Considered one of the greatest, most inventive, and groundbreaking British playwrights of our time, Caryl Churchill, now in her 80s, continues to write enigmatic and provocative new works in her distinctive combination of surreal, absurdist, and stream-of-consciousness styles. Four of her latest short works, which made their debuts with the English Stage Company at London’s Royal Court Theatre in 2019 and 2021, are being presented together for the first time, Off-Broadway by The Public Theater, in GLASS. KILL. WHAT IF IF ONLY. IMP., directed by her longtime collaborator James Macdonald.
Together, the quartet of strange and mysterious pieces looks into the minds of deeply troubled characters trying to grapple with the shattering pain of life, death, and what we believe, with fragile anthropomorphized objects on a mantel that suffer overwhelming abuse and trauma (GLASS), non-existent mythological gods on a cloud that recount the anguish and violence they inflict (KILL), a grief-stricken man in a white room desperate to know what the future holds, visited by ghosts and a personification of the Present (WHAT IF IF ONLY), and an unseen magical spirit in a bottle that an unhappy woman – seated on a chair in a time-worn living room she shares with her cousin, visited by their Irish niece and an unemployed homeless man she starts dating – believes will fulfill her wishes (IMP). Sound strange? They are, in Churchill’s mysterious, confounding, and artful manner, loaded with symbolism and metaphors that trigger our emotions and epitomize the uncanny workings of our psyches, the insurmountable struggles we face, and the unanswerable questions of our existence.
In each, a minimalist set (by Miriam Buether), with a few significant props (by Claire M. Kavanah), is surrounded by infinite darkness (lighting by Isabella Byrd) and enhanced with an unnerving soundscape (by Bray Poor). The characters wear casual everyday costumes (by Enver Chakartash) that don’t visually enforce their identities as collectibles on a shelf, a girl made of glass, apparitions of specters, or traditional depictions of the ancient deities (though one woman hovering above the stage, clothed in white, with a few feathers, is in keeping with familiar representations of a Christian angel), requiring us to use our imaginations and to see beyond what we’re shown in this liminal space to discern Churchill’s cryptic connections and meanings.
An excellent ensemble of ten – Japhet Balaban, John Ellison Conlee, Adelind Horan, Maddox Morfit-Tighe, Deirdre O’Connell, Sathya Sridharan, Junru Wang, and Ayana Workman, with Ruby Blount and Cecilia Ann Popp alternating in the role of the young Child Future in WHAT IF IF ONLY) – captures the arcane nature of the writing and the figures, sometimes funny, sometimes tragic, sometimes poignant, and always intriguing (enhanced with stunt coordination by Michael Rossmy). Workman takes the lead in GLASS as the breakable Girl, Sridharan as the mourning and questioning Someone in WHAT IF IF ONLY, and the always outstanding O’Connell flawlessly delivers the dense non-stop monologizing of the gods in KILL and embodies the sardonic and sickly Dot, a working-class Brit with a spotted past, confined to her chair in IMP (dialect coaching by Amanda Quaid), who puts what little hope she has left in an imaginary invisible spirit she keeps in her corked bottle.
Before and after the second of the two shorts, acrobat Wang, and then juggler Morfit-Tighe, perform in front of the red stage curtain and proscenium frame of marquee lights, evoking the circus that is life and the balance and finesse needed to navigate through it.
To say any more would result in spoilers and might influence the way audience members experience and interpret the work. Glass. Kill. What If If What. Imp. is a journey that everyone should enter with an open mind and see in their own light for its maximum impact. It will make you consider what’s going on as you watch it and leave you thinking about what it all meant and how it relates to your own life long after you’ve left the theater.
Running Time: Approximately two hours and 15 minutes, including an intermission.
GLASS. KILL. WHAT IF IF ONLY. IMP. plays through Sunday, May 11, 2025, at the Public Theater, 425 Lafayette Street, NYC. For tickets (priced at $69-89, including fees), go online, or visit TodayTix.
