{"id":5657,"date":"2016-05-16T06:56:11","date_gmt":"2016-05-16T10:56:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=5657"},"modified":"2016-06-08T07:35:22","modified_gmt":"2016-06-08T11:35:22","slug":"all-the-days","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=5657","title":{"rendered":"All the Days"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"All

Caroline Aaron & Stephanie Janssen in All the Days (photo: T. Charles Erickson)<\/p><\/div>\n

At McCarter Theatre in Princeton through May 29, is the world premiere of Sharyn Rothstein\u2019s new family \u201cdramedy,\u201d All the Days<\/em>. Three generations have their issues: divorced parents in their sixties, uptight divorced daughter, and a grandson approaching his bar mitzvah. The central conflict, though, is mother-daughter. Author Rothstein says, \u201cMothers and daughters, if they can stand it, should see the play together.\u201d<\/p>\n

The action begins in the mother\u2019s kitchen as she recuperates from eye surgery, and her daughter convinces her to come to Philadelphia \u201cuntil the bar mitzvah.\u201d The Philly living room becomes the setting for most of the play\u2019s numerous short scenes in which the characters laugh together, yell at each other, and reveal their secrets and desires.<\/p>\n

Caroline Aaron plays mother Ruth Zweigman, overweight and overbearing, afflicted with diabetes and its consequences. To manage her fears and resentments, not to mention her grief over the death of her only son, she lashes out. Early on, I found her constant comebacks and jibes simply unpleasant, but Ruth warms as the play unfolds.<\/p>\n

Daughter Miranda (played by Stephanie Janssen) doesn\u2019t have the temperament for the constant sparring with mom and fled Long Island for the city of brotherly love, Philadelphia. A social worker and newly converted Christian, Miranda\u2019s in the business of fixing other people\u2019s problems, and is frustrated by a mother who doesn\u2019t want to be fixed.<\/p>\n

Ruth\u2019s ex-husband Delmore, played by Ron Orbach, is trying to rekindle a relationship with his prickly ex-wife, drawing on her nostalgia and, perhaps, thinking ahead to what his \u201cliver disease\u201d will bring. Ruth sets him straight, saying, \u201cYou can\u2019t live in the past and the future at the same time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rothstein holds a degree in public health as well as her MFA, and wove into this play significant public health concerns\u2014problems of diabetes, diet, and stress-related illness among them.<\/p>\n

It takes an unerring sense of timing to keep a two and a half hour production moving without a single check-your-watch moment, which McCarter Artistic Director Emily Mann accomplishes superbly as director. Mann says, \u201cI laughed out loud as I read [Rothstein\u2019s] fiercely funny characters, exquisitely wrought, struggling with dilemmas at once heartbreaking and hilarious.\u201d<\/p>\n

Leslie Ayvazian plays Ruth\u2019s sister Monica, absolutely able to give as good as she gets and a long-time realist where Delmore is concerned. Justin Hagan plays Miranda\u2019s boyfriend Stew only now meeting her parents and soon realizing why he\u2019s been spared heretofore. Yet Stew recognizes the mother\u2019s essential loneliness and suggests she meet a friend of his\u2014an herbalist, whom Ruth styles \u201ca medical man,\u201d who soon evolves into \u201ca doctor, a surgeon.\u201d This friend, Baptiste Wright, played by Raphael Nash Thompson, provides a welcome layer of calm and understanding to Ruth, like a smoothing, soothing layer of butter over the bumpy and fractured muffin underneath. Matthew Kuenne is the bar mitzvah boy.<\/p>\n

Production credits to Daniel Ostling (sets), Jess Goldstein (costumes), Jeff Croiter (lighting), and Mark Bennett (music and sound\u00a0 design).<\/p>\n

For tickets, call McCarter Theatre\u2019s box office (609)258-2787\u00a0 or visit the box office online<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

At McCarter Theatre in Princeton through May 29, is the world premiere of Sharyn Rothstein\u2019s new family \u201cdramedy,\u201d All the Days. Three generations have their issues: divorced parents in their sixties, uptight divorced daughter, and a grandson approaching his bar … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"All the Days - world premiere family \"dramedy\" in Princeton","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[272,366,104,147],"tags":[329],"class_list":["post-5657","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-comedy","category-drama","category-the-morgue","category-theater","tag-mccarter-theatre"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2NkiT-1tf","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5657","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5657"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5657\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5659,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5657\/revisions\/5659"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5657"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5657"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5657"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}