“Red Light Winter” by Adam Rapp / directed by Claire Edmonds

Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize in 2005, “Red Light Winter” revolves around two Americans who travel to Amsterdam and the female sex worker they encounter in the famed Red Light District. The expectation of fantasy, the disappointment of reality, and the complications of lust and love – “Red Light Winter” will feature Max Hunter (Artistic Director, The Bridge; Pearl Theatre, Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival), Christina Toth (Last Season’s “Richard III”; “Orange is The New Black”) and Connor Bond (Public Theatre’s “Troilus and Cressida”). “Red Light Winter” runs for twelve performances in rotating repertory with Carol Brown’s darkly comic adaptation of Ibsen’s “Hedda Gabler” called, well, “Hedda.”

The chasm between our varied lives and theater’s capacity to reflect it is nothing to get down on; in fact, it’s a beautiful opportunity, and in many ways, is what this art form does do best. Red Light Winter, an excellent play by Adam Rapp, getting a remount in a very fine production by The Bridge Production Group directed by Claire Edmonds, genuinely speaks to the nuances of our experiences, the volume of what we encompass, the peculiar range of our true feelings. The alternative and abstract theater world has always implicitly dealt with this, but that Rapp has found this in a rather straightforward structure is a significant accomplishment. The play finds old college roommates Matt and Davis in an apartment in Amsterdam, in the Red Light District. At curtain up Matt begins to attempt suicide, but Davis, who, played by Connor Bond, is certainly charismatic but unquestionably fiercely unlikable, arrives with a girl, Christina, who they later confirm is from a window. Then comes the trappings of the American Theater: we get everything one could hope for, from desire to history to revelations to power. The first act feels very much like a satisfying one-act, though lacking a comple …Read more