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- In The Next Room or the vibrator play (The SOB Review)
- Because "Great White Way" Shouldn't Be Taken Literally
- Bringing Closure To Oleanna
- Superior Acting
- 98 Reasons Of Love
- More Recent Articles
- Search Steve On Broadway (SOB)
In The Next Room or the vibrator play (The SOB Review) - Lincoln Center Theatre, Lyceum Theatre, New York, New York
** (out of ****)
In Sarah Ruhl's provocative yet surpringly limp In The Next Room or the vibrator play that opened last evening, the playwright apparently wants to have it both ways.
Try as Ruhl might to suggest that the climax isn't the most important thing, she dares to make hers exactly that. Her conclusion's message on the delicate balance between intimacy and, er, paroxysms isn't so much heavy-handed as it is a few delicate digits milking things for all its worth making the rest of the work seem too clever by half.
Euphemisms and word play abound in supplementing the handheld variety in this work about the introduction of the vibrator in the Victorian era. As demonstrated by Dr. Givings (an unusually earnest Michael Cerveris), the device's earliest use was purely clinical in treating (primarily) women for "hysteria" by releasing paroxysms.
While he's helping his patients feel, um, better, his own wife (an unfortunately out-of-her-element Laura Benanti) is feeling low from post-partum neglect that we'll just call a no-coital connection with Dr. Givings. Exacerbating her melancholy are the squeals emanating from her husband's office, immediately adjacent to their home's living parlor. She's hearing an array of pleasured patients including the blooming sapphist Mrs. Daldry (portrayed with dizzying delight by Maria Dizzia) and caddish artist Leo Irving (Chandler Williams).
Try as she might to rouse her husband, including by actively engaging both Leo and Mrs. Daldry's own spouse (Thomas Jay Ryan), if only to elicit a response from Dr. Givings, Mrs. Givings is largely left to her own devices. That is, until Mrs. Daldry introduces her to the one Dr. Givings has been using in treatment.
Ruhl certainly tries to titillate by mining laughs at the expense of the period's intense degree of innocence and prudishness. And it is often quite funny. But even with an eleventh hour epiphany by Dr. Givings that enables him to view his wife in a new light (furnished here by Russell H. Champa), the real stimulation comes too late to be completely satisfying. It's enough to leave you feeling as if someone has been faking it all along just to be done with it.
Post script: On a side note, one aspect of this production that was particularly infuriating for me were the extremely poor sight-lines from my left orchestra seat. Not only could I not see much of the action, but for a play that yearns to be about intimacy, I felt as though I was in the theatre next door, trying to get my own peek inside. For this, I not only fault director Les Waters' blocking of his actors, but also Annie Smart's less than ingenious scenic design that separated the two time appropriate rooms from each other.
Would I have enjoyed the play more had I been able to see everything? It's possible. Word to the wise: If you're going to see this In The Next Room, be sure to get center seating to enjoy an unobstructed view.
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Because "Great White Way" Shouldn't Be Taken Literally
Take a good look at the faces to the left.
Each is a considerable talent in his or her own right to be sure. But do you notice anything missing? Or more precisely, anyone missing?
Aside from the background hues behind many of these performers, the only real color I'm seeing is red. It's as if the brains behind BroadwaySpace.com took "Great White Way" just a little too literally when coming up with its "30 under 30" list of Broadway's hottest young actors.
Yes, there's a slight Latino nod with Lin-Manuel Miranda, Krysta Rodriguez and David Alvarez. Yet as Broadway & Me points out, where's Daniel Breaker or Jon Michael Hill?
Surely, with shows like Fela!, Finian's Rainbow, Hair, In The Heights, Memphis, Ragtime, Shrek The Musical, Superior Donuts, The Lion King and Wicked among Broadway's current offerings that currently star or feature a wider (not whiter) spectrum of color, BroadwaySpace.com could have easily found very deserving candidates to fill out its list of 30 comers.
If only it had bothered to look.
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Bringing Closure To Oleanna
If Doug Hughes' Broadway mounting of David Mamet’s Oleanna succeeded in dividing audiences, it wasn't necessarily always along the gender lines the production had sought to foment. If anything, the revival seemed to split its audiences on whether the 75-minute play was good to begin with.
Perhaps stung by mixed reviews (including a pan from The New York Times Ben Brantley that left me wondering if we had seen the same show) and an illusion of declining fortunes at the box office (the show took in $241,999 last week, its second week in a row with an increase), it was announced yesterday that Oleanna would close January 3, immediately prior to the long cold winter months that typically take their toll on Broadway.
If you read Steve On Broadway regularly, you know that I came down on the side of the production and gave both Bill Pullman and Julia Stiles high marks for their efforts. The play has managed to stick with me, more than one month after taking it in.
Of course, part of the appeal, but by no means my reason for providing the show with a generous 3 1/2 stars, was the talk back session employed immediately after my preview. It's often been said that audiences vote with their feet. In the case of my fellow theatregoers the day I saw Oleanna, they were clearly engaged as virtually everyone stayed for the talk back session.
Some detractors could say that they merely stayed to get their full money's worth since the thinking is that a one hour and 15 minutes performance doesn't justify paying upwards of $100 for a ticket. But I believe this is one of those plays that leaves an audience grappling for answers, hoping to validate their opinions with others and verifying if others saw the same thing.
When given the opportunity, I stay for talk back sessions after shows offering them as personal elucidation -- my way of filling in the blanks left behind. Oleanna was the perfect kind of play to provide these sessions to round-out the communal aspect that is the theatrical experience. I was not only pleased to participate, but I was proud that fellow blogger and friend Leonard Jacobs of The Clyde Fitch Report was tapped as moderator for one of them.
Unfortunately for this production of Oleanna, its playwright apparently was none too pleased with the novelty of the talk back session and they ceased immediately after the show opened. According to one of the talk back moderators, New York Post columnist Michael Riedel:
Alas, Mamet hated them. He never attended one, but he's against them on principle, believing that his play should stand on its own and not be picked apart by "experts" on the law, feminism and campus sexual harassment policies.
"The talk-backs added a lot to the show," an investor says, "but we were told by David's agent right after we opened that he didn't like them."
Mamet couldn't stop them. Writers control only the script, not what happens onstage after the final bow. But he had a trump card to play. When the show opened to mixed reviews, the producers had to cut expenses and asked Mamet to waive his royalties.
His price? No more talk-backs.
I don't know that I would go so far as one wag Riedel quoted who essentially said Mamet was giving his audience the finger, but I do wonder if Mamet hasn't grasped how the mindset of today's theatregoers has evolved along with their expecting more from each experience.
It's my firm belief that in order to broaden the appeal of this great experiment called live theatre, particularly during a time when its pricing seems so out of whack with reality, you need to give audiences a bone to go with their meat. Producers have to engage their audiences in new ways, incorporate talk back sessions where they make sense, use social networking to connect and yes, reach out to theatre bloggers who can help create a viral buzz that in this age of splintered media becomes ever more important.
If there is a plus, it's that the producers of Mamet's newest work
Race seem to get the importance of active outreach, including with the blogging community. Let's just hope Mamet doesn't stop them.
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Superior Acting
If you've been a longtime reader of Steve On Broadway, the name Jon Michael Hill is not new to you. In fact, I first wrote about this gifted young actor in this space on July 10, 2006 when he was performing in the excellent Bruce Norris play, The Unmentionables.
My first words about Hill were as follows:
Even as the booming off-stage voice instructs the audience to silence their cell phones, a menacing, cocky young man named Etienne (Jon Hill) saunters down the aisle looking as if he might not belong before finally calling out to the audience that they should not bother staying for this show. Of course, it's all a ruse, but it's clearly designed to set the stage for the play and challenge some preconceived notions about race and appearance even before the performance begins.
More recently, I provided many of you with your more recent introduction to his talents when
I wrote this past July 16:
Take a close look at the smiling face to the left. Examine it very carefully. Because this is the exciting face of tomorrow's Broadway.
Ever since Hill made his impressive Broadway debut in the superb
Superior Donuts that opened October 1, he's been the subject of a lot of good buzz that amounts to so much more than just a sugar rush. Flush with great reviews and even some well-deserved Tony talk, Hill is making a name for himself on the Great White Way.
It may be a month overdue, but
The New York Times is finally sitting up and taking notice. In a
terrific story by Patrick Healy, Hill is profiled and assessed by his peers, including director Tina Landau, who states:
“Jon was one reason I said, ‘Count me in,’ ” said Tina Landau, a Steppenwolf ensemble member who directed the play in Chicago and New York. “He’s completely mercurial. He can do everything and its opposite. That’s so exciting to see in a young actor.”
Like I've said before, keep your eye on this exciting young actor. By swinging by the
Music Box Theatre and seeing him perform this fall, I have no doubt that you'll have bragging rights in someday saying -- when he's a major star -- that you saw him when.
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
98 Reasons Of Love
Ninety-eight years ago today in tiny Tipton, Indiana, a middle-aged farmer’s wife named Mary Frances Loucks gave birth to a bouncing baby boy. She and her husband Charles Sherman Loucks would call the infant Charles Francis Loucks. Charles Loucks became be the youngest of many children this sizeable farm family would welcome into the world.
Charles, or Charley as his friends call him, would migrate to Minnesota shortly after high school. Not too long after he arrived, he would meet and then marry Iowan Marian Lucille Plummer. Together, they would have two children, Barbara and Donald Dean, who in turn provided their parents with five grandchildren, including yours truly.
Now, as all of us -- including his 14 great grandchildren and 7 great-great grandchildren -- proudly celebrate our beloved Gramps’ 98th birthday, I’m using the occasion to pay tribute to this wonderful man by expressing 98 of the countless reasons why we love and adore him so very much.
And yes, we’re very blessed to still have this exceptional man in our lives.
So, in no particular order, I give you my 98 reasons:
1. He loves dogs and currently has an adorable Chihuahua named Lady as his very faithful companion.
2. He remains open to learning new tricks.
3. He once emulated magicians by pulling a table cloth out from under a table full of glasses without moving a one. He decided not to try and tempt fate twice.
4. Over the past ten years, he taught himself how to operate his own personal computer, which he continues to use in e-mailing family and friends.
5. He continues to volunteer at his local cable access television station in Bella Vista, Arkansas, and has even operated its camera from time to time over the last dozen years.
6. He has mastered his church’s sound mixing board and engineered it as recently as yesterday.
7. He is a man of immense faith.
8. He still believes he can drive a car, and yes, he continues to possess a valid license.
9. But he will acquiesce when we insist on taking the wheel.
10. He’s traveled to all 50 states, and driven in 49 of them.
11. He used to enjoy getting our adrenaline pumping by driving us across Minnesota’s frozen lakes during the wintertime.
12. He continues to purchase a new automobile each year, whether he needs one or not.
13. He just renewed his passport, so he’ll be good to go for the next ten years.
14. In 2006, he ventured to China for his first time in just over 60 years.
15. Shortly after the close of World War II, he was part of a detail that swept mines from the Yangtze River in Shanghai.
16. He served his nation proudly during World War II, enlisting in the U.S. Navy even though he could have avoided service altogether since he was already aged 32, had a wife and two children, and was already serving his community as a St. Paul firefighter.
17. He would be honorably discharged after having been promoted to the rank of Carpenter - Second Class.
18. He would serve in many theatres during World War II, including the waters around Europe, Africa and Asia.
19. He and his shipmates onboard the destroyer U.S.S. Baldwin proudly escorted President Franklin D. Roosevelt to Yalta; he even caught a glimpse of Winston Churchill once there.
20. He is the epitome of a true patriot and exemplifies the best in America.
21. While the navy was on a six week hiatus in New York City during the war, he took in countless performances of the Rockettes at Radio City Music Hall.
22. He is an exceptional storyteller and is always pleased to regale me with highlights from his life.
23. Knowing how much I love his stories, he once sat down in front of a video camera and chronicled much of his life for posterity (and me).
24. He’s always been drama-free, which has been a good thing given the drama his descendants have indulged in.
25. When he was just 17 years old and a senior in an Indianapolis high school, he performed alongside other minors as orphans in a play headlined by Ethel Barrymore.
26. He also performed in a high school production of The Pirates Of Penzance.
27. He has personally met Frank Sinatra, even though he admits that he wasn’t particularly a fan.
28. He’s also met Milton Berle, who made him laugh.
29. He once told me he wanted to meet Anne Murray, so I arranged a backstage meeting with the Canadian singer after a concert stop in Tulsa. Gramps was stunned.
30. He can be a bit shy.
31. He was supposed to personally meet and greet President Harry S. Truman, but was so overcome when observing the president’s uncanny resemblance to his deceased father that he retrenched into a corner of the reception room.
32. He learned how to pilot a plane after World War II, but because he was $12 short of the final payment necessary to enable him to fly solo, he never received his license -- and he never told my grandmother that he had even been practicing.
33. He has only ever been married to one woman, my grandmother, in a union that lasted 63 years until her death in 1995.
34. He met my grandmother on a blind date.
35. His pen “slipped” as he was signing his marriage license. Back in those days, the minimum legal age to get hitched without parental approval was 21. But he feared his parents would not approve, even though he was just shy of 21 years. When he signed the marriage license, his pen “slipped” so it appeared that he was born in 1910 rather than 1911.
36. He spent half of the money he had on his honeymoon -- an exorbitant $15 on a trip to Brainerd, Minnesota. It was exactly half of all the money he had to his name.
37. He was so in love with my grandmother that he was clearly heartbroken when she died. He still tears up when he talks about her.
38. After her passing, he uprooted himself by moving to a remote part of Arkansas where he owned some land. He built a new home for himself – at age 85.
39. From 1939 through 1975, he served with distinction as a proud St. Paul firefighter.
40. Out of hundreds of applicants to become a St. Paul fireman during the Depression, he would earn the third highest scores on the civil service examination.
41. By the time he was forced to retire, due to mandatory retirement at age 65, he had been promoted to the position of Fire Chief in St. Paul.
42. He once loaned his trumpet to his nephew George Myers, who would not only go on to become one the military’s most revered players, but he would also play taps at funerals for many dignitaries.
43. He has always been a great instructor.
44. He helped teach me how to water-ski.
45. He was patient with me even when I tried learning how to play golf.
46. He continues to actively play golf to this day.
47. He regularly shoots a golf score under his age (and typically beats his younger golfing buddies).
48. He scored his first hole-in-one back in 1935.
49. He scored his last hole-in-one as recently as 2004 – at age 92.
50. All totaled, he has scored five holes-in-one; although he nearly scored a sixth, the ball bounced back out of the cup landing just a foot-long putt away.
51. One of his earliest memories is smoking a cigar at the age of 8 at his eldest brother’s wedding reception (his brother Noel was a World War I veteran). He ended up rolling down a hill in a tire and was briefly knocked out, coming to after the reception had ended.
52. As children, he and another brother were thrown from their family horse because they were a little overeager in trying out the spurs they received as a gift; the duo wanted to be cowboys.
53. He can be a bit of a daredevil.
54. He went parasailing in Mexico at age 79.
55. He became an expert ski jumper back in the 1930s.
56. After he went home from his first planned attempt at ski-jumping, he couldn’t help but kick himself for not trying. When he went back for a second attempt, he saw teenagers skiing off the jump with ease and thought, “If they can do it, so can I.” While his first jump proved dangerous (he landed on his head), he dusted himself off and went right back up to the top and tried again. Successfully.
57. He is a model of perseverance.
58. He succeeded in learning how to build houses when moonlighting from the Fire Department.
59. He helped my father build the very first home I ever lived in.
60. He and my grandmother purchased their first residence back in the 1930s for a whopping $2,500. (When I was just a child, I liked knowing that they were just blocks up the street from us.)
61. He sold that same house during the 1970s for over $75,000.
62. He built his own lake home, which was one of our family’s favorite gathering places for special occasions, including a couple of mine.
63. He and my grandmother made every attempt to attend virtually all major milestone events in our family -- everything from graduations and confirmations to performances in musicals and concerts to weddings -- even after we moved to Milwaukee.
64. He is tremendously fit for his age.
65. In addition to playing golf, he stays in shape by clearing brush from the woods adjacent to his home.
66. He’s routinely mistaken for someone 20 years younger.
67. He makes more money now through his pension than he ever did via his regular paycheck; proving that living long is the best revenge.
68. When his own mother died, he received an “inheritance” totaling $15. He always jokes that the longer he lives, the less inheritance there will be for us. But we all implore him to spend it.
69. Nonetheless, he is a very frugal man.
70. Yet, he is exceedingly generous.
71. He likes to pick up the check at restaurants.
72. He became an expert woodworker before he was a firefighter.
73. His work from over 70 years ago can still be found in both the Ramsay County Courthouse (St. Paul) and the city’s First National Bank Building.
74. He also designed the single most beautiful inlaid wooden table I’ve ever seen.
75. He likes Peanut M & Ms.
76. He likes his ice cream, something his son and this particular grandson seemed to have inherited.
77. He is still very spry.
78. He is exceedingly lucid.
79. He cries every time we say goodbye.
80. He possesses a spark in his voice whenever we talk on the phone, beginning with his boisterous, “Hello, there!”
81. He maintains a terrific sense of humor.
82. He continues to be admired by the ladies.
83. He was quite mischievous growing up.
84. He can still recall when everyone had a horse and buggy, as well as when his father bought their first car.
85. When gas prices hit $4 per gallon last year, he recalled how a tank of gas was costing more than his very first automobile, a used Ford Model T, which he purchased in the 1920s for a mere $40.
86. He also remembers gasoline-free Sundays, when autos were only used on Sundays in case of emergencies.
87. He remembers how awkward it was to use party-line phones with everyone knowing his family’s business; but by the same token, they knew everything about their neighbors, too.
88. He grew up without electricity, but they heated everything with coal.
89. He understands the virtues of sacrifice.
90. He recognizes just how far he’s come.
91. He’s honest.
92. He has immense integrity.
93. Although he’s consistently voted for Democrats in presidential races beginning in 1940 right through 2008, he voted Republican during his first time at the polls because his farm family was strictly Indiana GOP.
94. He loves his family unconditionally, no matter who votes Republican.
95. He’s tremendously proud of his offspring, and just as the average face of America is changing with more color, so is the burgeoning rainbow hue in his family.
96. He looks forward to turning 100 years of age.
97. He loves us.
98. He gives us countless reasons to love him right back.
Happy birthday, Gramps!
With love, sincere appreciation and best wishes for your 99th year,
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
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