"North" celebrates the romance of flight and other delights

There is an exhilaration to flying above the clouds that is like no other sensation.

It is the romance of flight that anchors "North," at 59E59 Theaters in a for/word company production through October 28th. The characters in "North" are real, the story drawn from a wealth of printed materials.

Anne Morrow Lindbergh (Christina Ritter) was an accomplished and complicated woman. She was a writer, and mother, the daughter of an ambassador, and wife of a celebrity aviator. She was, also, a pilot in her own right. She and her husband Charles (Kalafatic Poole) suffered a very public and hideous loss when their first born was kidnapped and killed.

"North" is Anne's  story; it's style is narrative and suggestive. "This is not an adventure," Anne says, as she relates her meeting with the author/aviator Antoine Saint-Exupèry (Christopher Marlowe-Roche.) "And only in the most accidental and superficial sense can it even be called a flying story. Fundamentally," she ends, "it is simply a woman's story."

 "North," conceived by Christina Ritter and Jennifer Schlueter and written by Jennifer Schlueter, does not allow its thorough,  well-researched documentation to undermine the gentle lyricism of the play.

The spare set by Brad Steinmetz of three swings and a ladder shelf hints at the playful in tribute to St-Ex's imagination and Anne's desire to soar with him.

"North" exudes a giddy seriousness, illuminating the factual with a quiet emotional certitude.

For more information and tickets for "North,"please visit www.59e59.org.