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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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      Taiwan Was a Covid Haven for Performers. Then Cases Flared.

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      One of the few places where performances continued steadily for much of the pandemic has had to shut down theaters just as they are reopening elsewhere.TAIPEI, Taiwan — For much of the past year, Taiwan has been a sanctuary for performing artists, the rare almost-Covid-free place where audiences could cram into concert halls to hear live music and sip coffee together at intermission.The island played host to modern dance festivals, full-fledged productions of “La Traviata” and “The Phantom of the Opera,” and a recital of Bach’s cello suites by Yo-Yo Ma, which was attended by more than 4,000 people.But a recent surge in cases — Taiwan’s worst outbreak since the start of the pandemic — has brought a halt to cultural life on the island, forcing performing arts centers, concert halls and museums to shutter just as they are coming back to life in the rest of the world.Performers from Taiwan and abroad have been caught in the middle, grappling with lost income and an avalanche of canceled engagements.“Everything blew up,” said the American clarinetist Charles Neidich, who recently made the 7,781-mile trip from New York to Taipei only to have his first live performance in more than 400 days canceled.Neidich, who had been engaged to play a clarinet concerto by the American composer John Corigliano with the Taipei Symphony Orchestra, endured two weeks of hotel quarantine, one of the strict measures that had helped Taiwan tame the virus. Then Taipei went into a state of semi-lockdown last week, so he packed up and went home.“This is my non-adventure,” he said.The outbreak, coming as the government’s vaccination program has gotten off to a slow start, is forcing Taipei to shut down just as other cities around the world are finally reopening. In London, the theaters of the West End brought up their curtains last week. Officials in New York announced that Radio City Music Hall would soon allow full capacity, maskless crowds back inside, as long as they have been vaccinated.The American clarinetist Charles Neidich flew from New York to Taipei to give his first live performance in more than a year, but the concert was canceled.I-Hwa Cheng for The New York TimesTaiwan’s experience is a reminder of the ongoing uncertainty of life in the pandemic, the threat posed by the virus and its power to upset even the most carefully crafted of plans. Semi-staged performances of Verdi’s “Falstaff” have been called off. The French musical “Notre Dame de Paris” has been postponed.Even though the number of cases in Taiwan is low compared with many parts of the world — 283 cases were reported on Tuesday, fewer than in New York City — the authorities are doubling down on restrictions, hoping that lockdowns can bring the virus under control within weeks or months as Taiwan tries to speed its lumbering vaccine rollout.Artists are optimistic that concerts, dances, plays and museum exhibitions will soon return.“This is a place used to earthquakes and typhoons,” said Lin Hwai-min, the founder of Cloud Gate Dance Theater, a contemporary dance troupe, which has delayed performances until later in the summer. “The crisis comes, you deal with it and you come back to restore everything.”Over the past year Cloud Gate has suffered financially from the cancellations of its planned tours to the United States and Europe. But with infections near zero in Taiwan and residents hungry for entertainment, the company has offset those losses with strong demand at home, premiering new works before sold-out crowds.“It used to be so surreal that we could perform,” Lin said. “Now for the first time we are confronting the reality of the virus, like our peers in Western countries.”Taiwan’s closing of its borders early in the pandemic and its strict public health measures, including mask mandates and extensive contact tracing, turned the island of 23.5 million into a coronavirus success story. But the emergence of more contagious variants in recent months, a relaxation of quarantine rules and a vaccine shortage gave the virus an opening.Before that, the lack of widespread transmission in Taiwan made it easier for performance venues to operate near full capacity. And theaters and concert halls enforced tough public health measures that have been adjusted depending on the number of confirmed cases.At many venues, attendees were required to provide their names and phone numbers to be used for tracing in case of an outbreak. Masks and temperature checks were required. Some concert halls barred the selling of food and drinks. Seats at some spaces were staggered to resemble flowers, in an arrangement that came to be known in Taiwan as “plum blossom seating.”Despite the vigilance, there were occasional scares. More than a hundred people were forced to quarantine in March of last year after coming into contact with the Australian composer Brett Dean, who tested positive for the virus after performing in Taiwan. The incident was front-page news in Taiwan, with some people fuming that Dean — whose “Hamlet” is scheduled at the Metropolitan Opera in New York next season — had been allowed to perform even though he had a cough.Lydia Kuo, the executive director of the National Symphony Orchestra, which collaborated with Dean, said the scare taught the orchestra the importance of maintaining strict health measures even when infections were near zero.“We were facing an unknown enemy,” she said. “We were lucky to face this reality very early.”Taiwan’s still-active cultural scene attracted talent from around the world over the past year when many artists were without stable work and confined at home. There were visits by the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, the German organist Felix Hell, and Ma, the renowned cellist, who chartered a flight to the island for a tour in November.Many musicians with roots in Taiwan have also returned, some for an extended visit. Ray Chen, a violinist, came back in August at the urging of his family and has taken part in about 20 live concerts, master classes and music education outreach events since then. He said he was struck by the care people showed toward one another and the widespread adherence to public health rules, even when Taiwan went months without any reported infections.“Everyone is willing to play a part,” Chen said. “Everyone values life.”Taiwan’s strict approach has not been popular in all corners of the artistic world. After the outbreak this month, some artists questioned the government’s decision to close performance venues, concerned that it would hurt performers’ income.Lang Tsu-yun, a Taiwanese actress who leads a theater troupe, provoked controversy when she suggested, in a sharply worded Facebook post, that the restrictions would be devastating to arts groups.“Do you know how long we rehearse?” Lang wrote. “Do you know how many of us are working hard?” (After coming under criticism for her comments, Lang deleted the post and apologized.)A masked crowd at a performance at the National Concert Hall in Taipei in November, when low numbers of coronavirus cases allowed for a virtually normal cultural life.Ann Wang/ReutersThe government has provided tens of millions of dollars in subsidies to arts groups during the pandemic, but some performers say the grants have not been enough to offset losses. Officials say restrictions on large gatherings are necessary to curb the rising rate of infections.But for visiting performers caught in the middle of the latest surge, the experience has been frustrating.The violinist Cho-Liang Lin was excited to arrive in Taiwan last month, his third trip to the island since the start of the pandemic. After livestreaming for months and playing in empty halls in the United States, where he lives, he had come to relish the energy of live performances in Taiwan, where he was born, despite the mandatory quarantine.Then this month, Lin’s concert with the Taipei Symphony Orchestra, with which he was going to perform Korngold’s Violin Concerto, was canceled two hours after his first rehearsal. He was also forced to cancel a summer festival for young musicians that he leads in Taipei. He was devastated, going out with friends to drink Scotch.“All that work and waiting around went for nothing,” said Lin, who returned home to Houston last week. “I can’t help but notice the irony here. The model citizen of the world now has become a bit of a problem child.”Amy Chang Chien contributed reporting. More

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      A ‘Hamilton’ Star Discovers Lunatic Comedy With ‘Girls5eva’

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      Renée Elise Goldsberry plays a delusional diva reuniting a girl group in a music biz satire executive produced by Tina Fey. It’s her midcareer moment.It could have happened in her early 20s, fresh from college, with a face like a cherub and lungs like a hurricane, when she booked an understudy role in a Broadway-bound show that never arrived. Or 10 years later, when she moved to Los Angeles and sang with a jazz ensemble. Or five years after that, back in New York for a run on “One Life to Live,” or in the decade following, spent bounding between plays and short TV stints. 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

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      Broadway Restart Accelerates as ‘Hadestown’ Plans Its Return

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      This Tony Award-winning musical has chosen the earliest reopening date of any thus far: The curtain is to go up on Sept. 2.“Hadestown,” the last show to win a Tony Award for best musical before the coronavirus pandemic shut down the theater industry, announced Monday that it is planning to resume performances on Sept. 2, nearly two weeks before any other Broadway shows have set their reopening date.The show’s producers said they had consulted with the office of Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo as well as the Broadway League on their plan. They said tickets would go on sale June 11.“One of the themes of the show is imagining how the world could be, and we think it’s important to bring that hope and optimism to Broadway in this moment,” said Mara Isaacs, one of the show’s lead producers. She said that “Hadestown” wanted to open in early September for logistical reasons — the creative team is juggling the Broadway reopening with a new production in Korea and a North American tour — but also because “we felt we had a responsibility to get people back to work as quickly as possible.”Broadway’s 41 theaters have been closed since March 12, 2020, and until now the earliest resumption date has been Sept. 14, a date chosen by three juggernauts, “Wicked,” “The Lion King” and “Hamilton,” for a group reopening. Two other shows, the long-running revival of “Chicago” and “Lackawanna Blues,” a solo play by Ruben Santiago-Hudson, are also planning to start performances that night.It is possible that plans by “Hadestown” to start earlier will prompt other producers in New York to reconsider their own scheduling. Virus-related restrictions in the city have been easing in recent weeks, although it remains unclear when the tourist market that has in recent years been a key part of the Broadway economy will rebound.Isaacs said she would be fine if other shows opted to open early as well. “This is not about being first,” she said. “Every producer has to look at what is in the best interests of their show.”“Hadestown,” written by the singer-songwriter Anaïs Mitchell, is a contemporary adaptation of the ancient myth of Orpheus and Eurydice. The musical won eight Tony Awards, including the best musical prize, as well as one for Mitchell’s score, and one for the director, Rachel Chavkin.The show began performances in the spring of 2019, and had been seen by 371,000 people before the shutdown; the producers said they believe there remains a large potential audience in Greater New York of theater lovers who had not seen “Hadestown” before the pandemic, as well as a base of superfans who are eager to see it again.Twenty-seven shows have now announced dates during the 2021-22 Broadway season. Among them: “Girl from the North Country,” a musical featuring the songs of Bob Dylan that opened just a week before theaters shut down. The producers of that musical said Monday, which is Dylan’s 80th birthday, that they would resume performances Oct. 13.Broadway producers are planning to open their shows at full capacity, meaning no social distancing, and with mandatory masks, although it is unclear how changing conditions in the country might affect that. Thus far no shows are planning to require patrons to show proof of vaccination, but “Hamilton” has said it expects to mandate vaccinations for cast and crew.The “Hadestown” announcement advises that “protocols may include mask enforcement, increased cleaning and ventilation/filtration enhancements, vaccination or negative test verification.” Isaacs said it was too soon to be more specific.“If there’s one thing we’ve learned, it’s that things will likely change between now and when we reopen, so it’s not smart to make a decision today about what protocols will be required in September,” she said. “We will do whatever science and public health officials tell us is appropriate.” More

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      ‘This American Wife’ Review: Wives Out, Knives Out

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      The play is a wild genre-bending parody of, and homage to, “The Real Housewives” franchise.I hate reality TV. It’s not the annoying personalities or the absurd playground-style fights or the drama that belies a fundamental lack of substance. Nope, it’s the assertion that it isn’t another fabricated product but action that’s “real.” It’s even in the name: “The Real World” or “The Real Housewives” — with the implicit assumption that life can be as curated as, say, a filmed brunch gathering of pampered celebrity wives.But maybe I’m being too hard on these women, who exist in something between an anthropological experiment and the theater. Yes, theater, the realm where we find ourselves in “This American Wife,” by FourthWall Theatrical. It’s a wild parody of, and homage to, “The Real Housewives” franchise.If you saw Michael Breslin and Patrick Foley’s “Circle Jerk,” a bonkers queer fable on privilege and cancel culture for the internet age, you already have a sense of the kind of satirical comedy and ambition that defines “This American Wife.” Jeremy O. Harris, of “Slave Play,” is also a producer.In the 90-minute production, Breslin, Foley and Jakeem Dante Powell, who are real-life “Housewives” superfans, appear as fictionalized versions of themselves. They each end up in a Long Island mansion while recounting their love for the franchise.Once there, the actors suddenly dip into the personas of the housewives as easily as one would slip into a royal blue satin dress with fringed sleeves — or, you know, whatever you have lying around.Breslin, Foley and Powell act out scenes taken directly from the series, which are sometimes intercut into the production. At certain points the actors take charge of the cameras themselves, interviewing one another in a style that mimics the confession-room reveals of reality TV but also the voyeuristic false intimacy of porn.The production, conceived and written by Breslin and Foley, eventually spins out into a playful music video and then an improvised reunion-style segment where the actors argue and respond, as “Housewives”-esque caricatures of themselves, to questions from fans on Twitter. Throughout, an anonymous woman with a claw-like manicure and long wavy bottle-blonde hair appears in white chunky heels through the mansion — she’s like an apparition summoned from the inherited wealth of Beverly Hills, the splashy opulence of runway fashion and Bravo TV’s bulging wallet.The performers’ lips are thoroughly glossed for their close-ups.Nina Goodheart“This American Wife,” directed by Rory Pelsue (“Circle Jerk”) with mad intensity and mindful allusions to gay stereotypes and internet culture, channels “Housewives” first and foremost with its setting. The production and props designer Stephanie Osin Cohen bedazzles an already palatial Long Island mansion in Lake Success, complete with a museum-worthy collection of framed Pomeranian portraits.Like Cohen, who interrupts the upscale creams and off-whites of the décor with eruptions of colors, the costume designer, Cole McCarty, also walks the fine line between subtle and bold hues. He clothes the actors in sheer blouses and textured blazers before pulling out the extravagant party gowns and statement hats. Tommy Kurzman, the hair, wig and makeup designer, has the performers’ eyelashes ecstatically curled and lips thoroughly glossed for their close-ups.The superficial glamour of “This American Wife” is alluring, the kind of eye candy a superfan might enjoy on the show. Above all that’s Breslin, Foley and Powell embodying — with an uncanny level of precision — the various housewives. The gestures and affectations aren’t just acts of glorified mimicry, however; they are a statement on the Venn diagram of gay male tropes and a particular brand of performance by women. And so there are snapped heads and sashays and the glorious theatrics of Powell as Kenya Moore (“The Real Housewives of Atlanta”), saucily declaring himself “‘Gone With the Wind’ fabulous.” (Powell, as a Black man, also brings attention to the racial element of the franchise, which features mostly white women, but the script doesn’t offer a deeper analysis.)That would have already been a comedic feat for the three, but much of the production is also improvised — and so well that it’s hard to differentiate. The last scene, a feisty interview segment, contains such a juicy rapid-fire argument between Foley’s character and Powell’s that it might have been an actual scrap between two catty acquaintances. (Shout out to Powell’s “I could make avocado toast out of you,” the Louis Vuitton of retorts.)Though I probably risk snappy retribution here, seeing how thoroughly Foley, brandishing my colleague Jesse Green’s book “The Velveteen Father,” roasted him (bitingly and perhaps cruelly), I, like Vicki, Brandi, Danielle, Tamra and Porsha, must not back down.Because despite its vicious charms, “This American Wife” quickly becomes exhausting. Since the production is split into separate movements, the two longest of which are primarily Breslin, Foley and Powell recreating scenes from the franchise, the novelty soon wears off. And though the production is so consciously playing with the artifice of the form, each performer has a moment of vulnerability when he — or at least his autofictional persona — reveals a tragic fact or experience. But when Breslin and Foley separately share the same tragic assault story — experienced by one and appropriated by the other — the gross fabrication casts a shadow of doubt over everything.In one scene, Powell asks Breslin (who can shed white woman tears at the blink of an eye), “What’s your reality?” I had a similar question.For most of “This American Wife” I was onboard but occasionally felt left out of the joke, especially in the improvised parts that could feasibly be sincere. The same is true of the music video segment: The show often feels so seduced by its own eccentric performances that it loses track of its point.What is missing here, which was well-established in “Circle Jerk,” is a more coherent commentary on queerness and reality show divas.Conceptually and technically, “This American Wife” has much to offer, especially in the way it uses humor to seriously consider lowbrow reality TV as an art form that could be on the same level as the highbrow artifice of theater. And for “Housewives” apologists, it’s definitely a must-see.For viewers like me, who prefer their fiction with less spray tans and Prada, these housewives can offer some laughs, but not enough. If I have to watch reality TV, I’d rather look elsewhere — anyone know if “Chopped” is on tonight?This American WifeThrough June 6; thisamericanwife.live. More

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      in Theater

      Three Dramas Explore the Margins of the Digital Form

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      Talking dogs, green screen thrillers and gold turtles: Online productions, intended as a stopgap, are testing the boundaries of what makes theater theater.Puppets can’t cry. But they can make people cry.Or at least exceptionally well-made and well-voiced ones, like those in “Vancouver” by Ralph B. Peña, can. They create a new path for emotion by blocking access to paths that have become too familiar.“Vancouver” is among the many productions that, at this late date in the era of remote playgoing, are still exploring the ways artists can engage audiences theatrically even when what they’re offering is basically film. The gorgeously carved humanoids (and canines) in “Vancouver” — like the uncanny green screens in the workplace drama “Data” and the deliberately funky video in “The Sprezzaturameron” — are just some of the de-cinematizing strategies I’ve recently experienced online. As audiences creep out of their shells, these three got me thinking about the future of the digital form — and also the live one.But first they got me thinking about their particular lives and concerns. In “Vancouver,” a production of Ma-Yi Theater and the Chicago International Puppet Theater Festival, the subject seems to be the unhappiness of displacement. For a Japanese man named Hiro, his white wife, Amy, and their 19-year-old daughter, Ashley, that unhappiness is a knot: No one place — certainly not Vancouver, Wash., where they live — can feel like home to them all. The only reasonably content creature in the ménage is Lucky, their scraggly poodle.That Lucky talks — lovingly, directly and frequently about bacon — is a bit of absurdity you easily accept within the conventions of puppet drama. (Like all the puppets, he’s gorgeously made; the puppetry director is Tom Lee.)The other characters are more circumspect with their needs. Hiro (voiced by James Yaegashi) often speaks in anguished interior monologue. Amy (Cindy Cheung) drinks herself to sleep most nights in a pile of partly eaten sunflower seeds. Both are exhausted from managing the needs of their daughter, Ashley (Shannon Tyo), a 19-year-old whose Asperger’s diagnosis makes her feel like an alien in her own world. Washing her hair and keeping a job are challenges for her; only video games, amusingly rendered in the most analog way imaginable, are not.If “Vancouver” is fundamentally about “a mixed-race Asian American family dealing with racial aggressions” — as Peña, who also directed, has said — we see that only glancingly during its 35 minutes. Early on, Ashley tosses off the news that the “weird kid” across the street has called her family “radioactive from the bombs” once dropped on Japan. Later, as if linking varieties of hatred, the play finds Ashley at a bus stop, where someone throws a Chinese takeout food carton at her, shouting, “weirdo.”Otherwise, the subject of race is buried beneath the family’s many other problems, where, like some underground buildup of energy, it accumulates an almost tectonic power. That’s a paradox common to all art forms — great suppression creates great force — but here, the feeling is intensified by the paradox of the puppets. Their souls seem more accessible than human souls do because their eyes are made of glass.Jake Berne, left, and Cheech Manohar in Matthew Libby’s snappy drama “Data.” The production was filmed using green screen technology.via Alliance TheaterIn those eyes, you can see how the themes of “Vancouver” are linked by the problem of conditional love: how it destabilizes children, depresses adults and, writ large, victimizes whole segments of society. Even Lucky (Daniel K. Isaac) suffers when it turns out that he too is provisional.That moment when people realize how precariously they claim space in the world is a turning point in “Data,” produced by the Alliance Theater and this year’s winner of the Alliance/Kendeda competition for playwrights in graduate school. In this case, the playwright, Matthew Libby, had the requisite background not only in drama but also in high-tech, which is both the subject of the play and the way it got rescued when the pandemic foreclosed on a live, staged production.The tech also provides a neat visual counterpoint to the story of Maneesh (Cheech Manohar), a programmer at a data-mining company called Athena. When he is asked to transfer to a unit developing a secret algorithm for predicting terrorist acts against the United States government, Maneesh is forced to weigh the benefits to himself against the potential harm to others. The others are immigrants — including Maneesh’s own parents.If that’s too neat of a setup, it’s hardly science fiction; real-world cases involving data-mining behemoths like Palantir and Cambridge Analytica have raised similar concerns. In any case, the payoff is exciting, in an Aaron Sorkin meets Michael Lewis way. As directed by Susan V. Booth, the Alliance’s artistic director, the production leaps headlong past its problems. Certainly its 90 minutes of ticktock action, forwarded in snappy dialogue between Maneesh and two colleagues — one principled (Clare Latham) and one not (Jake Berne) — has the feel of a well-paced television procedural.Better than television, though, is the disorienting effect of the green screen technology, which allows the actors, who were actually 10 to 20 feet apart while filming, to appear together, even in endless games of table tennis. As you wonder how the effect was achieved you are brought up short by the contrast with the content: What does it mean when ethics becomes a kind of trick and a game?A giant gilded turtle in “The Sprezzaturameron,” a multimedia video from Tei Blow and Sean McElroy in which ethics are a subject of satire.via Baryshnikov Arts Center“The Sprezzaturameron” goes further: In its world, ethics are a subject of satire. This multimedia “video docudrama” from Tei Blow and Sean McElroy, who write and perform as Royal Osiris Karaoke Ensemble, is so high concept that its content seemed to vaporize as I stared at its bizarre images and tried to decipher its opaque dialogue. From what I could make out, it’s about documentarians in a perfected future world who look back on our highly imperfect one to see how artists in these backward years behaved.Apparently, they behaved badly; most of the 30-minute show’s action consists of attempts by Blow and McElroy — dressed in bad wigs, gold short-shorts and flowing white tunics — to craft apologies for unspecified crimes against wokeness. But as much as I am generally allergic to deliberately obscure avant-gardism, the kind that sniffs at anyone who can’t unpack the meaning of a portmanteau title composed of “sprezzatura” and “Decameron,” I found something usefully troubling, and specifically theatrical, about this commission from the Baryshnikov Arts Center.What makes it theatrical is the deliberate roughing up of the video interface; you can’t mistake it (as you likewise can’t mistake “Vancouver” or “Data”) for film. What makes it troubling is its equal opportunity carping at both cancel culture and the false apologetics that try to outwit it. It’s useful to have that conversation, or whatever “The Sprezzaturameron” is, in the air.At any rate, its image of the art world as a taffy-stretched Parthenon teetering on the back of a giant gilded turtle is surely one I’ll think of the next time a genius is felled by revelations of shocking misdeeds everyone knew about anyway.It is not an unreasonable question to ask whether the live arts, under the weight of the pandemic but also their own long-festering inequities, are expanding or, like that turtle, exploding — and which would be a better thing. Right now, my more pressing concern is whether experiments like these, enforced by the shutdown, will continue after the reopening.I hope so: By exploring the wilds of what theater can be without theaters, virtual works clear a path toward continued innovation and growth of the form. No need to apologize for that.VancouverThrough May 31; ma-yistudios.comDataExtended through June 6; alliancetheatre.orgThe SprezzaturameronThrough May 31; digital.bacnyc.org More