Theater Reviews: Three Visionary Productions Create Unique Worlds in the Thorton Wilder of “The Seat of Our Pants,” The Gay Variation of Shakespeare’s “Richard II” and the Disillusioned Commune of Ex-Pats in “The Burning Cauldron of Fiery Fire”

The Seat of Our Pants (c) Joan Marcus

Theater: The Seat of Our Pants 
At the Public Theater 

I have always had a love-hate relationship with Thorton Wilder’s 1942 Pulitzer Prize-winning play, The Skin of Our Teeth, a visionary absurdist allegorical retelling of man’s existence on Earth via the Family Antrobus (Greek for human), including inventor father George (Shuler Hensley), dutiful housewife Maggie (Ruthie Ann Miles) and their children, the hotheaded and toxic Henry (Damon Daunno) and the intelligent but trend-loving Glady (Amina Faye). They also had a son named Abel who may have been Biblically killed by his brother. In the first act, we are at the couple’s home in an amalgam of the world of Ice Age cavemen and future dystopia, post-pandemic version of Excelsior, New Jersey (mixing the hungry and cold humans with dinosaurs and mammoths). The second act moves to Atlantic City, where the humans are thriving in a hedonistic world led by President Antrobus, who cares more about his reputation than the impending flood that is about to hit. And the third act takes place back in the Antrobus home after a long war, with the family now exhausted and full of despair about the future in a chaotic and broken world. For me, some of these headier academic ideas in Wilder’s premise don’t make a logical translation onto the stage, especially the religious references that are spoken of but then quickly dropped. But in 1942 (with the world still in the throes of WWII), these big flourishes and wild takes on the follies of humans, may have been too hard to resist. 

Theater Reviews: Reunions Abound With the Amusing Musical Adaptation of “Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion,” a Charming Two One-Act Musicals Called “Reunions” and the Immigrant Women of the Gripping “Queens” Who Dream of Family Reunions

Queens (c) Valerie Tarranova

Theater: Queens 
At Manhattan Theater Club 

Martyna Majok’s follow-up to her Pulitzer Prize winning Cost of Living in 2017 was queens, her play at LCT3 about immigrant women sharing a small and cramped basement in Queens, and while I liked the ambition of the play as well as giving voice to the voiceless, the play’s actual plot felt very dispersed and unwieldy. After a couple of years of tinkering, the play has returned (now with a capital Q in its title), in a confident, shorter production by Trip Cullman and an enjoyable ensemble of actors, headed by a fierce Marin Ireland as our guide into this world at Manhattan Theatre Club. Ireland plays Renia, a Polish immigrant, who in 2017, owns a house in Queens, and is confronted one day by a young and homeless Ukrainian Inna (Julia Lester), confusing her for the mother who left her when she was a little girl to find a better life in New York City. Renia offers the girl a refuge in her empty basement, the same basement she moved into when she first arrived in NYC soon after the attacks on September 11th, when immigrants were especially scrutinized. At that time, the basement was overflowing with immigrants from all corners of the world, with Belarusian Pelagiya (Brooke Bloom), the self-declared warden of the basement; Afghani Aamani (Nadine Malouf, who played the role in the original), taking on the role of mother hen as she furiously tries to obtain legal status; and Isabela (Nicole Villamil), who at the time of Renia’s arrival in 2001 is going back to Honduras, as her pursuit of the American dream has failed. Majok finds some common themes in these women’s shared plight: Many have children they left behind, and many do not have the support of a partner, so they make the big and dangerous leap to come to the U.S. for a better life. The play’s dialogue has an internal poetry to it, especially the underlying theme that to even attempt to find a better life makes them figuratively queens of their own story. 

Theater Reviews: “Liberation” Moves to Broadway With Timely Messages About Woman Rights; “Did You Eat? (밥 먹었니?)” Is a Harrowing Tale of a Korean Daughter; “Not Ready for Prime Time” Focuses on the First Set of SNL Players

Did You Eat? (밥 먹었니?) (c) Emma Zordan

Theater: Did You Eat? (밥 먹었니?) 
Ma-Yi Theater Company at the Public Theater 

Every new generation of solo storytellers, especially ones for the theater, always has a primary story that defines their narrative, whether it’s David Sedaris, John Leguizamo or Mike Birbiglia. Zoë Kim, whose first solo play, Did You Eat? (밥 먹었니?) had its world premiere with Ma-Yi Theater Company, has already planned a trilogy of stories (surrounding the theme of hunger) and this show, directed by Chris Yejin, is an inviting introduction to Kim’s style and themes. The former is a modern aesthetic, highlighted by Iris McCloughan stylistic choreography, and the latter, well, is very dark and heavy. At the start of the play, Kim bounces on stage, all smiles and warm waves to the audience, but who she’s actually talking to is a younger version of herself, represented by a small orb of light. How old is this orb version of Kim is not determined: It could be Kim as a teenager, a toddler, a baby or even an embryo. But she tells her own life story to the orb, starting even before her birth, when her umma (mother) is expected to give birth to a son for her appa (father), and both are horrified when baby Zoë is a girl. Now, you might think “horrified” is a bit hyperbolic, but you can decide for yourself after hearing Kim’s story, from her having a boy’s name in Korean, her appa’s physical and emotional abuse of her and her umma, and umma’s belief that it is Zoë’s fault her life has become sure a torturous ordeal. 

Film: Award Season Continues (With One of the Best Films of the Year), Including the Winning Adaptations of the Novella “Train Dreams” and the Ibsen Play, “Hedda,” as Well as Another Yorgos Lanthimos Visionary Joint, “Bugonia”

Train Dream (c) Netflix

Film: Train Dreams 
In Cinemas on November 7,                                                  streaming on Netflix on November 21 

Writer director Clint Bentley made the 2021 modest, modern western, Jockey, focusing on an aging racehorse jockey (played with grace by character actor Clifton Collins, Jr.) trying to hang onto his career while dealing with his ailing and failing body. So, it’s not surprising that Bentley’s next movie would be the adaptation of the Pulitzer Prize-nominated novella, Train Dreams by Denis Johnson, which follows the life of a rather unremarkable man named Robert Grainier, a seasonal logger and railroad worker in 1917, who endures a horrible tragedy and tries and fails to move on. Grainier is played sensitively and with uncharacteristic restraint by Australian actor Joel Edgerton, mostly known for memorable machismo roles in Animal Kingdom, Warrior and as the young Uncle Owen in the Star Wars prequel series Obi-Wan Kenobi. I also saw him on stage as Stanley Kowalaski opposite Cate Blanchett in 2008’s A Streetcar Named Desire at BAM. But, in Train Dreams, Edgerton is at his best with a character who has barely any dialogue, but able to project big emotions while never breaking from Grainer’s interiority. 

The Interested Bystander’s Oscar Predictions: October 2025

Sinners (c) Warner Bros. Pictures

After the nailbiter of a year in 2024, the 2025 Oscar forecast and outlook seem to have some more sure things. It was obvious as the Oscar broadcast proceeded that Anora was going to be the big winner of the night, but it wasn’t until a couple of weeks before the Oscar ceremony that Anora was even in the top three of possible films to win. Prognosticators were still high on The Brutalist and there seemed to have been a last-minute surge of support for Conclave and Wicked (remember Jon M. Chu’s surprise win at the Critics' Choice Awards?). And even the wildcard and season-long villain Emilia Perez, which seem to have industry support amidst controversaries with the actions of some of the film’s actors as well as cries of poor representation of both trans people and Mexicans, had more buzz. But it was Anora, the Cannes Palm d’Or winner, that had the support of the Academy even as its chances ebbed and flowed. 

This year, it seems like a two-way race of popular box office and critical favorites Sinners and One Battle After Another. Both written and directed by auteur directors who are seen as due for Oscar glory, the momentum seems to be with Paul Thomas Anderson as of now, but Ryan Coogler could get a last-minute surge of support from critics' groups and year-end lists. The problem is that both films are being released by Warner Bros. and it may come down to which film gets more of its awards support. If they try to give equal weight to both films, a smaller film like Marty Supreme or Sentimental Value or the biggest threat to a big studio dominance, the indie darling Hamnet. 

Per usual, I will have my prediction in each category as well as two longshots and then a personal favorite that I doesn’t seem to have a lot of awards support now, but I hope they get support along the way. 

Enjoy.