The Father ***

The universally extravagant praise from across the pond for French playwright Florian Zeller’s unnerving portrait of a proud man’s descent into dementia set my expectations a bit too high. That is not to say that this Manhattan Theater Club production starring the magnificent Frank Langella is not worth seeing. Quite the contrary. I just felt that his performance was better than the material. Zeller cleverly presents things from the confused point of view of the person with dementia. Andre (Langella), a retired engineer, has once again driven away a caregiver that his daughter Anne (a fine Kathryn Erbe) has hired to help him cope with his increasingly confused state. The audience is forced to feel Andre’s disorientation as we are presented with conflicting sets of facts and even different actors playing the same roles. Anne is either divorced, married to Pierre (Brian Avers) or moving to London with her new lover. Laura (Hannah Cabell), a prospective caregiver, reminds Andre of his mysteriously absent daughter Elise whom he always favored over Anne. Charles Borland (Man) and Kathleen McNenny (Woman) round out the good cast. There’s more than a touch of Pinter lurking here. Even Scott Pask’s set reflects Andre’s confusion as objects disappear from the elegant Parisian apartment between scenes. Catherine Zuber’s costumes are fine. Doug Hughes’s direction is assured. Multiple short scenes are punctuated by flashing lights around the proscenium and loud strings, which becomes tiresome rather quickly. Go for the bravura performance by Langella and you won’t be disappointed. The audience reaction varied widely. The man next to me abruptly left midway through the play. The woman behind me was weeping softly. Running time: 90 minutes; no intermission.

Man and Boy *

A play about an unscrupulous financier during a time of economic distress -- what could be more timely? And by that crafter of well-made plays, Terence Rattigan, no less, starring multiple-award winner Frank Langella -- surely a recipe for success? Guess again. Instead, this Roundabout production was 2 1/2 dreary hours of creaky contrivances that went far beyond implausible. Although the play flopped in London when it was first presented, it had a successful revival with David Suchet in 2005 directed by Maria Aitken, the same director as this production. It's a mystery to me how that version succeeded when this one falls so flat. The plot revolves around a shady 1930's wheeler and dealer, Gregor Antonescu (Langella), whose international business empire is on the verge of collapse. He chooses to hide out, first from the press, then from the law, in the apartment of his estranged son (Adam Driver), a piano player in a Village bar who goes by the name Basil Anthony. Other characters include Basil's girlfriend Carol (Virginia Kull), Gregor's longtime lieutenant Sven (Michael Siberry), Gregor's current wife (Francesca Faridany) for whom he has bought the title of countess; Mark Herries (Zach Grenier), head of a company Gregor wants to merge with, and Herries' high-strung accountant David Beeston (Brian Hutchison). The main question of the evening is how low Gregor will stoop to save his skin. Surprisingly, Langella's performance lacked nuance and fire and was (dare I say it?) boring. Siberry and Grenier fared better. Driver was good at playing whiny and weak. Kull and Faridany had little chance to shine. The staging was awkward, with various characters forced to sit silently in Basil's bedroom for long periods. Derek McLane's set made a basement apartment in Greenwich Village look very gloomy, an appropriate setting for a dispiriting evening.