King Lear

photo: Michal Daniel

There are a few very good performances in the new production of King Lear at the Public, but unfortunately Kevin Kline's isn't one of them. His Lear is small and in many ways ordinary, as if it's believed that that's what's needed for us to identify with the character, but a small Lear is no Lear at all. In the first scene, where we should feel Lear's unsparingly cruel vengenance as he demands professions of love from his daughters, Lear comes off more like a capricious and irritated snit than a grandiose king whose pride has been wounded to the core. A fit of curtness follows where explosive rage should be. And so on. The production is handsomely designed but otherwise wrongheaded, and only half of the ensemble seems to have been introduced to one another. The best of the good half of the ensemble includes Larry Bryggman, Brian Avers, Michael Rudko and especially Logan Marshall-Green, whose dynamic, snakey performance as Edmund handily steals the show.

The Curse of the Mystic Renaldo The

Totally experimental, way out there, Art Rock Vaudeville. The Curse of the Mystic Renaldo The spends so much time trying to be different from everything else that I can't tell if it's actually good or just really quirky. After the multimedia faded into the background (about twenty minutes in), I started enjoying the performances; especially the musical numbers. It left no doubt in my mind that Aldo Perez is a very talented comic actor, that Jenny Lee Mitchell has an amazing voice, and that Richard Ginocchio has a hard time keeping a straight face, but it also left me in a state of perpetual disappointment. Just as I'd start to get into a segment--like Perez's bit as a singer/songwriter going on about a phone call he once made--it would skip to something weirder, and at times the show reminded me of Danny Elfman's cult film Forbidden Zone. At one point, Perez throws out the phrase tableau vivant, or "living picture," and that's an apt description for the work. Just know that the artists they like are the tortured ones, like Van Gogh, or the surrealists, like Escher and Dali (to whom the set designer is indebted, what with the ceiling-facing doors and slashed walls). Want to be weirded into laughter? Check out The Curse of the Mystic Renaldo The.

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Our Leading Lady

I saw the first act of the first preview of Charles Busch's new comedy at Manhattan Theatre Club's smaller stage. It needs work, and I've no doubt some sleeves are rolled up on capable arms to do it, so I've nothing more to say except that I love Charles Busch, I'm rooting for this one, and I'll be back to see it all in a couple of weeks.

Dying City

****1/2
Lincoln Center

Tony nominee, Pablo Schreiber, exited Awake And Sing! a boy and he has returned in Dying City a man. Playing adult twins in this fiercely modern play, the new Pablo, all decked out in muscles and edge all of a sudden resembles you know who (note that "resembles" is different than "imitates"). He is giving an extraordinary, natural, handsome, honest performance that needs to be seen. And the play. Yes. Christopher Shinn gives to us yet another challenging work of art that the older generations might not be totally comfortable with (as indicated by the chattering, crinkling, annoying matinee rabble I sat among (there's a story there if anyone wants to ask me about it)). Text messages and emails are major plot points in this play yet the revelation of character and gentle fluidity of story are as succinct as an Albee. Christopher Shinn and Pablo Schreiber have enormous futures ahead of them. Please go see this play. HGA!

Also blogged by: [Patrick] [Aaron]

Bill W. And Dr. Bob

photo: T. Charles Erickson

I read a biography of Grace Slick which quoted her as saying that she took so quickly to Alcoholics Anonymous because the group meetings were such "good theatre." I'm sure that good theatre could be made of the alchemy of identification that happens between people sharing intimately and painfully in AA but this one, about the first men to test it out, isn't it. This play aims to blandly instruct and isn't shaped for dramatic impact: it feels like a live presentation of the educational filmstrips you used to be forced to watch in school about how cells divide or how photosynthesis occurs. It's even less entertaining. At least a couple of the actors are good (Patrick Husted gets the chance to dig deep and deliver a wrenching speech near the end of the first act - it's the only reason I stayed for the second) but no one can reasonably be expected to overcome material this dry and pedantic.

Also blogged by: [Aaron]

Neglect

Not much has changed since I first covered Neglect last October. What playwright Sharyn Rothstein has changed is for the better: Joseph no longer has a gun, which makes him even more helplessly desperate, and Rose Anne Hayes, the elderly woman whose house he winds up attempting to rob, is no longer strong enough to put up a fight. I feel also that the actors -- specifically Geany Masai -- have only grown deeper roots and connections with their characters. I loved this show in '06, and I love that it's back now. I think it's a fresh, young play with vibrant observations made about the circumstances of the poor without all the polemic and proselytizing of the classicists. I also think director Catherine Ward has made the right choices, visually, in eliminating the hallway, as it concentrates everything within this cramped, sweltering inner-city apartment. The tension isn't just palpable - it's sticky and messy: check this one out for the phenomenal performances and natural scripting.

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