Yira, Yira Co-Directed by Bruno Isakovic and Natisa Rajkovic Queer New York International Arts Festival at the Skirball Center for the Performing Arts at NYC February 7, 2024 Production website ππ out of 5.
Yira, Yira was more of a doc-theatre piece than an actual play. Co-directors Bruno IsakoviΔ and NataΕ‘a RajkoviΔ spent several months with four Argentinian sex workers, leading to their theater piece, Yira, Yira(Cruising, Cruising,) which reveals aspects of sex work and fights against some of the stereotypes we have.Β Performed by actual sex workers – 2 men, 1 woman, and 1 transvestite – we enter the world of sex work defined both by personal choice and circumstances. We also become aware that at the same time, we are talking about their work conditions in general, demand and supply, healthcare, and other benefits afforded to any other working person in Argentina.
Public Obscenities written and directed by Shayok Misha Chowdhury Soho Reperatory at Polonsky Shakespeare Center February 6, 2024 Production website ππ out of 5.
Public Obscenities
Public Obscenities is one very big play coming in at over three hours. Our playwright involves as many themes, histories and possibilities as he can possibly put into the space given. Truthfully, this play would be best done as a mini series where all of the pieces could fit together and find their proper resolution. The play is at once to long for the audience and two short to wrap up all that it opens up.Β The play centers around a Bangla, American student, who has returned to his native India, for a oddly defined academic project at the PhD level in which he claims to want to study English, anthropology, performance, gender and cinema – – although how that all comes together for one PhD package is a bit hard to figure out.Β
Job The Play by Max Wolf Friedlich Starring Peter Friedman & Sydney Lemmon Directed by Michael Herwitz Connelly Theater February 5, 2024 Production website ππππ out of 5.
Have you ever seen a play and then wanted to tell a friend about it – – – but you just had to bite your tongue to prevent talking about the totally unexpected, yet perfectly prepared for ending.Β This play was so damn good but the end was the very best part.Β BUT you knew that if you told them the end, then the whole thing was ruined. That’s the way I feel about seeing Job. The play was terrific, but damn, if I am not tempted to tell you how the whole thing ended . . .
Wounded by Jiggs Burgess Directed by Del Shores P3 Theatre Company February 4, 2024 Production website ππ out of 5.
Wounded is one of the rare productions at a Fringe Festival that is a traditional play with a protagonist and a forward moving plot. The story revolves around a βwoundedβ man, Carrol, who over-compensates with everything (food, affectation, gossip, babble, etc.) to make up for feeling like a nobody.Β Soon to enter is his high school classmate, Robert, equally βwoundedβ now an addict, living with the parents – – in his fifties unable to get started in life.Β The play focuses on how an unhealed past simply feasters and feasters until it damages everything its path. Β
Jonah written by Rachel Bonds Directed by Danya Taymor Roundabout Theatre Company/Laura Pels Theatre February 2, 2024 Production website πππ out of 5.
Jonah is a quiet, frightening play that covers familiar territory for contemporary theatre with a new and rather fresh approach.Β Jonah tells the story of Ana who is leading multiple story lines on stage.Β In one story line, she is a college student that is striking up a beautifully innocent and simple relationship with Jonah – a relationship almost too simple and beautiful to believe that it is actually true.Β Then 30 minutes into the play we are introduced into another world for Ana in which she is the stepchild of a highly abusive stepdad that regularly and increasingly terrorizes her step- brother.Β These scenes get more and more brutal until incest and suicide raise their ugly heads.Β
