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Disclaimer:
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Peer Reviews Absalom Reviewed by Sherry Deatrick Entire contents are copyright © 2009 Sherry Deatrick. All rights reserved.
I had high hopes for a play written by Zoe Kazan, the granddaughter of the controversial director of such theatrical landmarks as A Streetcar Named Desire, Elia Kazan. And with such a somber, biblical title — Absalom, I looked forward to seeing a weighty play that I could discuss with friends after the show, as we debated its deep meaning long into the night over bottles of expensive wine. Wrong! Kazan's According to John Lahr, a great play's theme should be evident in the first few minutes. This bit of wisdom is my yardstick as a reviewer. Let's see how Kazan's play measures up. As Absalom opens, Adam is polishing the china and silverware for the party. His sister, Sophia (a name dripping with symbolism), asks through Teddy whether Adam needs help. He refuses help. Teddy tells Adam the yard looks good. Adam says Saul is spending thousands of dollars monthly on manure to keep it that way. Teddy guesses he's spending more than that on his own birthday. Adam says, "I don't know. You're the money man." Teddy says he and Knopf offered to pay but Saul wanted to "do it the old way." Hmm. Your guess is as good as mine. Apparently the theme is: "This is a story about a literary family who spend their money on horse doo-doo and refuse help from each other." However, I'd be wrong. The play is about a boring bunch of poseur men who backstab each other while the women nurture them. ("The kitchen won't clean itself," says Sophia to her intellectually and physically fecund sister-in-law, Julia). Interestingly, the theme plays itself out in the struggle between the patriarch and his foster son, Cole, over the rights to Tender Currencies, a bestseller each man claims to have written. But as Saul says, no one really owns the rights because the family was always batting around ideas together. It's simply incredible that a 25-year-old actress, a recent college graduate, is able to write in the style and voice of a 50-year-old man who was born in the 1930's or 1940's. Perhaps her family was always "batting around ideas" together as well. The old-fashioned language and odd directorial choices resulted in the most flubbed lines I've ever seen in a professional theater. The actors didn't cope with these flubs well, instead drawing more attention to them by trying to fix their mistakes, as you would expect from an unskilled performer. Normally, flubbed lines don't offend me, but in a festival watched by critics from all over the world, I cringed. Adding to the amateur hour, the characters are constantly making clumsy entrances and exits, slamming doors as in a drawing room farce. The "shocking" side plots (cancer, dead child) don't do much in the way of propping up the dull story, and don't make the characters any more compelling. The action takes place on a cozy back porch with expensive patio furniture. Next to the porch is an apple tree, which dutiful Sophia climbs to pick apples to make apple sauce for the old man's party. Other than this scene, the play leaves the actors little to do except talk at each other. It was hard to stay awake during the seemingly endless two acts. On a more positive note, Michael Raiford has outdone himself in designing the most gorgeous set I've seen at Actors Theatre. The rear of a 1950's modern asymmetrical Berkshire house, with green and red trim, takes up most of the stage. You can see inside the house, warmly lit by a modern hanging lamp. I kept imagining how this set could be used in a more interesting play. Too bad it's wasted here. Finally, there remains the possibility that what Kazan intended was a subtle satire of the talky drawing room 20th century theater in the tradition of Eugene O'Neill, Tennessee Williams, and Arthur Miller. If so, it was far too subtle to be evident.
Actors Theatre of Louisville Featuring Todd Weeks, Benjamin Huber, Katie Kreisler,
Stephanie Janssen, Peter Michael Goetz, and J.
Anthony Crane.
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