Taboo nicely put for 'A Naked Girl'

0 Comments | USA TODAY, October, 2005 | by Elysa Gardner

NEW YORK -- A few years back, one of our most celebrated playwrights demonstrated how love can conquer all, even when challenged by a squirm-inducing sexual taboo. Edward Albee's The Goat, or Who Is Sylvia? collected a Tony Award and other honors.

Richard Greenberg's A Naked Girl on the Appian Way (*** out of four), which opened Thursday at the Roundabout Theatre Company's American Airlines Theatre, isn't likely to inspire as much controversy, or as much hyperbolic praise. That's in part because the taboo this time isn't as off-putting as bestiality, but it also is because Greenberg, who earned a best-play Tony for 2003's Take Me Out, seems motivated more to entertain than to shock, enlighten or admonish us.

Like Goat, Naked Girl focuses on a smart, happily married...