THE DAZZLE Comes to Meraki Arts Bar Next Month

Corvus Arts Theatre will present their debut work, the Australian premiere of The Dazzle by Tony Award winning American playwright Richard Greenberg. Witty, disturbing, shockingly funny and profoundly humane, The Dazzle is playing at Meraki Arts Bar, November 16 - December 3.

"In their Harlem mansion, during the early years of the 20th century, the Collyer brothers share an eccentric life, consumed by their obsessions. Langley is a concert pianist but prefers to study the minutiae of the world, all of which is entirely collectible. Homer, his older brother, a former admiralty lawyer, maintains the household and dreams of his own life as it might have been. The beautiful socialite Milly inserts herself into the Collyer brother's world, bringing her money, secrets and designs on Langley. Time passes as it must, strangely, and changes them all, one by one."

Winner of the Outer Critics Circle Award, The Dazzle is a beautifully written, funny and sad story based on real-life characters - the legendary Collyer brothers - New York eccentrics who, following their deaths in 1947, were found to have collected more than 136 tons of trash within their grand but crumbling Harlem manse.

"To me, The Dazzle is a play about struggling through trauma, being an artist, managing relationships, and trying to hold on to sanity in a messy world. Almost everyone has experienced a degree of isolation and has suffered in various ways both mentally and physically during the pandemic, so this play should resonate with people. It's darkly funny and tragic, and offers insight into how we deal with pain and suffering and how we cope - or fail to cope." - Alec Ebert.

The play premiered in July 2000, presented by New York Stage and Film Company and The Powerhouse Theatre at Vassar. The work has been reviewed as "lively, brilliant, witty and sad-by far Greenberg's best" (New York Post), "odd and irresistible" (New York Newsday), and "wonderful entertainment" (Curtain Up). Time Out New York befittingly described the play as "blending the existential landscape of Waiting for Godot with the acid wit of Noel Coward".

On founding Corvus Arts Theatre, Alec Ebert says "My desire in creating Corvus was to create a home for my passion and profession as an artist, and to collaborate and share that passion with other artists and the public. After returning to Australia in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic, I quickly discovered there were not enough opportunities, so I decided to try my hand at producing. Corvus Arts Theatre is, at its core, a theatre company with a simple focus - to put on compelling works through great writing and performance."

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