Arlington
Opening Night: February 12, 2014
Closing: March 23, 2014
Theater: Vineyard Theatre
It’s a sunny day and Sara Jane is valiantly trying to keep it that way. Her young husband, Jerry, is away at war – and though Sara Jane believes in the cause, nothing has seemed quite right lately. Especially the last few messages from Jerry. At least she has her piano – and Jerry’s bourbon – to keep her company as she tries to figure things out. But how far will she go to keep the impending storm at bay? Arlington is a stirring, funny and powerful new work from playwright/novelist Victor Lodato and award-winning composer Polly Pen (Vineyard’s Goblin Market, Bed and Sofa).
BUY TICKETSREAD THE REVIEWS:
March 2, 2014
The gut-wrenching turmoil of life as an army wife takes the form of an hour-long recitative in Arlington, now playing off-Broadway at the Vineyard Theatre. Soulful soprano Alexandra Silber bears most of the scrutiny of the magnifying glass that playwright Victor Lodato has placed up to her character, Sara Jane, whose husband, Jerry, has gone off to fight the war in the Middle East. Over the course of 24 hours, Sara Jane frenetically traverses her plush, finely manicured living room (designed by Dane Laffrey), rambling on about everything from her childhood singing lessons to her mother’s affinity for plastic surgery. Slowly revealed over this time is the toll that war and its many ambiguities have taken on her mental and emotional fortitude during the endless wait for her husband’s return.
READ THE REVIEW
March 3, 2014
"I’m not a rain person, I’m a sun person," sings Sara Jane, the young woman at the center of Victor Lodato and Polly Pen’s musical Arlington, and that declaration could not be more true. From arranging flowers to operatic trilling to her love for chocolate, this wife of a military man recently deployed to parts unknown revels in the things that make her feminine and keep her on the straight, narrow, and traditionalist path to domestic tranquility. The thing about clouds, though: They don’t stop gathering just because you want them to.
READ THE REVIEW
March 2, 2014
An Army wife sings herself to the brink of a nervous breakdown in Arlington, a musical for solo voice and piano that opened on Sunday night at the Vineyard Theater. With book and lyrics by Victor Lodato, and music by Polly Pen, the show lasts just an hour as it charts the restless wandering of the heroine’s mind as she muses lightly on her past and more darkly on the war and its impact on her husband. But the long day of Sara Jane, flawlessly portrayed by the gifted singer Alexandra Silber, translates into a pretty long hour for the audience.
READ THE REVIEW