urban excavations

1951 session with Florence Vandamm (far right) and on stage (L-R) John Emery + Katharine Cornell + Brian Aherne in “The Constant Wife” — part of the 2013-2014 NYPL exhibit “Pioneering Poet of Light: Forence VanDamm & the Vandamm Studio”

I’ve had a several-month hiatus from frequent writing posted here but have published frequently elsewhere and will  muse about that in a subsequent post about a range of adventures. I aspire to re-up the posting energy in 2015, with a big push provided by a London theater and research adventure in early January.

I’ll wind up 2014 with my now annual summary of attendance at live performances of all kinds. This 2014 calendar year listing includes portions of two New York theatrical seasons: 2013-2014 (January-April 2014) and 2014-2015 (May-December 2014). Drama Desk nominator attendance at Broadway, Off-Broadway and Off-Off Broadway venues exploded my theater adventures in 2012-2013, and 2013-2014 — through April 2014. As a non-nominator but still a critic and writer about theater, I continue my search for a new normal of attendance in New York, around the country and around the world.

January

• (1/2) The Final Version (Nuyorican Poets Cafe)
• (1/4) Tyson vs. Ali (3LD Art & Technology Center)
• (1/6) So Into It with Damian & Anne (UCB East)
• (1/8) Beautiful (Stephen Sondheim)
• (1/9) Mercy Killers (Stella Adler Studio)
• (1/10) Machinal (Roundabout American Airlines)
• (1/11) The Surrender (Clurman)
• (1/11) Year of the Rooster (Ensemble Studio Theatre)
• (1/12) Ruff (La MaMa)
• (1/12) Desperate Archives (exhibit: La MaMa’s La Galleria)
• (1/12) Loot (Lucille Lortel)
• (1/13) LPTW Oral History: Mercedes Ruehl (Bruno Walter Auditorium NYPL)
• (1/14) Young Playwrights Conference Program B (Cherry Lane Studio)
• (1/15) Grounded (Walkerspace)
• (1/16) Antigone (Storm)
• (1/17) Craving for Travel (Peter J. Sharp)
• (1/18) King Lear (BAM Harvey)
• (1/18) The Clearing (Theatre at St. Clement’s)
• (1/19) Outside Mullingar (Samuel J. Friedman)
• (1/19) The Glass Menagerie (Booth, 2nd visit)
• (1/22) Row After Row (New York City Center)
• (1/23) The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner (Atlantic Stage 2)
• (1/24) My Daughter Keeps Our Hammer (Flea)
• (1/25) A Man’s a Man (CSC)
• (1/25) Intimacy (The New Group @ Acorn)
• (1/26) Dr. Dubois and Miss Ovington (Castillo)
• (1/28) Panic at the Riverside Motel (Stage IV)
• (1/29) Bronx Bombers (Circle in the Square)
• (1/30) iLuminate (New World Stages)
• (1/31) Almost, Maine (Gym at Judson)

February

• (2/2) Riding the Midnight Express (St. Luke’s)
• (2/3) I Call My Brothers (Playco @ New Ohio)
• (2/4) The Woodsman (59E59)
• (2/5) Hard Times (The Cell)
• (2/7) Sex Tips for Straight Women from a Gay Man (777)
• (2/8) Dinner with Friends (Roundabout Steinberg Center)
• (2/8) The Correspondent (Rattlestick)
• (2/9) The Faire (Fourth Street)
• (2/10) DD Panel: Promoting Broadway (Triad)
• (2/11) Philosophy for Gangsters (Beckett)
• (2/12) The Tribute Artist (59E59)
• (2/13) Transport (Irish Rep)
• (2/14) My Mother has 4 Noses (Duke)
• (2/15) Til Divorce Do Us Part (DR2)
• (2/16) Love and Information (Minetta Lane)
• (2/17) To the Bone (reading, Nola Studios)
• (2/19) London Wall (Mint)
• (2/20) Kunstler (reading, Shetler Studios)
• (2/20) Middle of the Night (Clurman)
• (2/21) Since Africa (14 Street Y)
• (2/22) Sex Tips for Straight Women from a Gay Guy (777)
• (2/22) The Shape of Something Squashed (Paradise Factory)
• (2/23) Ode to Joy (Cherry Lane)
• (2/25) Bikeman (Tribeca Performing Arts)
• (2/26) Elaine Stritch: Shoot Me (screening, IFC Center)
• (2/26) Bridges of Madison County (Schoenfeld)
• (2/26) Kung Fu (Signature)
• (2/27) Satchmo at the Waldorf (Westside)
• (2/28) Anthony and Cleopatra (Public)

March

• (3/1) Arlington (Signature)
• (3/1) Stage Kiss (Playwrights Horizons)
• (3/2) The Happiest Song Plays Last (Second Stage)
• (3/2) Sex Tips for Straight Women from a Gay Man (777 Theatre)
• (3/3) The Hero (Metropolitan Playhouse)
• (3/4) Character Man (Urban Stages)
• (3/5) The Open House (Signature)
• (3/5) After Midnight (Brooks Atkinson)
• (3/6) Art Shay’s Photography (Morrison Hotel Gallery)
• (3/8) Hand to God (Lucille Lortel)
• (3/8) No Exit (Pearl)
• (3/9) The Architecture of Becoming (Women’s Project @ City Center)
• (3/9) The Megile of Itzik Mangar (Baruch Performing Arts Center)
• (3/11) A Doll’s House (St.  Ann’s Warehouse)
• (3/12) Rocky (Winter  Garden)
• (3/13) Nothing to Hide (Axis Theatre)
• (3/14) Stockholm (59E59)
• (3/15) Aladdin (New Amsterdam)
• (3/15) Fast Company (EST)
• (3/16) The Real Americans (Culture Project)
• (3/16) The Junket (Culture Project)
• (3/17) John Van Druten: A Writer’s Writer (panel, NYPL)
• (3/18) Hellman v. McCarthy (Abingdon)
• (3/19) Appropriate (Signature)
• (3/19) All the Way (Neil Simon)
• (3/20) Tales from Red Vienna (MTC @ New York City Center)
• (3/21) Les Miserables (Imperial)
• (3/22) Beyond Therapy (Beckett @ Theatre Row)
• (3/22) 50 Shades The Musical (Elektra)
• (3/23) Mothers and Sons (Golden)
• (3/23) Breathing Time (Iati)
• (3/24) Charlatan (Ars Nova)
• (3/25) King Lear (Theatre for a New Audience)
• (3/26) I Remember Mama (Transport @ Judson Gym)
• (3/27) Amaluna (Citi Field)
• (3/28) Heathers (New World Stages)
• (3/29) If/Then (Richard Rodgers)
• (3/29) A Raisin in the Sun (Barrymore)
• (3/30) A Second Chance (Public)
• (3/30) A Baby Makes Seven (New Ohio)
• (3/31) Wingspace Salon: Chance (Wingspace Theatrical Design, Brooklyn)

April

• (4/1) Jasper in Deadland (Prospect @ West End)
• (4/2) The Realistic Joneses (Lyceum)
• (4/2) Red Velvet (St. Ann’s)
• (4/3) The Threepenny Opera (ATC)
• (4/4) Drama Desk Panel: Why Shakespeare (Sardi’s)
• (4/4) No Parole (Hartley House)
• (4/5) Extraordinary Extremities (Soho Playhouse)
• (4/5) The Heir Apparent (Classic Stage Company)
• (4/5) Greed (New World Stages)
• (4/6) The Most Deserving (Women’s Project @ City Center 2)
• (4/6) Don’t Wake Me (59E59)
• (4/7) Bullets Over  Broadway (St. James)
• (4/8) Fishing For Wives (Theatre Row Clurman)
• (4/8) Lady Day at the Emerson Bar and Grill (Circle in the Square)
• (4/9) Act One (LCT Beaumont)
• (4/9) Adoration of the Old Woman (Intar)
• (4/10) Of Mice and Men (Longacre)
• (4/11) Your Mother’s Copy of the Kama Sutra (Playwrights Horisons)
• (4/12) Violet (Roundabout American Airlines)
• (4/12) The International (The Cell)
• (4/13) The Library (Public)
• (4/14) The Mysteries (Flea)
• (4/15) The Mystery of Irma Vep (MCC @ Lucille Lortel)
• (4/16) Cabaret (Studio 54)
• (4/16) The Cripple of Inishman (Cort)
• (4/17) The Complete & Condensed Stage Directions of Eugene O’Neill, Vol 2 (Theater for a New City)
• (4/17) Hedwig and the Angry Inch (Belasco)
• (4/18) Casa Valentina (MTC Friedman)
• (4/19) Finding Mary Martin (York)
• (4/25) Drama Desk Nomination Announcement (54 Below)
• (4/25) The World is Round (BAM  Fisher)
• (4/26) The Great Immensity (Public)
• (4/26) Annapurna (New Group @ Theatre Row)
• (4/29) Cherry Smoke (Urban Stages)
• (4/29) Red-Eye to Havre de Grace (NYTW)
• (4/30) Nurturing New Works: What Producers Can Learn from
  the O’Neill’s National Playwrights Conference
  (TRU at The Players Mainstage Theater)

May

• (5/1) Tony n’ Tina’s Wedding (Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis High School)
• (5/2) Forbidden Broadway Comes Out Swinging! (Davenport)
• (5/3) 17 Orchard Street (Beckett Theatre @ Theatre Row)
• (5/4) The Few (Rattlestick)
• (5/6) A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder (Walter Kerr)
• (5/7) Drama Desk 2014 Nominees Reception (Essex House)
• (5/7) The City of Conversation (LCT Newhouse)
• (5/10) An Octoroon (Soho Rep)
• (5/11) The Rivals (Pearl)
• (5/16) O’Neill Center Exhibit Opening (NYPL)
• (5/17) WS SALON #13: Racial Diversity in Theatrical Design
  (Old American Can Factory, Brooklyn)
• (5/18) A Fable (Cherry Lane)
• (5/20) Beautiful (Stephen Sondheim)
• (5/21) The Dramaturg/Producer: A Symposium with LMDA
  About an Emerging Profession (Segal, CUNY Grad Center)
• (5/22) Sawbones & The Diamond Eater (HERE)
• (5/23) Degenerate Art: The Attack on Modern Art in
  Nazi Germany, 1937 (Neue Galerie)
• (5/27) The Anthem (Culture Project)
• (5/29) Just Jim Dale (Roundabout Laura Pels)
• (5/30) The Killer (TFANA)

June

• (6/1) Drama Desk Awards (Town Hall)
• (6/4) When January Feels Like Summer (Ensemble Studio Theatre)
• (6/5) Ethel Sings (Beckett Theatre, Theatre Row)
• (6/6) Blink (59E59)
• (6/7) The Village Bike (Lucille Lortel)
• (6/8) Sea Marks (Irish Rep)
• (6/12) Our New Girl (ATC 2)
• (6/13) Much Ado About Nothing (Delacorte)
• (6/16) Pretty Fucked Up (Wild Project)
• (6/18) Donogoo (Mint)
• (6/18) When We Were Young and Unafraid (MTC City Center)
• (6/19) Fly by Night (Playwrights Horizons)
• (6/22) Muscles in Their Toes (Bank Street)
• (6/24) Holler If Ya Hear Me (Palace)
• (6/26) Marilyn Maye (54 Below)
• (6/27) The Lion (MTC @ City Center II)
• (6/28-6/30) O’Neill National Critics Institute
• (6/29) A Life of the Mind (Trinity Repertory Company, Providence)
• (6/29) Jersey Boys (screening)

July

• (7/1-7/12) O’Neill National Critics Institute
• (7/1) All Shook Up (Ivoryton Playhouse)
• (7/2) The War Dept. (by Jim Bauer and Ruth Bauer, O’Neill NMTC)
• (7/3) Tiger Style! (by Mike Lew, O’Neill NPC)
• (7/5) I’m Gonna Pray For You So Hard (by Halley Feiffer, O’Neill NPC)
• (7/8) Tanaquil Le Clerq (screening, O’Neill, NCI)
• (7/9) Fiddler on the Roof (Goodspeed Opera House, East Haddam, CT)
• (7/10) Gypsy (Connecticut Repertory Theatre, Stors, CT)
• (7/11) The White City (by Jilia Gytri and Avi Amon, O’Neill NMTC)
• (7/15) Rights Week: Sharing Your Work (Lark Play Development Center)
• (7/16) Mapmakers Opera (NYMTF Pearl Theatre)
• (7/18) Gertrude: The Cry (Potomac @ ATC 2)
• (7/19) The Long Shrift (Rattstick)
• (7/19) Pentecost (Potomac @ ATC 2)
• (7/23) Piece of my Heart (Signature)
• (7/23) Mala Hierba (Second Stage Uptown)
• (7/24) Strictly Dishonorable (Flea)
• (7/28) Sex with Strangers (Second Stage)
• (7/31) In Flight (reading, Rusk Renovations Gallery)

August

• (8/1) The Opponent (Red Orchid NY, 59E59)
• (8/2) King Lear (Shakespeare in the Park, Delacorte)
• (8/5-8/6) Samuel French Off Off Broadway Short Play Festival
• (8/7) Capturing American Theater History: The O’Neill (NYPL PA)
• (8/8-8/9) Samuel French Off Off Broadway Short Play Festival
• (8/13) Poor Behavior (The Duke on 42nd)
• (8/14) Mike Daisey’s Moby Dick (Joe’s Pub)
• (8/16) Red Hollywood (screening, FSLC Francesca Beale Theater)
• (8/17) Tales from Geriassic Park (64E4 Underground, Fringe)
• (8/23) Kunstler (Sgouros Theatre, Fringe)
• (8/28) And I and Silence (Signature)
• (8/29) You Can’t Take It With You (Longacre)

September

• (9/4) Bauer (59E59)
• (9/5) 3Christs (Judson Church)
• (9/8) My Manana Comes (Peter Jay Sharp)
• (9/10) Bastards of Strindberg (Lion @ Theatre Row)
• (9/14) The Fatal Weakness (Mint)
• (9/14) Wayside Motor Inn (Signature)
• (9/18) I Like to be Here: Jackson Heights Revisited, or, This is a Mango (New Ohio)
• (9/19) The Valley of Astonishment (Theatre for a New Audience, Brooklyn)
• (9/20) The Money Shot (MCC @ Lucille Lortel)
• (9/21) Mr. Landing Takes a Fall (Flea)
• (9/21) Rococo Rouge (Company XIV)
• (9/24) Love Letters (Brooks Atkinson)
• (9/25) Almost Home (Acorn @ Theatre Row)
• (9/26) The Old Man and the Old Moon (New Victory)
• (9/27) A Walk in the Woods (Keen Company @ Clurman)
• (9/27) Scenes from a Marriage (NYTW)

October

• (10/2) The Killing of Sister George (Beckett @ Theatre Row)
• (10/4) Selma ’65 (La Mama LTC)
• (10/9) The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time (Barrymore)
• (10/10) Generations (Soho Rep)
• (10/11) Arcadia (Yale Repertory, New Haven)
• (10/12) Six Passionate Women (Theatre for a New City)
• (10/17) The Understody (McCarter, Princeton)
• (10/22) Lift (59E59)
• (10/23) Medea/Macbeth/Cinderella (Yale Repertory Theatre, [videorecording] TOFT)
• (10/28) Barb Jungr (59E59)

November

• (11/6) The Real Thing (Roundabout)
• (11/7) Love Letters (Brooks Atkinson)
• (11/8) Coffeehouse Chronicles: Split Britches (La MaMa)
• (11/15) Tamburlaine (Theatre for a New Audience)
• (11/15) Punk Rock (MCC @ Lortel)
• (11/25) A Particle of Dread (Oedipus Variations) (Signature)

December

• (12/6) War (Yale Repertory, New Haven)
• (12/8) Pitbulls (Rattlestick)
• (12/9) Julia’s Reading Room: Penny Jackson new play
• (12/12) Straight  White Men (Public)
• (12/17) Nutcracker Rouge (Company XIV)
• (12/20) The Historic Herbert Hoover 2014 Comeback Special (Abrons Arts Center)
• (12/29) Dying For It (ATC Linda Gross)

© Martha Wade Steketee (December 31, 2014)