… Dunsi Dai's evocative set, where an artful backdrop of army jackets, helmets and
ropes evokes Waldman's interior world.
By Judith Newmark on HEARTS
Post-Dispatch Theater Critic
The set design for this play was done by Dunsi Dai, and it beautifully utilizes the intimate
space in the Sarah and Abraham Wolfson Studio Theatre. The studio theater, located in
the lower level of the Jewish Community Center, couldn’t be much bigger than 50 by 50
feet, yet the boathouse is recreated with amazing detail and nuance. The audience fills up
three sides of the space, with the playing area taking up the fourth wall, figuratively and
literally. The lighting design by Andy Ottoson isn’t necessarily award-worthy, but still
manages to capture the feeling that I think Wilson and Jent were trying to create…
—Tyson Blanquart, on TALLEY’S FOLLY, Playback St. Louis
The play takes place on the summer night when Matt (Will Ledbetter) has returned to
Sally (Michelle Hand) to propose. In the course of the evening, they will "ice skate"
without actual ice, joke, quarrel, listen to a distant dance band and reveal the agonizing
secrets that haunt their lives.
They do all this in Dunsi Dai's beautifully wrought boathouse, cluttered with rubbish and
greenery. The set's sight lines might be better, but Dai's shabby-chic valentine is flawless
in terms of both accuracy and mood. Michele Friedman Siler hits the same apt note with
her period costumes.
Talley's Folly at New Jewish Theatre
By Judith Newmark
Post-Dispatch Theater Critic
Dunsi Dai's striking set design uses doors, windows and frames to define an interesting
variety of spaces for the action while creating a lived-in look for the Williams house. The
costumes by Cynthia Winstead, the lighting by Mark Putnam and the properties by Kate
Strembicki all add to the sense of realism.
River Niger
By GERRY KOWARSKY
Special to the Post-Dispatch
The set created by Dunsi Dai has a Dali-esque feel to it with a curved platform rising into
the air surmounted with symbols of Bearing's academic life. Onto this platform are the
gilded words from a poem by John Dunne referred to by Bearing throughout the play and,
it is truly magical as light designer M.L. Geiger makes those words glow.
Margaret Edson's Wit
Repertory Theatre of St. Louis Studio Season
Reviewed by Teresa Doggett
Even the detritus of war (sandbags, helmets, canteens) that clutters the stage in Dunsi
Dai's scenic design suggests that we are somewhere deep inside Donald's brain cavity. Is
that tinsel hanging from the barbed wire? It is, and in time we learn why. But throughout
the evening those tiny barbs are ever scraping against Donald's senses, eliciting howls of
confusion and pain. He may have been forgotten by his government ("Dear Mr.
Waldman, We regret to inform you that there is no record of you ever having served in
the Armed Forces of the United States"), but Donald cannot forget.
Willy Holtzman's World War II drama Hearts deserves a medal
BY DENNIS BROWN
The set by Dunsi Dai has a Dali-esque feel to it with a curved platform rising into the air
surmounted with symbols of Bearing’s academic life. Onto this platform are the glided
words from a poem by John Dunne referred to by Bearing throughout the play and, it is
truly magical as light designer M.L. Geiger makes those words glow.
“Wit” Repertory Theatre of St. Louis,
By Teresa Dogget, KDHX Radio
Your trip through time begins with
On Strivers Row Opening Night
By Sudan Arauz
Unexpected Tenderness
The New Jewish Theatre
Reviewed by Richard Green
… The detailed set by Dunsi Dai heightens the clash of wills with its game-board ceiling
and jutting entranceways.
"I'm Not Rappaport" has been widely revived, partly because it costs next to nothing to
stage. One bench, and you're in Central Park. New Jewish does considerably more,
thanks to set designer Dunsi Dai and lighting designer Glenn Dunn. Their autumnal,
detailed parkscape is charming.
I'm Not Rappaport
By Judith Newmark
POST-DISPATCH THEATER CRITIC
By relating Molly's story from the point of view of a boy, rather than Molly herself,
Horovitz avoids the finger-wagging didacticism and noble victimization that sap many
stories about transparently wrong behavior. Such deeds are all the more objectionable in
the steadfastly ordinary ambiance established by set designer Dunsi Dai, lighting designer
Don Guy and costumer Todd Schaefer.
Unexpected Tenderness
By Judith Newmark
Post-Dispatch Theater Critic
Dunsi Dai's stuccoed puzzle-box set opens and closes and folds itself into a pleasant
variety of backdrops.
The Merchant Of Venice
The New Jewish Theatre
By Richard Green
Dunsi Dai, Lou Bird and Matthew McCarthy envelop the production in appealing visual
wrappings. Dai's set gives us the picturesque poverty of cottages that float over the
proscenium and into the sky…
Fiddler on the Roof
By Joseph Stein, Jerry Bock and Sheldon Harnick
Stages St. Louis
 Bob Wilcox