Gerald Kean

Artistic Director Tony Prince and Producing Director Richard McGrew announce that The Liminal Playhouse is going out with a bang with its nineteenth Louisville premiere and final production: “Edward Gant’s Amazing Feats of Loneliness” by Anthony Neilson opening May 26. Written in 2008 but set in 1881, this play is the final performance of a Victorian theatre troupe led by an opium addict. An odd combination of melodrama, comedy, and fairy tale, it is a strange, and at times grotesque, exploration of loneliness, love, memory, the ephemeral nature of life and of theatre itself.

Tom Stoppard may not have created the notion of meta-theatricality but he established his reputation with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, a play that quickly became a milestone in Western theatre and influenced a tendency for heady self-awareness in generations of future playwrights.

America since the 2016 election has provoked no small amount of questioning. How could it ever have come to this? Beyond the immediacy of partisanship, the GOP has set about dismantling landmark legislation such as the Voting Rights Act. It has sent us reeling back in time to reexamine modern history for clues, and also to seek comfort in moments in which we felt secure in the march of progressiveness.

In his program notes for this production, director Charlie Sexton states, 'Sometimes we need a night of theatre where pretense, deep subtext and the desire to change the world is stripped away...' While I can understand how John Cariani's play fits the bill, I think there is still a few moments that speak to the darker complications of human relationships, even if it is charm that carries the day.

Mitch Albom's book Tuesday's With Morrie told of the renewal of a friendship with one of his college professors in the months before the old man dies from ALS. It was a bestseller and popular television movie, and it remains an appealing inspirational story. The stage adaptation, by Albom and Jeffrey Hatcher, keeps the schmaltz at bay for most of its length with humor grounded by J.R. Stuart's performance in the title role.