A tasty notion for a play that potentially might be fun and even enlightening, Sugarcraft is spoiled by poor writing, an inadequate staging and some lousy acting. Premiering on Sunday at 59E59 Theaters, Sugarcraft is confined to its 50-seat Theater C space, so few shall witness this misfire from No. 11 Productions.
Cookery and British history are mixed with insipid fiction by Danny Tieger, whose new play is inspired by Mrs. Mary Eales’s Receipts, a cookbook published in 1718 that contains the first recorded recipe in English for concocting ice cream. Eales claimed on the title page to be “confectioner to her late majesty, Queen Anne.” Historians cannot find Eales’ name among royal household accounts during Queen Anne’s 1702-1714 reign, but suggest she may have been an independent caterer. Little else is known about this culinary pioneer, although she may have had a daughter, Elizabeth.
No. 11 Productions notes in the program how it “exists to collaboratively create new works and original adaptations as an ensemble.” So it is unclear whether Tieger or another ensemble member hatched the smart concept that dictates both the play’s structure and its presentation: The greater part of the 90-minute Sugarcraft happens before an elite audience – meaning you — in a circa 1720s London drawing room, where Mary Eales offers a demonstration of confectionery that climaxes in whipping up a dish of ice cream for everyone.
Nice idea, right? Sadly, with the significant exception of a charming performance by Julie Congress as Eales, the show is a botch. The script mingles the ongoing cooking segment with contrived flashbacks featuring Eales’ backstairs disputes with a palace official who dismisses ice cream as “a ridiculous fad” and questions its effect on the Queen’s poor health; Eales’ seduction of a craftsman to carpenter up an ice cream churn to her own design; and other scenes between Eales and her child. The demonstration sequences involve a haughty society hostess, Lady Dupray, and her harried major domo, who often speak directly to the audience. The dialogue is stiff, corny stuff, other than a few surprisingly pretty speeches from Eales as she bakes a sponge cake and finally makes ice cream: “Behold the humble egg,” says Eales, raising it aloft. “In this simple, delicate shell lies the promise of transformation …”
Suggesting a bright-eyed wren in a mobcap, Julie Congress neatly animates Eales with a sweet voice and a lively, even mischievous, presence as she gracefully flourishes a spoon to emphasize her points. Three others are not so adept at realizing less felicitous characters; particularly Steven Conroy, who among several roles painfully camps it up as coy Lady Dupray. Conroy’s cartoonish turn in a very small theater is not helped by a ridiculous wig and cheap costuming.
It is obvious the play has been produced on scarcely a farthing, so let’s not name or blame the designers for the tatty attire and the too-sketchy visuals of a dozen framed 18th century landscapes sloppily hung upon maroon drapes. The event is carelessly helmed by Ryan Emmons, a co-artistic director of No. 11 Productions whose Broadway credits as an associate director include Water for Elephants and Kimberly Akimbo. Presumably by now Emmons should know better than to shove onstage such an underdone concoction. As the show concludes, the Ample Hills Creamery of Brooklyn provides little containers of ice cream that are dispensed to the audience as tokens of Eales’ artistry.
Sugarcraft opened March 2, 2025, at 59E59 and runs through March 15. Tickets and information: 59e59.org
