Kate Mulley

Here’s a picture from our tech on Wednesday afternoon. There aren’t any official pictures yet, but I think this one is pretty cool and captures the play well.

So far we have two reviews of the play. One is snarkier than the other. And both were written about a 10:30 pm performance on a night of torrential rain, so not our best night.

When I lived in London, I got to a point where I knew exactly which reviewers I agreed with and which ones I didn’t. And I could base which shows I wanted to see based on who liked what. It’s less clear over here because I’ve seen less theatre since getting back and haven’t actually been reading very many reviews. Though I tend to agree with or at the very least respect the reviews in The New Yorker. The Times can be more touch and go and has so much influence, it’s scary.

Here are the concluding quotes from the reviews:

“There are some beautiful moments of raw humanity to be seen in this production – the sort of thing you won’t see in any reality show, as only strong writing and committed acting can produce them.” -DC Theatre Guide

“The difference between real reality TV and this show: reality TV is more scripted and highly edited.” -Washington City Paper

Can you tell which I prefer?

Performances of Sezze Sun will be at the Soho Rep, 46 Walker Street (2 blocks south of Canal, between Church & Broadway), from August 5-16. Tickets can be purchased here.

Schedule is as follows:

Wed 8/5 @ 8pm

Thurs 8/6 @ 8pm

Fri 8/7 @ 8pm

Sat 8/8 @ 2pm & 8pm

Sun 8/9 @ 8pm

Tues 8/11 @ 8pm

Wed 8/12 @ 8pm

Thurs 8/13 @ 8pm

Fri 8/14 @ 8pm

Sat 8/15 @ 8pm

Sun 8/16 @ 2pm

Sometimes the work you see is more important than the work you create. That’s how I felt when I saw that the Maly Drama Theatre were coming to New York the same week my play premieres in DC. Luckily, Life and Fate starts on Tuesday night, which gives me the opportunity to spend 3 and a half blissful hours in the presence of Russian actors and then I can head down to DC Wednesday morning to see the first performance of Sezze Sun.

My first introduction to Lev Dodin’s company was during my masters at Goldsmiths when my coursemates taking a Contemporary Directors elective were urged to see the Maly production of Platonov. (I, on the other hand, was taking a Sociocultural Analysis of Musical Theatre elective and spending most of my time watching film versions of Seven Brides for Seven Brothers and discussing the meaning of the costume colors.) So I booked tickets to see Platonov and was in absolute awe from start to finish. I had never seen a Russian company perform Chekhov and it was so novel. There was even a massive swimming pool onstage and actual swimming. I rarely saw standing ovations in London (and have always been a bit of a snob about them in general), but I leapt to my feet at the end of this play and everyone else in the Barbican did as well. Shows like that make going to the theatre worthwhile.

Sidenote: My mother and I went to see Round and Round the Garden (the third play in The Norman Conquests) and loved it. So well done and such fun.

Sidenote 2: I’ve booked tickets for Jude Law’s Hamlet thanks to the Amex presale. $25 for seats in the back of the mezzanine, what is this, the West End?! Huzzah! When I know more about it, some day I will write a post about theatre ticket pricing.

We’re 9 days from our first performance in DC and have only really nailed down the script. We’ve done a significant amount of improv and rewriting to go into this play and it’s been a challenging process for everyone because it’s a new theatrical process for a lot of us (if not all of us). Lots of copies of the script being recycled.  Subtle changes at the beginning of the play make scenes later on irrelevant. And then when we think it works, something else pops up. It seems very similar to what I imagine television writing is like. Which I suppose is appropriate, given the premise.

Anyway, here’s the e-flyer. More about the New York run in a bit.