During the Holidays I was privileged to see three diverse Broadway plays. These are my personal comments.

On his emergence from bankruptcy, Twain wrote this high-spirited romp of a play. He was elated with the burden relieved and Is He Dead? was the result. It languished for more than a century till it was discovered in his papers. It is a light-hearted, cross-dressing, well-staged burlesquian, well-acted farce that made you laugh. It has a true villain with mustache and black top hat. It also has a hero who dons a dress and does female shtick. Norbert Leo Butz, the lead character is perfectly cast. If you are looking for depth and serious thinking, this is the wrong play to see. The teen-agers enjoyed it immensely. It was fun and well-done.

A sidelight incident was that Warren Beatty and Annette Benning and their four delightful children sat directly in front of Lorraine and myself. She

was beautiful and he had aged a bit. It was exciting.

This play concerns the true inventor of television. It is a duel between Philo Farnsworth, an inventor/scientist from Provo, Utah and David Sarnoff, the head of RCA and NBC. David Sarnoff received his credentials by being a Morse code operator and receiving the news of the Titanic sinking. He cleverly parlayed it into his great fortune and leadership in radio in America.

In many ways it is the tale of the City Slicker versus the Country Bumpkin. Hank Azaria plays David Sarnoff fastidiously with power and strength. He narrates much of the action. Jimmi Simpson, as Farnsworth, is a rumpled true scientist, who is not afraid to share his discovery (of television) with his fellow scientists. One little secret of stealing a process is what the story hangs on.

Sidelight - Hank Azaria went to Tufts University with my daughter, Cara. He was in her dormitory. Unfortunately, we did not go backstage to speak to him.

The best play I have seen in 10 years. When I read Christopher Isherwood's review in The New York Times, I rushed to view it. (He praised it to the skies). It made Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf seem like a walk in the park. Dysfunctional families are a lot of fun, as long as they are not your family. Three wild sisters, their husbands and lovers, an alcoholic father and a pill-popping mother are a few characters who get your attention. They carp at each other in brilliant multidialogues. The single set is the family house in cross-section. We can see different actors in different rooms at the same time.

The punch lines kept coming and I am sorry I didn't copy them down in a notebook. Amazingly enough, you got to know every character in-depth.

This play (with a name that doesn't mean anything) has come to Broadway from "The Steppenwolf Theater" of Chicago. You won't be sorry you went to see it. I guarantee that!

P.S. As I predicted in my Jan. 4, column, Roger Clemens has filed a Defamation of Character lawsuit. Nostradamus strikes again!