New York theatre

New York, New York 2009 – Seven Days of Theatre, Food and Dance:  PART  I

New York, New York 2009 – Seven Days of Theatre, Food and Dance:  PART  II

Friday September 11th

Last night I saw Yasmin Reza's play, God of Carnage, with Jeff  Daniels, Hope Davis, James Gandolfino and Marcia Gay Harden.

Tomorrow I am seeing the Keith Huff' play, with Daniel Craig and Hugh Jackman, called A Steady Rain. And how appropriate. This morning I woke to see a heavy rain pelting against the window. Up till now the weather has been wonderful but I guess New York has finally realized that it's not summer any  more.

I had originally planned to wander around among the stores in SOHO but without any rain gear and boots I did not feel like venturing out into the wet.  I don't really have to go out until 2 to get uptown for my dance class. The weather forecast predicts light rain tomorrow morning , clearing for Sunday and nice on Monday- but  on Monday I will be on my way home to Vancouver.  

Although Mike had given me an umbrella, I really did not have suitable rain gear with me and by the time I got to the studio for my 3 pm lesson I was soaked. I changed out of my damp jeans into a dance dress and put on my shoes. I was delighted to find that my feet had finally shrunk back to size 4.5.

 I had arranged to meet Mike later at the studio for his regular lesson and then we were going out for supper. But after my lesson it was still raining so hard that rather than venture out to window shop I just settled down with my notebooks and my lap top and caught up with my writing.

When Mike arrived, his teacher, Oleksandra was running a few minutes late so we had time to chat. We decided we would have a lesson together so we worked on some chacha, and leads and follows. it was almost half past eight  by the time the class was over and I changed back into my damp jeans and other shoes. I thanked Yuriy for the lessons - I really enjoyed them - and said goodbye to both of them.

It was still raining when Mike and I left the studio so we decided  to get a cab down to the East Village.

For dinner that evening, Mike had planned to take me to one of the typical new restaurants that have opened up in the re-gentrified East Village.  The area attracts a lot of young people, and the bars and restaurants are humming, high energy places.

But when we made our reservation for Perbacco, the hot new Italian restaurant on E 4th Street, between Aves. A and B,  Mike and I failed to take a few factors into account.

Firstly eating dinner at 9 would mean eating three hours later than my usual dinner time, so I was really hungry and quite tired from 3 hours of dance.  Secondly what in  Mike's view is vibrant and high energy, to me as  loud and crowded.

       After waiting quite a few minutes for a table we were seated at a rather small table against the wall. There were  tables of four on either side of us and little space between us. I felt crowded and uncomfortable. The lighting was very low - ambiance I suppose -but I simply could not read the menu in the poor lighting. So I felt distinctly grumpy - not my usual state at all

But worse was to come. Mike decided we needed a good bottle of red wine and we got a nice 2006 Montepulciano.  After the waiter had just filled my glass, in an attempt to move my purse to make more room, I managed to knock my glass of red wine onto the floor. Glass shattered, expensive wine on the floor, and I was feeling like an clumsy idiot. I actually can't remember when I ever spilled a glass of wine in a restaurant before. Not in the last thirty years!

What to do? I wanted to have a nice relaxed dinner with Mike so we could both unwind, and discuss all the theater I had seen and my restaurant experiences. And here I was instead feeling irritable  and edgy.

There was only one solution.First  I rapidly drained the wine that the waiter had poured into the replacement glass. Then as a warm glow began to radiate through my body I chowed down on bread dipped in olive oil, sat back and relaxed and got Mike to read me the menu items..

Gradually the alcohol soothed my jangled neurons, and I settled down to enjoy the meal. We ended up having a very pleasant meal.

Emily by Chris Cragin
Directed by Steve Day
Firebone Theater
Theatre Row, 42nd St, NY
September 13, 2009
 

New York, NY:  I had only the vaguest knowledge about the life of Emily Dickinson, who posthumously came to be  considered one of America's major  poets.  I knew that in her latter years she had become reclusive and eventually did not leave her house but I knew little else of her history. So I  eagerly anticipated my visit to Theatre Row to see this new play by emerging playwright, Chris Cragin.

Theatre Row is a great asset for smaller theatre companies.  It houses 5 theatres ranging in seating capacity from 55 to 199 seats. I saw Ascension, an excellent production, in The Lion on my last visit,  and Emily is running in The Kirk. It is a long narrow  theatre that seats about 90 people and it was almost full. Nice  for a Sunday matinee of a new play.

The Retributionists by Daniel Goldfarb
Directed by Leigh Silverman
Playwrights Horizons Theatre, New York
Through September 27th, 2009

New York, NY:  The World Premiere of  The Retributionists,  a new play by Daniel Goldfarb, is presently being staged at Playwrights Horizon, which like our own much smaller Vancouver Playwrights Theatre Centre, is dedicated to supporting and developing playwrights and their works.  The production offically opens Monday, September 14 when I will be back in Vancouver,  but I managed to catch it in preview. Goldfarb, who is originally from Toronto, obtained a BFA and MFA from NYU, and now lives in New York and teaches at NYU.

Tuesday September 8th

Back in Manhattan after an awesome dance-filled Labour Day Getaway Cruise, feeling great except for my tired feet. I am ready for another 5 days of dance, theatre and fine food. First thing on the agenda will be to pick up a pair of practice shoes for the next couple of lessons. Somehow on board ship my feet must have grown  from a  dainty size 4½  to something huge. By the end of the voyage I felt like one of Cinderella's sisters,  trying to squeeze my foot into a shoe that was suddenly far too small. Oh well, no prince for me I guess.

I plan to spend the rest of the day catching up on writing, laundry and planning my feasts  for mind and body for my remaining days in the city. 

Wednesday, September 9th  - No Gill,  you're not in a Bruce Willis movie !

I guess it was bad karma for being amused at the lady in the elevator who was scared of heights but my day started out with a bang - literally. I have only two phobias - I shudder at fluttering things like butterflies and moths - and I have a mild degree of claustrophobia. While my ultimate claustrophobic nightmare would be to be in a submarine, being trapped in an elevator would come pretty close.  And guess what happened.

With my day planned out to the minute - subway to Times Square, pick up theatre tickets, visit  Worldtone dance shop, have lunch, go to dance lesson, have supper, see play - I was feeling quite the jaunty travel-writer as I waited for the elevator on the 11th floor of my building. After all I had sort of mastered the routes I needed on the New York subway, only turned in the wrong direction about 5 times, and was comfortable finding my way around the various areas of Manhattan where I needed to go. After all in theory with an intelligently numbered grid system even a directionally challenged person should hardly stray  too far wrong. But back to the elevator.

So the elevator comes, I enter and press the button for the Lobby. Doors close,  the elevators starts to move - and I hear a loud bang. The elevator drops precipitously and then stops. My stomach continues downward. Oh Oh. I look at  the indicator - it still says 11  and it is not moving.  I press the Door Open button - no response.  Something was definitely wrong but an intrepid world traveller does not panic, even a claustrophobic world traveller.

Burn The Floor
Directed and choreographed by Jason Gilkison
Longacre Theater,220 West 48th St., New York
Till January 3rd, 2010

New York, NY:  As a reviewer, I think it important that my readers know the biases and foibles that influence my writing.  So before I write another word about the show itself,  I have two confessions to make.

Number one is that there is no way I can be even remotely objective about this production. I am an unrepentant  ballroom dance addict (doing as well as watching)  and my summary of this show is that  I loved it, loved it, loved it - yup, I really really loved it.

And that leads me to confession number two.  I was so blown away by the dancing and the amazing dancers when I saw it  before leaving on my  Labour Day Getaway  dance cruise, that I used up a second slot of my precious six available  theatre time slots of this New York visit  to see Burn The Floor again. This time I saw it with my son who is rapidly becoming almost as addicted to ballroom dancing as I am.

A Steady Rain by Keith Huff
Directed by John Crowley
Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre,
236 West 45th St., NY
Sept 12 In preview: opening September 29th, 2009

New York, NY.  Two men seated on an otherwise empty stage - the playing space surrounded by black drapes, briefly opened to reveal tall buildings on either side of a dark alley, or briefly   lluminated to create the illusion of a forest. No props, no fancy set, nothing to draw our attention away from the two Chicago beat cops, relating the events of a summer when the rain poured incessantly and  the world as they knew it  came crashing down on them.  

A Steady Rain runs about 90 minutes without intermission, and I was mesmerized for the entire time. The play is still in preview, which started two days ago, but  Daniel Craig (Joey) and Hugh Jackman (Denny)  produced outstanding performances, worthy of Keith Huff's well crafted script.   The play was directed by John Crowley,  whose work I last saw in the 2005 Broadway production of  Martin McDonagh's The Pillowman.

Denny and Joey have been friends since childhood. Now they are  partners, patrolling the streets of Chicago and standing back to back against the enemy on the streets; drug dealers, gangster, pimps.  Sadly for them, times have changed - affirmative action  quota systems govern promotion  - words they grew up with are now considered politically incorrect or racist -  and the "enemy"  against whom they must stand together, includes their captain and the police department bureaucracy.

God of Carnage
by Yasmina Reza
Translated by Michael Hampton
Directed by Matthew Warchus
Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre, 242 W. 45th St
September 10, 2009.

New York, NY:  As I took my  premium seat, center  in the 4th row orchestra ( the only way I could get a last minute decent seat to this play), the contrast between the childlike cartoon figures of  a boy standing betweeen his mom and dad, depicted on the scrim, and the play title, God of Carnage, promised an interesting show. 

At curtain rise the symbolism was overt.  The stage set  (designer Mark Thompson), an elegant living room with art books piled high on a coffee table,  is surrounded by walls painted blood-red .  The facade of the upstage wall demarcating the  living room,  is cave-like in its appearance; a  creamy-coloured sofa and  vases of pure white tulips contrast with  the blood-red of the carpeting.

New York is one of my favorite cities – it has a unique buzz, an electric feel, that is unlike anywhere else I have visited. Each time I visit New York I feel like a humming bird, hovering just above the surface of culture and cuisine, dipping down for a taste, but never able to perch long enough to experience more than that brief and tantalizing taste.

So when the opportunity arose to combine a Ballroom Dancing Cruise with a trip to New York to visit my son, I did not think too long and hard before signing up. The dance part of the cruise was arranged by Wendy, of  Dancers at Sea, the group with which I had recently done a seven night  West Coast Dance Cruise from Los Angeles to Vancouver on the Sapphire Princess. I really enjoyed the dancing, and the fellow dancers I met from all over the US were delightful, so I figured that this four night East Coast cruise would be just as much fun. As well, this Labour Day Getaway dance cruise is on the Queen Mary 2, and I have always wanted to see what these elegant Cunard ocean liners are like.