1. The acting, while better than most plays, is broad and exaggerated. Acting in a theater calls for techniques that enable every person in the audience to understand the gestures and dialogue on the stage. But sweeping movements and Keystone Kops antics, along with shouted sotto voce remarks, are totally unnatural. This makes even likable characters and good actors unbelievable.
2. The show was long. Three hours and 20 minutes. It moved surprisingly quickly, for the length, but still felt to me as though the playwright was self-indulgent. There were too many plot quirks thrown in, and it came off feeling like secondhand Faulkner or Tennessee Williams crossed with One Life to Live: Osage County.
3. There was a mythical Native American character, Johna. It's baffling to me why she isn't referred to in the NY Times review. Her presence in the show is beyond irritating and offensive. She is intended to be the soul bearer of the father, and she is as pure and righteous as a Dime Store Indian. There are two minor points in the play that are intended to diffuse the obnoxious stereotyping but I didn't think they were effective in the face of Johna's inexplicable goodness and fortitude. Why would she continue to work for these people? Which leads to my next complaint about plays: They traffic in Big Ideas. The medium doesn't do the ideas justice, however, so instead they seem like childish points to score extra credit on a philosophy exam.
4. The audience REALLY annoyed me. They laughed far louder than the jokes warranted, and were far more invested in the characters than they probably are in their own families. At the end the second act, when the oldest daughter yells, "I'M IN CHARGE NOW!", a man actually yelled, "YEAHHH!!" I hated them all except the guy sitting next to me.
So why is this play nominated for 8 Tony's? Here's my guess for the categories in which it was nominated:
- Tallest Set
- Most Number of Drunk Characters in a Drama
- Slyest Reference to a Taboo Sex Act
- Most Overbearing Mother Character
- Best Representation of Academics in a Drama
- Most Boring Wardrobe
- Most Inexplicable Use of Eric Clapton as a Plot Device
- Most Sheeplike Audience
2 comments:
you leave out a few things about the theatre audience, i.e. the self-reinforcing notion of feeling cultured when leaving the theater, sort of the same feeling as donating to charity. Notice I used two spellings of theater, although the British use of theatre lends more sophistication. Did you feel elegant on leaving the theatre? did you disucss the Big Ideas?
One last thing, if I were to review your theatre appearance as Mother Superior in the 1991 St. Elizabeth's production of "Sound of Music," I would duly note your understated performance, perhaps the only time a 17 year old brought such gravitas and dignity to the role of a 70-something Austrian nun. the acne-riddled Von Trapp was a delight as a senior figure of the 1939 Austrian navy, pre-Anchshluss, and the set and mise-en-sene were delctable.
You have to mention mise-en-sene wuth theatre.
Dave McMahon
two more things...aren't there enough pretentious plays in the SF area to fill your needs? Why waste time in "The City" on such ventures? In high school you would have been joyriding the elevators in tall buildings, isn;t that a better use of time? Also, how could your waste precious time away from kids on such a venture? perhaps you should "take in a movie" next time, or spend time pondering meaningless modern art somewhere sipping chardonnay.
Finally, my views on theatre are a lot like those classic rock purists who claim the last good rock song was written in 1970. The old classics are still manageable to "take in," but "new theatre" requires a puke bucket.
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