A Better Place @ The Duke on 42nd Street

Calling all dreamers! A Better Place, presented by The Directors Company in association with Pascal Productions reflects issues of trust, family and overcoming the struggles of comparison, all the while looking into our own notions of grandeur as we seek our next horizon.

Director Evan Bergman has a thrust stage as her personal canvas to present the story of two families seeking a better place. Scenic Designer David L. Arsenault created two apartments for the audience to peer into—one quaint and small living room pre-war walkup and the other “better place” hi-rise apartment equipped with a sitting room, hallway and office.

We begin by looking into Les Covert’s (Bob Maitner) mind of “if only I lived across the street in that apartment, my life would be perfect.” Maitner conveys Les as the self-limited middle-aged waiter faced with his own past. His character was funny and relatable.

Covert’s lover and life partner, Sel Trevoc (John Fitzgibbon) is a philosophy professor five years into waiting for his tenure. Fitzgibbon created a mirror for Maitner’s character and offered the comic relief and introspection needed to drive his inner conflicts to fruition. The two had good chemistry and Fitzgibbon’s character was the only one philosophically at peace with his life and choices.

Across the way, the Roberts family struggles with gambling addiction, familial envy and growing into adulthood. Husband and wife Mary and John Roberts are looking to sell their hi-rise and move to Florida while their daughter, Carol, is left to find her way in New York City without them.

Mary Roberts (Judith Hawking) struggles with her suspicions that her husband may not want to sell and finally retire to a more Southern climate. She consistently harps on her daughter Carol about beginning life as an adult rather than a dependent 28-year-old and prances around the set mumbling relatable and funny anecdotes.

Her husband, John (Edward James Hyland) has a horse gambling addiction that seems to always end in winning. He ushers himself to provide for his family in ways that he can and is meticulous about the luscious upgrades he has made to the hi-rise. His love for his wife shows through in his performance. 

Their daughter Carol (Jessica DiGiovanni) holds a strange fetish. Needing to concentrate on her better place, she is only attracted to real estate brokers and will open herself to their affections only after they have described upscale apartments in ways that excite her. She is seen with many renditions of Michael Satow and their taking to the stage was always met with laughter.

The play was introspective (yet somewhat predictable) and showed the inner turmoil that many of us all face in our search for the next beginning. 

Review By: Alex Lipari

Photos By:  Jenny Anderson

Perfect Arrangement @ The Duke on 42nd Street

 Perfection is the only word that can describe Primary Stages’ Perfect Arrangement.  Somehow, a show set in the 1950s is fun, contemporary and completely relevant to today.  Topher Payne’s script engages, makes you laugh, and also cry, as you follow the lives of Bob and Norma and their seemingly perfect marriages.

Robert Eli (Bob) and Julia Coffey (Norma) play two U.S. State Department officials during the Red Scare, who are tasked with removing anyone from their ranks who is considered a “threat” to the U.S. government, ie: anyone practicing lewd behavior, sluts and homosexuals.  The catch? Bob and Norma are both gay who are living next door to one another in sham marriages.  During times when guests visit, it appears that Bob and his wife, Mikaela Feely-Lehmann (Millie), and Norma and her husband, Christopher J. Hanke (Jim), have ideal marriages, when in reality the couples are Millie and Norma and Jim and Bob who cross back and forth between the two houses seamlessly through a secret door hidden in their closet.  This provides a lot of room for hilarity as they constantly have to think quickly when someone asks about their supposed spouses’ whereabouts. 

The watershed moment comes when we meet the sexually adventurous, U.S. State Department translator, Barbara Grant, (Kelly McAndrew), and learn she is someone from Millie's past who knows about her all too well.  We see the families blackmailed; the worry of Bob and Norma’s boss, Mr. Sunderson (Kevin O’Rouke), who’s main argument for starting this crusade now coming to a sharp reality.  The lines get drawn once again as we see the dynamic between the societal advantages of men and women during the 50s come into focus.  The two couples come up with separate plans to stifle this blackmailer which only leads to more trouble and eventual destruction of everything they worked so hard to achieve.  

This show keeps you laughing until suddenly, you’re crying.  You start to scream silently in your head as their “perfect arrangement” becomes unraveled and the only thing you can do is stand by and watch.  The entire cast does a wonderful job of pulling you in and making themselves a part of your lives.  You leave, forever changed, viewing the world today just a bit differently than you did before.  

The Duke on 42^nd Street is an intimate black-box theater that has been transformed by Neil Patel into a beautiful stereotypical 1950’s home that reminds you just a bit too well of the room in your grandmother’s house where you couldn’t touch anything.  The hair and wig design by J. Jared Janas and costumes, by Jennifer Caprio, add the touch of authenticity this play calls for.  Kudos to the entire company and crew for a show that is nothing short of excellence.  Perfect Arrangement runs for a limited engagement through November 6^th so get your tickets today before it’s too late. 

Review By: Renee Demaio

Photo By: James Leynse