Lisa Kron's solo show, 2.5 Minute Ride, directed by Mark Brokaw, will begin performances March 17 for a March 28 opening at the Shiva Theater. Kron, one of the Five Lesbian Brothers, brought her solo to CA's Marin CenterStage, SF's Magic Theatre and RI's Trinity Rep, Jan. 21-25.
Writer and actress Kron (101 Humiliating Stories) tells of the trip she took with her 74 year-old father -- a Holocaust survivor -- to Auschwitz (the Jan. 21 performance benefits both RI's Perishable Theatre and the Rhode Island Holocaust Memorial Museum). Also part of the mix: other true family travels and her brother's marriage to an internet bride.
The show's title refers to a "Mean Streak" roller coaster ride in Sandusky, OH, which Kron took with her father -- who was taking nitrogen pills for a heart condition at the time. His philosophy about the Holocaust (in which his parents died): "If it weren't for the good fortune of being born a Jew, I might have become a Nazi."
As part of The Five Lesbian Brothers, Kron appeared in The Secretaries and Brides Of The Moon at New York Theatre Workshop. Recently, she returned to NYTW in Paul Rudnick's The Most Fabulous Story Ever Told.
Brokaw, who for the past couple years can do no wrong, has directed such successes as This Is Our Youth, As Bees in Honey Drown, The Dying Gaul and How I Learned to Drive. *
In other Public news, "NYPD Blue"'s Sharon Lawrence and Tony-winner Elizabeth Wilson will join Cherry Jones on stage for the Public Theatre production of Ellen McLaughlin's Tongue of a Bird, due to begin performances March 16, open April 4 and run through April 18.
As first reported by Playbill On-Line (Feb. 5), Cherry Jones will repeat her Mark Taper Forum performance as a search and rescue pilot in Tongue of a Bird. Her co-stars there were Marian Seldes and Diana Verona.
Lawrence is best known for her Emmy-nominated role on television's "NYPD Blue." Her Broadway credits include such landmark shows as Cabaret and Zorba.
Wilson won a Tony and Obie for her performance in David Rabe's Sticks and Bones. Other credits include Threepenny Opera, Solonika, Morning's at Seven and Ah, Wilderness.
Also in the cast are Melissa Leo and pre-teen actress Julia McIlvaine, who played opposite Jones in Lincoln Center Theatre's production of Tina Howe's Pride's Crossing.
Taper resident director Lisa Peterson stages the drama, which tells the story of an ace pilot (Jones) hunting for an abducted young girl (Johnson). The Taper is co-producing with the Joseph Papp Public Theatre.
The drama is described as being "rich in poetic text and stunning imagery," and as defining "a quest that transcends time itself as it soars toward its haunting, inexorable climax."
Bird was originally commissioned by the Taper and developed in the Taper's 1995-96 New Work Festival. It had its world premiere at the Intiman Theatre in September 1997 and was subsequently produced at the Almeida Theatre in London.
Jones won acclaim last season in Pride's Crossing. She is expected in New York next season in a Broadway revival of O'Neill's A Moon for the Misbegotten. Jones said (Feb. 4) the O'Neill is still in the works and no theatre or cast have been selected.
-- By Robert Simonson
