Broadway Bound 

Page 5 of 8

We're back in 1964, the early days of Pope Paul VI's reformist papacy — when women's powers as decision-makers are still nil. But it's Father Flynn who seems most transported by crusading zeal, reaching out to the first African-American to enroll at St. Nicholas school in the Bronx. In her nun's habit, Jones's zeal is prosecutorial. Her steely Aloysius presides in the principal's office more like a bird of prey than a mother hen, instantly elevating suspicion of Father Flynn to certainty.

To gather damning evidence against Flynn, Aloysius enlists Sister James. Still enraptured by her commitment to Christ, the young idealist finds the inquisition unsavory. Sister James is charmed and counseled by Flynn, a man who's more prone to see the virtues of remaining in doubt. "In pursuit of wrongdoing, one steps away from God," Sister Aloysius tells Sister James with chilling self-knowledge, still gung-ho on making the journey.

Additional surprises tighten the tension when the allegedly molested boy's mother is summoned for a conference in Sister's office — and we get our first scary inkling that the dogmatic Aloysius is no stranger to political and moral compromise. All of the cast is superb as this taut drama careens to its haunting denouement. But Jones is clearly the standout in one of the first great theater roles of the new century.

Bug (***3/4) — Agnes White's options are slim and grim from the moment we encounter her in Tracy Letts' apocalyptic thriller. Just released from prison, there's her hulking ex-husband Jerry Goss, who terrorizes her with silent phone calls before he arrives and punches her out.

That's the banal side of Agnes's life, and the brutality she suffers from Goss is a mere preamble to some of the most convincing fighting — and bloodletting — you'll ever see onstage. Peter Evans is a more exotic and mysterious proposition. He claims to be the victim of a diabolical government experiment whereby carnivorous aphids were implanted in his gums during a dental procedure — in preparation for loosing the microbes on Baghdad. In fact, Peter might be an escaped lunatic suffering from dangerous paranoid delusions. Or how about a combo, exploited by evil scientists and crazy?

Whatever the truth may be, the Feds are definitely on Peter's tail and closing in. Agnes chooses to believe in Peter, a telling indicator of just how banal her life is — and how desperate she is to escape to something more satisfying. Jim Jones and Guyana are always an airline ticket away.

Kate Buddeke heads this pitch-perfect cast as the beleaguered Agnes, with Michael Cullen magnificently menacing as Goss, and Joey Collins ambiguously cuddly, weasely, volatile, and catatonic as Peter. For those who are fearless and not squeamish, this is a 4-star evening of meaty suspense. I do have to make a small deduction, however, for toxicity. Agnes and Peter are constantly chain-smoking, and as my daughter noted when we first sat down, the place smells like Raid.

Yes, this is a true taste of Greenwich Village bohemia.

Lone Star Love (**3/4) — It's hard to resist this fun-loving, chili-flavored makeover of Shakespeare, subtitled The Merry Wives of Windsor, Texas. John L. Haber, with Tony Award-winner Jack Herrick supplying the songs, is often brilliant in transporting the lovable Elizabethan comedy to the post-Civil War era.

Still a rotund, lovable scamp, Sir John Falstaff is now the cowardly Sergeant John when we first encounter him in Bentonville, North Carolina. Not the only Tarheel connection, as we'll soon see. Sgt. Falstaff soon promotes himself to Colonel when the rebel cause is lost by scavenging his fallen comrade's jacket and cap. Then the roly-poly rapscallion, played by a hearty and heavily-padded Jay O. Sanders, heads westward with Pistol, Bardolph, and Nym — or as this trio of renegades is better known in Chapel Hill, the Red Clay Ramblers, headed by Herrick.

Fenton, played by velvet-voiced Clarke Thorell, is also ingeniously transformed, coming on to Miss Anne Page as "the yodeling cowboy." Extra voltage is injected into Falstaff's failed attempts at seducing Windsor's wives by the presence of Gary Sandy, whom you may recall from his stint on WKRP. Here he snarls husband Frank Ford's jealousy with whiplash force. Toss in the gospel-tinged song stylings of Harriet D. Foy as Miss Quickly, and you have a potent stew.

Michael Bogdanov, armed with impressive Shakespearean credentials, directs with disarming resourcefulness, turning the John Houseman Theater into a grungy roadhouse — festooned with Lone Star and Falstaff Beer signage. Before the show and at intermission, there's a hospitable barbecue at the Page Ranch. You can walk up onstage and dig into some cornbread, wieners, potato salad, a damn fine chili, and other vittles, served by Sandy and the rest of the cast. Or belly up to the bar for a hand of poker!