It's always nice to have the hyphenated adjective "award-winning" lead your name. The production of Brother that is ending its run at downtown Manhattan's Performance Space 122, May 26, has a pair of those before the names of its creators. The show started May 17.
Obie Award-winning John Kelly and Pulitzer Prize-winning David Del Tredici are the co-conspirators in this play subtitled Songs my mother never taught me [sic]. The theatrical work is a song cycle which takes the Del Tredici-composed songs set to Kelly's words (poetry and lyrics) and stages them using props, minimal set pieces and choreography.
The production also includes five additional songs written by Del Tredic set to the words of Allen Ginsberg, Jamie Manrique, Paul Monette and Lewis Carroll.
Composer Del Tredic garnered the coveted Pulitzer in 1980 for his work Final Alice which was based on the Lewis Carroll story. Performer Kelly, who recently played in James Joyce's The Dead on Broadway, won Obie Awards in 1987 for Pass the Blutwurst, Bitte (The Egon Schiele St) and in 1991 for Love of a Poet.
For tickets to Brother at P.S. 122, 150 First Avenue, call (212) 477-5288. For more information, visit their website at www.ps122.org. — by Ernio Hernandez