Interludes

VIEWPOINTS – The penetrating gaze of Molière: Assessing the Off-Broadway productions of THE IMAGINARY INVALID and PROSPEROUS FOOLS

• By drediman
• July 3, 2025
• No Comments

Last weekend, a pair of Off-Broadway plays inspired by the works of French playwright Molière closed up shop. Here is my assessment of them in hindsight.

THE IMAGINARY INVALID
New World Stages
Closed

First up at New World Stages was Red Bull Theater’s now shuttered staging of The Imaginary Invalid (RECOMMENDED). As penned by Jeffrey Hatcher after Molière, the adaptation did a nifty job of appealing to contemporary audiences by dusting the cobwebs off the play and updating the humor to sync with today’s comedic sensibility — despite the production’s period look (the colorful, slightly heightened set and costume designs were by Beowulf Boritt and Tilly Grimes, respectively). Molière’s silly plot is neither here nor there, existing for the most part as a framework for some rather frisky onstage shenanigans. Collectively, the animated performances — confidently led by Mark Linn-Baker (of Perfect Strangers fame) as Argan, the hapless hypochondriac at the center of the play — amounted to a well-oiled machine, thanks largely to Jesse Berger’s brisk, hilariously physical direction. With the inspired hilarity rarely flagging, this was madcap farce as it should be done. Indeed, at the performance I attended, the whole thing was running on all cylinders, much to the audience’s delight. Other standout performances came from Sarah Stiles as the wry maid who practically runs the entire show and the hardworking Arnie Burton as Argan’s multiple doctors; both gave masterclasses in comic timing. Although the piece was a perfect escapist antidote for our troubled times — there’s not a serious bone in its body — Hatcher also managed to slip in a hint of the slicing social commentary for which Molière is known (aren’t we all occasionally fooled by fake news as Argan is by gimmicky medicinal trends?).

PROSPEROUS FOOLS
Theatre for a New Audience
Closed

Then over at the Polonsky Shakespeare Center in Brooklyn, there was Theatre for a New Audience’s production of Prosperous Fools (RECOMMENDED), Taylor Mac’s relentless satire about the moral predicament faced by many arts organizations. More specifically, the new play — which is loosely adapted from Moliere’s Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme — depicts a gala night of a large fictitious ballet company (perhaps a stand-in for New York City Ballet?) gone wrong when two of its main donors are asked to give speeches. Clearly, Mac had some things to get off his chest. Indeed, as a now brand name artist who has had to likely, to some extent, navigate fundraising functions at non-for-profit performing arts institutions, he’s had to probably “play the game” to help get money in the door (aside from penning the piece, judy also portrays a downtown choreographer who finally breaks into mainstream dance). Although Prosperous Fools paints an extreme portrait — one donor is clearly inspired by Trump (voraciously played by Jason O’Connell), the other a self-centered diva whose charitable giving is a ruse to feed her need for attention (Sierra Boggess, in an inspired comedic turn) — it’s nonetheless an audacious critique of how art gets produced domestically these days. Unfortunately, the pacing of director Darko Tresnjak’s staging sometimes flags — which is surprising given his pitch perfect direction of the Tony-wining musical parody A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder — particularly in the somewhat sluggish first act. The second act, however, is an absolute doozy. Here, the play devolves into unsettling outrageousness that renders the entire system absurd.