ANCESTRAL VOICES IBD

Sinopsis

á á&ldquo,If the family is the key theme of American drama, A R Gurney&rsquo,s ANCESTRAL VOICES: A FAMILY STORY is a beautiful chamber work in that great tradition.á áThe short play is staged as a concert work, with five performers sitting on chairs in front of music stands, where they&rsquo,ve laid their scripts. The five are playing members&mdash,grandfather, grandmother, father, mother, son&mdash,of a rich WASP family in Buffalo NY between 1935 and 1942, with a brief coda from the 1960s.á áThe son, Eddie, who goes from age eight to twelve, is our narrator, guide and point of view&hellip,.á áThis lovely play unites the microcosm of family to the macrocosm of America at war. On Eddie&rsquo,s first date he brings his girl a paper `war-sage&rsquo,. It&rsquo,s also about something in between&mdash,a city. It&rsquo,s an elegy for Buffalo, a once-glorious place whose fortunes are declining.á áThe texture of life in Buffalo is heartbreakingly evoked in ways reminiscent of The Magnificent Ambersons&hellip,.á áThis is a magical play, not a mere exercise in uncritical nostalgia, but a nuanced reminiscence full of time and change and loss and suffering--as well as joy.&rdquo,Donald Lyons, New York Postá á&ldquo,&hellip,A R Gurney&rsquo,s genteel and gently comic ANCESTRAL VOICES&hellip,leaving exceedingly pleasant memories in its wake.á áMr Gurney&rsquo,s play is performed in the manner of his popular epistolary drama LOVE LETTERS, with the cast reading from scripts while seated on a bare stage&hellip,.á áThe hybrid Mr Gurney has produced is as elegantly faceted as a marquise diamond. What distinguishes the tales is the rueful maturity with which it is recounted by a man gazing back over the decades. The characters feel like fully fleshed-out cousins of the denizens of the novels of John Cheever, to whom the dramatist is often compared. The production is not dramatic in the strictest sense, either, the flare-ups in this confrontation-averse clan flicker only for instants. Yet isn&rsquo,t that the way a lot of families let off steam?&rdquo,Peter Marks, The New York Timesá á&ldquo,&hellip,with ANCESTRAL VOICES, the result is a wistful, colorful companion piece to LOVE LETTERS. That two-character epistolary goldmine, of course, has been similarly read on stages, cruise ships and wherever pairs of actors hunger for quick-study, quality work. Given the new one&rsquo,s larger cast requirements, it is not likely to duplicate the phenomenal popularity of its predecessor. The story of unraveling expectations in a society that considered itself a constant, however, is no less captivating a human document of recent but very foreign times.&rdquo,Linda Winer, Newsday