A TREE GROWS ON 24TH STREET

Mike Kenny’s lyrical
world premiere makes magic

Simplicity fused with memory is one of the foundations of poetry, and truth finds its most eloquent expression in an economy of words.

Anne Gee Byrd and Shih-wei Wu

This is certainly exquisitely exhibited in Mike Kenny’s Winter’s Bench, presently enhancing the stage of the 24th Street Theatre.

Anne Gee Byrd and Shih-wei Wu

Gladys (Anne Gee Byrd), a brash, saucy senior, breaks through an enclosure of a forgotten urban park to visit an old friend. That old friend is a towering, aged tree, with knotted branches of autumn-laden foliage, planted by her grandfather when the family’s fortunes were at their height, on what was then part of their extended estate.

Anne Gee Byrd and Shih-wei Wu

Despite her intention to engage the tree in conversation, Gladys assures the audience of her sanity: “I’m not crazy,” she says. “I’m just old…ish.”

Anne Gee Byrd

Over a brief hour, what is disentangled from Gladys’s reminiscences and childhood reflections is a recognition of the past, concluding in a liberating revelation that we rise from our roots.

Anne Gee Byrd

Kenny’s play swirls a silken line of ethereal subtleness, weaving fairy tale and fable into a poetic parable, requiring the audience to become like little children in order to embrace it. Indeed, with its exploration of childhood and fairy-tale-like staging, Winter’s Bench would make an ideal introduction to the theatre for a child.

Anne Gee Byrd and Shih-wei Wu

And no other stage has shown itself a more adept loom at the interweaving of the warp and weft of Kenny’s lyrical verse into a tapestry of theatric brilliance than the 24th Street Theatre. The company has aptly demonstrated this in its past productions of the English playwright’s earlier works like Rapunzel Alone and its near-legendary staging of Walking the Tightrope.

Anne Gee Byrd

Director Debbie Devine has collected the artistry of lighting designer Dan Weingarten, graphic designer Eve Mazarra, and sound designer Nick Foran, like fireflies in a jar, to conjure up on Keith Mitchell’s dark and wondrous set a soft, glowing sense of reality that at times is conveyed like a child’s recollection, at times like an elderly soul’s fading remembrances.

Anne Gee Byrd

For Byrd’s communion with the tree of her past, Devine has placed flutist Shih-Wei Wu, whose playing merges with Bradley Brough’s melodic score to maintain an ever-present mist of enchantment over the scene. A reminder that no matter the perilous and perplexing course one’s life takes, the journey is always magical. As is this production of Winter’s Bench at the 24th Street Theatre.

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photos by Cooper Bates

Winter’s Bench
24th Street Theatre
24th Street Theatre, 1117 W. 24th St. in Los Angeles
Sat. 8; Sun. 2
ends on Oct. 25, 2026
1 hour
for tickets ($10–$24), call 213.745.6516 or visit 24th Street Theatre

for more shows, visit Theatre in LA
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