing humanity. “Perhaps we could learn to fly,” one of the boys remarks, eager to reach his destination in any way he can, by which point the singular wonder of “Flight” has sent the heart soaring.A panoramic look at “Flight,” a collaboration by the directors Candice Edmunds and Jamie Harrison.Drew FarrellAnd what of actual actors? In this climate, don’t expect them all to share a stage. The recent Soho Theater revival of “Herding Cats,” Lucinda Coxon’s brittle 2010 play set in the world of online sex, had the distinguishing feature of beaming in the American actor Greg Germann (“Grey’s Anatomy”) live from Los Angeles. Appearing intermittently on a giant screen, Germann joined his British colleagues, Sophie Melville and Jassa Ahluwalia, in a play about the difficulty of making connections. How apposite, then, to have had one cast member a continent away.The production, directed by Anthony Banks, has finished its brief run but will be available June 7-21 via the video-on-demand service Stellar, and it will be interesting to see how its components link up online. Watching in a socially distanced theater, I was struck by my feeling of alienation from the characters. The fast-talking, angsty Justine quickly wears out her welcome in Melville’s frantic portrayal, and Ahluwalia can do only so much to flesh out the cryptic Michael, a pajama-wearing shut-in who makes his living on the telephone chat line that brings him into contact with Germann’s quietly threatening Saddo.Jassa Ahluwalia, in headphones, interacting with Greg Germann onscreen in Lucinda Coxon’s 2010 play “Herding Cats” at the Soho Theater.Danny KaanThe most arresting sight was the curtain call, in which the two onstage actors did their best to link hands with the looming figure of Germann during the bows. Might this mark some weird new way forward for trans-Atlantic productions, in which American actors become part of a London play without ever getting on a plane?The two onstage actors, Sophie Melville and Jassa Ahluwalia, in “Herding Cats.” Danny KaanAfter one show with no actors and another featuring only two in person, “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” the season opener at Shakespeare’s Globe, seems to be populated by a veritable army: Its 11-person cast represents a notably high number in these Covid-cautious times. But that figure is smaller than usual for this play and has been achieved by doubling of roles. The members of the ensemble, for instance, take turns playing that quicksilver fairy, Puck.The Globe, normally crowd-friendly, has blocked off rows of seats in accordance with government protocols, and the fabled yard, usually home to 700 “groundlings” standing shoulder to shoulder, offers carefully arranged chairs, still for the remarkably low price of 5 pounds, or $7. The production is a partially recast version of the “Dream” seen at the Globe in 2019, where it was the debut at the theater of the associate artistic director Sean Holmes.As was the case then, Holmes’s raucous approach works best as a colorful, elaborately costumed party, complete with streamers and a piñata, and with Titania (a sprightly Victoria Elliott) emerging from a recycling bin. Before the performance begins, the five-person Hackney Colliery Band warms things up with a brass-heavy version of “The Power of Love,” instructing the audience to “relearn how to clap.” Snatches of pop songs recur throughout the play, and Bryan Dick’s floppy-haired Lysander gives off a rock-star vibe.From left, Nadine Higgin, Sophie Russell, Victoria Elliott and Jacoba Williams at Shakespeare’s Globe in “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” directed by Sean Holmes.Tristram KentonThe costumes are a carnival, mixing thigh-high boots with Elizabethan ruffs that seem to sprout from the young lovers’ backs and with turquoise headgear for Peter Bourke’s Oberon. Jacoba Williams’s Snout at one point appears in a pink skirt and sequins as if ready for an Abba tribute concert.An appeal early on from the weaver Bottom (Sophie Russell, delightful) to her colleagues in the “Pyramus and Thisbe” play-within-a-play to “spread yourselves” could have been written with the pandemic in mind, and Quince (Nadine Higgin) informs Flute (George Fouracres) that he can play Thisbe “in a mask” — which seems apt given the masks that the actors slip on as they move through the yard toward the stage. The physical intimacy associated with the play has also been adjusted: Rather than reclining into one another, the smitten Lysander and Hermia lie at right angles, only their footwear touching.This isn’t the most poetic “Dream” or the most reflective, but it offers one moment that stops the heart. It comes near the end when two senior characters abandon the rules and take hands in a firm gesture, held for a noticeably long while. There before us is the human connection that we have been deprived of for so long and that, with luck, may again become the norm as we move toward midsummer.Nadi Kemp-Sayfi, kneeling, in “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”Tristram KentonFlight. Directed by Candice Edmunds and Jamie Harrison. Bridge Theater, through June 6.Herding Cats. Directed by Anthony Banks. Stellar, online, June 7-21.A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Directed by Sean Holmes. Shakespeare’s Globe, in repertory through Oct. 30. More

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      For a New Troupe, Going Digital Has Been Easier Than Returning Live

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      Molière in the Park garnered praise for Zoom productions of “Tartuffe” and other plays. Putting on an outdoor show in Brooklyn has been another matter.Sitting on a bench in Prospect Park recently as flocks of maskless Brooklynites passed by, Lucie Tiberghien reflected on the long, strange journey toward the first full production of Molière in the Park, the company she conceived to bring free theater with a diverse cast and crew to her home borough.This weekend, after months of delays that radically reshaped her plans, she is on her way to fulfilling that dream, with a staged and costumed reading of “Tartuffe.”Raised in France and Switzerland, Tiberghien has lived in New York since 1995, directing plays regionally and Off Broadway. Walking through the park a few years ago, she wondered to herself, “Why isn’t there a company dedicated to putting on theater here?”She created a nonprofit in 2018 to fill that role. Since Shakespeare already has his own park gig, at the Delacorte Theater in Central Park, and since she is French, she chose Molière, whose works she has long admired. “I had been trying to be hired to direct Molière for years,” she said.And since the plays mix comedy and drama, she added, “it’s great for an outdoor spring theater, because it can be subversive and biting but also festive and joyous.”Garth Belcon, an executive producer of Molière in the Park, offered another reason: “His plays place their thumb ever so lovingly into the eyes of the establishment and glitterati of his day.”Kate Rigg (with Andy Grotelueschen) takes on the role of Tartuffe, a duplicitous holy man.Sara Krulwich/The New York Times“Tartuffe,” which revolves around a supposed holy man whose ardent supporters hang on his every idea even when they fly in the face of evidence, certainly fits that bill. With the company’s mission stressing inclusivity, this “Tartuffe” will feature Kate Rigg, a multiracial, multicultural woman, as the title character.“I appreciate that it wasn’t such a big deal for Lucie,” Rigg said. “And also that she didn’t want me because I was Asian or a woman, but because she wanted a funny person in that role.”When Tiberghien first envisioned Molière in the Park, everything fell into place with surprising ease.She contacted Itai Shoffman, who runs the LeFrak Center at Lakeside in Prospect Park — home to a skating rink in winter and a water park in summer — and he said yes to producing plays there. Belcon agreed to be the executive producer, and Jerome Barth, who had helped run Bryant Park and the High Line, joined her board of directors.“So everybody said yes, but I had no money,” recalled Tiberghien, who is married to the playwright Stephen Belber. “I had to learn to write a grant proposal on the fly.”With foundation support from the likes of Bloomberg Philanthropies and the de Groot Foundation, Molière in the Park kicked off with readings of “The Misanthrope” at LeFrak Center in the spring of 2019 and “The School for Wives” at the park’s Picnic House that fall. For 2020, the company prepped a full production of “The Misanthrope,” to be directed by Tiberghien, followed by a reading of another play.Then, of course, came the pandemic.“We hadn’t spent anything yet so we didn’t lose money,” Tiberghien said. “We didn’t have a huge staff so we were not forced to pay people, or to lay them off.”Like most of the theater world, Molière in the Park migrated to Zoom. With the lower cost of online productions, the company put on three shows in fairly quick succession — “The Misanthrope,” “Tartuffe” and “School for Wives” — attracting such notable talent as Tonya Pinkins, Samira Wiley, Stew and Raúl Esparza.Reviewing “Tartuffe” in The New York Times, Jesse Green praised Esparza’s “hilariously outré performance” in the title role and called the production “full of delight for our undelightful time.”From left: Marjan Neshat, Postell Pringle, Jared McNeill and Nicole Ansari at a recent rehearsal. Though McNeill performed with some fellow actors in other Molière in the Park shows on Zoom, he said he was meeting them in person for the first time.Sara Krulwich/The New York TimesThe theater had invested in software that made it easier to light and edit remotely, and hired animators to add other production effects. “It started to feel like we were actually doing a play,” Tiberghien said.A partnership with the French Institute Alliance Française, in New York, brought in an international audience and enough donations to almost pay for all the productions. “We not only stayed afloat, we grew,” she said.With the new world of Zoom theater and demand for more online productions, Tiberghien and Belcon ventured into territory they would not have contemplated for years, doing contemporary plays — bringing new perspectives to the theater was central to the company’s intention. “We want new plays that explore the present through the lens of the past, which is what we are trying to do with Molière,” Tiberghien said.The company finished last year with an online production of Christina Anderson’s “pen/man/ship,” which Tiberghien had directed in regional theaters. It is set in 1896 on a ship bound for Liberia.In December, with vaccines on the horizon, she hoped for an in-person 2021 production, perhaps even “Tartuffe” and “pen/man/ship” in repertory. A month later, budgetary and Covid-19 restrictions, among other factors, narrowed the focus to just “Tartuffe,” starring the Tony-nominated Esparza. But the city moved cautiously in its planning, Shoffman said, keeping a moratorium on proposals for outdoor events until March.The lack of confirmation was both understandable and “extraordinarily frustrating,” Tiberghien said. (The long-established Brooklyn Academy of Music got permission from the city to hold a dance event at LeFrak in April.)Kaliswa Brewster, left, and Tonya Pinkins in the company’s streaming production of “The School for Wives.”via Moliere in the ParkUnable to get sponsorship without official approval, the company was in a “financially precarious situation,” and Tiberghien briefly doubted the show would go on.Shoffman said he stayed hopeful. “The parks department was inundated with requests about opening up all over the city,” he said. “I thought they’d be likely to say yes to a nonprofit group offering free culture to the public, so I was encouraging Lucie to stick with it.”As the clock ticked on, the planned two-week run of “Tartuffe” was knocked in half, and then from a full production to this staged reading. “It became: ‘What could we get done with just a week of rehearsals and a week of shows?’” Belcon said. Esparza then left the production, leading eventually to Rigg’s casting as Tartuffe. “His plays place their thumb ever so lovingly into the eyes of the establishment,” said Garth Belcon (far left, with Tiberghien at center), a co-founder of Molière in the Park.Sara Krulwich/The New York TimesIt was only on May 13 that Molière in the Park got the official go-ahead, with time for just a handful of remote rehearsals and two days in the space to prepare. All 165 seats (socially distanced in pods) for the three free shows were snapped up within the first 24 hours.“Now we have to work triple time to make it happen,” Belcon said soon afterward. Safety protocols for the actors, designers and audience members had to meet local and Actors’ Equity standards.The actor Jared McNeill, who did three of the company’s Zoom plays from his home in Italy last year, said that while the limitations were frustrating, he ultimately has been eager to go forward. “I’ve worked with some of these actors and developed a friendship, yet I’ve never met them in person before,” he said.Tiberghien holds out hope for a full-fledged indoor “Tartuffe” at the French Institute this fall, as well as another play reading at Prospect Park’s Picnic House — although for that, she will be competing with other organizations emerging from the pandemic.The company will continue expanding their reach with Zoom productions, and Tiberghien plans to eventually hire other directors for full Molière productions in Prospect Park, but not anytime soon. “I want to direct the first one myself,” she said. More

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      Theater to Stream: Concert Sets and Reimagined Classics

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      Highlights include “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” at Shakespeare’s Globe, the rising stars of LaGuardia High School and “Uncle Vanya” on PBS.Streaming music was difficult in the beginning of the pandemic. Zoom delays made it tough to sync singers and accompanists, but workarounds have since appeared, sometimes involving some prerecording, that allow for theatrical flair.Among the most popular musical theater programming has been Seth Rudetsky’s “The Seth Concert Series,” which can be relied on for a canny, entertaining mix of performances and chitchat.Up on May 30 is George Salazar, who has something many performers spend a career chasing: a signature number, “Michael in the Bathroom,” from the musical “Be More Chill.” As for Alex Newell (June 6), he is the rare crossover between Broadway and dance clubs. Newell brought down the roof with “Mama Will Provide” in the Tony Award-winning revival of “Once on This Island,” but you can just as often hear him booming out of discos around the world on great tracks like DJ Cassidy’s “Kill the Lights.” thesethconcertseries.comAli Stroker first pinged on New York’s radar in the 2015 revival of “Spring Awakening,” then confirmed her gifts with a Tony-winning turn as Ado Annie in Daniel Fish’s production of “Oklahoma!” It won’t be a huge surprise if “I Cain’t Say No” turns up in Stroker’s fund-raising concert for the Philadelphia Theater Company, where she once played Olive in “The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee.” Rumor has it that the set list will also include a certain Goffin-King classic and an excerpt from “Grease.” May 26; philadelphiatheatrecompany.orgAli Stroker in her concert for the Philadelphia Theater Company.Chris AshAnother concert, by Jane Krakowski for the Roundabout Theater Company’s 2021 gala, features guest stars including Tituss Burgess and the New York Pops. The event will be both live in Central Park and streaming — a sign of hybrids to come? June 7; roundabouttheatre.orgGlobal Forms Theater FestivalIt’ll be a while before international companies can travel easily again. In the meantime, New York Theater Salon and the Rattlestick Playwrights Theater are presenting a free, globe-spanning festival featuring works by immigrant artists and troupes based outside the United States, as well as events that provide opportunities for worldwide exchanges and discussions. June 1-9; nytheatresalon.com‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’Shakespeare’s Globe is bringing back physical performances of Sean Holmes’s production of this wackiest of comedies, and the good news is that a couple of them will be livestreamed, with the first one in June. Make sure to take note of time zone differences; being too late or too early by several hours rather than a few minutes is the new normal in theater. June 5; shakespearesglobe.com‘Rising Stars 2021’LaGuardia High School is usually introduced as the inspiration for the 1980 movie “Fame,” but younger generations might favor more up-to-date references: The New York City arts school’s many alumni include Awkwafina and Ansel Elgort. This year, LaGuardia is taking its “Rising Stars” variety showcase online; so now you can try to spot the next Timothée Chalamet. Premiering June 4; allarts.org‘Time Capsule’Virtual theater, as we have seen during the past year, makes access to the stage financially and physically easier. It’s an evolution that is particularly relevant, and perhaps game-changing, for companies like Theater Breaking Through Barriers, which focuses on writers, performers and audiences with disabilities. The latest “Playmakers’ Intensive” festival features 14 new short pieces. May 31-June 13; tbtb.orgFrida Espinosa-Müller in “Ursula.”Morgana Wilborn‘Ursula’The Latino Theater Company presents Cara Mía Theater’s production of Frida Espinosa-Müller’s powerful, emotional solo play about Nadia, a 7-year-old Honduran girl separated from her family at the Mexico-United States border. (The title refers to a detention center in McAllen, Texas.) Performing in English and Spanish, both subtitled, Espinosa-Müller brings to life a tale ripped, all too tragically, from the headlines. Through June 6; latinotheaterco.orgHeather Christian, center, in the Bushwick Starr production of “Animal Wisdom.”via Animal WisdomExpanding BoundariesHeather Christian is among the young writers and performers upending musical theater with hard-to-pin-down works. A good opportunity to catch up is a film adaptation by Woolly Mammoth and American Conservatory Theater of Christian’s “Animal Wisdom,” which mines a “rhapsodic musical style of cosmic gospel” and played at that wonderful incubator the Bushwick Starr in 2017. Through June 13; animalwisdomfilm.comThe pop band Sky-Pony has slightly more straightforward theatrical roots: the core members Lauren Worsham was in “A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder,” and her husband, Kyle Jarrow, wrote the book for “SpongeBob SquarePants: The Broadway Musical” (some of us are not-so-patiently waiting for a revival of Jarrow’s “A Very Merry Unauthorized Children’s Scientology Pageant”). Now they are reimagining their 2016 show, “The Wildness,” for streaming. May 26; arsnovanyc.comLisa Banes, left, and Jordan Boatman in “The Niceties.”via Manhattan Theatre Club and The Huntington Theater Company‘The Niceties’In Eleanor Burgess’s two-hander “The Niceties,” a white university professor and a Black student start discussing opinion and sources in an academic paper — then their exchange spins out of control, building toward a chilly ending. Lisa Banes and Jordan Boatman reprise their roles from the Manhattan Theater Club 2018 production for this streaming version. May 27-June 13; manhattantheatreclub.comKara Young, left, and Corey Stoll in “Bulrusher.”via Bard at the Gate‘Bulrusher’Among the most striking offerings in Paula Vogel’s Bard at the Gate series, which is dedicated to undersung plays, was a reading of Eisa Davis’s unabashedly lyrical 2007 Pulitzer Prize finalist “Bulrusher.” Luckily, those who missed last year’s short run, which Davis directed, have a second chance with this stream, thanks to Bard at the Gate’s new partnership with the McCarter Theater Center in Princeton, N.J. Kara Young stars as the title character, a teenage clairvoyant in 1950s California; the superlative cast also includes André Holland and Corey Stoll. June 3-9; mccarter.orgClassics, Every Which WayYou may think you know your classics, but chances are that these radical versions will scramble your brain. That’s how they roll in German theater. This week’s offerings include subtitled interpretations of a pair of texts by two major Berlin companies. Eugene O’Neill was inspired by Greek tragedy for “Mourning Becomes Electra,” which has been taken up by the Volksbühne Berlin (May 27; volksbuehne.berlin). And at the experimental Maxim Gorki Theater, “Hamlet” is framed as a movie directed by Horatio. (May 28; gorki.de).Toby Jones, left, and Richard Armitage in “Uncle Vanya.”Johan PerssonConor McPherson’s adaptation of “Uncle Vanya,” directed by Ian Rickson and part of the PBS series “Great Performances,” is a retreat to more familiar ground. Toby Jones stars in the title role, and Richard Armitage is Astrov. Neither of them will, say, launch into techno or strip naked while hanging upside down. Vive la différence! May 7-June 4; pbs.org More

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      After Tragedy, an Indianapolis Theater Stages a Comeback

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      Bryan Fonseca, the founder of a notable company, died of complications from Covid-19. But at the theater named for him, the show goes on.INDIANAPOLIS — On a breezy, 80-degree evening, the sun still in the sky, the actor Chandra Lynch walked to the center of the Fonseca Theater Company’s outdoor stage-in-the-round. At her back was a semicircle of oversized blocks, each with printed words that together formed the sentence “Blackness iz not a monolith.”She turned to face a section of a dozen mostly white audience members, part of the sold-out opening night crowd of 50.“White folks call what I’m about to do ‘exposition,’” she said, her mouth visible through a clear face shield. “But the Black folks in the audience know I’m about to preach.”The Fonseca Theater, located in a working-class neighborhood on the city’s west side whose actors are more than 80 percent people of color, staged its first show on Friday night since its founder, Bryan Fonseca, died from complications from Covid-19 last September.And not just any show — the world premiere of Rachel Lynett’s play “Apologies to Lorraine Hansberry (You Too August Wilson),” a metafictional meditation on Blackness that was recently selected as the winner of the 2021 Yale Drama Series Prize, one of the most prestigious awards for playwrights.Chandra Lynch getting ready backstage for the play.Maddie McGarvey for The New York Times“This play allows us to just be 100 percent, unapologetically Black,” said Latrice Young, who plays Jules, a young queer woman who chafes at the regulations of her all-Black community. “There aren’t a lot of spaces outside the home environment where I can do that.”Friday’s sold-out premiere, held in the theater’s parking lot, was the culmination of a nearly nine-month journey back to the stage after Fonseca’s death — and one of the first shows to be held in Indianapolis since the pandemic closed theaters across the country in March 2020.And it was far from easy. The theater’s 27-year-old producing director, Jordan Flores Schwartz, had to adjust to taking on a top-dog role she hadn’t been expected to assume for years. Then the comeback was pushed back by two weeks after rain delays put the theater behind on set construction — and two of the actors tested positive for the coronavirus four days before opening night.“It’s been a journey,” said Schwartz, who is juggling her new role with coursework for a master’s degree in dramaturgy from Indiana University. “But there was never a question of whether we would continue. We had to.”Theater for the CommunityFonseca had long enjoyed a reputation as one of the most daring producers in the Indianapolis theater scene. He co-founded the Phoenix Theater in 1983, which became a home for productions that might never have found a place on the city’s half-dozen more mainstream stages.Aniqua Chatman, left, and Chinyelu Mwaafrika wait backstage for their cue.Maddie McGarvey for The New York TimesHis shows included Terrence McNally’s exploration of a group of gay men, “Love! Valour! Compassion!” — which attracted picketers — “Human Rites,” by Seth Rozin, which deals with female circumcision, and offbeat musicals like “Urinetown” and “Avenue Q.”“His personal mission was to bring diverse work to Indianapolis, because he firmly believed we deserved that, too,” Schwartz said.She and Fonseca had been a team since 2016, when he hired her at the Phoenix as a summer intern while she was working on her master’s degree in arts administration at the University of Oregon — one of the few paid internships available in the industry, she said.And when he left the Phoenix in 2018 after 35 years following a dispute with the board, she became a collaborator on his next venture: the Fonseca Theater Company, a grass-roots theater in a working-class neighborhood that champions work by writers of color. The theater, which has an annual budget of roughly $180,000, still often plays to majority-white audiences, though Schwartz said the share of people of color who attend is growing.Fonseca envisioned one day creating a community center in the building next door, with a coffee shop, free Wi-Fi, space for classes and gatherings, and laundry and shower facilities open to anyone.“He really wanted to give the neighborhood a seat at the table,” said Schwartz, who said 10 percent of the company’s audience members come from the surrounding Haughville, Hawthorne, Stringtown and WeCare communities.Jordan Flores Schwartz, who had been mentored by Bryan Fonseca, has now taken over as the theater’s producing director.Maddie McGarvey for The New York TimesFonseca became one of the first producers in the city to resume performances during the coronavirus pandemic last July, when he staged a socially distanced production of Idris Goodwin’s “Hype Man: A Break Beat Play,” which centers on the police shooting of an unarmed young Black man, in the theater’s parking lot.“He always believed theater had the power to unite people,” Schwartz told The New York Times last summer. “He wanted to be part of the conversation around the Black Lives Matter protests.”Fonseca took precautions, such as requiring masks and situating actors and audience members six feet apart, but “Hype Man” was forced to close a week early after one of the actors became ill. He was tested for the virus, but the theater declined to divulge the results, citing privacy.Fonseca became sick in August, Schwartz said. He died a little over a month later, a few weeks after the theater wrapped a second production, Tearrance Arvelle Chisholm’s “Hooded, or Being Black for Dummies.” (She said it was unclear how he contracted the virus.)He had already planned for the theater to take a hiatus, a decision that proved prescient when Schwartz, who had just begun her master’s program, took on the role of interim producing director.Josiah McCruiston, whose character often serves as comic relief, onstage in the production.Maddie McGarvey for The New York TimesBut there was never a question as to whether the theater would continue after his death, maintained Schwartz, who is Mexican-American and Jewish and has long worked in community and children’s bilingual theater.She began plotting a four-show outdoor season of ambitious plays by Quiara Alegria Hudes, Fernanda Coppel and Carla Ching, all women of color. One script in particular jumped out at her — Lynett’s “Apologies,” a play she’d first read in March 2020, and which seemed newly relevant in light of the racial justice protests and reckoning in the theater industry.The play is set after a second Civil War, in the fictional world of Bronx Bay, an all-Black state devoted to protecting “Blackness.” Five residents debate what makes someone Black enough to live in their community — conversations that allow Lynett to emphasize that Blackness is not a monolithic experience.But unlike “Fairview” or “Slave Play” — two works Lynett said she admires — hers is not aimed at white viewers. It’s about finding Black joy, she said in a video discussion hosted by the theater.“What does it mean to be a Black woman who’s sexually assaulted onstage every night in front of a mostly white audience?” she added. “I wanted to write a play that really avoided the trauma.”Just Getting StartedIn April, the theater’s board voted to promote Schwartz to full-fledged producing director, Fonseca’s former role. And the company has raised about half of the $500,000 it needs to create the community center, which it hopes to begin construction on by the fall.But the biggest milestone has already been achieved: returning to the stage.The play’s ending, according to the script, is the most important part. It calls for the five actors to each answer the question, as themselves: “What does Blackness mean to you?”On Friday night, Josiah McCruiston, whose character, Izaak, often supplies comic relief, picked up one of the blocks, labeled “Monolith,” and carried it to the center of the stage.Audience members watching the production, which is being staged outdoors.Maddie McGarvey for The New York Times“I feel this play helps me scream at the top of my lungs about who I am,” he said. “That because I’m Black, I have a story, that I am rich, complex and deep. But I still think some white eyes will say I was funny.”Aniqua Chatman, another actor, said, “I can say ‘Blackness is not a monolith,’ but I still feel the white stares looking at me.”Then Chinyelu Mwaafrika said, “White people, raise your hands.” Thirty hands went up.“I say racism, you say sorry,” he said. “Racism.”“Sorry.”“Racism.”“Sorry.”“Racism.”“Sorry.”With that, the play ended, and the chorus was replaced by applause. More