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A CurtainUp Review
A Beautiful Day In November On The Banks Of The Greatest Of The Great Lakes
By Elyse Sommer
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"I wanted to write a play without stage directions, and I wanted to write a play about a family, and I wanted to turn the standard models of the American Family Play inside out: no couch--no furniture!, no props, no deep dark family secrets, no sitting down. Just: the trouble of doing something together, and doing that thing well, or as well as you can." — Kate Benson explaining her intentions to Caroline V. McGraw when A Beautiful Day In November. . . previewed at New Georges' Jam on Toast last year. |
Gerry Bamman, Mia Katigbak, Nina Hellman, Brooke Ishibash
i, Heather Alicia Simms,
Jessica Almasy, Christian Felix (photo: Heather Phelps-Lipton)
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I was willing to buy into this experimental approach, especially since the cast included excellent pros like Gerry Bamman, Nina Hellman and Mia Katigbak. I squashed the little warning flag about the quirky names given to the various Wembly family members (Cheesecake, Cherry Pie, Trifle-- really!!). But while it's a clever conceit, I'm sorry to report that vive la difference turns out to be different but far from better. Ms. Benson's deserves praise for her effort to experiment with a departure of the tried and true family play which invariably has at least one big scene around a dining room table. But the potentially funny metaphorical sports framework failw to keep even the short 80 minutes seem long.
In Thornton Wilder's iconic Our Town, meals that are prepared without props are part of what happens in Grover's Corners, but not all. Here, however, the stylized choreography dominates and ultimately makes for characters who are cartoons rather than real people. The abstract movements quickly become tiresome and no amount of verbal to do over the giblet gravy can make this a really tasty theatrical meal.
Rather than echo the pretentiously unwieldy length of the title I'll heed one of Ms. Benson's stage directions about pacing. The director and actors are urged to make things move "basketball fast" because "we're all going to die soon and there is no time to waste." And so, rather than waste any more time quibbling, I''ll sign off with the hope that Women's Project Theater will get back to the excellence that has marked so many of its past works.
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A Beautiful Day in November On The Banks Of The Greatest Of The Great Lakes Playwright: Kate Benson Director: Lee Sunday Evans City Center Stage 2 New Georges in association with Women's Project Theater. Cast: Jessica Almasy, Gerry Bamman, Christian Felix, Nina Hellman, Brooke Ishibashi, Mia Katigbak, Kristine Haruna Lee, Hubert Point-Du Jour, Heather Alicia Simms,Ben Williams Set Design by Sara C. Walsh Lighting Design by Barbara Samuels Sound Design by Brandon Wolcott Stage Manager: Jamie Van Dyke Women's Project Theater and New Georges at New York City Center Stage II, 131 West 55th Street From 1/12/15; opening 1/15/15; closing 2/07/15 7:30pm Tuesday-Friday, 2:30pm & 7:30pm Saturday, 2:30pm Sunday Reviewed by Elyse Sommer at 1/13/15 press preview |
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