SAILOR’S DELIGHT

Richard Maxwell’s New York City Players and the artists of the Wooster Group have set themselves a difficult course—creating American experimental theater even at a time when it seemed most experiments had already been undertaken. Their latest theatrical trial, Early Plays, involves a collaboration centered on the early “Glencairn” works of Eugene O’Neill, another American experimentalist. The Wooster actors, who have already explored The Hairy Ape and The Emperor Jones, and Maxwell’s corps, who have less direct experience of the master, set sail at St. Ann’s Warehouse to present a trio of plays all staged aboard a tramp steamer: Bound East for Cardiff, The Long Voyage Home, and The Moon of the Caribbees. Helmed by Maxwell with a crew assembled from both companies, it should have fans of the avant-garde saying aye-aye. (And mark your calendars for February 17 when Anthology Film Archives kicks off its special series “The Wooster Group on Film and Video.”)

Tuesdays-Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 3 & 7 p.m. Starts: Feb. 15. Continues through March 11, 2012