STEPHANIE J. BLOCK, “FALSETTOS” There are certain musical numbers that, in addition to flooring you, generate a lot of suspense. Ms. Block doing “I’m Breaking Down,” in that revivified “Falsettos” revival that I saw on Broadway last winter, is one of those numbers. She stood, aproned, behind a kitchen block, wielding a bowl and a knife, on her way to becoming an anxious cuckoo clock. Her voice went up and down the scale, the bowl went on her head and the carrots went to their grave. Would she survive all the neurosis she put into the song? Yup. She broke down. We cracked up.
LAURIE METCALF, “A DOLL’S HOUSE, PART 2,” “LADY BIRD” She doesn’t seem to do much to alter herself from one character to the next. No extreme accents or makeup jobs. Everything with her is energy, posture, eyes, temperature and America. To watch her, in “A Doll’s House, Part 2,” collapse to the floor, flat on her back, wearing period finery, stay there and act, or to see her drive a car in “Lady Bird” — haranguing her passenger then, later, with no one to harangue — is to experience a master comedic technician strip away her technique and leave you soaked in tears, both the pants-wetting and heartbroken varieties. |
