Lillian Hellman Dramatizes Altruistic Actions by Barry David Horwitz Berkeley Rep’s choice of Lillian Hellman’s “Watch on the Rhine” (1941) plunges us into the pre-World War Two time of indecision, cowardice, and sporadic bravery. Hellman’s play illuminates the 1930s, when “good” folks could still turn their eyes away from the Nazi invasions, and live…
The play draws us in with the tension of competing narratives: the story as told by polished lawyer Sarah Weddington (Sarah Jane Agnew) who, along with Linda Coffee (a convincingly eccentric Susan Lynskey), argued the case; and the life and opinions of spunky Norma McCorvey (Sara Bruner), the pregnant and feisty “Roe,” who claims the lawyers deceived her into pressing the case.
“Frog and Toad” (Bay Area Children’s Theater) runs weekends until September 25 at Berkeley Repertory Theatre. The show sidesteps heavy-handed morality to portray instead that most ethically challenging of life’s endeavors: a real human relationship.