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REVIEWS OF PRESENT AND PAST WORK (excerpts)
From BACKSTAGE
Kerri Allen's review of THE GREAT DIVORCE January 23,
2007
Drance is one hell of an actor. Handsome,
charismatic, committed, it's clear he means the words...
NEW YORK TIMES THEATER REVIEW
by Anita Gates
Fragments of a Greek Trilogy
"Trojan Women" "Electra" "Medea"
directed by Andrei Serban
music by Elizabeth Swados
Ah, the life of the Off Off Broadway critic! Rushing off to see ... four hours of Greek tragedy on East Fourth Street
in the original Greek.
But let me just say this: Wow.
Twenty five years after Andrei Serban, Elizabeth Swados and La MaMa's Great Jones Repertory Company astounded critics
and audiences with their avant-garde production "Fragments of a Greek Trilogy" the work is just as powerful,
just as mesmerizing, just as consistently surprising as it ever could have been...
"Medea" is elegant in its simplicity and urgency. When the title character's murdered
children and thrown down to Jason, their father (George Drance) no words are needed...
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NEW YORK TIMES THEATER REVIEW
'Communications From a Cockroach': that typing
cockroach strikes again, poetically
By ANITA GATES
"Communications From a Cockroach," ... is original, laugh-provoking and charming to a
fault. Four actors, a dozen or so puppets, the appropriately off-kilter set and an enthusiasm for treating grown-up subjects
playfully make this modest one-act production a pleasure.
The show's success is also a tribute to Ralph Lee, the show's
director and designer, who founded the Greenwich Village Halloween Parade and ran it in the good old days. Interpretation
of this source material was probably tricky.
This adaptation by Mr. Lee and Scott Cargle ... is brought to life by
a smart, skillful cast. Tom Marion operates and speaks for Archy (who can't be said to be cute, but he's not repulsive either).
Margi Sharp's main character is Mehitabel. Sam Zuckerman's is Freddy the Rat. George Drance
is a standout, especially as a tarantula (the multilegged stranger mentioned above) and as a cricket who drives
Archy insane by constantly repeating "Cheer up, cheer up."
In a series of short sketches, Archy also witnesses a fight
to the death, terrifies a sleeping couple on Long Island and visits an Egyptian pharaoh at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
In one sketch, all the puppets are beds, including a young slumber couch who won't reveal the paternity of her little crib
to her father, the four-poster.
COMMUNICATIONS FROM A COCKROACH
Archy and the Underside
Based on the sketches
of Don Marquis; adapted by Ralph Lee with Scott Cargle; directed and designed by Mr. Lee; producer, Mr. Cargle; associate
producer, Susan Hoff. Stage manager, Walter Pagan; lighting operator, David Logan Rankin. Research by Casey Compton and Mr.
Rankin; puppets and masks by Mr. Lee; costumes by Ms. Compton; music composed by Neal Kirkwood; lighting by Richard Maldonado.
Presented by Here Arts Center, Mettawee River Theater Company and the Shakespeare Project.
WITH: George Drance, Tom
Marion, Margi Sharp and Sam Zuckerman.
THEATRE REVIEW - France Amerique
By Rosette Lamont
"The Lesson" by Eugene Ionesco
Directed by Niky Wolcz.
La MaMa ETC./ Teatrul Tineretului, Piatra Neamtz Romania*
We were spoilt with an irresistable production staged by NikyWolcz, assisted by his wife Ulla.
In the part of the Professor/dictator, the actor George Drance passes through the entire range
of emotions: false shyness, increasing lubricity, murderous rage, anguish, panic... Niky Wolcz has gone far beyond
Bataille with this play which is more than ever and image of our criminal ans raging planet.
THEATRE REVIEW The New Journal
by Gryzina Drabik
The Lesson
The Lesson is foreboding from the outset. The Professor, superbly performed by George
Drance immediately appears distressing as he moves stealthily,
like an animal in a cage. As the play unfolds, the rhythm of the action is more and more decisive. Thus,
the final murder scene appears to be logical and inevitable
Show Business Weekly ---Review by Patrick Gallagher
The Last
Two Jews of Kabul is legitimately transporting. It creates
the feeling of an entire city, riddled with bullets and fear, spreading out in all directions from the tiny, crumbling synagogue
set. While the turns it takes later make the characters more like specific people and less like broad abstractions
Two
Jews manages to transcend the obviousness
of its themes thanks to the conviction and strength of Drance and Matzs performances. Drance invests Wolf
with enough wild-eyed mania to make his behavior toward the end of the play plausible and Matz convincingly portrays
a humble man who is close to death and yet a remains a paragon of strength. In the first act, the play develops real momentum
as the characters reveal themselves and the situation develops.
Click here for the entire review
nytheatre.com review
by Martin Denton ·
March 2, 2003
...What I admire most about The Last Two Jews of Kabul is its urgency; when you see it, you'll understand that Greenfield
clearly felt compelled to write it. That sense of mission keeps us riveted. The production at La MaMa is spare but effective.
It's directed by George Ferencz on a terrifically evocative set designed by Tom Lee. George Drance
(Wolf) and Jerry Matz (Abram) do outstanding work as the title characters.
If you read German, this is a review of "The Trojan Women" in the Austrian paper. I get a nice mention in this one.
if you read romanian, this is a commentary from Peatra Neamtz, Romania about Ionesco's "The Lesson."
If you read chinese, this is from "The Trojan Women" in Taiwan
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