A Fable – Location, Tickets, Reviews
A Fable, a new play by David Van Asselt, the artistic director at Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, is celebrating a world premiere at Cherry Lane Theatre. A Fable is a joint production of Rattlestick, piece by piece productions, and Rising Phoenix Repertory. It is directed by Daniel Talbott, the literary manager at Rattlestick.
A dark fairytale, A Fable explores love and morality in the wake of tragedy. Jonny is a soldier whose conscience wages an internal war after a mission goes awry. He tries to assuage his guilt by helping Chandra, a civilian whose mother died during the operation, find her father. Their journey meanders in many directions, some contrived, some genuinely surprising, and all examining the range of human responses to difficult circumstances.
The series of events at the heart of this play happen quickly and there is little room for the emotional impact of those events and the personal connections between the characters to evolve naturally. This weakens the power of the play. Moreover, Van Asselt’s commentary on righteousness and his attempts to warn against apathy can feel preachy. The number of abstract themes wedged into this drama distracts from the play’s plot and character development. That may be intentional but ultimately makes both the intellectual lessons of this play and the sentimental journeys of its characters convoluted.
Critics’ Reviews
Huffington Post
First Nighter”: A Feeble “Fable,” A Lively “So, This Then is Life”
TICKETS
$66 (click here for tickets)
DATES
Performances through June 28, 2014
LOCATION
Cherry Lane Theatre
38 Commerce Street
New York City
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RUNNING TIME
2 hours 30 minutes, 1 intermission
CAST & CREW
(partial list)
Written by David Van Asselt
Directed by Daniel Talbott
Music by Elizabeth Swados
Featuring Edward Carnevale, Liza Fernandez, Dawn-Lyen Gardner, Maxwell Hamilton, Jerry Matz, Hubert Point-Du Jour, Eileen Rivera, Sarah Shaefer, Pamela Shaw, Samantha Soule, Alok Tewari, Sanford Wilson, Gordon Joseph Weiss