Meet The Simpsons

Stunning play elevates The Simpsons to near myth at Stage West

The Simpsons reach near-mythic proportions by the end of Mr. Burns: A Post-electric Play.

Photo by Buddy Myers

In Anne Washburn's 2012 marvel Mr. Burns: A Post-electric Play, the world ends not with a bang, but with a whisper: "I'm going to kill you, Bart Simpson."

No, wait, it's "Die, Bart, die," isn't it? I'm referring to the iconic "Cape Feare" episode from the fifth season of The Simpsons, a touchstone of pop culture. If you ever kept up with Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa, and Maggie, I bet you could even recite a couple of the show's memorable lines.

That's what a group of survivors in Mr. Burns do following a mysterious apocalyptic event. Huddled around a trash-can fire, the motley crew tries to reconstruct the episode in an unacknowledged effort to distract themselves from encroaching danger. Stage West's fresh interpretation creates an eerie look at civilization clinging to its humanity, couched in Sideshow Bob impressions and snippets of Gilbert and Sullivan operetta.

If Washburn had set her entire play in this murky, tense world, the act of watching these frightened people seek out comfort would have eventually worn thin. Smartly, the second act skips ahead seven years, and the third act 75 years more after that. With each time change, The Simpsons become more a part of our mythology and history, as the animated residents of Springfield morph to fit fading memories and immediate societal needs.

In act two, roving troupes of performers — including our intrepid survivors — eke out a living by reenacting favorite (and some not so) episodes. It's a time where correctly remembering lines from the original show (or making up even better ones) can help you cheat death.

Even the commercials are re-created, portraying the cushy pre-apocalypse with absurd levels of self-absorption. This netherworld of humanity gives the design team at Stage West plenty with which to show off, as they must assemble gloriously low-fi yet admittedly genius costumes and props.

By the finale, The Simpson family has reached near mythical proportions, starring in a heavily stylized and even more heavily rewritten stage version of "Cape Feare." Bart is a princely hero and Mr. Burns (Sideshow Bob having been lost to the annals of history) has transformed into a murderous ghoul.

The sets, costumes, props, and lighting become more impressive with each act. But it's Garret Storms' acute direction that keeps these Twilight Zone worlds spinning.

Storms has an immensely talented cast, including Ian Ferguson, Jessica Cavanagh, Kelsey Leigh Ervi, Mikaela Krantz, Henry Greenberg, and Caroline Dubberly. Amy Mills makes a haunting cameo in the third act, while Paul Taylor stuns as the nightmarish Mr. Burns.

Though technically a play, there is quite a bit of music in the show. (Washburn and Michael Friedman collaborated on the score.) The purgatory version of America in the second act, especially, has multiple aspects of pop culture float into the performance, with an a capella mashup being particularly enjoyable.

The accessibility of a play about a cartoon, a wonderful combination of high-brow and low-brow entertainment, mirrors the astounding success of The Simpsons. It is, as Mr. Burns would say, "Excellent."

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Mr. Burns: A Post-electric Play runs through September 13 at Stage West in Fort Worth.

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Ancient Sculpture News

Fort Worth museum one of only 3 in U.S. to get rare sculpture exhibit

Lorenzo di Masi/Torlonia Collection

The Torlonia Nile

A major exhibition of ancient Roman masterworks is coming to the U.S. for the first time to be viewed at only three museums — including the Kimbell Art Museum in Fort Worth.

Called Myth and Marble: Ancient Roman Sculpture from the Torlonia Collection, it's an assemblage of works stewarded by the Torlonia Family beginning in the early-19th century, and will be installed at the Kimbell from September 14, 2025 – January 25, 2026.

As part of the Foundation’s mission to showcase these historical works to the public, the exhibition will premiere at the Art Institute of Chicago on March 15 through June 29, before traveling to the Kimbell Art Museum in Fort Worth. Its third stop will be at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, from March 14 - July 19, 2026.

The Torlonia Collection was established during the course of the 19th century by the Franco-Italian banker Prince Giovanni Torlonia and his son Alessandro, then handed down over generations, eventually growing into the largest private collection of ancient Roman sculptures.

Today, the Torlonia Foundation represents the culmination of the Family’s continued passion for art. Created at the behest of Prince Alessandro Torlonia (1925–2017), the Foundation’s mission is to preserve and promote the Torlonia Collection and Villa Albani Torlonia.

In 1876, Prince Alessandro Torlonia (1800-1886) created a museum to house and exhibit the Family’s holdings, which was open to small groups until its closure at the onset of World War II. The sculptures remained unseen by the public from that time until the Foundation’s first exhibition at the Musei Capitolini in Rome in 2020. That was followed by a stint at the Louvre, the first presentation of the collection outside of Rome, where it has drawn more than 600,000 visitors to date, an unprecedented feat.

The exhibit
The curators of Myth & Marble: Ancient Roman Sculpture from the Torlonia Collection are Lisa Ayla Çakmak and Katharine A. Raff of the Art Institute of Chicago. The exhibition is co-organized by the Art Institute of Chicago and the Torlonia Foundation, in collaboration with the Kimbell Art Museum, the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, and The Museum Box. All of the sculptures in the exhibition have been restored by the Foundation with the support of Bvlgari.

The exhibition is accompanied by a catalogue co-published by the Art Institute of Chicago and the Torlonia Foundation, edited by Lisa Ayla Çakmak and Katharine A. Raff, with essays by Silvia Beltrametti and Salvatore Settis.

The North American presentation will feature 58 highlights from the Torlonia Collection, including 24 newly restored works that have not been on view in nearly a century. The sculptures date from approximately the 5th century BCE to the early 4th century CE, with the majority of the works dating to the High Imperial period (1st–2nd centuries CE). Highlights include examples of the most emblematic genres of ancient marble sculpture, acquired by the Torlonia Family from the most prominent collections of Rome’s patrician families, as well as from excavations made on the Family’s own estates throughout Italy.

“The Foundation is excited to be sharing the Torlonia Collection with audiences in North America for the first time. This exceptional group of ancient sculptures is a testament to the enduring cultural legacy of ancient Rome, as well as the vision and passion of multiple generations of the Torlonia Family,” said Alessandro Poma Murialdo, President of the Torlonia Foundation.

The presentation is organized thematically in six sections, featuring sculptures found on the Torlonia Family’s properties in Rome and the surrounding suburbs and their estate in Porto, Portugal, as well as a number of exceptional sarcophagi (stone coffins), among the largest sculpted works in marble to survive from ancient Rome.

The tour reinforces the work of the Foundation to advance the appreciation and understanding of this unparalleled collection and the rich cultural heritage it represents. The Foundation’s mission is carried out through a continuous joint effort between the public and private sectors, including with the cooperation of the Italian Ministry of Culture. The Foundation is supported by a longstanding collaboration with Bvlgari as the principal sponsor of the restoration project since its inception in Rome and throughout the global tour, and Chiomenti, who has lent invaluable support to the Foundation’s core activities.

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