{"id":104,"date":"2023-11-27T13:00:52","date_gmt":"2023-11-27T09:30:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/theateronline.ir\/en\/?p=104"},"modified":"2023-11-28T15:33:37","modified_gmt":"2023-11-28T12:03:37","slug":"school-pictures-amusements-and-sad-boys-in-harpy-land-at-playwrights-horizons","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theateronline.ir\/en\/school-pictures-amusements-and-sad-boys-in-harpy-land-at-playwrights-horizons\/","title":{"rendered":"School Pictures, Amusements, and Sad Boys in Harpy Land at Playwrights Horizons"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Theater Online<\/a>: Rather than mount one play at its upstairs Peter J. Sharp Theater, Playwrights Horizons is presenting three solo shows in rep: Milo Cramer\u2019s School Pictures<\/em>, Ikechukwu Ufomadu\u2019s Amusements<\/em>, and Alexandra Tatarsky\u2019s Sad Boys in Harpy Land<\/em>. Even if you consider yourself allergic to solo performance, there\u2019s something in one of these three shows for you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Milo Cramer wrote and stars in School Pictures<\/em>, directed by Morgan Green, at Playwrights Horizons. (\u00a9 Chelcie Parry)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The one I keep thinking about is School Pictures, which ought to be required viewing for anyone crazy (or rich) enough to raise kids in New York City. Cramer draws on their experience working as a private tutor for some of the city\u2019s most privileged children, all of whom aspire to be admitted to an exclusive private school or one of the city\u2019s specialized public high schools (or at least their parents have that aspiration for them). For the latter, they must conquer the dreaded SHSAT, an admissions test with the power to catapult a student to elite Stuyvesant High School (a ladder to join the ranks of America\u2019s elite) or leave them to languish at a failing neighborhood school (a chute to working-class servitude). The stakes are enormous \u2014 but try convincing a hormonal teenager who hates everything.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Through 11 original songs, Cramer offers sketches of 10 pupils, taking artistic liberties with names and details to protect the innocent. There\u2019s Jade, who has a meltdown about missing flashcards. Javier doesn\u2019t think there\u2019s a point in attending his lawyer-themed summer camp since we\u2019re all going to die from climate change. Divya is terrified of incorrectly answering the essay prompt, \u201cIs Shakespeare\u2019s Othello<\/em> racist?\u201d And teenage libertarian Jason already knows everything<\/em> and contends (not irrationally) that Democrats want him to hate himself because he is white. Born with every advantage in the richest city in human history, these people have a very good chance of becoming your boss or client or landlord or congressperson some day!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The songs have a vaguely improvisational feel. Some stanzas rhyme, others do not, but all are bracingly honest. Cramer sings in a sweetly unpolished voice while playing an array of ever-larger instruments (the evening starts with a ukulele and goes from there). I worried that the morose pixie dream tutor gimmick would wear off, but it never did thanks to sharp direction from Morgan Green and the beguiling presence of Cramer, an enigmatic performer who makes you lean forward and pay attention.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Andreea Mincic\u2019s oppressive institutional scenic design (tile wall, grey carpet) offer a strong sense of place, while Taylor Lilly\u2019s guerrilla concert lighting enhances the tones established by the songs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Before the heartbreaking final two numbers, about a smart girl unlucky enough to spend her senior year (2020-21) hiding behind a blank Zoom screen, there is a brief nonmusical interlude in which Cramer lays down some statistics about education in New York City. What emerges is a clear picture of a class-sorting machine disguised as a meritocracy, lubricated by expensive private tutors and fueled by cringeworthy personal essays about overcoming adversity<\/em>. \u201cThe people with urgent stories to tell don\u2019t have the means to tell them. The people who have the means to tell stories don\u2019t have urgent stories to tell,\u201d Cramers sings. We know they are right, and wonder about the kind of people who can survive in New York City long enough to emerge with a theatrical career.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Ikechukwu Ufomadu wrote and stars in Amusements<\/em>, directed by Nemuna Ceesay, at Playwrights Horizons. (\u00a9 Chelcie Parry)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Unlike School Pictures<\/em>, Ikechukwu Ufomadu\u2019s Amusements<\/em> is aggressively apolitical, a gentle parade of dad jokes and other verbal sleights-of-hand. Shortly after his arrival onstage, he peers into the audience and asks, \u201cBy show of hands, who\u2019s here?\u201d He later slips into a decent vocal impersonation of Robert F. Kennedy, scrupulously avoiding any mention of the late Senator\u2019s son, who aspires to be our next president. This show is not about that, or anything else that might raise your blood-pressure. In the grand tradition of Waiting for Godot<\/em>, Amusements<\/em> is a play about nothing (but maybe everything). Either way, I can confidently state that Ufomadu is a much funnier writer than Samuel Beckett.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Over the course of an hour, Ufomadu tries on new accents like a kid playing dress-up, interacting with the audience in purposefully lame bits: At one point, he asks if anyone in the house needs a volunteer in an inversion of the old magic show trope. \u201cMy hobbies include enunciating and emailing my r\u00e9sum\u00e9 to various gatekeepers,\u201d he announces with a smile, perhaps unintentionally pointing back to School Pictures<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Director Nemuna Ceesay keeps the tone loose and lighthearted, with every element (Andreea Mincic\u2019s swanky bar cart set, Taylor Lilly\u2019s spot-against-red-curtain lighting, Christopher Darbassie\u2019s sound design, the underscoring of which sounds like it came from a Google search for royalty-free music) springing from the singular presence of the writer-performer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Alexandra Tatarsky wrote and stars in Sad Boys in Harpy Land<\/em>, directed by Iris McCloughan, at Playwrights Horizons. (\u00a9 Chelcie Parry)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Ufomadu has long been interested in the affable host archetype, a parasocial buddy to lull you to sleep with inoffensive jokes and inconsequential chatter. His off-off-Broadway talk show, Ike at Night<\/em>, was an earlier expression of this (here he is interviewing then Brooklyn Borough President and now Mayor Eric Adams). Amusements<\/em> represents the refinement of that idea. It escapes the surly bonds of Tischcore to touch the face of the universally absurd, and it feels like a welcome respite from all the urgent<\/em> and important<\/em> theater being created in the city. Whether he\u2019s performing a flaccid magic trick or leading you in a holiday sing-along, it\u2019s impossible not to like Ike.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Your reaction to Alexandra Tatarsky\u2019s Sad Boys in Harpy Land<\/em> is likely to be less warm-fuzzy and more head-scratchy. The 80-minute show is about the creative process, Goethe\u2019s Wilhelm Meister\u2019s Apprenticeship, <\/em>G\u00fcnter Grass\u2019s The Tin Drum<\/em>, the concept of the wandering Jew, the end of the world, and hell \u2014 and it\u2019s a clown show!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tatarsky actually achieves a decent lampoon of the American creative class, guzzling iced coffee (she drinks about a gallon over the course of the show) and wallowing in self-doubt as they pour over old texts in an attempt to ground a new work in something solid, while also justifying the expensive arts degree that led them down this path of despair (we\u2019re back to School Pictures<\/em> again). At times, the shows feels like an extended elevator pitch of itself, with more screaming and weeping than one would typically want to display before a group of potential backers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tatarsky is a dynamite performer who physically commits to every beat except for one frustrating trait: She tends to laugh at her own bits, momentarily escaping from the character she\u2019s playing or the mood she\u2019s setting to let us know that she\u2019s in on the joke and she finds it just as ridiculous as we do. That\u2019s reassuring, but deflates whatever moment she and her creative team have worked so hard to create, resulting in a show that feels like a big freeform rehearsal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That roughness extends to Iris McCloughan\u2019s production, which teems with half-baked great ideas. Some of Andreea Mincic\u2019s costumes reveal brilliance (like a long gray beard that comes in a fire hose reel), while others are merely revealing (a sheer red \u201cearthworm\u201d costume in the second half). A section that transfers the whole audience to the stage is poorly executed and takes too long, although the little backstage warren Mincic creates (\u201cmy bedroom,\u201d Tatarsky calls it) at least feels like a more appropriate environment for this kind of show \u2014 something you would typically have to take a Brooklyn-bound L train to see.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Playwrights Horizons (a \u201cshockingly respectable venue,\u201d in the words of Tatarsky) should be congratulated for handing over some of its primo real estate to this kind of challenging theater. It may not all work, but these are three voices worth hearing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Source: theatermania<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Three solo shows play in rep at the 42nd Street venue.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":109,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,17],"tags":[40],"class_list":["post-104","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-international-theater","tag-playwrights-horizons"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theateronline.ir\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theateronline.ir\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theateronline.ir\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theateronline.ir\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theateronline.ir\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=104"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/theateronline.ir\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":203,"href":"https:\/\/theateronline.ir\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104\/revisions\/203"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theateronline.ir\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/109"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theateronline.ir\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=104"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theateronline.ir\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=104"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theateronline.ir\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=104"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}