Bonjour,
Eugene O’Neill’s “Hughie” is now Playing!
“Hughie,” Eugene O’Neill’s small masterpiece, continues its successful run. If you haven’t yet seen it, don’t miss this haunting, late masterpiece by one of America’s greatest playwrights. Watch the trailer!
“A welcoming simplicity….[Troy Dunn] is a walking parcel of unrealized dreams and bluster….What emerges is a stark, sad picture of Erie’s shallow, desperate existence. Director Frederique Michel has added a layer to the narrative with the inclusion of the voice of a narrator (Nathan Dana Aldrich), who provides occasional insight, commentary and humor….solidly convincing.”
— Stage Raw
“[An] inspiring production with excellent actors. [A] short play, with a big story to tell.”
— Edward Goldman, Art Matters
“Erie Smith is a liar and a con man, a boaster who dances between truth and delusion. The direction of Frédérique Michel of these fine actors brings all that to the surface, bubbling out like the stuff of an existential cauldron. It feels tragic to watch, and hopeful, disorienting as well as sad. In the end Dunn’s Erie comes across as in some fundamental way…us. You. Them. Me. All of us.”
— David MacDowell Blue, The World Through Night Tinted Glasses
About the Play
Hughie, one of Eugene O’Neill’s last works, takes place in a seedy New York hotel lobby at 3:00am on a hot night in the summer of 1928. Erie Smith, a small-time gambler, down on his luck and at the end of his rope, shows up after a three-day bender, brought on by the death of “Hughie,” a night clerk at the hotel and always a willing listener to Erie’s yarns of his life’s imaginary successes. But Hughie is gone now, and Erie has only his dull, disinterested replacement to listen to him as he tries to boast and lie his way through his grief, loneliness, and despair. Only now, with Hughie dead, a guy he always considered a dope and a sucker, does he realize the desolate emptiness of his life. in this powerful, haunting piece, as in The Iceman Cometh, O’Neill draws a heartbreaking portrait of longing and loss, of the loneliness of the human condition, and the desperate hunger to overcome it.
New Grants for City Garage!
Great news! We’ve just received notice of new government grants for City Garage—for a total of $25,900! But they are also matching grants. That’s where we look to you, our kind and loyal audience. Like all non-profit theaters, large and small, we could never meet our expenses through box office alone. We depend on grants like these and on generous contributions from patrons like you to match them. Help us raise this $25,900 by your donation. And thanks to the generous patrons below, we’ve already raised $5,138!
Michelle & Curt Wittig
William R. Gray Jr
Andrea Baker
Jennifer Ferro
Jay Bevan
Michael Intriere
Alexandria Gray
Shelly Martinez
Lisa & Bill Gray
Roger Marheine
Holly Dunnigan
Martha Duncan
Lindsie Carlsen
Tom Laskey
Please join them in supporting the work at City Garage. Any amount helps, large or small. Follow this link and donate today!
Merci, and see you at City Garage!
Frederique & Archie