Gothamist
A non-profit newsroom, powered by WNYC.
Gothamist
Listen Live
Arts & Entertainment
The Coast of Utopia
By
John Del Signore
Published Sep 15, 2006
Modified Mar 7, 2008
Share
FacebookTwitterRedditEmail
Never miss a story
Email address
By submitting your information, you're agreeing to receive communications from New York Public Radio in accordance with our Terms .
By
John Del Signore
Published Sep 15, 2006
Modified Mar 7, 2008
Share
FacebookTwitterRedditEmail
We rely on your support to make local news available to all
Make your contribution now and help Gothamist thrive in 2026. Donate today
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
A monstrous wave of theater will engulf Lincoln Center next month and Tom Stoppard, the protean dramatist of unparalleled wit and imagination, is at the center of the squall. His three play cycle, “The Coast of Utopia”, will have its U.S. premiere in October and seems like an ideal autumn theater overload.
The opus spans thirty years of Russian life in the mid-19th century as revolution swept Europe and a group of intellectuals, anarchists and poets led a failed movement to topple the Tsar. (Though they did, ultimately, have some influence on the Tsar’s emancipation of the serfs.)
Stoppard insists that though the plays are sequential, each is self contained and they can be viewed out of order, “like Star Wars”. The trilogy is directed by Jack O’Brien, who helmed the Broadway production of “Hairspray”, “The Full Monty” and Stoppard’s last Lincoln Center foray, “The Invention of Love”.
This massive production will provide employment for 44 actors playing 70 roles (and requires over 169 costumes). The standout of the cast is arguably Josh Hamilton, who delivered a riveting performance in last year’s “Hurlyburly”. (Baumbach fans will also know him from “Kicking and Screaming”.) Other boldface cast members include Martha Plimpton (“The Goonies”), Ethan Hawke (“The Velocity of Gary”) and Billy (“Almost Famous”) Crudup.
The first third of the trilogy, “Voyage”, is centered on famed writer (and future anarchist) Michael Bakunin and his family circle. But Stoppard says his initial inspiration was literary critic Vissarion Belinsky and Alexander Herzen, the first (self-proclaimed) Russian socialist. These two men become the focus of the latter plays, “Shipwreck” and “Salvage”, though they appear in all three.
If you’re not familiar with these historical figures, don’t feel bad; Stoppard admits in an article for the Guardian that he had not even heard of Belinsky or Herzen before he began researching the plays. We’re taking “The Coast of Utopia” as motivation to brush up on 19th century European history and maybe even lug around a heavy Russian novel this winter (we might even read some of it, who knows?)
In a fascinating interview on Lincoln Center’s website, O’Brien divulges that when the first part of the cycle premiered in London in 2002, Stoppard had just started the third play. Part of his impetus to re-mount the trilogy was that Stoppard “felt the time had come to figure out just what in fact he had created.”
O’Brien cautions audiences against expecting a tidy narrative wrap up at the trilogy’s end, which he feels is one of Stoppard’s great virtues: “[Stoppard] says: Let me look at the fact that these shoelaces never get tied up again. And how like my life this is. You may not get what's going on every second -- that's okay. You may think: Here comes this character again -- I know where I am. How exciting! Then, oops -- gone again! How is that any different from the last five years of your life? On a larger level, you should be looking at something very like a parallel universe of what it feels to be alive in the 19th century at a time of crisis and peril, which, in terms of dissatisfaction and political irritation, is not so very different from our time.”
On three Saturdays starting in February, those with a monomaniacal bent can commit to watching the entire three part trilogy performed in a single day (with breaks for power bars, vodka-infused Gatorade and Adderall). This kind of full-body-and-mind immersion can be deliriously rewarding; one of our favorite experiences of winter ’05 was GATZ, Elevator Repair Service’s six hour full-text adaptation of The Great Gatsby.
Tickets for the three marathon performances are limited, so die-hard theatergoers are advised to purchase now. Read the backstage blog starting in October.
Tagged
Almost Famous
broadway
ethan hawke
josh hamilton
lincoln center
love
martha plimpton
star wars
The Coast
The Full Monty
The Goonies
theater
Tom Stoppard
John Del Signore
Originally from the Albany area, John Del Signore has called NYC home since 1995. In addition to his thousands of meticulously-crafted bespoke blog posts for Gothamist, his writing has also been published in The Awl, Deadspin, The Nervous Breakdown, and performed at The Brick Theater in Brooklyn.
Read more
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
MORE arts-entertainment
Will Barnes and Noble in the East Village spell doom for smaller shops? It's complicated.
Independent booksellers are grappling with whether the big-box chain is a threat or an ally in the fight against Amazon.
By
Sonia Rao
Published Oct 16, 2026
Can eligible NYC singles find love with 30 minutes and some really spicy food?
We went to the Spiciest Supper Club singles night to take the temperature of New York City's dating scene.
By
Elizabeth Shwe
and
James Ramsay
Arts & Entertainment
Can eligible NYC singles find love with 30 minutes and some really spicy food?
We went to the Spiciest Supper Club singles night to take the temperature of New York City's dating scene.
By
Elizabeth Shwe
and
James Ramsay
How the NYC Marathon has changed in the last 50 years
By
Hannah Frishberg
A visit to Art of Play, the Brooklyn store in an animatronic bird beef with Kelly Clarkson
By
Sonia Rao
The hottest way to show you're an authentic New Yorker is… riding a Citi Bike?
By
Lindsay Lee Wallace
Never miss a story
Catch up on the most important headlines with a roundup of essential NYC stories, delivered to your inbox daily.
Sign upEmail address
By submitting your information, you're agreeing to receive communications from New York Public Radio in accordance with our Terms .