The Seafarer

Emily Fishbaine

The Seafarer is a Christmas play. It’s not the biblical story of Christmas, nor is it in the spirit of the hyper-commercialized holiday fluff that surrounds us from Halloween to December 25th. But it is truly in the spirit of Christmas (and the new year) in the sense that it offers a reminder of what the possibilities of redemption feel like. This play does not particularly tackle new ground. Its conceit is one found throughout literature and film. However, Conor McPherson’s new take is lovely, well-acted, poetically told, and most of all, hopeful.

The play revels in the comedies (and humiliations) of everyday life, starting with Sharky (David Morse) rising to clean up after yet another of his brother’s nights of debauchery. It takes place over the course of twenty-four hours, from Christmas Eve morning through Christmas day. We are gradually introduced to Richard, Sharky’s older, blind brother – played by an exceedingly nimble and sharp Jim Norton – and Ivan, a friend, played by an endearing Conleth Hill. We learn that Sharky has come home to take care of Richard. McPherson slowly, through sweet and seemingly innocuous gossip and banter, reveals to us bits and pieces from their lives, most notably, Sharky’s apparently violent past.

Time passes, and preparations are made for that evening’s get-together with Niki (Sean Mahon) and his mysterious guest, Mr. Lockhart (Ciarán Hinds). Shortly after the guests arrive, Mr. Lockhart reveals himself to be the Devil and declares that he has come to play Sharky in a game of poker for his soul. But it is not this revelation that makes the play special—in fact, I found it to be sudden and a bit forced. However, from this point on, the casual Christmas poker game takes on new import, and settles into a more comfortable rhythm that builds through to the end, as Sharky wrestles with the possibility that his life might end tonight.

The play pivots around Sharky, and his sober presence. Mr. Morse does a very fine job quietly keeping his motor running, and allowing his inner tension to mount as the play progresses. I felt great sympathy for Sharky as a lonely, aimless, angry man. We learn about various aspects of his life: missed opportunities, potential illicit and lost loves, and the fact that he may be guilty of manslaughter. But again, what I walked away with was the importance of everyday things, and the love that we experience everyday from those around us. In the end it is chance and love that saves Sharky, and this seems to be McPherson’s main point.

This production is certainly set up to highlight the writing (which may be why I’ve found it hard not to spend so much time focusing on it in this review). I must admit that this is my first exposure to a McPherson text, so I have little to compare it to, though I hear that this is one of his first real attempts at a dialogue (and not monologue) based play. Perhaps because of this, the structure feels a little formulaic and comfortable. He does include a few beautiful monologues and uses the characters’ drunkenness as a vehicle for musings on the afterlife, hell, and faith. Mr. Hines has an eerie monologue describing hell as an immensely magnified feeling of self-loathing that was, if not terrifying, certainly affecting. And Mr. Norton has a stunning bit about a dream he had where he could see, which turned into a gorgeous portrayal of total and unpretentious faith in God.

McPherson directed the piece himself, so the writing and language take precedence. It took me some time to get past the brogues, and at times I missed lines even late in the play. But it didn’t matter—the ensemble’s cohesion and clear physicality successfully communicated meaning where language failed or was absent. There were fantastic moments, such as Richard’s Christmas song medley, and in general, this ensemble was incredibly on point in their comic timing and togetherness.

The design was unimposing, and quietly supported the story. The action centers in the basement portion of Richard and Sharky’s apartment, and is both a little dingy and homey at the same time. It is a warm heart, surrounded by cool and mysterious outside spaces. The upstairs hallway is shrouded in a lace scrim, and has very low lighting, serving as a vaguely menacing entrance and exit; you never know exactly who is arriving through that hallway until they are well into it. There is also a moat of space surrounding the set, and a back walkway that is referenced continually. Rae Smith, who designed the sets, seems to be suggesting that the world outside the apartment is slightly threatening, and offers little to the apartment’s inhabitants. There was one stunning conjunction of set and lights when Mr. Lockhart gives his speech about Hell that in fact made it feel like that basement apartment was the only lonely thing that existed in the entire universe.

I was a little skeptical about the idea of having Sharky play the Devil for his soul, and the idea still feels a little glitzy. However, the execution of the idea is unusual, and McPherson uses it to get at something deeper. He pointed to the cycles that our lives can fall into, the seeming inability to break out and change, even with our best efforts. He points out that sometimes, missed chances are almost as “sinful” as overtly awful deeds. While this play was not groundbreaking, if you’re looking for a thoughtful, enjoyable piece that has optimism and hope for the survival of a human soul, it is very worthwhile; we do need to be reminded now and then that all is not lost, even at our worst moments.

Is He Dead?

Jason Platt

I was quite unsure of what to expect when I walked into the Lyceum to see this long lost/newly discovered Mark Twain play. (It was written in 1898, then forgotten until discovered in 2002 in his private papers). Previews had only just begun when the strike hit, so I knew nobody who had scene it, the advertisting campaign has been unagressive, and of course the piece hasn't ever been performed. To my great delight -- and likely that of 1,000 others -- the production is outstanding.

The plot is a simple one. A painter, Jean-Francois Millet, who is deep in debt and down on his luck, decides to fake his own death in order to drive up the prices of his paintings. He then masquerades as his twin sister to reap the financial benefits. Then there are of course a number of other complications; the piece is a rowdy combination of farce and unapologetic melodrama, so there is a villain avec mustache as well as frequent door-slamming and shenanigans. Given its almost amateurish simplicity, whether the play works on its own or could succeed in any other production is a more complicated question, but the direction of Michael Blakemore is so tight and precise, and the cast give such fantastic performances that the play is one of the most enjoyable theatrical experiences I have had in years.

As Millet, and cross-dressing as his fake sister, Norbert Leo Butz is nothing short of incredible. As Millet alone he is not particularly memorable, but once he puts the dress on . . . dear me, the part and the play immediately shift into fourth gear. Thankfully, this happens quite early, and we are treated for an hour and half to the obvious relish and bliss with which Butz devours "Daisy." The supporting cast -- and this is an ensemble piece when one considers the farcical nature -- are also very strong and beautifully energetic, particularly Michael McGrath and David Pittu. Blakemore has done an outstanding job in handling this text, which because of its over-the-top humor and often stereotypical matter could easily fall flat, but he has everyone on the same page and enjoying themselves. It did take some time for the audience to catch up on the fact that we were all meant to revel in the ridiculousness (indeed, the first scene is somewhat slow and unengaging, though this may change as previews continue), but once the viewers committed themselves to playing along, it was downright raucous. There are one or two questionable directing decisions, particularly the convention of having actors be lit by specials when delivering asides to the audience (but only sometimes), but nothing so frustrating as to ruin the piece.

The design of the play is very good if unexceptional. Peter Davison's perspective sets are great fun and quite lovely, though the door-slamming did at times have the effect of a small seismic disturbance. Pakledinaz's costumes (particularly in the second act when everyone is rich and happy) are sumptuous. His dresses for Butz-as-sister are just, well, they're just super.

I must admit that it is very infrequent that I not only enjoy, but subsequently admit to enjoying, a piece with as little intellectual and artistic depth. Aside from the basic commentary on the art market and values of pieces there is very little to stimulate the mind. However, there is a great deal of the historical nature to enjoy. The piece plays up both its melodramatic and farcical influences, engaging the audience in a sort of appreciation for theater history gone by. Similarly, for the art historians in the audience, the play makes a number of visual gags out of the fact that Millet's masterpieces (The Gleaners, The Sower, Evening Prayer) can't be bought for any price; each new painting revealed by the actors garners a laugh.

I would be curious to know just how much of the piece is Twain and how much is David Ives (who adapted it), because there seems to be just a tad too much self-referential humor and po-mo irony for Twain, though god knows the numerous jokes at the expense of the French and Germans are likely his. In the end, though, the question is academic; the production is delightful and engaging, and an absolute success, without question a step forward for the Broadway gruel. I will now make a joke that every shameless reviewer will at least be tempted toward. Is He Dead? No. And I hope this play won't be for quite some time.

August: Osage County

Julie Brook

I spend a lot of time trying to figure out how we can wake up a theater audience: what will ask them to sit forward in their seats and listen, ask questions, in new way? August: Osage County is not an innovative idea. It is not a play that is breaking ground with a surprising way to reach the audience, but I cannot remember the last time I was in an audience that was breathing, gasping for air, with a play in the way the audience did at the performance I saw of August: Osage County. I sat in the back of the orchestra and at the end of the second act of a THREE ACT play saw an audience that didn’t want to leave their seats. Truth be told, I saw this play in Chicago as well. It was a third or fourth preview and at the time it felt like I was watching the fruition of a truly American play that filled the entire theater. I was not sure how it would feel away from Steppenwolf’s home, yet the Imperial Theater was filled with “ooohs” and “no”’s and gasps all night.

Tracy Letts has written an epic play that does not surprise in its tactics or its language, but does in its humanity, humor and tragedy. The play is set in a large country home of the Weston brood in Pawhuska, Oklahoma on the “Plains” as they say, different than the Midwest or the West; we have an acute sense that this house is isolated, solitary. The matriarchs are two sisters, Violet Weston and Mattie Fae Weston, played by Deanna Dunagan and Rondi Reed respectively. The play begins with Beverly Weston, Violet’s husband, (played by the playwright’s father Dennis Letts) hiring a housekeeper played by the illusive and strong Johanna Monevata. What follows is a family drama like none we have seen in a while on the stage. What Tract Letts has accomplished with this play is a family so big we can find ourselves somewhere in it and get comfortable, find ourselves laughing with understanding. But then the moment we get comfortable it all falls apart, and we fall apart with the Westons. The first and second acts of August are spellbinding. Letts has written a play that he admits comes from his own family experience AND was inspired by his artistic family at Steppenwolf (the majority of the cast are company members). The result is a play that has the neurosis of a family and the energy of a family, but its problem is that at its end it is trying to accomplish too much. For the first time in the third act I felt myself and the audience lean away because there are too many family secrets revealed, and there are so many in such a short period of time we begin to feel the theatrical desire to tie up all the loose ends with a bow. Families bows are not all tied, mine certainly aren’t, and I think August would have landed more at the end without pulling all the lines to their most unexpected end.

That being said, I am not sure it entirely matters. That is to say that the play is still one of the best-written family dramas I have seen on stage for as long as I can remember. It is epic and personal and that is not often done well. Some of the scenes in this play made me laugh in a way where I wasn’t laughing at the people onstage, but really laughing with them and in their house. So the last act doesn’t fulfill the standards set by the acts before, oh well, I still felt I was a part of an audience during August in a way that the stiffness of a Broadway house does not often allow . . .

It needs to be said that the performances in this production bring this script to life in a way that is striking. Amy Morton plays Barbara Fordham and takes over the family with the terror and accountability of an apprehensive matriarch and then responds to her new role with heartbreaking neurosis. She is our way into this family. We meet her as the eldest daughter who has left but struggles with the guilt of it, and we watch her painfully pulled between her husband, daughter, and parent's desires. Jeff Perry plays her husband, Bill Fordham, whose genuine sweetness truly makes his transgressions acceptable and human. Her daughter, Jean, is played by the shockingly clear and strong Madeline Martin. With her young voice and adult sensibility we feel in her a child pushed and pulled between growing up and still stamping her kid foot. This is a cast where it is hard to leave anyone out. Rondi Reed and Francis Guinan are the sister and brother-in-law who allow you to see love in a clear and fallible way. The two seem to be connected with a cord throughout the play as they weave in and out of scenes with their squabbles and their references to each other, and their son played by Ian Barford is hopelessly endearing in all his problems. The Weston sisters are completed with the spot-on neuroses of Karen Weston, played by Mariann Mayberry, the daughter with a one-sided view of almost everything AND Ivy Weston the individuated and martyred middle child, played by the refreshingly straightforward Sally Murphy.

The problem I had was with the overall direction by Anna D. Shapiro. Her beats within the scenes were lovely, full and clearly directed with a precise comic timing. It is the overall seams between the scenes and the design that left me feeling this house could even be more full. The set by Todd Rosenthal is a generous open house, three levels high. At no point in the production did the house feel full with this family. At no point did I feel Shapiro really expand the play between the scenes so we felt the energy of a truly bursting house that could really contrast the amazing intimacy she found in the smaller scenes. The set and lighting design did not feel entwined with the staging. The sound by Richard Woodbury was incredibly effective and the lighting design in the third act (by Ann G Wrightson) is sharp and beautiful, but the elements didn’t seem to build or tie in through the whole of the play. After the third act ended when I felt there was still more that could be fleshed out, I realized the true strength and muscle of this play. It could be fuller; it could be more seamlessly filled with the design and the script and the direction, but again, I am pretty sure it doesn’t matter. When you have performances like these, and an ensemble doing some of the best work in reference to each other I have seen, AND a play that surprises you with its storytelling, the problems are insignificant.

August: Osage County should be seen by as many as possible once the strike is over. It could inspire new theater audiences with its accessibility, while challenging them with its complex issues and family humor. I wonder if with a bit more shaping this family could really grow into its house and have a more permanent address as an important American play. I am pretty certain Tracy Letts and the powerful cast have accomplished this even with the cracks shining through because it is a play that feels incredibly alive and necessary: everything we need right now in American storytelling on stage.