Panic! (How To Be Happy!)

2003

Vienna & Zurich performances
The production toured internationally, including:
Vienna (Austria), Zurich (Switzerland)

Ontological-Hysteric Theater
St. Mark’s Church-in-the-Bowery
New York, NY

Co-produced with the Wiener Festwochen/Vienna Festival

Written, Directed and Designed by Richard Foreman

Performed by Tea Alagić (Svijetlana), Robert Cucuzza, Elina Lowensohn, DJ Mendel
Stage Crawe: BJ Lockhart, Caitlin McDonough, Kristin Pratt, Rachel Shukert, Ryan West

Production Crew: Joshua Briggs (Managing Director/Assistant Stage Manager), Michael Darling (Technical Director), Evan Cabnet (Stage Manager), Brian PJ Cronin (Sound Operator), Michael Wilson Morgan (Props Master), Kasia Walicka Maimone (Costumes), Katherine Wong (Assistant Costume Designer), Cara Czekanski & Miho Miho (Special Costume Construction), Owen Hughes (Master Electrician), Manny Igrejas (Press), Performing Art Services (Management and Administration), Elka Krajewska (Graphic Design), Kim Whitener (US Touring Representative), Paula Court (Archival Photography), Timothy Braun (Box Office), Big Apple Lights (Lighting Equipment)

Productions Interns: Timothy Braun, Kate Brehm, Kenneth Collins, Ramona Fantino, Nicholas Hermansen, Schuyler Hoffman, Ophelia Landrin, Hannah Lilly, Aleksandra Malik, Eric Powers, Nate Schenkkan

Tea Alagić Studio
TEA ALAGIĆ STUDIO

REVIEWS / PRESS

– Ben Brantley,
New York Times

– Michael Feingold,
Village Voice

– Jenny Sandman 
Curtain Up (PDF)

– Jenny Sandman
CurtainUp (full review online)
Panic! (How to Be Happy!) – CurtainUp review (2003)

– Marc Robinson,
Theatre Journal review (scholarly, paywalled) “The Mind King Abdicates” (review of Panic!) (This is a Johns Hopkins Project MUSE page — usually institutional access required.)

– Bill Aitchison,
Total Theatre Magazine Panic! (How to Be Happy!) review (2003 archive page)

– Ben Brantley, The New York Times

  • Praised the production as another example of Foreman’s singular theatrical imagination.
  • Concluded that despite its bleak worldview, Foreman created “joyous showmanship” that “never feels stale.”

– Jenny Sandman, CurtainUp

  • Called it “like nothing else you will ever see.”
  • Particularly praised the performances of Tea Alagić and D.J. Mendel.
  • Recommended audiences stop looking for conventional meaning and instead experience the production on its own terms. 

– Marc Robinson, Theatre journal

  • Published the scholarly review “The Mind King Abdicates.”
  • Interpreted Panic! as an exploration of paralysis, contradictory desires, and the architecture of consciousness rather than narrative. 

– Bill Aitchison, Total Theatre

  • Described the work as “dense, multi-layered, non-narrative.”
  • Praised the performers’ integrity and the emotional force beneath Foreman’s complexity. 

– Michael Feingold

  • Reviewed the production in The Village Voice (“Shanghaied Gestures,” January 2003).
  • The review is frequently cited in later scholarship, though the full text is not freely available online. 

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