"Sisters in Law" at Six Points Theater

Things look pretty bleak in the Supreme Court these days, with recent decisions walking back the rights of women and people of color that we've had for decades. But the new play Sisters in Law, based on the 2015 book of the same name, harkens back to a time of hope, although not without struggle, with the appointment of the first woman to the court, and then the second. Sandra Day O'Connor and Ruth Bader Ginsburg were very different women – in their politics and in their personalities – but they became allies as the only two women in a position long held exclusively by men. The play explores their work and their friendship, and ends with a reminder that their work is not done. The excellent production of this two-hander at Six Points Theater is close to selling out, but select tickets remain through November 5 to see this incredibly relevant, inspiring, and moving play.

"25 Questions for a Jewish Mother" by Minnesota Jewish Theatre Company at Harriet Island Target Stage

The last time I saw a play was on February 22. In fact I saw two plays that day (as I sometimes had to do to fit everything in in the good old days) - the Children's Theatre's new original play Spamtown, USA, and Theatre Pro Rata's production of Silent Sky at the Bell Museum. If someone had told me that I wouldn't see a play live and in-person for almost six months, I would not have believed them. I would have said that's impossible. But a few days after seeing those plays, I left the country to spend two weeks in paradise (aka New Zealand), and returned home to find that the world had turned upside down. We found ourselves in a global pandemic that we're still very much in, with theater being one of the first things to go, and unfortunately one of the last to return. The good news is some #TCTheater companies have gotten creative in this time (see also Park Square Theatre's delightful original Zoom play series RIDDLE PUZZLE PLOT). Minnesota Jewish Theatre Company is opening their 26th season with an outdoor, masked, socially distanced play. I cannot tell you how wonderful it was to gather together again and listen to a story, simply and beautifully told. To anyone else who's craving that, go see this play! And not just because it's the only thing out there right now in terms of live theater, but also because it's a really moving, funny, relatable, heart-warming play.

"Oh My God!" by Minnesota Jewish Theatre Company at Highland Park Center Theatre

In Minnesota Jewish Theatre Company's 25th Anniversary season, they're bringing us Israeli playwright Anat Gov's O my God!, an imagined therapy session with none other than God himself. As someone who doesn't believe in the God of the Bible, I found it a little hard to connect to, but still an interesting exploration of faith and philosophy. What there's no doubt about is that this excellent three-person cast, under Robert Dorfman's direction, makes the story feel real and grounded, despite the fantastical elements.

"Marjorie Prime" by Prime Productions at Park Square Theatre

New #TCTheater company Prime Productions "seeks to explore, illuminate and support women over fifty and their stories through the creative voice of performance." Hooray! Their third full production just opened at Park Square Theatre, and it's another high quality thought-provoking play featuring women in their prime. The regional premiere of the new play Marjorie Prime by playwright Jordan Harrison is, like his play Maple and Vine, a little trippy and creepy. But instead of a scary Stepford society, it deals with artificial intelligence and the benefits and possibly scary consequences of technology. But it also deals with very human issues of aging, death, grief, and complicated family relationships.

"The Last Schwartz" by Minnesota Jewish Theatre Company at the Highland Park Center Theatre

Minnesota Jewish Theatre Company brings us another modern (well, late '90s) Jewish family trying to maintain their cultural identity while living in the melting pot of America. Four siblings gather at the family home in upstate New York for their father's Jahrzeit (one-year anniversary of death), and disagree about just about everything. At times funny, at times heart-breaking, The Last Schwartz is an intense 90 minutes spent with a family that puts the fun in dysfunctional. Or as one character puts it when another laments "why can't you be a normal family?" - "this is a normal family."

"Little Wars" by Prime Productions at Mixed Blood Theatre

British mystery writer Agatha Christie. American playwright Lillian Hellman. Activist Muriel Gardiner. American author Dorothy Parker. It's debatable whether or not these four accomplished women met in the home of the equally accomplished women Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas in the French Alps in 1940, but it sure makes for a fascinating play. One with these many roles for women in their prime. A perfect choice, then, for the debut of the new theater company Prime Productions whose mission is "to explore, illuminate, and support women over 50 and their stories through the creative voice of performance." As a woman who's approaching that age (at a seemingly greater speed with each passing year), it's a mission I whole-heartedly support. And the Twin Cities is the perfect location for such a company, as we are lucky enough to have many female theater artists in their prime. Little Wars, a play about fascinating real-life historical women*, is an exiting debut for this company. I look forward to seeing what else the amazingly talented women in their prime in the #TCTheater community can do, when given the opportunities they deserve but are often denied by our ageist and sexist society.

"Stars of David" by Minnesota Jewish Theatre Company at the Highland Park Center Theater

In 2007, journalist Abigail Pogrebin interviewed dozens of famous Jewish-Americans about their experiences being Jewish in this country, and compiled them into a book called Stars of David. People like Senator Al Franken, actresses Lauren Bacall and Sarah Jessica Parker, actors Jason Alexander and Dustin Hoffman, director Stephen Spielberg, and playwright Wendy Wassserstein. A book of interviews does not exactly scream "musical theater," yet it has been turned into just that, with much success, and Minnesota Jewish Theater Company has brought it to Minnesota. It's not so much a musical as it is a musical review, featuring four actors telling these personal stories in the form of a dozen or so new original songs by various successful musical theater composers. The result is an entertaining, educational, funny, and poignant 90 minutes of musical storytelling.

Bryan Porter, Daisy Macklin Skarning, Laura B. Adams,
and David Carey (photo by Sarah Whiting)

Director Michael Kissin has assembled a great cast and arranged the show nicely in the circular stage space designed by Michael Hoover. Names of the book's subjects are projected onto the set, along with a brief photo as each one is introduced. The onstage four-piece band directed by Kevin Dutcher sounds terrific on these varied songs. Cast members Laura B. Adams, David Carey, Bryan Porter, and Daisy Macklin Skarning, dressed in black to more easily slip into the skins of these famous people, are all very engaging with beautiful voices. Singing solo, with or without backup, or in group numbers, these four singer/actors tell stories that are funny, tragic, moving, or all three.

Highlights include:

• Bryan sings a cute and then sad story about how Leonard Nimoy's childhood magician dreams are crushed by bigotry.
• As my favorite TV writer Aaron Sorkin, David sings a funny song about "Smart People."
• Laura has the unenviable job of being both Fran Drescher and Joan Rivers, two of the most recognizable voices in show business, and she pulls them both off. Joan's song is a sweet one in which she conveys the feeling of being able to just be herself on the "High Holy Days," and Fran's song is as funny and determined as she is, "What Do They Know?"
• Leave it to Next to Normal composer Tom Kitt to write a melody that made me cry, along with lyrics by book writer Abigail Pogrebin. "As If I Weren't There" tells the story of Ruth Bader Ginsburg being unable to grieve her mother in the traditional way she wanted, beautifully sung by Daisy.
• Another familiar musical theater composer, Duncan Sheik, wrote a song that's very reminiscent of his most famous work, Spring Awakening. "The Darkening Blue" features those same hauntingly gorgeous harmonies, as it relates Kenneth Cole's struggle with how to pass on his heritage to his children, who are being raised as Christians.
• In addition to telling his own story, Michael Feinstein wrote the music and lyrics for playwright Tony Kushner's "Horrible Seders," a fast, funny, and poignant song well sung by Bryan.
• Laura and Daisy sing Gloria Steinem's song, which is of course powerful and meaningful and woman-affirming. "The Women Who Had No Names" celebrates all of the women who came before.
• Gwyneth Paltrow is Jewish? "Who Knew?"
• David leads the cast in the moving closing song "L'Dor V'Dor," which means "from generation to generation." 

In this country that prides itself as a "melting plot," all cultures get lost through the generations. This book and musical are a way for people of Jewish heritage to hold on to some of that culture that they grew up with and share it with others of their and future generations. But it's about more than being Jewish, it's about how to hold on to and celebrate who you are and who your ancestors were in a world that's trying to make us all the same.

Stars of David plays Saturdays and Sundays only through March 8 at the Highland Park Center Theater on Ford Parkway.

"Standing on Ceremony: The Gay Marriage Plays" at New Century Theatre

Planning a wedding. Writing your vows. Pre-wedding jitters. Pressure from one’s parents to get married. The loss of a loved one. All of these things are associated with a common milestone in life – getting married. The one tiny difference in the series of short plays called Standing on Ceremony: The Gay Marriage Plays is that the couples living through these common experiences are same sex-couples. But the emotions conveyed in this funny, touching, and at times heart-breaking play are universal human emotions that everyone in the audience can related to, no matter their sexual orientation or marital status.

Standing on Ceremony: The Gay Marriage Plays began as a series of benefits in L.A., continued Off-Broadway last fall, and is now being produced in theaters across the country. Nine playwrights contributed to the work, and their collective body of work is impressive, including some plays I’ve seen recently: I Am My Own Wife (Doug Wright), Compleat Female Stage Beauty, What’s the Word For (both Jeffrey Hatcher), reasons to be pretty (Neil LaBute). Wendy Knox of the innovative Frank Theatre directs six talented local actors who portray a variety of characters in the nine stories. In one a couple is writing their vows, and discovering that the traditional words don’t really apply. Another is in the airport on their way from L.A. to Iowa (of all places) for a hometown wedding and coming to terms with the gravity of what they’re about to do. A New York mother pressures her single gay son to find a husband, because all of her friends' gay kids are getting married now that it’s legal. A heterosexual couple amusingly deals with the possibility that the husband is gay and worry that their son may follow in his father’s footsteps. A crazy woman begins hearing voices in her head and feels that her traditional suburban lifestyle is being threatened. A man delivers a heart-wrenching eulogy for his partner of 40 years. And finally, a happy couple celebrate their union with all of their friends.

About that talented cast of six. Jim Lichtsheidl (recently seen in the delightful fairy tale Vasa Lisa with Ten Thousand Things) is always a delight to watch, especially when he gets to play several characters in one piece. Shanan Custer brings her very funny style to stories both serious and ridiculous (the aforementioned crazy woman, in a hilarious monologue). Shawn Hamilton (Ragtime and Avenue Q) and Aimee K Bryant (Hairspray at the Chan) unfortunately don’t get to sing, but they do play a hypocritical evangelical couple determined to stay together despite her husband’s indiscretions and scandals. Mark Rhein is the man whose wife tells him he has a “gay sense of humor,” and in the most moving vignette, talks about his 40-year love story. Last but not least, Laura B. Adams is strong and funny as the Jewish mother and a woman planning a wedding, something she never thought she'd do.

Mark Rhein and Jim Lichtsheidl

Standing on Ceremony: The Gay Marriage Plays is playing at the newest of the Hennepin theaters – the New Century Theatre in City Center in downtown Minneapolis. It’s the first time I’ve been there and I quite like the space, which includes little cocktail tables among the seats in the audience, reminiscent of Hennepin Stages (Hey City Theater) down the street. The plays are staged very simply staged, with a row of chairs on the stage and a few tables to the sides. The actors occasionally hold scripts; its more like a reading than a fully staged production.

I very much recommend this show (it runs for two more weekends). It’s an entertaining evening of theater that tells universal human stories, and it might get you thinking and talking about the subject of marriage equality. Which is something that we as Minnesotans need to think and talk about in light of the upcoming vote on the Marriage Amendment. For more information on that check out Minnesotans United for All Families.