Actor and freeFall Theatre artistic/executive director Eric Davis imagined what Shakespeare’s Tempest would be like if it were set in Florida, and came up with the one-man play The Tempest: Esta Isla Es Mia. Davis’ all-new adaptation grafts a second storyline that appropriates events in Cuban history with shout-outs to Jose Marti and prominent Cuban writers. In Davis’ play, Prospero is a Havana professor facing arrest for his production of The Tempest and flees to Florida alone in a rickety boat. The story is at once personal and an homage to Cuba’s cultural contributions and the history of revolution and dissent across Latin America. In addition to a new script, we get a newly commissioned score, live musicians, a brand-new seating configuration, a set design with 18,000 pounds of sand and some special effects — including a rainstorm! James Oliver directs.
Following her success with In the Heights at American Stage in the Park, director-about-town Karla Hartley has moved indoors for the engrossing two-character play Red at American Stage.
John Logan’s 2010 Tony winner focuses on the charismatic, self-destructive artist Mark Rothko, whose darkly layered canvases have only increased in value since his suicide in 1970, one selling recently for $46.45 million. The intersection of art and commerce is central to Red, which focuses on the period in the late 1950s when Rothko was commissioned to create a series of red and black murals for the Four Seasons restaurant in NYC’s Seagram Building. As we watch him prepare the paintings with the help of his young, opinionated and increasingly challenging assistant (a role that won Eddie Redmayne a Tony), Rothko begins to question not only whether his art belongs on the walls of an elitist restaurant but the future of art itself, and of his own legacy. Gregg Weiner and Andrew J. Perez star. American Stage, 163 3rd St. N., St. Petersburg.
Red previews are May 27-28. Runs Fri., May 29-Sun., June 21. Tickets: $29 (for previews), $39-$49 (Wed.-Sun.), and $59 for opening night (includes pre-performance reception). 727-823-PLAY, americanstage.org.
This article appears in May 21-27, 2015.