Washington, DC, gets the Off-Broadway revival of Are You Now or Have You Ever Been? next. Arena Stage has named an 11-strong company for Anna D. Shapiro's production of Eric Bentley's docudrama, which runs in the Kreeger Theater from October 17 to December 6, with Jason Babinsky reprising his role from this summer's New York City Center staging.
Press night is Thursday, October 22. Bentley built the play entirely from the transcripts of the House Un-American Activities Committee hearings of the 1940s, when the committee called some of the country's best-known artists to account. The testimony heard on stage includes that of Arthur Miller, Jerome Robbins, Paul Robeson, Elia Kazan, Lillian Hellman, Abe Burrows and Lionel Stander.
Babinsky plays Committeeman 2 again. Around him are John Leslie Wolfe as the Chairman, Philip Earl Johnson as Committeeman 1, Edward L. Simon, Greg Stuhr and Stephen Cefalu Jr. as Men 1 to 3, Aaron Bliden as Larry Parks, Peter Jacobson as Abe Burrows, Rivka Borek as Lillian Hellman, Jeff Still as Lionel Stander and Kevin Mambo as Paul Robeson. Coleman Pedigo, Joey Collins, David Bryan Jackson and Eli El are the understudies.
Still has been here before. In 1990 he played Stander in a Chicago staging of the same play by Big Game Theatre, and Shapiro directed that one too.
Arena added the production to its season in September, straight from the City Center run, and the New York design team travels with it: Andrew Boyce (sets), Johanna Pan (costumes), Donald Holder (lighting), Rob Milburn and Michael Bodeen of Milbo Music (sound), Brittany Bland (projections) and Brittany Hartman (hair and wigs). Zoë Adams is associate director and Raiyon Hunter casts.
Arena Stage artistic advisor Tazewell Thompson, who saw the New York production at the request of executive producer Edgar Dobie, said he "immediately reported back that Arena absolutely MUST produce this play," calling it "brilliant, compelling, frighteningly relevant."
Performances run Tuesday, Wednesday and Sunday at 7:30pm, Thursday to Saturday at 8pm and weekend matinees at 2pm, plus six weekday matinees at noon. Tickets start at $37 from the Arena Stage sales office (202-488-3300) at 1101 Sixth Street SW and through the theater's production page.
