Profile for Ariella

Esper & co. looked more than a little starstruck in the post-show photos.

"or else he could have just benched Michael Esper and taken the whole thing over. " This is a joke right? Gideon is clearly in his 30s, and Sting is not. Yes, I was joking. I'm glad to hear Sting has taken over the role in a non-disruptive way and is a credit to the production. And I'm glad he didn't claim Esper's curtain call.

I hope they would know better than to start redistributing songs. Talk about undermining an already precariously weak book. Presumably Sting prizes the integrity of his show too much to do that... or else he could have just benched Michael Esper and taken the whole thing over.

It's unusual for a cast recording to take as long to materialize as THE SHAGGS did. FBN is still very much on track to be released within the next month and a half.

Broadway.com put up photos of today's recording session.

I agree with henrikegerman. These characters aren't pleasant to watch, but they can be fascinating. In this case, I think the independent characters are much stronger than the content/structure of the play itself, so a lot of its success rides on the performances. For me, Cera and especially Culkin made it worth watching. ArtMan - I've encountered Culkin several times this fall and liked him. He's very very sarcastic and caustic in a deadpan way, but not nasty. I can't speak to his stage door...

I thought Esper was terrific - he's a very fine actor and his choices (partly) compensated for the ho-humness of the show in general.

I thought Cyclops was fantastic - some Hedwig, some Rocky Horror mixed with Percy Shelley and Euripides. Great energy and momentum. Jane Austen's P&P was incredibly well done - probably the most "professional" looking production at NYMF this year. Some very strong performances there too.

Wait, Adam Pascal? Who's Adam Pascal? It's been that long.

Wow, I guess I'm also one of the few people who caught Ovenden.

I've met her on several occasions, and unfortunately the Lea Michele/Rachel Berry line is just as ambiguous (nonexistent) as people have speculated. And was before Rachel Berry even existed (i.e. she had a dreadful attitude problem back in the Spring Awakening Days too). I've seldom been so repulsed by snobbery, b*tchery, and self-absorption in a performer - especially such a young one. I don't usually go out of my way to bash her, but I have no patience for egos like that.

This is a non-issue. NYMF has cast plenty of non-professional, non-NY actors in the past, so "Kissless" is no exception. In fact, it's common - given that many performers and artists get their start at NYMF. If the child actors are students and the festival is being treated as a learning opportunity, it's no different from me having to cough up a couple hundred when my high school choir went to sing at Carnegie Hall. Also, the author of the blog seems to have had her show rejected by NYMF, so...

I'm not saying Brantley should have answered them. I'm just saying he should have looked a little deeper and asked himself why the characters behave the way they do instead of just attributing it to Kushner's logorrhea.

I'm disappointed in Brantley but unsurprised. Once again he failed to dig deeper into a show to discover why the show works as it does. Of course he's entitled to his opinion, but his job as critic is also to examine what the PLAYWRIGHT is trying to accomplish and assess him by that standard too. Brantley thinks the characters are essentially talking heads for all of Kushner's ideas, but they're more than that. The question he should be asking is, what is the significance of the fact that the...

I hope the reviews are positive. I think iHo is an absolutely stunning piece of writing and there is not a weak link among the stupendous cast. Fingers crossed!

Meaning...?

At the Guthrie, Kushner did speak openly about trying to craft a traditional family drama - you can feel the influences of Miller, Williams, Chekhov etc throughout.

Okay, having seen it twice in as many days here goes. I was actually surprised at how little has changed from the first staging in Minneapolis. Given Kushner's proclivities for rewriting I expected intensive overhauls, but it's quite similar and nothing has been done to address the show's structural issues. Just some modifications of dialogue and a few scenes compressed or combined. I maintain that iHo has the potential to be brilliant, genius, but it's still rough around the edges, and Kushn...

I agree with you, Namo. I thought the pre-curtain exchange was deftly humorous back in Minneapolis (and obviously it got a big laugh there). On opening night they even handed out bookmarks with Michael Esper/Eli's line "So any good theater in Minneapolis?" Namo, what did you think of the "verbal symphony" scene where everyone was talking at once?

FYI, Michael gives a very different performance in iHo, bearing no resemblance to what he did in American Idiot. Eli in iHo is one of the show's most troubling characters, so don't go in expecting an experience comparable to Idiot. That being said, he gives an extraordinary performance that demonstrates his true virtuosity as an actor.