Violet Secrets

Playwright Richard Greenberg delivers a mystical New York moment.

A A A Comments By Susan Froyd Thursday, Jul 9 2009

Everyone knows this particular time of day: I call it “Blue Time,” but a more classical designation for the full-on blush and ebb of dusk, when everything glows and then sinks into the shadows, is the “Violet Hour.” That playwright Richard Greenberg, a Pulitzer Prize finalist for his plays Three Days of Rain and Take Me Out, chose to name another work after that trick of light tells you a lot about it: The play is like a moment of brightness that circles a conundrum.

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Vintage Theatre, in collaboration with Hunger Artists Ensemble Theatre, should provide an illuminating evening when it presents The Violet Hour, Greenberg’s word-perfect circa 1919 New York story of a young publisher with limited capital who’s torn between which of two books to produce: the overflowing manuscript of his college buddy or the memoirs of his secret mistress, both of which carry caveats. And then there’s a side story of still more unruly pages -- endless pages that seem to come spewing, literally, from heaven -- and what’s written on them.

The Violet Hour opens tonight at 7:30 p.m. at the Vintage, 2119 East 17th Avenue, and continues Fridays through Sundays until August 9; for tickets, $17 in advance ($22 at the door), go to www.vintagetheatre.com or call 303-839-1361.
Fridays, Saturdays, 7:30 p.m.; Sundays, 2:30 p.m. Starts: July 10. Continues through Aug. 9, 2009

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