TDF Stages Archive

The three main characters of Sylvia , A.R. Gurney’s comedy famous for its love triangle of a Manhattan couple and their newly adopted dog, travel in a kind of pack. Trekking through conflict and crisis, they sniff out their story together, seeking a family.

At that, Morgan quips, “That’s just how it works in musicals.”

It helps, of course, that the play is so stimulating. The first act takes place in colonial Africa in the 19th century, where Martin, a British administrator, lives with his family and tries his best to uphold his country’s ideals. These include the presumed superiority of straight, white men, and that perception is ingrained so strongly that Betty (Martin’s wife) is played by a male actor in drag

Twenty minutes in, Robert O’Hara’s new play Barbecue seems to be about just that: a barbecue. You see a family gathered in a public park, grilling, drinking, barking at each other the way only family members can. Then all the rules change, and you realize you were wrong about what’s happening.

Welcome to On the Record, where we celebrate original cast recordings. Today’s title: the just-released Hamilton .

How director Daniel Aukin keeps the dance of dysfunction moving in Fool for Love

What strikes you most about the set? The brightly colored paper everywhere, like a gift bag just exploded? The rickety old piano in the back, like Miss Kitty is going to saunter out of her saloon and sing you a tune?

“I was at once struck by how alien and yet how familiar the music was,” says the NYC-based choreographer. “It’s paradoxical, considering there were instruments we’d never even seen. But folk art spans the world, and from the Irish jig to the dances and music in Kyrgyz, it connects us.”

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