The Countess

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A thoroughly satisfying drama called The Countess has quietly joined the ranks of Off-Broadway's long-running plays. The production began 14 months ago as a showcase at the Greenwich Street Theatre before moving to the Samuel Beckett on Theater Row last June. With that theater scheduled for demolition, the show has moved yet again to continue its extraordinary run, officially reopening on May 11 at the Lamb's Theater. The play's commercial success has nothing to do with stars, sex, skin, or the vanity of its producers. The Countess continues to draw audiences because playwright Gregory Murphy has written a work of emotional complexity, staged with elegant simplicity by Ludovica Villar-Haus[...]

If this were 1939, Gregory Murphy's new play The Countess might be
ensconced in a Broadway theatre, where it would play for a full and profitable season
before embarking, perhaps, on a year-long tour. Someone like Katherine Cornell would take
the title role; she would appear in a dazzling succession of beautiful and extravagant gowns,
framed elegantly against an inevitably well-appointed and lavish set. A mogul like Selznick
would buy the rights for a movie star like Ingrid Bergman; all of the lush exterior scenes,
implied but not included in Mr. Murphy's script, would be shot on location in glor[...]