Words of the Week
I’m going to break a bit with the usual format of these “Words of the Week” posts.
A couple of weeks ago, the wonderful 24/6: Jewish Theater Twitter feed alerted me to an amazing online offering: a full video of the recent Signature Theatre production of Arthur Miller’s play Incident at Vichy, presented via WNET-THIRTEEN’s Theater Close-Up series. I was lucky to catch a performance of the play here in New York a few months ago. It was excellent, and I recommend that you take this opportunity to see it for yourself from the comfort of your own screen.
As WNET has noted of this production:
In Vichy, France at the height of World War II, nine men and a boy are rounded up under suspicious circumstances. As ominous reports of far-off camps and cattle cars packed with prisoners begin to circulate, the men battle over politics, philosophy and how to escape.
Longtime Signature director Michael Wilson (Horton Foote’s The Old Friends and The Orphans’ Home Cycle) helmed this haunting examination of the cold, bureaucratic efficiency of evil—and the shared humanity that might overcome it.
The ensemble cast includes David Abeles, Curtis Billings, James Carpinello, AJ Cedeño, Demosthenes Chrysan, Quinlan Corbett, Brian Cross, Jonathan Gordon, Jonathan Hadary, Alex Morf, Jonny Orsini, Darren Pettie, John Procaccino, Alec Shaw, Derek Smith, Richard Thomas, and Evan Zes.
When this production opened in November, AM NY proclaimed it “a superb, highly compelling revival!” Talkin’ Broadway rated it “a first-rate revival…Wilson’s Incident at Vichy could scarcely feel more alive.” And The Hollywood Reporter found “its powerful themes of guilt and responsibility, tautly dramatized and well-defined.”
Again, I recommend that you watch the full Thirteen Theater Close-Up presentation. But since I can’t seem to embed THIRTEEN’s video here, I’m offering you just a snippet via the Signature Theatre itself.