3/28/23: How to Defend Yourself
What: NYTW presents Liliana Padilla's new work about a student-taught self-defense class in the wake of a brutal physical and sexual assault of a sorority sister.
And? Near the end of the play Nikki, whose arc from a hunched and whispering mien to a confident and jocular demeanor is shattered by an incident before class, says (and I paraphrase), "I feel like I'm just a body that can be attacked. And you know what? I am." This is the devastating gut punch of Padilla's play. We can teach all the self-defense courses we like, and some of the techniques can probably help, but at the end of the day we're still addressing the wrong problem. Instead of teaching (mostly but not exclusively) women how to not be assaulted, we need to be teaching (mostly but not exclusively) men to not assault. While I think I ultimately didn't pick up every thing this production was putting down (especially with the final sequence, a series of situations in which consent gets muddy--are these moments from the characters' lives, origin stories of their individual traumas, or just the many times in which we are bodies waiting to be attacked?), it's still for the most part a well-crafted script with an excellent cast able to articulate every unspoken nuance of interaction (extra big special shoutout to Amaya Braganza as Nikki, who absolutely steals the show). Communication, we well know, is never just verbal. (Also special nod to co-directors Padilla, Rachel Chavkin, and Steph Paul for navigating the scenes of overlapping dialog so that we catch every beat without panicking that we're missing an important moment elsewhere)
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| Ariana Mahallati, Sarah Marie Rodriguez, Talia Ryder, and Gabriela Ortega as Mojdeh, Kara, Brandi, and Diana. Photo by Joan Marcus. |
3/31/23: Bad Cinderella
What: It's, you know, Cinderella. But bad.
And? The thing is, I could probably write a lot, but how much of it would actually surprise anyone here? We know what the NY critics said (even without reading the reviews, we know what they said). We know what the TikTok folk said. The show isn't good. The lyrics are insipid, the music feels like leftovers from better ALW scores (I'll trash this all I want, but I still have a fondness for JCS and Evita). I don't think the costume designer read the script. Or watched the show. The script? It's a no from me, dawg. The basic world premise--that everyone in this kingdom is beautiful, with the sole exception of Bad Cindy and her bestie-slash-true-love Prince Sebastian--holds very little water when you take into account 1, the fact that hey, nearly every musical ensemble looks like this, so there's nothing actually new onstage; and 2, guess what the two actors playing the leads are also beautiful (I'm quietly confused that Cinderella is expositioned to not wear makeup, then shows up in distinct eye and lip makeup, but whatever). There are so many plotholes we need to treat the show for termites. Even the surprise gay romance feels so cynically tokenizing I can't enjoy it. The cast tries. It's always a treat to see Carolee Carmello and Grace McLean onstage, to hear them sing (though their duet was the point of the first audience exodus I witnessed; by intermission the entire row behind us in the mezz had emptied out).
Honestly though this wasn't even that fun to dislike. It didn't invigorate me with anger like Sam Gold's travesty of King Lear. Its biggest sin? It's just boring.
And it didn't need to be.
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| Linedy Genao as Cinderella with the male ensemble. Photo by Matthew Murphy and Evan Zimmerman. |
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