Night Is a Room **

To say that I liked this play the best of Naomi Wallace’s three plays for Signature Theatre’s residency program amounts to faint praise. The current play is set in Leeds, England where we meet Liana (Dagmara Dominczyk), an ad executive with beauty and style who is happily married to Marcus (Bill Heck), a popular history teacher in a girls’ school. In the first scene Liana is visiting the modest garden flat of Doré (Ann Dowd), a frumpy 55-year-old cleaning woman, who at age 15 was forced to give up the baby boy she bore. Doré is Marcus’s birth mother, whom Liana has tracked down at great expense, so she could unite mother and son as a surprise present for Marcus’s 40th birthday. Big mistake. The play skips the reunion and moves ahead three months. Liana, jealous at the many evenings Marcus has been spending at Doré’s, invites her to their upscale flat for tea. Their lives all change dramatically after that evening. After the big “reveal” which I will not give away here, what follows seems anti-climactic. The final scene, set six years later, spins its wheels and ends unconvincingly. The production is better than the material. All three actors, particularly the women, are excellent. Rachel Hauck’s set design is simple but evocative. Clint Ramos’s costumes are well-chosen. Bill Rauch’s direction is confident. If only the play did not peak too early and then go on too long, it would have been a more satisfying experience. Running time: 2 hours 5 minutes including intermission.

Cabaret ***

Roundabout’s revival of the revival of this classic musical is mostly successful. The Sam Mendes/Rob Marshall production has lost little of its bite. Alan Cumming’s Emcee is as compelling a presence as ever. Bill Heck makes a fine Clifford Bradshaw. The ever-reliable Danny Burstein is a natural for Herr Schultz. Linda Emond is a revelation as Fraulein Schneider — who knew she had the vocal chops to go with her fine acting? Gayle Rankin and Aaron Krohn do right by the roles of Fraulein Kost and Ernst Ludwig. The talented (and beautiful!) Kit Kat Band once again plays Kander & Ebb's terrific score sensationally and the Kit Kat Girls and Boys are easy on the eyes and light on their feet. And then, alas, there’s Michelle Williams as Sally Bowles. I can’t explain precisely why she fails — her voice is not bad — but the role somehow seems beyond her expressive range. It doesn’t sink the show, but it definitely weakens its impact. Robert Brill’s set successfully turns Studio 54 into the Kit Kat Klub. The audience was wildly enthusiastic. Running time: 2 hours 30 minutes including intermission.

Water by the Spoonful ***

(Please click on the title to see the complete review.)
Being awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Drama raised high expectations for Quiara Alegria Hudes' drama now in previews at Second Stage. By and large, these expectations were met. Even though the play did not fully win me over, I can easily understand why it was selected for the Pulitzer. Its ambition and complexity are admirable. In the first act, there are alternating scenes with two different sets of characters. A pair of Puerto Rican-American cousins, Elliot (Armando Riesco), an ex-Marine who was injured in Iraq, and Yaz (Zabryna Guevara), who teaches music at Swarthmore, are dealing with the illness of a relative. When the scene shifts, we meet Chutes and Ladders (Frankie Faison), Orangutan (Sue Jean Kim) and Fountainhead (Bill Heck) who, we gradually realize, are in a chat room for crack addicts moderated by Haikumom a/k/a Odessa (Liza Colon-Zayas). Ryan Shams also appears in three small roles. The connection between the two groups is not revealed until just before intermission. During the second act, their relationships develop and shift as they confront or avoid their personal demons. Some of these relationships are less than convincing.  Davis McCallum's assured direction handles the rapid changes of scene and characters smoothly. Neil Patel's scenic design is dominated by an abstract backdrop suggesting an aerial view of a rock garden. (Is this a trend? The set for "The Great God Pan" was also a scene from nature.) This play is the second in a trilogy in which Elliot plays a central role. I am sorry not to have seen the first one, but I look forward to catching the final one before too long. Running time: 2 hours, 15 minutes including intermission.