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In these conversations, relevance is always king.
But even in quieter years than this one, chasing currency had its dangers.
Also the world is always with us.
Do audienceswantto walk into a theater to see exactly whats outside?
How much relevance can we bear?
Just a few blocks apart in New York, two theaters are struggling with these questions.
They dont struggle equally: One of the shows is embarrassing, while the other is delightful and moving.
But in this one way, theyre alike.
Tone, taste, pace, executionall are a mess.
And after a certain point, its choices pratfall into chaos, becoming accidentally hilarious.
that still gives me the horrified giggles.
Its a little hard to understand the allure of the original material, for one thing.
Somehow, youll see…
We will find home
For you and me.
But what kills the show stone-dead is its intersection with the moment.
What could they do in a week?
(Ahmad Maksoud now plays the part.)
Whatever conversations, whatever adjustments the team was making were clearly melting down.
The Publics decision to produceThe Visitorgoes back ages.
Clearly the effort to decenter white men hasnt gone great.
But that, in and of itself, isnt the trouble here.
The show has begun to turn its anger inwards, and a musical must have confidence to survive.
The world got into the rehearsal room; the confrontation tore this project apart.
But the musical itself has also been shaped by those struggles, pummeled by them, humiliated by them.
And thats what were left withthe sound of a show that doesnt believe in what its doing anymore.
If you want belief, youll have to go two blocks over to New York Theatre Workshop.
The last 500 days werent childs play, though.
while also reminding us of the way-markers of 2020 and 2021.
Have we already forgotten the standoff at the Michigan statehouse?
Or when the papers called Cuomo The Love Gov?
So much of it was awful.
Heres the first lockdown order,rrrip.
Here are the Atlanta spa killings,rrrip.
So far, so much we all remember.
But Wong did do a few things differently from the average run of pandemic-lockdownees.
Most of the aunties are Asian women.
What she hasinherited is an ability to sew, handed down her Chinese-American matriarchal line.
She also tells us that the experience has been the great, unexpected, sustaining gift of her life.
So here it is, a show about the COVID era.
We knew it was coming.
How could it not?
But its also an interesting test for theories about the palatability of something so … relevant.
Some folks have said they dont want to see any pandemic plays.
(I am in both camps, on alternating days.)
I didnt have that reactionI was impressed through-and-through.
But even for those whom the work stings, its still clearly a valuable archive of the experience.
Wong has stopped sewing masks but shes taken on yet another burden, that of living witness.
We ought to put her in the Smithsonian.
Yes, the future will remark, this is how it was.
And then shell throw a pincushion at them.
The Visitoris at the Public Theater through December 5.
Kristina Wong, Sweatshop Overlordis at New York Theatre Workshop through November 21.
