A theatre makes an asset of its unusual space

Actors have clambered up it. Paintings have hung on it, as have flags and bunting. It has been a fence post, a ship mast, a tiny house and (on numerous occasions) a tree. No matter what it is, though, the pillar looming in the downstage right corner of the Irish Repertory Theatre’s stage is always the elephant in the room.

“It’s an old friend by this point,” says artistic director Charlotte Moore, who has wrangled with the pillar on dozens of occasions. “When you design for this space, that’s where you have to start.”
Luckily, she and her producing director, Ciarán O’Reilly, use the same designers repeatedly, among them James Morgan, Tony Walton and Klara Zieglerova.

A pillar in the far corner would attract little notice in most theatres, but the odd configuration at Irish Rep’s cozy Chelsea venue draws attention. At stage right, where actors typically can exit into the wings, there’s a small side pocket of additional seating. These 40 seats—”the jury box,” Moore calls them— make the pillar seem to be dead center in the stage.

She and her set designer, Antje Ellermann, have gone the tried-and-true route of turning the pillar into a tree for their acclaimed revival of Brian Friel’s Dancing at Lughnasa, which closes Jan. 29. “We often set up ladders next to it,” Moore says, “and this time we have Gerry Evans, the ne’er-do-well in the play, climb up it at one point.”

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The “War Horse” sequel finds the power of a good yarn

This month, children’s novelist Michael Morpurgo may be the most prominent author in New York. The stage adaptation of his book War Horse, about a young man and his horse surviving World War I, has been on Broadway since March, and Steven Spielberg’s film adaptation arrives on Christmas Day. Meanwhile, 59E59 is presenting Farm Boy, a War Horse sequel that follows the young man’s family through several generations.

In all cases, it’s evident why Morpurgo’s work is so alluring: His books tell sweeping, emotional stories that blend epic adventure with intimate relationships. “He has an innate storytelling, dramatic quality within his writing.” says Daniel Buckroyd, artistic director of Britain’s New Perspectives Theatre Company, which is producing Farm Boy. Buckroyd adapted and directed the material, and true to Morpurgo’s spirit, he says he wants it to be an exercise in “good old honest storytelling, as though we were gathered round the campfire.”

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The “Ugly Betty” star tackles one of Chekhov’s most interesting characters

He doesn’t have the most lines or the most stage time, but Epikhodov is one of the most interesting characters in the The Cherry Orchard.

Anton Chekhov’s masterpiece follows the final days on a faded Russian estate, where the former owners have lost their money and a former peasant has purchased the land. There’s an existential melancholy in these changing fortunes, and the world itself seems to pity how this Russian society has lost its way. At one point, the sound of a snapping cord shivers in the air, and in the famous final moment, an old servant, unknowingly left behind, lays down to die as the cherry trees outside begin to fall.

In the midst of this change, we meet Epikhodov (pronounced “yep-ih-HOE-dawv”), the estate’s hapless clerk. He pines for a young noblewoman, and he’s so clumsy that everyone jokingly calls him “Master Disaster.”

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The stars of “Lysistrata Jones” balance comedy and heart

Welcome to Building Character, TDF Stages’ ongoing series about actors and how they create their roles
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There are roughly 5 trillion jokes in Lysistrata Jones, the new Broadway musical that transports the ancient Greek play Lysistrata to a modern-day college basketball court. With a book by Douglas Carter Beane and a score by Lewis Flinn, it cracks on everything from the perils of dating and the power of myths to Batman movies and dropped iPhone calls. As the gags whiz by, they create an atmosphere of breathless, fizzy fun.

But there’s heart beneath the humor. Lysistrata Jones (Patti Murin) convinces her fellow cheerleaders to stop sleeping with their basketball-team boyfriends until they finally win a game, which drives the boys crazy. That’s a breezy premise, but eventually, the characters realize their attitudes affect more than a basketball season. By accepting failure on the court or by forcing everyone to do what they say, these kids are short-circuiting their entire lives.

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Thoughts from the stars of “Wild Animals You Should Know”

Now that they’re in their twenties, the stars of  Wild Animals You Should Know feel prepared to play teenagers.

“You don’t have perspective until you’re out of it,” said Gideon Glick, 23, who joins Jay Armstrong Johnson, 24, as a pair of high schoolers with a twisted friendship. “When I was younger, I always got upset that they didn’t cast people who were the correct age for these parts. But as I’ve gotten older I’ve realized [that] I don’t think I could have played this part when I was 16.”

Glick plays Jacob, a sensitive, passive boy in love with his friend Matthew (Johnson), who’s full of bravado and a sexual energy. The play mostly follows the boys on a Boy Scout camping trip, where Matthew harasses his gay Scout master.

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