revolutionary spirit; New York gets ready for Tom Stoppard's monumental The Coast of Utopia- three plays, nine hours, and an all-star cast, writes Adam Green.(Theater review)

Byline: Adam Green

Audiences in London have been lining up like teenagers to see Tom Stoppard's Rock 'n' Roll, a journey through late-twentieth-century Czech politics, set to the beat of Pink Floyd and the Rolling Stones. But, of course, the Czech-born playwright has been captivating theatergoers for almost four decades, ever since his debut, in 1967, with the existential farce Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead. The Real Inspector Hound, Travesties, and Jumpers followed, confirming his reputation as a linguistic acrobat of dizzying wit and intellect. The Real Thing, his passionate 1982 drama about love and cricket, proved he could feel, too. Now, with The Coast of Utopia, an epic trilogy about Russian intellectuals in the nineteenth century, about to make its American premiere, Sir Tom (he was knighted in 1997) shows that he is not only one of the world's greatest living dramatists but also, at 69, a hardworking artist at the top of his game.

With the infectious delight of a schoolboy showing off his erudition, Stoppard has made a career turning unlikely subjects-from metaphysics to quantum mechanics-into sublime entertainment. An encounter with Russian Thinkers, Isaiah Berlin's study of the men whose ideas paved the way for the 1917 revolution, set him on his course for The Coast of Utopia. It started as a single play about the literary critic Vissarion Belinsky, to be directed by Trevor Nunn at London's Royal National Theatre, but then things got out of hand. "I told Trevor, alarmingly, that I thought it would be three plays, and that they would be called Bakunin, Herzen, and Turgenev," Stoppard recalls. "I must say he took it rather bravely."

The plays, which wound up being called Voyage, Shipwreck, and Salvage, follow a group of friends from their fervent, privileged youth in Russia to their exile in Europe. Against a backdrop of suffering masses and failed revolutions, Stoppard brings to life the affections, rivalries, and romantic entanglements of men in love with, and finally betrayed by, Big Ideas. Amid the usual verbal dexterity and sly humor, he gives us complex human beings driven by unruly passions and some of his most luminous, deeply felt writing yet. The Coast of Utopia premiered at the National in 2002, directed by Nunn with inventiveness and panache, plus 30 actors, dozens of projections, and a seven-minute Les Miz-style set piece. "It interrupted all the interminable talk, of which I'm all too fond," Stoppard says.

Here, Stoppard's frequent American collaborator Jack O'Brien takes the helm. O'Brien is a director of remarkable range, who can turn on a dime from Hairspray to Henry IV. With his crackling productions of the Stoppard dazzlers Hapgood (1994) and The Invention of Love (2001), he has shown a keen eye for the warm heart behind the author's cool intellect. "He's the smartest person I'll ever know," O'Brien says. "What I have to give him is what he doesn't always fully give us in the scenario-blood and guts." O'Brien also has a showman's knack for keeping things moving. He says, "That's the covenant, isn't it? You give me two hours of your time-or nine-and I'll try to entertain you."

Lincoln Center Theater has given over most of the Vivian Beaumont's season to the plays, which will be mounted, one at a time, between next month and March, culminating in ...