becky sarwate

“No matter one’s Kinsey Scale rating, the fictional collegiate audience merges with the actual, present one to take a big, gay ride with Dan, Robyn, and sexy A/V guy Stefan (a flawlessly sculpted Bradley Allen Meyer). For 75-minutes, broken up neatly into six segments that correspond to chapters from Dan’s celebrated book, we get ad-libbed lessons in hair tossing, hand jobs, dressing sexy (but not slutty), and the poetry of drunken flirting from a maestro we never get to know personally. Dan, as inhabited by the incredibly winsome Adam Fane, is a cipher for the impish naughtiness that lives inside us all, just waiting for the right tease to release it.

However, the bulk of the play’s segments rely on individual audience member participation, and this is where the aforementioned authentic social awkwardness becomes a factor. While the Greenhouse Theater Center maintains a proof-of-vaccination mandate, masking in one’s seat is optional. Like so many social settings encountered in the last two-plus years, it’s choose your own level of risk aversion.”

Read the full review on The Broadway Blog.

“Most are familiar with the broad plot lines of A Christmas Carol. Elderly miser Ebeneezer Scrooge (played for the 14th consecutive year by the wonderful Larry Yondo) sits in his office counting coins and totaling debts on Christmas Eve while handing out doses of ‘Bah, humbug!’ to anyone who tries to engage him with the holiday spirit. This unpleasant attitude applies equally to family and trusted employees and goes double for well-wishing strangers. Casting himself in the light of the practical, one-dimensional businessman devoid of time for pleasantries, Scrooge is the determined enemy of frivolity, gaiety and generosity.

However, after the old man returns home to the cold, all-but-abandoned mansion once occupied by his deceased partner in profits, Jacob Marley (Kareem Bandealy), a succession of spirits visit, forcing Scrooge to take a hard look at his place in the world — past and present — and how he might eventually leave his mark upon it. The audience learns that Scrooge wasn’t always devoid of love and compassion, and he still has time to change his ways before death permanently imprints a nihilistic legacy.

There are timeless but sober questions that remain as relevant to the living today as they were to Londoners in the 19th century. Where is the line between kindness and foolishness? Is it more important to protect oneself and one’s assets or risk reputation and riches in the pursuit of bettering the lot of your fellows? And at the end of one’s life, does any of it matter if you die alone?”

Read the full post on The Broadway Blog