Interludes

VIEWPOINTS – Pushing the envelope: Assessing the captivating and thought-provoking U.S. premieres of GOOD SEX and BURNT TOAST

• By drediman
• November 10, 2025
• No Comments

Last week, I had the great opportunity to catch a pair of American premieres — both captivating and thought-provoking productions that push the envelope in terms of both theatrical form and content. Read on below for my assessment of these fascinating productions from abroad, each an example of live theater at its most vital.

GOOD SEX
Dead Centre at Powerhouse: International

From Ireland, we have the U.S. premiere of Dublin-based Dead Centre’s production of the intriguingly titled Good Sex (HIGHLY RECOMMENDED), which was presented last week by Brooklyn’s new multidisciplinary arts festival Powerhouse: International, which is currently in the midst of an enticing maiden season. A collaboration with author Emilie Pine, the meta-theatrical production invites two actors to enact, for the first and only time (sans rehearsal), a short play about two ex-lovers who reconnect during the pandemic. Scattered throughout the play are moments of varying degrees of intimacy — e.g., touching, kissing, and yes, sex — which are overseen by an onstage Intimacy Director, who guides the unsuspecting performers in the how best to physically and psychologically navigate these potentially awkward and messy exchanges. On the evening I attended, Tony-winner John Cameron Mitchell (Hedwig and the Angry Inch) and Oscar-nominee Elliot Page (Juno) brought game attitudes and a ‍refreshing sense of pliability to the table. As slyly directed by Ben Kidd, the production weaves in and out of the “play” as needed for the scenes to proceed smoothly and safely, sparking provocative yet insightful dialogue around the blurred lines between theater and reality, further yielding to unsettling implications regarding the nature of desire, consensual behavior, and loneliness. Good Sex is smart and layered theater that’s also very funny and bound to be vasty different from night to night depending on the chemistry between its two stars and the rest of the company.

BURNT TOAST
Susie Wang at NYU Skirball

Then there’s one of the most outlandish and daring pieces of theater I’ve seen all fall, the U.S. premiere of Norwegian theater company Susie Wang’s disturbing yet wholly unforgettable Burnt Toast (HIGHLY RECOMMENDED), which was presented last week as part of NYU Skirball’s robustly revitalized programming. Set in a lobby of hotel in somewhere in the South, Trine Falch‘s absurdist play tells the story of the chance meeting between a mysterious man with a suitcase and a nursing mother and the spectacularly gory downward spiral that subsequently transpires (no spoilers here!). With its unapologetically graphic violence — blood and other bodily fluids are prominently featured — and other B-movie horror elements, the show is admittedly not for everyone. But for those willing and able to stomach the work’s extremities will find potent social commentary and even beauty in its artful juxtaposition of cannibalism and heroic acts of love, the grotesque and the familiar. Much like the films of David Lynch and Stanley Kubrick, a pungent sense of menacing dread hangs over the the work’s fragmented world, thanks in large part to the production’s striking design elements (particularly brilliant was Martin Langlie’s eerily evocative music and sound design); I also found the clever references to director Alfonso Cuarón’s dystopian science fiction masterpiece Children of Men to be particularly potent. The company performs the Burnt Toast with rigorously deliberate cadence — in addition to highly exaggerated Southern accents — meticulously executing the not insignificant physical demands of the piece with precision and deadpan matter-of-factness.