ScheckOnTheater

Two current revivals of vintage plays, one American and one British, demonstrate that not every forgotten drama from the past is necessarily worth excavating. Both the Mint Theater Company’s revival of Arnold Bennett’s 1909 What the Public Wants and the Atlantic Theater Company’s world premiere adaptation by David Auburn (Proof) of Langdon Mitchell’s 1906 The New York Idea mainly come across as theatrical relics.

Both plays seem to have been unearthed for their supposed contemporary relevance. Mitchell’s comedy is a portrait of upper crust New York society dealing with new ideas about divorce and the role of women. Bennett’s is about a tabloid newspaper magnate who brings to mind a certain current media tycoon. Unfortunately, neither play works particularly well on dramatic terms.

I’m not familiar with the original version of Mitchell’s original, so it’s hard to know exactly how Auburn has transformed it, although no doubt extensive cutting was involved. It portrays the romantic roundelay among several characters: Cynthia (Jaime Ray Newman), a free-spirited young divorcee about to get remarried to the older Philip (Michael Countryman), a straight-laced judge; Philip’s ex-wife Vida (Francesca Faridany), who displays surprisingly modern attitudes about sex and marriage; and Cynthia’s former husband John (Jeremy Shamos), now in such desperate financial straits that he is forced to sell off all of his possessions, including her beloved race horse.

Observing from the sidelines are several peripheral characters, including the wealthy Sir Wilfrid (Rick Holmes), who attempts to woo Cynthia despite her upcoming nuptials.

While the play aims to be the sort of madcap romantic farce that would later be realized to perfection in such works as The Philadelphia Story, none of the situations or dialogue have the required comic zing. We care little about the characters, who seem little more than convenient mouthpieces for the provocative societal ideas being expressed. The climax of the play concerns the reconciliation of two of the former spouses, but by then we are so unengaged that it registers with little effect.

Under the sluggish direction of Mark Brokaw, the performers mainly struggle with their stock characters, although Newman, making her New York stage debut, brings a vivacity and charm to Cynthia that is largely missing from the rest of the evening.

The Mint, normally so savvy with their theatrical exhumations, is at a similar loss with this British comedy by Bennett, a wildly popular playwright in his day. Loosely based on the real-life figure of Lord Northcliffe, the founder of The Daily Mail, What the Public Wants originally found success both on the West End and in New York.

It’s easy to see why the work seemed ripe for revival, dealing as it does with a publishing mogul who is desperate for both huge circulation and social prestige. He is the rich and successful Sir Charles Worgan (Rob Breckenridge), whose newspaper empire is based on feeding its readership sensationalism rather than the truth.

The return of his brother Francis (Marc Vietor) after nearly two decades spent abroad spurs Charles into self-reflection and a newfound desire to change his ways. Deciding that he needs to be married in order to become a respected member of society, he impulsively proposes to childhood friend Emily (Ellen Adair), now a struggling actress.

But when couple returns to their hometown for a family dinner, the resulting contentious family dynamics put the spotlight on their clashing values. 

The playwright’s satirical observations, while certainly prescient for their day, seem all too familiar and redundant by now. The work plods along, suffering from a surfeit of minor characters, including a prickly theater critic apoplectic over the split infinitives popping up in his edited prose.

Although Matthew Arnold’s staging and the performances by the ensemble reflect the Mint’s usual solid level of professionalism, it’s hard to imagine that this antiquated work will be what the public wants.

The New York Idea

Lucille Lortel Theatre, 121 Christopher St. 212-279-4200. www.ticketcentral.com.

What the Public Wants

Mint Theater, 311 W. 43rd St. 212-315-0231, www.minttheater.org.

It’s such a welcome pleasure to once again hear poet Richard Wilbur’s gorgeously elegant verse translation of The Misanthrope that one can almost, but not quite, overlook the general blandness of the Pearl Theatre Company’s revival. While Moliere’s 17th century comedy has lost none of its sharpness or power to amuse, this overly tame production hardly serves as a proper introduction to this too rarely performed classic.

Company regular Sean McNall stars as Alceste, the titular character who suffers fools badly and who can’t restrain himself from telling the truth to the fops and hypocrites surrounding him, consequences be damned. Declaring that he plans to “break with the whole human race,” he suddenly finds his principles tested when he falls in love with the beautiful but shallow Celimene (Janie Brookshire), the gossipy darling of the Parisian social scene who is fawned over by leagues of male admirers.

For some reason, director Joseph Hanreddy has updated the action to the 18th century, a curious choice since the playwright was pointedly satirizing the shallow conventions of the court of Louis XVI. And while it’s admirable that his restrained staging avoids the sort of overly broad comedy that too often afflicts productions of Moliere’s works, the proceedings are far too enervating.

Part of the problem is McNall’s performance. The actor is normally very reliable, but his too understated turn robs his character of the delicious outrageousness that normally provides the play of much of its humor. Equally underwhelming is Brookshire’s coquettish Celimene, although admittedly the actress looks smashing in Sam Fleming’s handsome costumes.

The supporting performances are mainly fine, with Kern McFadden particularly amusing as Oronte, the self-styled poet whose verses Alceste can’t help but nastily deride.

While the Pearl can’t be overly criticized for their inevitably modest production values, Harry Feiner’s set design is particularly underwhelming, looking more like a California patio than an elegant Parisian drawing room.

City Center Stage II, 131 W. 55th St. 212-581-1212. www.nycitycenter.org. 

Theatrical experiences rarely come in more intimate forms than Green Eyes. This production of a long-lost Tennessee Williams play—how many of them are there, exactly?—is being performed in a room at midtown’s Hudson Hotel, with its fourteen audience members being within touching distance of the two barely clad performers.

Indeed, it’s not every show in which a comely actress asks a viewer’s help in removing her dress.

The immediacy adds greatly to the impact of Williams’ 1970 one-act, which depicts the emotionally and physically charged encounter between a pair of honeymooners in their hotel room in New Orleans’ French Quarter. Claude (Adam Couperthwaite) is a clearly traumatized soldier on temporary leave from serving in Vietnam. His sexually rapacious young wife (Erin Markey) is a sort of younger amalgam of various female characters from other Williams plays, alternately flirtatious and mocking.

Fueling the couple’s conflict is Claude’s discovery of a condom in the toilet, leading to his accusation of infidelity after she returned to the room alone the night before.

The two performers, clad mainly in their underwear (and Markey frequently in less) deliver no-holds barred turns, with their close proximity adding greatly to the evening’s intensity. Markey is particularly hypnotic, using a heavily Southern-accented drawl to accentuate her florid dialogue.

It’s a minor work, to be sure, gussied up here by Duncan Cutler’s ominous sound design which simultaneously evokes the passionate and occasionally violent nature of the characters’ interactions as well as Claude’s recent military experiences. Another reminder of the latter is the appearance of a breakfast toting bellhop wearing army fatigues, his face painted camouflage style.

While one wouldn’t particularly want to be staying in one of the hotel’s adjacent rooms—one can imagine that there are more than a few complaining calls to the front desk, considering the volume of the shouted dialogue—this environmental staging adds greatly to the theatrical impact of this brief but fascinating footnote to the playwright’s career.

Hudson Hotel, 356 W. 58th St. 212-352-3101. www.ovationstix.com.

Sharp dialogue delivered by a quintet of superb actors enlivens Other Desert Cities, Jon Robin Baitz’s entertaining if ultimately overly familiar dysfunctional family drama. Director Joe Mantello’s superb staging of this work about a California clan squabbling over the revelation of family secrets makes the play feel weightier than it actually is, but there’s no denying the sheer proficiency of this world premiere Lincoln Center Theater production that is already being buzzed about for a Broadway transfer.

The play is largely set during Christmastime in 2004 in the lush Palm Springs home (beautifully rendered in John Lee Beatty’s creamy set design) of solid Republicans Lyman (Stacy Keach) and Polly Wyeth (Stockard Channing). Lyman, a former well-known actor, eventually parlayed his fame into an ambassadorship during the Reagan administration, but is now happily retired.

Joining them for the holidays are Polly’s sharp-tongued, alcoholic sister Silda (Linda Lavin), fresh out of rehab; apolitical son Trip (Thomas Sadowski), who created a hot new television reality show; and liberal daughter Brooke (Elizabeth Marvel), a New York City-based writer—dressed all in black, natch—with a successful novel to her credit.

What starts out as a jolly reunion quickly turns heated when Brooke reveals the details of her latest book, which is shortly to appear in serialized form in the New Yorker. It tells the story of her brother, who apparently committed suicide decades earlier after being involved in a domestic terrorism bombing which claimed the life of an innocent victim.

Needless to say, her parents, who have become established figures on the Republican scene, are horrified to learn of her plans to bring this sordid incident from their past back to public consciousness. The arguments are soon flowing in fast and furious fashion, leavened by generous doses of sharp humor and ultimately resulting in a dramatic revelation that upends Brooke’s assumptions about what transpired.

Playwright Baitz (The Substance of Fire, A Fair Country)  who in recent years created and shepherded the not dissimilar television series Brothers & Sisters, concentrates more on the domestic than the political aspects of the conflict, with mainly predictable results. And the eventual shift from comedy to melodrama is handled in less than artful fashion.

But he’s also created sympathetic, complex characters who largely defy our expectations, with the result that the play is consistently engrossing nonetheless. The five performers play their roles to perfection, providing superb texture not only to their delivery of the crackling dialogue but also using perfectly modulated body language to excellent effect.

Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater, 150 W. 65th St. 212-239-6200. www.lct.org.

Don’t expect a respite from the frosty temperatures at the superb production of John Gabriel Borkman being presented at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. From the mounds of snow dotting the bleak set to its chilly emotional climate, Ibsen’s 19th century classic doesn’t exactly provide much in the way of warmth.

What it does possess, thanks to the Bernie Madoff scandal, is a newfound immediacy. The title character, played with haughty grandeur by Alan Rickman, is a financier who went to prison for five years for embezzling his investors’ money. Now he lives in disgrace and rarely ventures from the upper floor of his house, with his relationships with his resentful wife Gunhild (Fiona Shaw) and grown son Erhart (Marty Rea) in tatters.

The arrival of his wife’s twin sister Ella (Lindsay Duncan, Rickman’s co-star in both Les Liaisons Dangereuse and Private Lives) creates even more tension in the troubled household. It seems that Ella, who was John’s lover before he married her sister, wants her nephew to come live with her. Gunhild, convinced that only he is only capable of restoring honor to the family name, bitterly resents the request.

The resulting collision among these figures forms the heart of the drama, which memorably ends in a climactic scene taking place in the midst of a fierce blizzard that is evocatively evoked in this masterful staging by James Macdonald that was imported from Dublin’s Abbey Theatre.

While the play itself has its definite longeurs, it is rendered here with shattering results thanks to the brilliant performances by the three leads. Rickman, using his sonorous voice to great effect, subtly conveys the stubborn pride of a man who refuses to admit he did anything wrong. His performance contrasts beautifully with those Shaw, constantly teetering on the edge of hysteria as the wronged wife, and Duncan, deeply moving as the self-assured Ella who is harboring a dark secret.

Once again, the invaluable Brooklyn Academy of Music is to be commended for bringing to these shores yet another superb foreign production that would otherwise require an overseas flight to experience. One can hardly wait for the upcoming King Lear starring Derek Jacobi that is being imported from London’s Donmar Warehouse.

Brooklyn Academy of Music, 651 Fulton Street, Brooklyn. 718-636-4100. www.BAM.org.