Wit

There are some plays that stick with you long after you have left the theater. They ruminate in your mind and leave an indelible impression on your heart and soul. Margarete Edison's Pulitzer prize (and many other award) winning Wit is just such a play. Just as there are plays that endure, there are performances. Cynthia Nixon (Tony winner for Rabbit Hole, and Miranda on Sex and the city) gave one such a performance in the role of Vivian Bearing PhD.

As Dr. Bearing, Ms. Nixon often addresses the audience directly. From the start of the play she makes no bones about telling you that she is going to die, and that it will not be pleasant. It is this earnest frankness, and that analytical approach to examining the process of her own death, and subsequently life, which propels the play forward.

Cynthia Nixon delivers each scene with exceptional power and grace. Her ability to navigate the different points of Vivian Bearings life, from her time as a professor of literature, to her early childhood, to her time as a student of literature, is astounding. Her costume never changes. She is always clad in hospital gown and baseball cap (to hide her bald head). Yet you would swear you see her at each specific stage of her life.

The rest of the cast is fine, though they more often than not fade into the background. Greg Keller as Dr Jason Posner fares best against Nixon as the impersonal, and possibly unethical fellow studying her case. Carra Patterson as Suzie, the nurse who befriends and ultimately stands up for Vivian Bearing comes off as weak. The rest of the cast is fine.

The set design by Santo Loquasto is simple yet effective, being able to transform between a hospital room, a college lecture hall, an professors office, and Vivian's child hood living room with a simple turn of a white panel. Peter Kaczorowski's lighting design is similar in it's simplicity and equal in it's utter brilliance of being able to transform the stage by emitting soft pools of light, and darkness when needed. Lynn Meadows direction is flawless.

Wit ended it's first (limited) Broadway run at Manhattan Theater Clubs Samuel Friedman Theater on March 17th 2012. Expect Nixon (and quite possibly the production, and Lynn Meadows direction) to be nominated for a Tony award on May 1st.