"The Service Road by Erin Courtney conjures an eerie landscape that follows its own rules and dares you not to believe in it.  The setting is Prospect Park, but imbued with dark enchantment, and fertile ground for Ms. Courtney's investigations into self-recrimination and forgiveness.  Ms. Courtney won an Obie Award last year for A Map of Virtue... and that play's haunting ambience is shared here.  Road follows the journey of a park tour guide, Lia (Kalle Macrides), searching for a child in the aftermath of a powerful storm.  Mythological or literary antecedents, including Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, are suggested, but Ms. Courtney offers up her own brand of dream imagery. ... Lia must rebuild after a cataclysm of the soul.  She commences her search, interacting with men she encounters (a park ranger, a teenager, a carousel operator and a tree attendant on a hydraulic scaffold, all convincingly played by Cory Einbinder).  Taunting her on the quest are three Tree Children (played by Caroline Tamas), their faces emblazoned via live video on giant eggs resting on a branch, sowing self-doubt like malevolent Cheshire cats.  And just who, or what, is Lia's quarry?  The traumatic past, personified in the Big-Headed Toddler, a wondrous puppet devised by Mr. Einbinder and partly manipulated by Ms. Tamas.  Using a camera rigged to her head, Ms. Tamas transfers her facial expressions using a real-time video feed to the Toddler's broad face. ... The set, by Michael Riccio, is an Expressionist conception of inclined planes, moving branches and the aforementioned eggs.  Mark Bruckner, the sound designer and composer, creates a backdrop of electronic textures and a brilliantly jagged take on Joni Mitchell's Both Sides Now, working with the multitalented Claire Moodey, who also operates puppets and collaborated on the animation.  The director, Meghan Finn, deftly strikes a balance between ingenious technology and Ms. Courtney's intimate script, marshaling the two into a resonant and captivating whole.  The play's internal order, however surreal, feels entirely complete."
  –  The New York Times (see the complete review)

"Responsibility, obligation, and service are the themes of Erin Courtney's new play The Service Road...  For the first fifteen minutes, the magical realism of the mise-en-scène, which is reinforced by the light poetry of the dialogue, the wonderfully evocative build out of the stage and the use of puppets, makes The Service Road feel like a childrens' play.  Halfway through, however, the viewer realizes that innocence and childhood in The Service Road are fictive idealizations, thoroughly dyed in nostalgia, presented from the point of view of an adulthood stained and torn by life.  The playwright confuses the "real" scene, where magic is the result of mental illness, and the real magic that invests the world in childhood with the device of the storm (what the English naturalist John Ruskin called "the pathetic fallacy"). The result demonstrates the resiliency of children and the necessity for some wounded people to return to childhood as a prerequisite for healing.  ... The production is a luscious treat for your eyes and ears... (a) mature reflection on the residual guilt many adults feel on surviving a difficult childhood."
  –  Cultural Capitol (see the complete review)

"...innovative and wittily designed production of Erin Courtney's look at loss and redemption"
  –  TimeOut NY  (4 Star Best Bet)

"The production's exploration of how we cope with our inner demons feels haunting and genuine."
  –  New York Theatre Review

"...we the audience elicited audible gasps at branches dropping in the wind, dead geese plummeting to the stage, and chilling wind sounds, all bringing the desolation vividly to life. ... a beautiful art piece .... Performance/modern art and multimedia buffs will love this production..."
  –  Brooklyn Exposed

"It's (The Service Road) an utterly sublime sequence in which the arts of performance and stagecraft gorgeously connect, plucking your heartstrings and causing your senses to tingle."
  – TheaterMania

"...a visceral treat... Lovers of art and technology would be wise to visit The Service Road."
  –  Theatre Is Easy

"...brimming with design talent ...outstanding."
  –  NYTheatre.com

"...a lovely, unique experience."
  –  The Arts Wire

"Kalle Macrides' new play Noir is intriguing...  Director Cory Einbinder and choreographer Laura Peterson match Macrides note for note in a production that blends high- and low- tech aesthetics to produce some very cool indie theater...  Noir is a fine showcase for Einbinder and his wizardly technical colleagues, and it's also a keen entertainment wrought by a talented writer and ensemble."
  –  NYTheatre.com (see the complete review)

"Noir  is a studiously rendered exercise in translating the visual aesthetic of film noir into a live theatre experience.  Ingeniously designed by Cory Einbinder, who also directed, the production sets its detective-story action within a slick milieu in which everything is black or white, rectangular, two- dimensional, framed by rolling panels and screens, and bathed in deep shadows or sharp streams of light.  Nothing is curve- shaped or three-dimensional except the actors.  Most intriguing are Einbinder's cleverly designed props:  Be it a bottle, a telephone, or a coffee cup, they are all flat and angular, wooden cutouts with magnets on the bottom that allow them to stand up on the linear furniture.  A briefcase full of cash is flat as a pancake.  Even the steering wheel of a car isn't round; it's diamond-shaped.  Noir sports a deliciously edgy musical score composed by Tara Gladden and the Evil Horns, a combo of sax, flute, drums, bass, and clarinet.  Performed live by the Evil Horns with band leader Nicole D'Agostino under the musical direction of Gladden, the hard-driving jazz music brilliantly evokes the postwar period and pays homage to classic movie music."
  –  BackStage