Word: absentes
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...firms have prevailed as decisively as American troops did on the battlefield. Conspicuously absent from the fray: bidders from Japan and Germany, whose soldiers stayed home from the fighting (see box). Huddled in hotel rooms in Saudi Arabia with officials of Kuwait's government-in-exile, executives of U.S. companies have won 70% of initial awards for emergency services during the first three months of rebuilding. Such tasks as putting out oil fires and restoring water and power to blasted buildings could cost more than $500 million during this period. As part of the effort, Kuwait awarded the U.S. Army...
...like some wines, they don't seem to travel. Simon is known in Britain mostly for films of his plays; the British Ayckbourn is staged in the U.S., but rarely in major venues. The vital thing they share is a determination to push comedy toward its mainstream limits. Absent Friends, from 1974, prefigures later and even darker works, too many not yet seen in the U.S. Lynne Meadow, who directed Woman in Mind better than Ayckbourn himself, is again shrewd, save in miscasting the clueless Peter Frechette as the guest. Fortunately, Brenda Blethyn is perfect as the nerved-up hostess...
...pivotal scene of the off-Broadway Absent Friends, one of two Alan Ayckbourn works from the 1970s making New York City debuts (the other, Taking Steps, opened last week on Broadway), a man rattles on about his drowned fiance to old friends who never met her. Because Colin lost his love during the first blind rapture of romance, she remains forever perfect. For friends with whom he spent times that he recalls as golden and that they barely recall at all, his ardor is tedious -- especially when he hauls out an immense volume of snapshots of the deceased. His sentimentalizing...
...with the exception of a run on the Bank of New England the day it announced its insolvency, the mile-long lines to withdraw deposits that were so familiar during the Great Depression have been noticably absent...
Elements entirely absent from Ibsen's original play have been introduced: Irene's character has been split into two persons, one dressed in white and the other in black. Ulfheim, originally a Scandanavian squire, has acquired a thick Texas accent. A spear, brandied about by various characters, becomes the production's major focus for over an hour. And three "knee plays", short musical skits devised by talented singer/dancer Charles "Honi" Coles (who also plays the spa's manager), precede each...