a wildly silly satire of politics and war that doubles as a metatheatrical exploration of how plays summon worlds out of language. It’s batty and unhinged and just what you want from a three-week run at La MaMa.
- Adam feldman, time out

Countries are made of laws, and laws are made of words. So are plays. How strange.

“The Barbarians” is an imaginative, word-drunk romp through that strangeness, a play about a description of a play about a group of scientists gumming up the linkage between language and political power (much to Madam President Fake President’s chagrin). The Barbarians nestles in the valley between the word and the world, the declaration of war and the war itself — what if the President declared a war, but the words wouldn’t work?

Written by Jerry Lieblich
Directed by Paul Lazar
Cast: Chloe Claudel; Jess Barbagallo*; Anne Gridley; Jennifer Ikeda*; Steve Mellor*; Naren Weiss*

PSM: Carter White
PM/TD: Eric Nightengale
Scenic Designer: Amy Rubin
Costume Designer: Suzanne Bocanegra
Lighting Designer: Joe Levasseur
Sound Designer: Johnny Gasper
Video Designer: CultureHub
Props/Asst. Scenic Designer: Forest Entsminger
Asst. Costume/ASM: Eva Rubin
Graphic Designer: June Buck
PR: Girlie Action
Producer: Leigh Honigman
Associate Producers: Matthew Antoci, McKenna Harrington

Select Reviews

"The Barbarians” attacks your sense-making faculties from all fronts as each new twist asks for your patience and imagination to play along with the cast. - Jeff Careyva, Culturebot

The results are a tongue-twisting tumble of fun...listening to its frenetic flow of Lieblish is a consistently brain-tickling treat, like drinking seltzer through your ears. - Sara Holdren, Vulture

...frenetic, hilarious and provocative... it arrives at La MaMa at this right time of national discord.
- Darryl Reilly, Theater Scene

Select Features

Jerry Lieblich is constantly upending what my idea of theater is, or even what role language plays in our world.
- 3Views

Jerry Lieblich (“Mahinerator”) writes confounding, inventive works that interrogate the relationships between language, knowledge and power. - Adam Feldman, Time Out

A frantic feast of fractured language and whirligig political satire. - New York Magazine

...only increasing in nauseating resonance by the day. - Sara Holdren, Vulture