Can You Forgive Her?

C-

Gina Gionfriddo has borrowed the title of an 1864 Trollope novel for her new play at the Vineyard Theatre. We are left to guess to whom “Her” refers. Is it Tanya (Ella Dershowitz, Alan’s daughter), the virtuous young single mother who is doggedly trying to win a place in the middle class after a bad marriage and who wants to avoid getting stuck with another PWP (partner without prospects)? Is it the flamboyant Miranda (Amber Tamblyn, Russ’s daughter) who is trying to work off the six-figure debt she ran up largely due to the cost of her liberal education by getting together twice a week with David (the wonderful Frank Wood), a sugar daddy she met online? Could it be Miranda’s unseen mother who enabled her irresponsible lifestyle? Is it the late mother of 40-year-old twice-divorced Graham (a solid Darren Pettie), who has left him a run-down beach cottage and boxes of her unpublished manuscripts that he feels both compelled to and reluctant to read? My choice for the identity of “Her” is the playwright herself and my answer is a qualified “yes.” After greatly enjoying her two Pulitzer-nominated plays “Becky Shaw” and “Rapture, Blister, Burn,”  I had high expectations. Unfortunately they were not met. There won’t be any Pulitzer nominations for this play. Nevertheless, despite the dubious premise that brings these four characters together, despite the awkward structure with a long opening scene between Graham and Tanya followed by an even longer scene between Graham and Miranda, the play has its redeeming features, including some wonderful dialogue. The scene following David’s arrival works particularly well. Unfortunately it is followed by a weak ending. Eshan Bay has a small role as Sateesh, the Indian man who is allegedly Miranda's date for the weekend. I would have guessed that the play was a piece that needed further work, but learned that it was produced in Boston a year ago. Maybe its problems are resistant to further improvement. In any case, I forgive the playwright for not being at the top of her form. Even her second-drawer material can be entertaining. Allen Moyer’s set presents an appropriately drab living room. Jessica Pabst’s costumes are excellent. I’m not sure what director Peter DuBois might could have done to improve the play’s coherence. Running time: one hour 35 minutes; no intermission. 

This Day Forward *** B-

It’s good to have another Nicky Silver play onstage at the Vineyard Theatre, which has nurtured his work for over 20 years. Few playwrights can spin hilarity out of tragic circumstances as well as Silver. Perhaps his most popular play is The Lyons, with its deeply dysfunctional Jewish family that included an overbearing mother (a role Linda Lavin was born to play), a tyrannical father, a conflicted gay son and a less-than-appreciated daughter. If you enjoyed The Lyons, you will feel right at home here. The first act, set in 1958 in a room at the St. Regis, features a bridal couple whose wedding night is thrown into disarray by the revelation of a secret. In the second act, we learn how the consequences of that night have played out 46 years later. The dialog is often brutally funny. To say more would be to reveal too much. The entire production is topnotch. The cast of six (Andrew Burnap, Michael Crane, Holley Fain, Francesca Faridany, June Gable and Joe Tippett), some doubling roles, are all superb. The sets for both acts, by Allen Moyer, are perfection. Kaye Voyce’s costumes suit their characters well. J. David Brimmer’s  fight direction is worthy of note. Longtime Silver collaborator Mark Brokaw directs with a sure hand. With Silver, the style sometimes threatens to overwhelm the substance, but that is a flaw I can accept. Running time: 2 hours, including intermission.

Dot ***

Hard as it may be to envision a hilarious comedy about a family facing the mother’s descent into dementia, that’s exactly what Colman Domingo has written in his new play at Vineyard Theatre. Dotty Shealy (Marjorie Johnson) is the matriarch of a middle-class black family who have lived in their West Philadelphia row house since 1954. The father, now deceased was a successful physician. Her eldest child Shelly (Sharon Washington), now in her mid-forties, is an attorney and a single mother. Middle child Donnie (Stephen Conrad Moore), now 40, is a gay freelance music critic in New York, where he lives with his activist white husband Adam (Colin Hanlon). Youngest child Averie (Libya V. Pugh) is a brash would-be entertainment whose 15 minutes of YouTube fame has led only to a cashier’s job at Shop Rite. Fidel (Michael Rosen) is a sweet-natured unlicensed health care aide from Kazakhstan who takes care of Dotty three days a week. Jackie (Finnerty Steeves), a white neighbor who was Donnie’s high school sweetheart and who fled to New York when she learned he was gay, has suddenly returned to town and has joined them for their Christmas celebration. There is much hilarity, but the underlying situation of Dot’s deterioration is no joke. During the second act, the play bogs down a bit with some didactic moments and some sentimentality. The ensemble cast work well together. Scenic designer Allen Moyer is a triple threat: he offers a pointillist front curtain depicting the exterior of the family home, a first act kitchen that really looks lived in, and an attractive living room for the second act. Costume designer Kara Harmon has dressed the characters aptly. Director Susan Stroman shows that her talent is not limited to musicals, although she does manage to slip in a delightful dance duo for Dot and Adam. Despite the play’s flaws, the overall effect is very winning. The audience loved it. Running time: 2 hours, 15 minutes including intermission.

Steve **

If you arrive early at the Signature Center for the New Group’s production of Mark Gerrard’s dramedy Steve, you will find Malcolm Gets already onstage playing show tunes on an upright piano. He is joined by four other cast members for an enjoyable 15-minute Broadway songfest. At play’s end, there’s a charming musical curtain call. Unfortunately, between those two points there is the play itself which, for me, wore out its welcome long before its 90 minutes had passed. Although there are strong superficial similarities with the recently opened Dada Woof Papa Hot — both plays deal with a gay couple approaching middle age who are raising a child, their fears about losing attractiveness, their worries about infidelity and their relations with another gay couple, the play that Steve really reminded me of was Matt Crowley’s 1968 hit The Boys in the Band. Both begin with a birthday party that turns out badly. Despite all the ways that gay life has changed in the intervening years, the characters’ mode of relating to each other has not made much progress. If anything, modern technology has increased the possibility of bad behavior. There was no sexting in 1968. Steven (Matt McGrath, so good recently in The Legend of Georgia McBride), once a chorus boy and singing waiter, has just turned 47. His partner Stephen (Gets) is a successful attorney. Steven is now a stay-at-home dad raising their unseen 8-year-old son Zach. (For some reason that have not chosen to marry.) When Steven retrieves his partner’s cellphone from Zach, who has “borrowed” it, he finds a sexting exchange between Stephen and Brian (Jerry Dixon), the partner of Steven’s oldest friend Matt (Mario Cantone). The fifth guest at the birthday dinner is Carrie (Ashlie Atkinson), their terminally ill lesbian friend whose lover abandoned her when she became sick. Their waiter is a hunky Argentinian named Esteban (Francisco Pryor Garat) who keeps turning up at various locations throughout the play. Just to round out the name game, there is a fourth Steven, Brian and Matt’s prodigiously endowed trainer, who is unseen but much commented upon. Any attempt at meaningful communication is short-circuited by turning either to show-queen bitchiness or raunch. One scene is instantly replayed with a different ending, but that device goes nowhere. There is a funny scene where Stephen is juggling texts, sexts and a phone conversation with his mother. The capable cast does their best to animate characters that aren’t well-developed. Allen Moyer’s set is elegantly simple and Tom Broecker’s costumes are fine. Director Cynthia Nixon plays a weak hand well. Running time: 90 minutes, no intermission.

Rasheeda Speaking ***

This workplace drama by Chicago playwright Joel Drake Johnson, now in previews at The New Group, is notable mainly for providing juicy roles for two fine actresses, Tonya Pinkins and Dianne Wiest, and for marking the directorial debut of Cynthia Nixon. The setting is the in-hospital office of Dr. Williams (Darren Goldstein), a surgeon who is both smug and cowardly. The two clerical jobs in the office are filled by the white Ilene (Wiest), who has been there for eight years and loves her job, and the black Jaclyn (Pinkins), who has been there for six months and does not. The doctor wants to get rid of Jaclyn for not being a team player. When Jaclyn is out for a week suffering from exposure to mysterious office toxins (racism, perhaps?), he promotes Ilene to office manager and enlists her reluctant help to find and document reasons to let Jaclyn go that will pass muster with Human Resources. He makes clear that truthfulness is not a requirement. Whether Jaclyn is really a satisfactory employee is called into question by her brusque treatment of a patient, Rose (Patricia Connolly), and her generally truculent demeanor. When she catches on to the plan to get rid of her, she fights back with mind games that threaten Ilene’s stability. The dialog is smart, but the workings of the plot are a bit repetitious and predictable. About ten minutes before the play’s actual conclusion, there is a scene that ends with the words of the title. Most of the audience thought the play had ended and acted surprised when the lights came back up for an additional scene. Since the final scene did not really add to the play’s impact, the playwright might well have ended the play one scene sooner. Although the play addresses the issue of racism, 21st century style, its various strands don’t cohere all that well. Nevertheless, I was grateful for the opportunity to enjoy such uniformly fine acting. Allen Moyer’s set looks just like many doctor’s offices I have visited and Toni-Leslie James’s costumes are apt. Aside from the problem of the false ending, Nixon’s direction is effective. Running time: 1 hour, 45 minutew; no intermission.

Far from Heaven **

(Please click on the title to see the complete review.)
Todd Haynes' 2002 film tribute to Douglas Sirk's lush melodramas of the 1950's must have seemed like suitable material for a musical, but the current adaptation with book by the ubiquitous Richard Greenberg, music by Scott Frankel and lyrics by Michael Korie does not make the case. Despite fine performances by Kelli O'Hara, Stephen Pasquale and Isaiah Johnson in the leading roles, this production, now in previews at Playwrights Horizons, falls flat. One hopes that paring down a screenplay to make room for songs that will amplify emotions and/or move the plot along will yield a net gain. In this instance, at least for me, the results diminish rather than enhance the film. I missed the film's gorgeous cinematography that went so far to create the feel of suburban Connecticut in 1957. The basic story of a seemingly perfect marriage destroyed by the husband's homosexuality and the wife's friendship with her black gardener is still there, but the weaknesses in the plot seem more nakedly exposed here. The music and lyrics are far from memorable. Allen Moyer's Mondrian-like set is complemented by Peter Nigrini's projections. Catherine Zuber's costumes are period-appropriate. Kenneth Posner's lighting is especially fine. I hoped that Frankel, Korie and director Michael Greif, the people who had a great success at Playwrights Horizons with another film adaptation, Grey Gardens, would strike gold twice. Unfortunately, they have not. Running time: two hours, 25 minutes including intermission.