Faith Hope and Charity

This trio of related short plays by three of our theater's most successful and respect writers-which echo a similar three-part program (entitled Morning, Noon and Night) which was presented on Broadway some twenty years earlier. Concerned with the terrors and pitfalls of modern urban life, the plays also find zany humor-and hope-amid the disorder

In the first play, Faith by Israel Horovitz, a group of 1960s radical writers hold a reunion, twenty years later, in front of the statue of the Polish King Jagiello in New York's Central Park. Reared in an age of sex, booze, drugs and explicit language, the group finds that time, and the demands of making a living, have both drained their passions and left their dreams half-realized

But the daughter of one of them, speaking for her own generation, confronts them with the legacy of cynicism and hopelessness which they have passed on, whether or not they realize it

The second play, Hope by Terrence McNally takes place in the same setting, but this time the central figures are a young brother and sister who have come to the park before dawn to honor the memory of a close friend who has committed suicide after becoming ill with AIDS

They meet a nun in civilian clothes (who is really not a nun at all, but who nevertheless admonishes the boy for his salty language); a man listening to Mahler on his headphones; and a chatty lady who has come to feed the pigeons. Although they meet by chance, and have little in common, somehow they manage to infuse each other with a sense of hope as the sun, at last, comes up over the quiet city

In the third play, Charity by Leonard Melfi the action again takes place at the same site in Central Park, but this time after nightfall. A woman swigs brandy and talks to the statue and then, suddenly, draws a gun and accosts another woman, an artist who has come to capture the statue on canvas. But the gun isn't loaded. In fact, as she demonstrates by persuading the artist to "hold up" another pair of evening strollers, the gun is really a way to spread love and good cheer-which, with infectious whimsy, the play most certainly does

REVIEWS

"The interesting thing about the new program is that all three writers have held on to their individual styles, which made them interesting playwrights 20 years ago" ~ Star-Ledger

"The plays, set in Central Park, are comic, provocative and touching, imbued with desperation and delight an extraordinary trilogy-a parable of modern times-worthy of its esteemed authors" ~ NY City Tribune

"thought-provoking in addition to being funny" ~ NY Native