About the Show

A revival of Edward Albee’s Pulitzer Prize-winning drama, featuring a cast of Asian-American actors.

Agnes (Mia Katigbak) and Tobias (Manu Narayan) are a content middle-aged couple with a guest who has long overstayed her welcome—Agnes’ alcoholic sister Claire (Carmen M. Herlihy).

But when their friends Harry (Paul Juhn) and Edna (Rita Wolf) arrive at their door, claiming an unknown “fear” has caused them to flee their home at the same time their four-times divorced daughter Julia (Tina Chilip) is moving into the home, the balance that they're used to is shattered.

As Agnes and Tobias attempt to take control of their lives and their home, they begin to question if that will ever be possible again.

Critic Reviews (9)

"As for the play’s action, it’s all in the talking — the subtle and explicit ways the dynamics among the characters are revealed, in their intonation and gestures and expressions."
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"This uneven production of 'A Delicate Balance' is solid enough to make a persuasive case for the universality of Albee's darkly poetic insights into upper-middle-class existential ennui."
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If this isn't the definitive version of A Delicate Balance -- the latest entry in New York's current informal festival of Pulitzer Prize winners -- it is a solid introduction to an oblique masterpiece. Whether you take it as a savage critique of American life or a Pinteresque report from a blasted psychological war zone, it continues to exert a reptilian fascination. Cocktail time!
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"In this production, thoughtfully directed by Jack Cummings III, "balance" no longer is the operant term. Rather, it is tension on which this particular family group thrives. It is what invigorates them and keeps them from falling into a state of entropy and dissolution."
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"...'A Delicate Balance' is an uncommonly delicate work, which by virtue of the story it tells – the situations it presents – requires a director to find a balance among vast interpretation choices."
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The first Off Broadway revival of Edward Albee’s "A Delicate Balance," his first Pulitzer Prize-winning play (of three) is also the first to feature an all Asian-American cast as well as being the first New York production of an Albee play to be performed by a non-white cast. A coproduction of Transport Group and the National Asian American Theatre Company (NAATCO), it is has been directed by Jack Cummings III, Transport Group’s artistic director. The production is elegant and polished, if a bit leisurely. However, at two hours and 45 minutes the running time is the same length as the 2014 Broadway revival. The six character cast is led by Mia Katigbak, actor-manager and co-founder of NAATCO.
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The freshness here is of this fascinating play now being performed by an all-Asian company of exceptional actors in the intimate space of an Off-Off-Broadway theater.
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"In spite of a lopsided production, there is something thrilling about hearing the play spoken in this eloquent way...To glean every word certainly brings a deeper understanding."
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Cast and creative team