Starring Oscar awarded F. Murray Abraham and Mercedes Ruehl, the reading of Jules Feiffer’s 2003 play A Bad Friend at Guild Hall, could not have featured more good friends. Under the expert direction of Harris Yulin who also read, along with the outstanding Tedra Millan, Dave Quay, and Josh Gladstone, one of the East End’s finest character actors, the reading thrilled an audience of Feiffer’s friends (Monte Farber and Amy Zerner, Audrey Flack, Susan Lacy, Celia Weston, among them), his wife Joan Holden, and the author himself.

Set in the McCarthy ‘50’s when loyalty to the American Communist Party was for some, more powerful than love for democracy, Feiffer’s intention was to give voice to diehard Stalinists, to examine how they talked and acted. Mercedes Ruehl’s character served as a stand-in for his older sister Mimi, who, Jules explained to the rapt crowd, died a Stalinist.

Josh Gladstone’s character, a composite of many screenwriters of the time who, under pressure, named names, suffers the ostracism from family and friends.

If you live to 90, you’ve seen a thing or two. Said Jules about the play’s resonance: “It’s not that I’m prophetic. Nobody in this country learns anything. It’s so easy to know the future.” So, when asked to be specific about the parallels and relevance today, he sighed: “Are you kidding?”