Other Desert Cities

Perhaps the working title of this play used to be How to Ruin a Family in 12 Easy Steps.  Boy oh boy, What a punch this play packs!  The brilliant playwright Jon Robin Baitz is back from his brief detour to Hollywood and very glad we should be.  Under the direction of Joe Mantello, this production hits all the high notes in all the right places - comedy, religion, social commentary, drama and politics - all within the confines of the (very) white, upper middle class Palm Springs, California home of the Wyeth family.

Take all those powder-keg ingredients and toss in a top notch cast - Linda Lavin, Stockard Channing, Stacy Keach, Elizabeth Marvel, and the very sexy Thomas Sadowski and you've got a 2 1/2 hour weapon of mass destruction on your hands.   How did news of this stellar cast escape the news media, PR people, and me?.   I'm just glad my good friend, Donna, sent me the Playbill offer and I could end the year on such a high quality note as seeing this cast perform this play.

So what's it about?  It's about family, secrets, lies, love, protecting, and possibly at the same time, potentially destroying your children and your entire family.  In many ways, this play is like an season of Brothers and Sisters concentrated into two power-packed acts.  I mention this specifically because I was thinking about the similarities in format and style the entire time I was watching the family drama unfold.  I only realized afterwards as I was reading my playbill that Jon Robin Baitz actually wrote for the series for a season.  Now it all makes sense.

There are a few minor points that I'd like to see clarified in the text - one being the time frame - it's not until you really do the math that you realize the incident they are all dancing around happened in the 1970's (most of the audience spent the intermission discussing the math of how old the characters all were) and the other has to do with the ending.  No spoilers - but let's just say it was not clear to me right away what Mr. and Mrs. Wyeth actually did - it happened too quickly and was not clearly articulated.  It was perhaps the most important revelation of the entire play and it was done too quickly, I had about 3 versions of what was running in my head in parallel for a while.

Whether you like the family drama format, the actors, or the playwright - (or maybe all of the above) - Run, Don't walk - over to the Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater at Lincoln Center and catch a performance of Other Desert Cities. It's currently in previews with an opening night slated for January 13th.  I think this one will be around for a while.  I could even imagine a Broadway transfer being discussed.  Hey - if God of Carnage can do it, this one is a shoe in.

The Little Foxes

The New York Theatre Workshop under the direction of Ivo Van Hove has put a unique and refreshing performance of Lillian Hellman's stage gem.  Bare stage with purple velvet walls, ominous music, video, and, what I can only presume is the director's signature on this work, several anachronistic elements that turned this twisted family ordeal into the a powerhouse performance on East 4th Street.

From the get-go, the feel was "Festen-like".  An incestuous family, dark secrets, money, greed, power, and sex start this gem off and it only kicks into a higher gear with every passing eerie moment.  Elizabeth Marvel (Regina Giddens), Marton Csokas (Ben Hubbard), and Thomas Jay Ryan (Oscar Hubbard) take the helm as the Hubbard children - siblings in a long line of southern Hubbards hell bent on proving they can be even more successful Hubbards than all before them.  Backstabbing, negotiating, side-dealing, and cheating at every turn.  Christopher Evan Welch (Horace Giddens), the terminally ill brother-in-law holds the key to the entire deal and we find out just how far this family is willing to go to achieve their goals.

This is one of those plays that leaves an impression on you for days and weeks afterward.  You'll return to it ruminating on this aspect or that ploy or that relationship.  I did wonder (as did many of those who I chatted with after the play) why the director choose to introduce all the anachronistic elements into the performance - the car alarm sounds, the coffee maker, the airport moving sidewalk, and the video itself.  I found them slightly distracting, constantly wondering "what it meant".   I respect the decision, of course, and will admit they the entire production was a tremendous, high-impact success.

Is there room on Broadway for another Festen so soon?  With the right leading lady and supporting cast, I think so.  Too bad Tallulah Bankhead, Elizabeth Taylor, and Betty Davis can't reprise their roles (the Regina in the original Broadway production in 1939, revival in 1981, and and the movie in 1941 respectively).  I can think of a few evil deals that could be struck for the 2011-2012 season.  But let's not get ahead of ourselves.  I don't have all the cash yet.

Fifty Words

Just like the Eskimos have 50 words to describe snow, Playwright, Michael Weller suggests that we should have the same to describe love.  Norbert Leo Butz (Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, Is he Dead?) and Elizabeth Marvel (Top Girls, Seascape, Hedda Gabler) take the helm at the Lucille Lortel Theatre as Adam and Jan, a seemingly ordinary couple with one child living in Brooklyn who end up alone for one evening for the first time in 9 years due to their son's first sleep-over with a friend.

What ensues on stage is a Lifetime-movie-like drama of a husband and wife who have issues that have been simmering under the surface for years including self esteem, dreams forgone, insecurities, annoyances,  and infidelity.  The dialogue is cutting, acerbic, and honest.  The play does not skirt the issues; does not dance around the core issues.  It lays them all out bare on stage for the audience to absorb.   On more than one occasion, a gasp, a sigh, and even a few affirmations and "um-hmm's" were quietly emoted from the audience. 

In the short 100 minutes we ride the extremes of the ups and downs. We move fluidly from the fighting to the mind-blowing sex to the instinctual and unconditional concern for the child and back to the fighting again.   No holds bared in this one.  All the while, love itself simmers below the surface. Two sensational performances by two Broadway juggernauts.    If I try hard enough, I'm sure I can come up with 50 reasons to see this one!

Top Girls

Let me start off by saying I completely enjoyed the acting of the gals on stage. Kudos to your talents. That's the only good thing I have to say about this train wreck on 47th and 8th.

A thoroughly painful evening at the theater. A complete turn-off and complete fraud thrust upon the audience.

I'm completely disappointed at Manhattan Theater Club's choice to present this show. At the first reading of this play Caryl Churchill they should have thrown it in the trash bin and burned it. It's revolting. It's absurd. It's unacceptably long and boring. There doesn't even seem to be a point to anything that occurred on stage the entire evening. Shame on you MTC!

MTC seems to hype this show and provide a description of the plot which doesn't even jive with what transpires on stage. Only one of the many scenes takes place at the Top Girls employment agency in London. It happens to be one of the better scenes (take them where you can get them). Is this show really about the values of the leading lady? Values?? I think not. Choices, maybe, but values? No.

When I see over 1/2 of the audience leave their seats by the end of the show (3 unbearable acts with two intermissions and over 2.5 hours!) it's usually a hint something is not kosher. But there's nothing more telling than the leading lady politely bowing, but then rolling her eyes as if to say "Oh boy, we've cleared another house again", it's only validation that even the actresses seemed to regret their decision to perform in this show.

Seascape

Edward Albee wrote a gem. It won a pulitzer prize actually. An entertaining tale, actually. Francis Sternhagen and George Grizzard bring a touch of warmth and a bit of comedy to the story of an aging couple - just arriving at the golden years of their life. The story takes a twist just in time for Act II. where it turns surreal and thought provking -the entire time a bit too farsical.

Seems that Mr. Albee was a deep thinker, but just ran out of time and decided to "wrap it up" quickly. The second act contained too many elements of evolution, emotion, and humanity. He tried to explain them all away to the "other couple" too quickly and to easily.

With all that said - it was still entertaining - but not necessarily one to put on your Rebok's for.