Victory Song - A Reader Writes

The Skinny on The Addams Family (Broadway)

My dear friend and fellow theater lover Gwynn said it best as we escaped from The Addams Family on Broadway last night.

"That plot made Mama Mia seem like Anna Karenina."

Well said! 

As much as I love Nathan Lane and Bebe Neuwirth, even they could not save this one.  This show was boring, unimaginative and completely uninspired - in dialog, plot and musical composition.  Too bad, as the Addams Family heritage is rich with creative opportunity.

Impressions of Impressionism

I saw Impressionism on Broadway last night with my friend Toni.  It has all the makings of a fabulous new dramatic sensation:  big stars (Jeremy Irons and Joan Allen), cool technical staging and a multi-layered plot.

Makings are not enough, of course. It got panned harshlyby the critics.  The NY Post and NY Times both hated it.  Apparently, so many people were walking out at intermission, that they had to cut the play in half, eliminate the break and keep it to 90 minutes.  We saw this shorter version.

Toni thought it was weak.  She was bored, didn't get it and thought the plot plodding.

I liked it.  I know that it was stupid to portray seemingly intelligentManhattan dwellers as confused wanderers, bereft of sense.  I know that Allen's character is a lousy businessperson. (I had to smile later when Toni, a professional and uber-talented salesperson, ranted on about how offended she was.  No one could ever keep a gallery in business if she tried to sell the way this woman sells.)

But, I loved that you had to wait until the whole thing was over before understanding the characters. Just like a great novel, they weaved a story over time, didn't hit you over the head with it.

I loved the love story. I loved the charm and easy banter.  I loved the good advice and well composed secondary characters.  I especially thought the use of Impressionist paintings to serve as metaphor of the lovers' struggle to overcome their pain and engage fully in the world.   The technology was cool - they projected the paintings on a series of screens positioned at the front of the stage. One, full size, served as background, and four others were "picture sized."  The screens also diffused the actors behind them, giving a magical appearance and showing how art imitates life, and life imitates art and the beauty of art is the memory -- or impression -- we assign to it.

The story is ambitious.  No shortage of big questions here.  What is love?  Can love last?  Is life real or impression?  Can we forgive our parents?  Do small habits give us joy or prevent us from experiencing other opportunities?  When we give away what we love, does that multiply our joy?

I can see the critics' point. The story drags a bit, get a little preachy and the action is slow paced.  Toni felt that Irons and Allen were underutilized.  I felt that they were demonstrating their fine abilities - it's harder to keep the story going if you have limited props and movement. We were invited into their personal, troubled worlds.   Where what you don't say is often more poignant than what you do say. Life is often twisted and troubling.  And so great actors make it look easy.

Toni's advice:  skip it.

My recommendation, see if if you can (especially with a discount ticket, which are now readily available thanks to the critics).  And open yourself up to seeing the love story, despite the distractions.

And yes, we did laugh on the subway home as I defended the play and my enjoyment... "Did we see the same show just now?"   She's a good friend and let me wax on, even though she was having none of it.

Let me know what you think!

Who Needs Jeremy Pivens?

Many people know that Jeremy Pivens left his Broadway contract with "Speed the Plow" abruptly in December due to mercury poisoning, rumored to have been caused by eating too much sushi.  Show author David Mamet was quoted in the Huffington Post, "I talked to Jeremy on the phone, and he told me that he discovered that he had a very high level of mercury," Mamet said. "So my understanding is that he is leaving show business to pursue a career as a thermometer."

Doesn't matter, although of course I hope Mr. Pivens is okay.  The show is awesome.  I saw the show with replacement Norbert Leo Butz (of Rent and Dirty Rotten Scoundrelsfame, and whom I saw in the original cast of Wicked.)  He was incredible.  And even more incredible was the beautiful energy between Butz and actors Raul Esparza (whom I saw in Company last year) and Elisabeth Moss (who is best known for her HBO role in "MadMen"). 

There's a bit of irony in all this.  The show is a fast-paced two days in Hollywood, where everyone is ambitious and back-stabbing and selfish.  Butz (Bobby Gould) and Esparza (Charlie Fox) are such ruthless producers that they are almost characatures of themselves.  Moss (Karen) is a temp filling in for Bobby's secretary.   She appears naive.  But of course, is not. 

Bobby and Charlie are excited to be able to present a great, sure-win movie (along with a coveted lead actor) to the studio head.  They are sure this is going to be their trip to the big time.  They have worked together for 11 years and while they circle around each other a bit, they say that they are friend. Genuine friends.  Of course, what does that mean in Hollywood?  Not much.  Right.  Let's do lunch, baby.  That is the crux of the tension in the play.

So the irony is that Pivens, who was supposed to be so central to the success of the show, bails out for what at first seems like a bogus health claim (although apparently he really was sick), and the cast and Mamet do not rally around him - letting him go down in a howl of laughter from the industry.  That is typical Hollywood behavior, right?  You abandon the guy just when he needs you most - and you never hang on to friends in a tailspin.

More irony.  The way I heard about this play was from a very friendly (and, now that I remember, pretty loud. No Irony there!) guy that I met at a singles gathering who was telling me all about how he's an investor in this sure-fire, white hot Broadway play.  It's Speed-the-Plow, he tells me.  And of course he's very important to the investor team.

I'm always up for a play, so I get a ticket.  Ironic that despite his eagerness to "stay in touch, honey" I haven't seen or heard from this Mr. Investor guy.  How much more Hollywood can you get?

I still loved the play, all irony aside.   The timing of the piece demands incredible precision and the three actors are clearly enjoying themselves.  The dialog is a repartee - back and forth and forth and back... they miss one beat and the whole thing collapses into nonsense.  It's a hard play to perform. And they all did an amazing job, especially Esparza and Butz.

We do live in a rough, political world. And we all need friends to see us through - good and bad, when we soar with eagles or when we make stupid mistakes. For all the bravado and the hype, turns out that Bobby and Charlie really ARE friends.  The stuff of champions.  And that, perhaps, is the biggest irony of all.

If you can get a ticket - go see Speed-the-Plow. It ends soon!

A Sad Thing: Theater that Disapoints

There is nothing sadder than leaving a Broadway theater uninspired.

Yet that was my feeling last night after I saw Dividing the Estate.  The play was, frankly, mediocre.  What a shame. I expect to leave Broadway with my heart singing - in some way - either by the music, the clever jokes, some wonderful character or perhaps just musing some thoughtful revere sparked by the dialog.  Nope. 

Here is what I got:  Dysfunctional family with one dimensional characters; weak actors playing the secondary roles* with stiff presentation (you never left the fact that this was a play and the people merely players.  That is a bad thing.  I want magic! I want to be transported.); a plot that is nothing more than the longest, most boring, one joke story in history. The combination was just not working for me.

Somewhat notable is actress Hallie Foote, who plays youngest daughter/high strung mother/biggest whiner Mary Jo.   She has great timing and subtle physical comedy that makes me think that she'd be amazing if the character had any more than a two-step spectrum of emotional depth. Instead, her high anxiety and angst never dims, and so the character is tiring and fades from interesting to predictable rather early in the show.

To regain my love of the magic of theater, tonight I am heading out to Slava's Snow Show- a wonderful experience that I saw last year and just loved.  It's truly fantastic, in both sense of that word - wonderful and phantasmagoric.  It will be nice to ring in the near year with some clowns!

*With one exception. The young actress who plays the uncle's teen-age love interest enters the stage with five minutes to curtain and is so energetic and cringing inappropriate (as a teen-ager would be) that she infused the ending with a new pulse.  She's so unimportant however, that her name (and character) is not even listed on the website.  Hmm. What does that tell you?!

Equus on Broadway

Starring Harry Potter (actor Daniel Radcliffe) and featuring horses, Equus seems like every nine year old girl's dream Broadway production! 

Ah, unfortunate irony.  The story is equal parts disturbing and inspiring.  It's primal.  And terrifying in that way that horror fascinates us.  Not at all fodder for young people. 

Richard Griffiths plays Martin Dysart, the juvenile psychiatrist working with troubled 17-year old Alan Strang (played by Radcliffe).  Strang has been sent to the reform ward of the local mental hospital (instead of jail) by a caring magistrate.  His crime is hauntingly gruesome and utterly troubling: He blinds six horses in a fierce act of cruel violence.  Dysart calms the boy and the play is basically a reenactment of all the memories and actions that led to the violence.  Griffiths' doctor is so insightful that he helps us see that given the circumstances, the violent conclusion is not only comprehensible, but actually caused by a passion for life that few us ever experience. 

As he "cures" Strang, he regrets the loss of this passion.  It's an incredibly disturbing and sad play on many levels - the horror of the violence, the compassion we feel for the troubled boy, the admiration we have for his passion and the sadness we have at the stifling of that passion. Of course it must be stifled. Otherwise, Strand can not function in society.  Of course, cruelty of this measure is not acceptable for any reason.  But the play teaches us that passion out of control is just as sad and unspeakable as the acts we perform from a life of no passion at all. 

This is Radcliffe's first Broadway and nearly first stage performance and I thought he did a fine job. Much of the character is extremes, which are easier to play. But Radcliffe also does well with a series of scenes were he is both acting his own memories and narrating them to the doctor.  So Radcliffe has to move in and out of the action as player and observer, and he does so seamlessly.  The role is pretty physical and includes a long scene performed nude - an aspect that would be rather intense and unnerving for your stage debut, I should think. 

All the interviews that I've seen indicate that Radcliffe chose this play in part because Griffiths agreed to also do it and they have a very strong onstage connection that must extend to real life.  It's a great first play for Radcliffe also because it is so challenging and revealing - if you are going to shake off the cloak of Harry Potter, you best do it with a very strong and different role.

I definitely recommend Equus - it's not cheery, but it's really really well done.