The Year in Theater, More and/or Less

This time each year, drama critics pore over their notebooks, gnaw away at their cuticles, and proclaim their 10-Best lists. A big deal, the 10-Best list. Opinions that went unheeded in paragraph form assume a whole new authority when preceded by a number.

But no matter how much I pour or gnaw, my own 10-Best list refuses to be born. A year's worth of theater in New York is too scattershot - too sublime and ridiculous - to line up and march for me that way.

Still, what critic doesn't want a piece of that easy, bullet-pointed, year-end clout?

In an effort to grab some for myself, I here present theater's 10 (or So) Best (or Whatever) Something (or Other) of 2004.

REASONS WHY FILM IS CLEARLY BETTER THAN THEATER

1. The ingenious, heartbreaking "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind"

REASONS WHY THAT MAY NOT BE TRUE

1. John Patrick Shanley's riveting, provocative "Doubt"
2. Ed Hall's giddy all-male "Midsummer Night's Dream" at BAM
3. Tracy Letts's shocking, harrowing "Bug"
4. "Spatter Pattern," haunting noir from Neal Bell and director Michael Greif

ACHIEVEMENTS IN QUANTITY AND QUALITY (Or, Actors Whose Wide-Ranging Triumphs Kept Me Up Nights, Arranging Repertory Companies in My Head)

1. Byron Jennings, "Sight Unseen" and "The Foreigner"
2. Linda Emond, "Homebody/Kabul" and "The Cherry Orchard" at Williamstown
3. Brian F. O'Byrne, "Frozen" and "Doubt"
4. Elizabeth Marvel, "Hedda Gabler" and "A Secondhand Memory"
5. Jeremy Shamos, "Reckless," "Suitcase," and "The Rivals"
6. Ana Reeder, "Small Tragedy" and "Hedda Gabler"
7. Frances Sternhagen, "The Old Lady Shows Her Medals" and "The Foreigner"
8. Gareth Saxe, "The Old Lady Shows Her Medals" and "Richard III"
* and Doug Hughes, the unerring director of "Doubt," "Engaged," and almost everything else worth seeing this year

BAD CASTING IDEAS (or, The "You-Go-Into-Previews-With-the-Actors-You-Have, Not-the-Actors-You-Want" Awards)

1. Peter Krause, "After the Fall"
2. Peter Dinklage, "Richard III"
3. P Diddy, "A Raisin in the Sun"
4. Sam Shepard, "A Number"

NEW YORK THEATERS HALF AS ADVENTUROUS AS BAM IN 2004

Zero

NEW YORK THEATERS HALF AS ACCOMPLISHED AS THE ROYAL NATIONAL THEATRE IN 2004

Zero

GOOD EXCUSES FOR EITHER NUMBER

Zero

PLAYWRIGHTS IN THE ASCENDANT/YET MORE REASONS WHY MEN ARE THE SUPERFLUOUS SEX

1. Lynn Nottage, balancing humor and sorrow in "Intimate Apparel" and "Fabulation"
2. Anne Washburn, sharp-witted and intellectual in "The Ladies" and "The Internationalist"
3. Lisa Kron, whose heartfelt metatheatrics lit up "Well"
4. Caryl Churchill, who, in "A Number," continued to fuse an upstart rookie's energy with a master's control (which is why she might be our greatest living playwright)

SOME ROLES THAT MERYL STREEP HAS, INEXPLICABLY, GONE ANOTHER YEAR WITHOUT HAVING PLAYED IN NEW YORK

1. Lady Macbeth
2. Cleopatra
3. Madame Ranevskaya in "The Cherry Orchard"

WHAT I WOULD GIVE TO SEE MERYL STREEP PLAY ONE OF THOSE ROLES IN THE NEW YEAR

1. A kidney
2. The other kidney
3. $1,000,000

HIGHLIGHTS FROM NEW YORK'S POLITICAL STAGES

1. The bracing, disturbing, maddeningly short-lived revival of "Assassins"
2. "Only We Who Guard the Mystery Shall Be Unhappy," Tony Kushner's surprisingly nuanced work-in-progress about Laura Bush, Dostoevsky, and dead Iraqi children
3. Richard Foreman's exercise in surreal political biography, "King Cowboy Rufus Rules the Universe"
4. Michael Frayn's "Democracy," political science with a pulse
5. Zell Miller's inspired fusion of the mob scene in "Julius Caesar" and the mad scene from "King Lear"

HAPPY REMINDERS THAT A GOOD REVIVAL CAN HAVE 10 TIMES THE LIFE AND ENERGY OF AN ENDLESSLY WORKSHOPPED NEW PLAY

1. W.S. Gilbert's "Engaged," which saw its hysterical topicality restored by Theater for a New Audience
2. Thornton Wilder's one-acts, gracefully staged by Keen Co.
3. The Roundabout's production of "The Foreigner," sparkling with Matthew Broderick, Frances Sternhagen, Byron Jennings, and more

NEW REASONS TO BE OPTIMISTIC ABOUT THE FUTURE OF THE MUSICAL

1. Um...

BIGGEST DISAPPOINTMENTS; OR, THE YEAR IN BUZZKILLS

1. Jonathan Miller's tiny, tidy "King Lear"
2. Edie Falco and Brenda Blethyn's deadly (so to speak) " 'Night, Mother"
3. The nonexistent NYC Hip-Hop Theatre Festival
4. Neil LaBute

SHOWS THAT WOULD HAVE BEEN FUNNIER IF AUBREY REUBEN - BROADWAY PHOTOGRAPHER, BON VIVANT, AND RACONTEUR - HAD BEEN ONSTAGE WITH THE CAST

1. "Dame Edna: Back With a Vengeance"
2. "Belle Epoque"

APOLOGIES OWED (partial list)

1. Regina Taylor, to the sensational Anthony Mackie, for squandering his talent on "Drowning Crow"
2. Mark Medoff, to science, for "Prymate"
3. Mark Schoenfeld and Barri McPherson, to my eardrums, home borough, and will to live, for "Brooklyn"
4. Thornton Wilder, to all of us, for not living forever

MOMENTS THAT REDEEM HAVING TO SIT THROUGH WHAT WE HAD TO SIT THROUGH THIS YEAR

1. Cherry Jones and Brian F. O'Bryne's thrilling climactic showdown in "Doubt"
2. The outrageous finale of "Bug," which went places I didn't think a play could go
3. Nina Hellman's breathtaking, slow-motion transformation into Madame Mao, in "The Ladies"
4. The play-within-a-play of "Midsummer" at BAM: I've rarely laughed so hard, or been so moved; if 2005 produces anything so wonderful, it'll be a delightful year