The Paris Letter [C]

This play is a really good concept, but it is not well executed. The underlying idea is clever enough, and the huge (and depressing) philosophies that the author is struggling with are important, but he never seems to quite get it right. The cast/direction doesn't help much. Many of the characters seem to want to act like caricatures of their parts - especially the narrator and the psychiatrist. The narrator is especially problematic for me as he seems to slip in and out of this comic book mode. Sometimes (usually when he is interacting with others) he is a real person, and at other times (when he's narrating) he is an over the top foppish parody of a real person.

Despite all these complaints, there's really a lot to think about here. You may well find yourself reviewing the play's ideas/themes for several days - I did. So, I didn't particularly like it, but I'm really glad I went. ???

Richard III [A]

This is 'Shakespeare in the Park(ing Lot)'. It's a free production of "Richard III" done outdoors in a lower east side parking lot, with all the noise and distractions that the locale implies. Even so, the performance overcomes the environment - or, more precisely, feeds on those distractions and shines through. The cast is uneven, but the good ones carry the show, and the lesser ones aren't fatal.

I'm not a huge fan of "Richard III", but I really liked this production. It emphasizes what little humor there is, and allows Shakespeare's irony to shine.

The play has been trimmed (some might say abridged) to 1:45 with no intermission.