Flying monks, undersea oddity, more

Describing eviction from his childhood home by those who once loved him: "To pass on to less melancholy matters . . . [beat] on my father's death . . . ." On women's intuitive powers: They "smell a rigid phallus from 10 miles away [beat] and wonder, 'How did he spot me from there?' "

Balanced by a yarn-spinning rhythm that evokes another Irish Conor - McPherson, whose work the company also performs - Lovett transmits the inconvenient "disturbance" of human connection (being with Lulu is a torment, without her, misery) blandly, pleasantly. He's ambling inexorably toward the Endgame, but at least there's comfort in transience. Of course, an audience is yet another inconvenient human complication, and Lovett ingeniously plays with this idea ("The mistake one makes is talking to them"). But there's no mistake about this: Beckett's pain is Lovett's audience's gain.

- Wendy Rosenfield

The Persecution and Assassination of Jean-Paul Marat as Performed by the Inmates of the Asylum of Charenton Under the Direction of the Marquis de Sade. Whoever decided EgoPo Classic Theater should perform Peter Weiss' rich, Brechtian work at the Rotunda in University City was wrong. The place is fine for dance, but its vaulted masonry ceiling sucks in, chews up, and spits out sound.

And arranging the audience in a wide arc of benches? People sitting toward each end, on the sidelines, may as well wear earplugs; the songs and words roll up to the dome and bounce back, indecipherable. I was one of those people.

But, hey, it's not always just about us: The cast members, a terrific bunch who play instruments while singing and acting, deserve better, as does the work itself - a re-creation of a play by the philosopher/deviant (whatever that meant then or now) Marquis de Sade (the excellent David Blatt), who was allowed to stage plays at France's Charenton Asylum, where he was a forced resident in the early 1800s.

Brenna Geffers' direction of this story about the French Reign of Terror yields a beautiful, sweeping staging. It's easy to see why the peeling, down-at-the-heels Rotunda seemed plausible; we feel as if we're in a crumbling European institution, before air-conditioning, alas.

After intermission, I sat poking from a portico mid-audience to hear more clearly the revolutionary writer-philosopher Marat in Steve Wright's stirring portrayal. Charlotte Corday is compelling as the woman who murders him, and Jered McLenigan is a standout narrator (uncannily like Broadway star Michael Cerveris in looks, voice, and poise). Theatre Exile's Joe Canuso acts here, as the asylum bureaucrat who harrumphs to keep the inmates in line.

EgoPo could have built more risers to confine the audience to the middle, directly in front of the action. If you go, peek in first to see whether those mid-seats are all taken before you agree to a sort of asylum of your own.

- Howard Shapiro