Stop the Tempo
Three Romanian twenty-somethings rebel against contemporary, post-Communism, consumerist, hyper-connected culture, staged in a basement bar on the lower east side.
This production of “Stop the Tempo” by Romanian playwright Gianina Carbinariu is performed at Arlene’s Grocery (the bar on the LES). It’s lit largely by mini flashlights and strobe lights, punctuated by occasional blasts of techno music, and includes three strong performances by actors Reuben Barsky, Olivia Horton, and Sarah Silk.
It’s short (an hour), cheap ($25), and it starts early (7 p.m.) so it can fit on top of your existing plans.
Arlene’s Grocery
95 Stanton Street (between Orchard and Ludlow), NYC
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Reviews
NYTheatre
You couldn’t do Gianina Carbinariu’s Stop the Tempo—a taut yelp of a play that imagines a series of small, shared, personal acts of rebellion against the omnipresence of the technology that connects us at every moment of every day—in a traditional theater space; it’s powered by an uncomfortable intimacy between audience and performers, which is mirrored by the uncomfortable intimacy found and forced among the characters themselves.