Before the performance even started I was sold. This space was so powerfully moving to me. I felt ghosts. I have this fascination with decay and this space intentionally shows its bones and has been stripped and aged for effect. It is designed to be a "modern ruin." I honestly felt like I was in some open-air amphitheatre in Greece when, in fact, I was in a closed space in Brooklyn. It didn't have any Disney-recreation cheesiness about it either.
John Turturro and Elaine Stritch were the stars in the production, but I have to say that it was Max Casella and Alvin Epstein (a true Beckettian actor) who knocked it out of the park for me.
I went with my friend M.E. is who is always fun and keen and we had a drink in the cafe area before the show. She ran into people she knew, I read e-mail and took in the scene. The whole space reminds me of my happy, happy days working and hanging at the Tron Theatre in Glasgow and how (pretension alert!) ALIVE the theatre makes me feel and how the hang out theatre atmosphere is like a second skin to me. (Okay, I really pushed it there.) I looked around at all the people in the audience and it was central casting for urban intellectuals. I do not judge, truth be told, I roll around in that happily!
M.E. and I in our fantastic ring-side seats. Thank you, Laura!!!
What a great night out it was and the taxi ride back over the Manhattan Bridge with all the surrounding "bridginess" was fantastically theatrical!
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