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Lets talk aboutGeorgy Tovstonogov.
But the first and fifth event belong to the director and happen in the theater.
1 is the handshake of the whole experience, the tuning fork: How does a production establish itself?
That first event, said Tovstonogov, reflects the play like a drop of water reflects the whole ocean.
Lights up, music down, they come back, and the play gets going.
But it does matter.
Because lets just get it over with is no kind of first event.
Nor is clap for the celebrities.
This kind of surface-level engagement is allThe Roommatecan really withstand.
Their chemistry is spicy and real, and theres nothing wrong with having a straight-up good time.
Beneath its veneer,The Roommateis in an on-again, off-again relationship with its own conscience.
This could partly be a matter of context.
2015 isnt just nine years ago its a different time continuum.
Anti-heroes abounded and often felt exciting in a way that they dont quite these days.
In this sense, Silvermans characters cant be blamed for growing from different soil.
They are Sharon (Farrow) and Robyn (LuPone), and theyve recently moved in together.
Or, rather, Robyn has moved in with Sharon.
Robyn wears dark sunglasses, leather jackets, and a Chrissie Hynde shag.
Sharon wears comfy shoes and flannels and puts her feathery, strawberry-blonde princess hair in Laura Ingalls Wilder braids.
Im a vegan, says Robyn.
Shes also a potter and a slam poet who grows her own weed.
And shes also, of course gay.
Some of my sons friends are homosexual people.
Probably most of them …
I think most New Yorkers are.
Her timing is great, as is her high-key blending of blushing naivete and unnerving tenacity.
Heres where things start to escalate and where Silvermans grip gets shaky.
Even the doubts Robyn expresses are solipsistic.
Theyre mostly screeches of surprise (Do you even know how to use a gun??)
and worries for personal safety (We are keeping alow profile).
But theres always been something a little dispiriting about the contemporary Women Behaving Badly genre.
The fuck you defiance Itsmyturn to be a selfish asshole now, boys!
lands with the empty clatter of revenge or even boring old resentment.
Its shortsighted and inward-turning, less a howl of freedom than a self-owning neener-neener-neener.
The Roommateis at the Booth Theatre.
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