Saturday, October 29, 2011

Theater Review: Relatively Speaking

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Enjoying These Three One-Acts is All Relative
By Lauren Yarger
A who's-who stellar cast entertains in three one-act plays linked together by a theme of relationships with relatives, but enjoying them is, well, relative.

The first piece, Talk Therapy, by Ethan Coen, pits a mental patient (Danny Hoch) against his doctor (Jason Kravits) in a verbal match where identities and why the in-institution therapy sessions continue over time are up for grabs, both by the characters and the audience.

Hoch and Kravits are quite good as the intelligent, angry postal worker and his frustrated, intimidated therapist, respectively, and there's excellent attention to detail for the characters by director John Turturro who directs all of the night's plays, but the play is full of holes, not filled, even after the set (Santo Loquasto, design) breaks away to reveal another scene featuring the patient's bickering parents (Allen Lewis Rickman and Katherine Borowitz). This play ends abruptly leaving the audience to wonder whether that was the first act of something or the end of the first play.

Titles of the plays projected onto the curtain (Kenneth Posner, lighting design) provide the answer and next up is George is Dead by Elaine May.

This longer play serves as a vehicle for the welcome return to the stage of Marlo Thomas, sporting a blonde "do" and looking fabulous as Doreen, a shallow and pampered socialite who shows up on the doorstep of her former nanny's daughter, Carla (Lisa Emery). Doreen is unable to cope with the death of her husband, George, at a skiing lodge and thinks nothing of intruding on Carla for help. Carla's not excited to see her, however. Her own marriage to Michael (Grant Shaud) is on the rocks and her nanny mother (Patricia O'Connell) always loved her charge more than her daughter.

Thomas is a hoot as the hapless, insensitive, selfish Doreen. One scene in which she escapes her reality by watching classic comedies on TV would be even funnier if one of the opening themes we hear playing were from "That Girl." Emery is a nice foil for Thomas and her frenzied preparation of crackers and cheese to the specifications of her demanding guest will probably always cause me to chuckle at the sight of a saltine. The play structure itself is flawed, though, and ends on a less than satusfying note.

The showcase of the evening is the final play, Honeymoon Hotel by Woody Allen. Jerry Spector (Steve Guttenberg) and Nina Roth (Ari Graynor), in her wedding dress, then in a revealing negligee, (Donna Zakowska, costume design) flee a wedding ceremony and escape to a tacky hotel's bridal suite. Their blissful plans of pizza and an evening alone on the round bed are shattered, however, when friends and family follow them from the wedding. A drole Julie Kavner and Mark Linn-Baker play Nina's parents; Bill Army plays Jerry's son, Paul, and a very funny Caroline Aaron plays Paul's disapproving mother, Judy.

Also showing up at the hotel are Rabbi Baumel (Richard Libertini), who after imbibing a bit too much, keeps shifting from wedding talk to eulogies for the guests, as well as the pizza delivery guy (Hoch) and others played by Shaud and Kravits. It's funny in that bizarre Woody Allen way, but its ending isn't more satisfying than those offered by the first two plays. Enjoyment level of these plays really is relative -- compared to each other, the first play doesn't fare too well; compared to other plays on Broadway, the trio here seems flawed and guilty of underusing some great talent on the stage.

Relatively Speaking is presented at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre, 256 West 47th St., NYC. Discounted tickets are available by clicking here.

Christians might also like to know:
--Sexual dialogue
--Language
--God's name taken in vain
Posted by Lauren Yarger at 2:34 PM

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My Bio

Lauren Yarger is Executive Director/Producer with Masterwork Productions, Inc. She has written, directed and produced numerous shows and special events for both secular and Christian audiences. She co-wrote a Christian musical version of “A Christmas Carol” which played to sold-out audiences of over 3,000 in Vermont and was awarded the 2000 Vermont Bessie (theater and film awards) for “People’s Choice for Theatre.” She also has written two other dinner theaters, sketches for church services and devotions for Christian artists.

Yarger trained for three years in the Broadway League’s Producer Development Program, completed the Commercial Theater Institute's Producing Three-Day Training and produced a one-woman musical about Mary Magdalene that toured nationally and closed with an off-Broadway run.

In 2008 she was a Fellow at the National Critics Institute at the O'Neill Theater Center in Waterford, CT. She writes reviews of Broadway and off-Broadway theater with an added Christian perspective for Masterwork Productions at http://reflectionsinthelight.blogspot.com/. She is editor of The Connecticut Arts Connection (http://ctarts.blogspot.com), an award-winning website featuring theater and arts news for the state. She is a contributing editor for BroadwayWorld.com and previously served as Connecticut theater editor for CurtainUp and as Connecticut and New York reviewer for American Theater Web.

Yarger is a book reviewer for Publishers Weekly and freelances for other sites. She is a member of the National Book Critics Circle.

She is a freelance writer and playwright and member of The Drama Desk, The Outer Critics Circle, The American Theater Critics Association and The League of Professional Theatre Women. She is a judge for the SDX Awards presented by the Society of Professional Journalists. She also is a member of the CT Press Club, the Connecticut SPJ and the Connecticut Critics Circle.

A former newspaper editor and graduate of the University of Missouri’s School of Journalism, Yarger also worked in arts management for the Bushnell Center for the Performing Arts and the Hartford Symphony Orchestra. She lives with her husband in West Granby, CT. They have two adult children.

Copyright

All material is copyright 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012 by Lauren Yarger. Reviews and articles may not be reprinted without permission. Contact reflectionsinthelight@gmail.com

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Key to Content Notes:

God's name taken in vain -- means God or Jesus is used in dialogue without speaking directly to or about them.
Language -- means some curse words are used. "Minor" usually means the words are not too strong or that it only occurs once or twice throughout the show.
Strong Language -- means some of the more heavy duty curse words are used.
Nudity -- means a man or woman's backside, a man's lower front or a woman's front are revealed.
Scantily clad -- means actors' private areas are technically covered, but I can see a lot of them.
Sexual Language -- means the dialogue contains sexually explicit language but there's no action.
Sexual Activity -- means a man and woman are performing sexual acts.
Adultery -- Means a married man or woman is involved sexually with someone besides their spouse. If this is depicted with sexual acts on stage, the list would include "sexual activity" as well.
Sex Outside of Marriage -- means a man and woman are involved sexually without being married. If this is depicted sexually on stage, the list would include "sexual activity" as well.
Homosexuality -- means this is in the show, but not physically depicted.
Homosexual activity -- means two persons of the same sex are embracing/kissing. If they do more than that, the list would include "sexual activity" as well.
Cross Dresser -- Means someone is dressing as the opposite sex. If they do more than that on stage the listing would include the corresponding "sexual activity" and/or "homosexual activity" as well.
Cross Gender -- A man is playing a female part or a woman is playing a man's part.
Suggestive Dancing -- means dancing contains sexually suggestive moves.

Other content matters such as torture, suicide or rape will be noted, with details revealed only as necessary in the review itself.

The term "throughout" added to any of the above means it happens many times throughout the show.

Our Reviewing Policy

Our reviewer Lauren Yarger receives free tickets to Broadway and Off-Broadway shows made available to all voting members of the Outer Critics Circle and The Drama Desk, the two professional critics organizations with journalists covering NY theater. Journalistically, she provides an unbiased review and is under no obligation to make positive statements. Sometimes shows do not make tickets available to reviewers. If these are shows our readers want to know about (we review all Broadway shows and pertinent Off-Broadway shows), Masterworks purchases a ticket.

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