Interludes

THE HANGOVER REPORT – Lileana Blain-Cruz’s timely, outsized revival of Thornton Wilder’s THE SKIN OF OUR TEETH leans in on the work’s operatic absurdity

• By drediman
• May 2, 2022
• No Comments

This past weekend at the Vivian Beaumont Theater, I attended a performance of Lincoln Center Theater’s Broadway revival of The Skin of Our Teeth by Thornton Wilder (who is best known for penning that ubiquitous American classic Our Town). The Pulitzer Prize-winning play essentially tells the story of human civilization through the lens of the Antrobus family, who over the course of thousands of years (and counting), have weathered plagues, natural disasters, wars, and other catastrophes, often getting by just by the “skin of their teeth”. In short, the work is a testament to the resiliency of the human spirit.

Written more than 80 years ago, The Skin of Our Teeth remains a singularly wild ride, thanks largely to the staging by director Lileana Blain-Cruz (more on her invaluable contributions later) and new material by playwright Branden Jacobs-Jenkins. Both ensure that the play has received a good dusting off for contemporary audiences. Because they both lean in on the work’s operatic absurdity, its meta-theatrical antics and freewheeling experimental spirit feel less unwieldy and more playfully theatrical this time around. Indeed, the production currently at the Beaumont crackles with the kind of audacity that audiences way back in 1942 must have felt upon the play’s premiere. Given the turbulence of today’s world and what we’ve collectively had to go through over the last two-plus years, a revival of the work at this current juncture seems particularly timely and needed.

Ms. Blain-Cruz makes an auspicious Main Stem debut helming the Lincoln Center Theater revival of The Skin of Our Teeth. Given the considerable resources at her disposal, she takes every opportunity to embrace the play’s huge scale with a similarly mammoth, epic staging (the stylish, outsized scenic design is by Adam Rigg) that she orchestrates masterfully. She’s also elicited some vivid, larger-than-life performances from her large cast, notably from the commanding James Vincent Meredith (as Mr. Antrobus), the incisive Roslyn Ruff (as Mrs. Antrobus), and especially the hurricane that is Gabby Beans (as Sabina).

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

THE SKIN OF OUR TEETH
Broadway, Play
Lincoln Center Theater at the Vivian Beaumont Theater
2 hours, 55 minutes (with one intermission and a brief pause)
Through May 29