Yeah, sure. It’s a long haul, you’ll get no argument here, but the Big Apple is the only place you’ll get an argument from Port playwright Gregory S. Moss. Well, not “an” argument, but “The Argument.” The play, originally produced at The Hangar Theater almost four years ago as part of director Kerry Whigham’s Drama League Fellowship — and, not long after, enjoyed a successful run at the Firehouse in a stunning Stephen Haley production, is the story of life, death and regret in post-Katrina New Orleans, although the hurricane is never mentioned by name. The story is non-literal, a funny, grotesque, apocalyptic fairy tale conceived as a response to the disaster. It addresses the issues raised, and still unresolved, and rapidly fading from the public consciousness, without directly invoking the actual events: Two young Chinese twin sisters inherit a Big Easy watering hole, a business that has consumed their lives. One sister wants to sell the business, to leave, to live. The other believes it's their "duty" to carry on. This is the argument, which ends when flood waters claim the life of one sister. The surviving sister then begins a quest to give the life unlived by the dead sister back to her.
Attic Theater Company, a collective focusing on the work of contemporary playwrights, brings the new production to the stage this weekend at another former firehouse — DCTV, a Manhattan landmark, with Whigham at the helm again. The cast includes John Albano, Brooke Bundy, Sara Bues, Ted Caine, Nick Choksi, Eric Clem, Andrea Dionne, Michael Eisenstein, Sam Gooley, Monica Hammond, Krista Hasinger, Harrison Hill, Sarah Kohl, Sarah Montgomery, Claire Natale, Kevin O'Callaghan, Mallory Portnoy, Stephen Stocking. The show runs March 4 to 13. Moss, who seems to be leading a vagabond existence, bouncing from city to city for productions of his work, which is grabbing some rave reviews. His “punkplay,” a play inspired by the purple-hair kids hanging around the Inn Street fountain, was described as “brilliantly funny dissection of adolescent grasping for identity” by Time Out Chicago. His “Orange, Hat and Grace,” recently staged at Soho Rep, “works its way into the creases of your soul, conjuring influences as disparate as Pygmalion and Beckett and Shepard,” says New York Magazine ... Wow, We like him, too, man.
JUST THE FACTS, MAN: The Attic Theater Company will stage Gregory S. Moss's "The Argument" at 8 p.m. March 4-6 and March 10-13, at DCTV, 87 Lafayette St., New York. The theater is located between Canal and White streets, Tickets are $18, or $5 for students. For more information, check out the Attic web.
