Time Stands Still

"Time Stands Still" presented by Manhattan Theatre Club at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre, March 24, 2010

Donald Margulies continues his successful relationship with MTC in his latest work, Time Stands Still, an exploration of two war journalists trying to survive the aftermath of recording the gore and horrors in Iraq and Afghanistan.  Jamie (Brian D'Arcy James) brings home long-time girlfriend, Sarah (Laura Linney), in the last stages of recovery from injuries by a roadside bomb.  Her scarred and broken body belies her passion for the value of her photography as a means to expose the injustice and cruelty of war.

Tightly directed by Daniel Sullivan, the able cast brings us a compelling tale of a warrior who can't stop fighting despite the love she receives.  Ms. Linney is, as always, clear and focused in her portrayal of Sarah.  Mr. Bogosian and Ms. Silverstone support very well as Jamie's editor/publisher and his new, young girlfriend, respectively.  It is Mr. D'Arcy James who carries the evening.  His Jamie is exhausted from the real battles that he and Sarah cover, the battle of her infidelity as well as the battle to get Sarah to leave the danger of that life behind.  He's always first to reach out and always ends up rejected.  It's a remarkable performance.

Time Stands Still closed on March 27.

Starwatch - Mary Louise Parker was in the audience (scouting for the movie, perhaps?).

The American Plan

"The American Plan" presented by Manhattan Theatre Club at the Biltmore Theatre, January 8, 2009

Richard Greenberg's latest outing on the Rialto is a revival of his fractured fairy tale of sorts, set in a Catskills resort area in 1960.

The princess, Lili Adler (Lily Rabe) sits on a dock watching the social games going on across the lake at the all-inclusive and exclusive resort. Her callow and flawed prince, Nick Lockridge (Kieran Campion) climbs from his swim across the lake onto the dock to join her, apparently unaware that the property is not part of the hotel.

Lili's widowed mother Eva (Mercedes Ruehl), controls the ample purse strings left from her father's death, and the accusations quickly begin. "She murdered him, my father, you know." Eva enjoys her notoriety among the summer guests who refer to her as the Duchess or Czarina ("One should always have a population one can be superior to!"). Rounding out the household is Olivia (Brenda Pressley), the maid.

Seeing such a damsel in distress, Nick is soon enthralled to save her despite already being engaged to a social climber at the hotel, but has motives of his own. Family fortune lost, mother dead, his father was killed when cleaning his gun. Lili forces Nick's loyalty when she starts a rumor that he has an STD. This ends the engagement, not because the fiance' is disgusted, but because she fears she may have been the one to give it to him.

Eva, after some research of her own, learns some of Nick's secrets and rather than use them to get rid of the boy, she lures him into her own trap masked in goodwill. After Gil Harbison (Austin Lysy), another hotel visitor, wanders onto the property several week later, the plot thickens with some not unexpected Greenberg plot twists over who is telling the truth and when.

The story moves well enough at the lakeside, but Mr. Greenberg has tacked on an epilogue of sorts which takes place ten years later in the Adler's NYC apartment. Eva has died and Nick turns up to see Lili - it was never really clear why he came, nor were the protests heard outside her window given so much attention. Their cause was never stated, presumably Columbia students protesting the Vietnam war, but who knows?

As Lili, Ms. Rabe captures the manic child who can't escape the safe, if cloying, clutches of her domineering mother. Mr Campion, who makes his first entrance in only bathing trunks (thankfully!), masks his character a bit too much, leaving his performance slightly lacking. Ms. Pressley avoids the stereotype of household staff (unlike those in "Dividing The Estate"), in a slightly underwritten role.

It is Ms. Ruehl who commands every moment she is on stage. Though the German accent tended to obscure her lines, the character was always clear. She's the monster who suspects she may be a monster, enough so to tell other that possibility exists, but in the end fulfills the foregone conclusion without admitting the truth.

Jonathan Fensom, whose WWI trenches for last year's "Journey's End" evoked such cool dampness has put a nice spin on this revolving set, a tilting dock on a glassy black floor. He has also repeated the use of a traveling curtain for changes, quite similar to his design for "Faith Healer" from 2006. Mark McCullough's lighting completes the effect nicely.

Director David Grindley, who sat silently in the back of the orchestra section as cell phones and pagers continuously sounded during both acts, could work a bit on the pace. The show opens in two weeks, so time remains to tighten up scenes and get all the lines down cold.

I would hope that Manhattan Theatre Club might invest a bit of the Dentyne money to toss out some of the offending cell phone using ticket-holders, since the company sponsored the pre-show announcements and program stuffers. Shame on the offenders and shame on MTC for their inaction afterwards!

Perfecting Codependence

"Come Back, Little Sheba" presented by the Manhattan Theater Club at the Biltmore Theatre, January 13, 2008

William Inge's classic play of dysfunction and longing returns for its first Broadway revival under the sensitive direction of Michael Pressman. He has assembled an admirable cast. The story centers around Lola (S. Epatha Merkerson), a faded beauty married and childless slogging into middle age. She longs for happier times and her dog Sheba who ran away sometime ago. Her sometime-recovering-alcoholic husband Doc (Kevin Anderson) longs for the youthful freedom he never had, as well as Marie (Zoe Kazan), the college student who boards with them.

Ms. Merkerson braves the challenge to take on a role so closely associated with the inimitable Shirley Booth who originated the role of Lola on stage and on film winning both a Tony and an Oscar for her portrayal. I've never seen the film, but I can easily imagine the power Ms. Booth brought to that performance. Ms. Merkerson's Lola is a woman lost in her love for a man who can't raise himself to what he wants to be, and lost after the death of their child during childbirth. She is prompted to action by Marie, who serves as something of a surrogate child. Yet she remains child-like and starved for companionship, striking up conversations with the postman and milkman, and developing an odd friendship with her neighbor.

Mr. Anderson's Doc is the strongest characterization of the cast. His desire for Marie torments him more than the bottle of bourbon in the pantry. After being pushed over the edge, his drunken violent rage was particularly visceral.

Ms. Kazan continues to establish herself as one of the brightest stage talents in New York. Her Marie is practical and forward-thinking, juggling romance with two boys, school athlete and classmate Turk (the delectably athletic Brian Smith) and her long distance boyfriend Bruce (Chad Hoeppner) who shows up with a ring and sweeps her off late in Act II.

I made comparisons to Mr. Inge's work in my comments on "August: Osage County" which seem all the more relevant after seeing tonight's play. I also noticed some striking comparisons to characters in Mr. Inge's "The Dark at the Top of the Stairs," faded beauties discovering themselves stuck in middle age with undependable men who require their support instead of being the support they thought they had chosen.

James Noone's semi-skeletal set functions relatively well, though also reminiscent of the set for "August: Osage County." Must be something about Midwestern dysfunction that inspires such a design. I did find the set a bit ineffective with some action taking place upstage left blocked by the lace curtains surrounding the front door for those of on the right side of the audience. Jane Cox's lighting added the appropriate level of intimacy.

Mr. Pressman is to be commended for his work here. Pace and intensity provide a nice flow.

Two Stamp Monte

"Mauritius" presented by Manhattan Theatre Club at the Biltmore Theatre, September 13, 2007

Theresa Rebeck's latest effort has begun performances at Manhattan Theatre Club. With an impressive cast, and some occasionally good scenes, the result is pretty much a cable "dramedy" (hence the pointless profanity) disguised as theatre.

I missed "The Scene" last season, but did suffer through "The Water's Edge." The mixed reviews from TS, combined with MTC's willingness to produce her on B'way gave me hope that Ms. Rebeck was hitting her stride as a playwright. I think MTC would have been wiser to produce this one at City Center and saved their big stage for better material. Sorry to see them with another miss, right on the heels of "Lovemusik."

Now, I do realize that I saw the very first preview performance and likely was one of the first run-throughs this cast has had with a sizeable audience. That said, I will proceed.

Jackie (Alison Pill) whose mother has just died after what was apparently a difficult period emotionally and financially. Among her effects are a stamp collection compiled by her late father-in-law. Jackie's half-sister Mary (Katie Finneran) has arrived after fleeing the home as a teenager, leaving Jackie to deal with the fallout.

Driving the title of the play are a couple of particularly valuable stamps, printed with errors during the reign of Queen Victoria on the island of Mauritius in the Indian Ocean off the coast of Madagascar. The pair could be worth more than $6 million. Jackie arrives at the stamp shop of Phil (Dylan Baker) to see about getting an idea of how much the collection might be worth.

Yes, that's Phil the philatelist.

Lurking about the store is Dennis (Bobby Cannavale), a somewhat shady dabbler in the stamp trade. He spots the opportunity to scam Jackie on her stamps, hoping to set her up with Sterling (F. Murray Abraham), an equally shady dabbler in the stamp trade, but with the cash to back it up.

Yes, Sterling is the man with the money.

Scams and double-crosses are attempted and exposed. Jackie slugs Mary. Sterling slugs and chokes Jackie. Sterling slugs Dennis. One could only hope that hilarity would ensue, but it's just not that funny.

As Jackie, Ms Pill is at first unsure and awkward, wavering in whatever direction she's pushed by whomever she's talking to. She does find some strength as events transpire, finding a bit of backbone that seems to come out of nowhere. She plays what she's given, but the character has been drawn a bit thin.

Katie Finneran as half-sister Mary, suffers with even less to work with. I should have counted how many times she said "He was my grandfather" in comparison to how many other lines she had. I'm gonna guess the ratio was just under 40%, but Ms. Finneran did her best to bring some kind of interest to the vapid role.

Dylan Baker's Phil is self-important and elitist with little to support it. He sneers and snubs sufficiently.

Bobby Cannavale, in his Broadway debut, charms as Dennis, but I was never really sure what his character wanted out of the transaction. I can only presume he was looking for a cut/commission on the sale of the stamps, but that part was never made clear. Beyond that, he was merely a device to facilitate the plot.

The real question is: What is F. Murry Abraham doing in this mess? Is this role his attempt to transform his image like Ben Kingsley did in "Sexy Beast?" If so, I don't think this will be the vehicle to accomplish that. He's much better than his material here, but even then can't bring the play much above mediocrity.

Doug Hughes has assembled a fine cast of very talented actors, and seems to have worked pretty hard to make the play enjoyable. The material just doesn't provide enough of a foundation to make any magic.

Catherine Zuber's talents go wasted (though I did think putting Sterling in a shiny, silver, sharkskin suit was an excellent touch), as do John Lee Beatty's excellent sets. He really has done a nice job exploiting the double turntables at the Biltmore. Paul Gallo's industrial and intrusive light towers overwhelm the delicate proscenium - does a play like that really require so many instruments to light it effectively?

But Where Was Pirate Jenny's Song?

"LoveMusik" presented by the Manhattan Theatre Club at the Biltmore Theatre, April 14, 2007

In what should have been a triumphant return to directing on Broadway, Hal Prince's latest effort is (so far - since the show is still in previews) a long and drawn out affair that seems most interested in trying to present the entire Weill songbook in a single evening of theatre. He's got some significant talent to work with in Donna Murphy as Lotte Lenya and Michael Cerveris as Kurt Weill. Alfred Uhry's book takes a while to find its way, and does manage some interesting moments. There is a tendency to get bogged down in minutiae to accomodate the song coming up next. I liked that they indicated the lyricist for each song, but wish they'd taken the next step and identified the show in which it appeared. MTC has done a nice job with program notes about the four principal characters of Lenya, Weill, Bertold Brecht and George Davis.

As Lotte Lenya, Ms. Murphy works hard to remain compelling with some rather redundant moments. It's established early on that fidelity is not her strong suit, but challenging Weill's ability to love her is. That said, it took a while for that passion to really come through. Though Weill was of a particularly passive nature, I didn't sense that the book provided Mr. Cerveris the chance to really express himself in their first argument. Once that passion was revealed a scene or two later, Mr. Cerveris' awkward and tender portrayal came through beautifully. Even though it's only listed twice in the playbill, it seemed like there were at least three (if not five) reprises of "I Don't Love You."

Ms. Murphy, all gangly knees and hips again like in the recent "Wonderful Town" gives us a Lenya who is free with her love as a defense to mask her fear of rejection. I do have to say, though, that her songs reminded me a lot more of Edith Piaf than Lotte Lenya. I did a quick internet search to find a Lenya recording and think Ms. Murphy's own un-accented voice much closer than that of her performance in this show.

As Bertold Brecht, David Pittu, whose skills remind me more and more of a Stanley Tucci for musical theatre with another chameleon-like turn. His Brecht is trashy and talented, only concerned about self-promotion and pleasure.

John Scherer gets saddled with the standard-required-gay-role of George Davis, Weill's American agent. He does get to show off some nice song-and-dance skills in "The Illusion Wedding Show." I'm still not sure why Patricia Birch didn't put tap shoes on him for that number - he certainly hit the marks from what I could hear in the mezzanine.

I was struck with how many scenes/moments reminded me of Kander and Ebb's "Cabaret, originally directed by Mr. Prince. From the first scene between Weill and Lenya in Weill's tiny apartment, which seemed much like Cliff and Sally's first scene at Frau Schneider's boarding house, to Brecht's first number, "Tango Ballad" and "Schickelgruber," both of which pointed back to Cabaret's "Two Ladies."

I did have a couple of tactical questions about some staging decisions.

• Why did the rowboat bit at the beginning look so cheaply done?
• Why were some parts of scenes staged out of view of the mezzanine?
  
• Why was one of Brecht's companions scrubbing the sand outside his trailer in Santa Monica?
• Why did Alan Lake's costume during "Buddy on the Night Shift" look like a Chelsea-boy sleeveless tshirt?
• Has anyone ever seen such well-endowed figures as were depicted on the first act false proscenium?
• Most of all, with all the music they did manage to put into the show, why would they leave out Pirate Jenny's song from "Threepenny Opera," a number I saw Ms. Murphy sing at the Public's anniversary celebration (summer of 2004?) in a devastating performance? There are many references to TPO throughout the show, but for a role so closely associated with Lenya, how does one leave it out?
  

Overall, I would have to describe the production as slightly awkward right now. It seems like a production that should still be out of town, working through some of these issues, the most pressing of which is the nearly three-hour running time.

Technically, this isn't one of MTC's better efforts. Costumes by Judith Dolan are a mish-mash of styles, with no indication of a unified look. Beowulf Boritt's sets are also an uneven affair, working from a palette of red and black, but tossing in a mix of styles without much apparent attention to theme. It is early in previews, but the Howell Binkley's lighting experienced a few glitches here and there.

That said, there is much to be seen here. When Ms. Murphy sings "Surabaya Johnny," she is mesmerizing, once again earning her reputation as a powerful and charismatic performer. I thought the staging of Weill's death was beautifully done, followed by a heartbreaking delivery of "September Song" by Ms. Murphy and Mr. Davis. Mr. Cerveris is equally compelling, particularly so in the reprises of "I Don't Love You."