“This Is Our Youth”
Sends “Love Letters”
Of “A Fatal Weakness”
by TONY VELLELA
It was twenty-five years ago [1980] and a few doors down from 256 west 47th street’s Brooks Atkinson Theatre [at the former Edison Theatre, 240 west 47th street] that I first saw A. R. Gurney’s truly masterful work “Love Letters.” That cast starred Richard Thomas and Swoozie Kurtz. Today, you can see Mia Farrow and Brian Dennehy in the same roles, bringing to life, through only their letters, two well-healed, upper crust people, as their lives continue to bring them together and pull them apart.
From the very first exchange, Melissa Gardner [Farrow] and Andrew Makepeace Ladd III [Dennehy] share a love-hate, conundrum-laden relationship . . . male vs. female, sensitive vs. stoic, flight vs. stolid, needy vs. supportive. And they change sides again and again, as events and relationships tear at their tenuous bonds. The genius of this piece lies in Gurney’s brilliant capturing of the changes in the language they use to convey where they are, how they are, and the never-ending questions that all begin with why.
Letter-writing, as so many essays and op-eds and social commentators have pointed out [some with distasteful glee], has fallen into an almost obscure category of behaviors, like getting up when a lady enters the room, or using ‘please’ and ‘thank you’ even when you don’t have a secret agenda at play. In “Love Letters,” Melissa and Andy eventually, and too late, come to terms with each other’s flaws, and their own, in part because the act of writing a letter requires more contemplation and reflection than typing a couple dozen characters and pushing a button. Gurney gives us the unvarnished observations these two discover, and he lets us in on the discoveries.
And here, both Farrow and Dennehy bring those discoveries to vivid life, all through the delicate, subtle, even meticulous use of the inflections of their voices. Farrow’s young Melissa keeps us entertained with the kinds of speech patterns only little girls can get away with – a shade too cute, and a shade too dismissive. And as Farrow’s Melissa ages, we hear [and see] how the dismissive side comes to win out over the more loving, the more human side she has learned to hide. And Dennehy’s Andy is forever struggling to balance the influences of the upper class, high expectations, always proper family life that led him to a successful political career, and a dubious marriage, all the while missing those earliest chances to express emotions that Melissa desperately sought
There are two compelling reasons to see this production: great writing and great acting. Some have balked that the stage is bare except for a long wooden desk the two share, but without eye contact, a pair of chairs, and two loose-leaf notebooks containing the ‘letters.’ But keep this in mind: “Chicago” has now been running for a couple of decades using all-black costumes and about eleven chairs.
Kenneth Lonnergan’s “This Is Our Youth” is also a product of that original era – its story takes place in 1982. I first saw it done in its premiere production in 1996, when Scott Elliot’s New Group brought in the young director Mark Brokaw to stage this young playwright’s first work, with Josh Hamilton, Mark Ruffalo and Missy Yager. And a mere eighteen years later, it has made it to Broadway, with Anna D. Shapiro directing Kieran Culkin, Michael Cera and Tavi Gevinson.
Like Gurney, Lonergan intends to provide us with a window into the lives of a few privileged young people. Unlike “Love Letters,” which chronicles two lives during maybe fifty or so years, “This Is Our Youth” unfolds in under fifty hours. Set in an unkempt Upper West Side studio apartment where Dennis [Culkin] plies his trade as a moderately savvy drug dealer to his ‘friends,’ the perennially luckless Warren [Cera] bursts into the room with almost as much disruptive force as Pale in “Burn This,” though with the opposite quantity of self-confidence. Warren has absconded from his father’s place with $15,000 in cash. For the first half of the first act, the two wrestle verbally and physically with all the pleasurable possibilities this booty presents, and all the horrendous consequences that spending it could bring down on them. This is a chess match between unequals – Dennis knows every button to push to humiliate, denigrate and manipulate Warren, and Warren has been on the receiving end for the entire history of their friendship, that by now he repeats the sad, almost masochist responses Dennis counts on. But when Dennis moves into new territory with the fugitive teen, which is to end his virginity as one of the spoils of the cash adventures, it’s a new game.
Dennis trades in any and all drugs, mentioning heroin as casually as pot. We are meant to take it all in with a lack of awe, a kind of acceptance that this is a not-untypical dynamic among these kids. While the disaffected post-hippie era of the story did witness the crash-and-burn of their parents’ progressive fantasy future, not all of their kids wound up smoking and toking and looting and shooting up. With that in mind, “This Is Our Youth” smacks [excuse the pun] the audience with the harshest cases, those something-teen near-casualties whose lives banged around like the little silver spheres in a pinball machine. And under Shapiro’s pitch-perfect direction, these two guys affect as much, or more physical careering off walls, onto the floor and up against each other’s bodies as anything you’ll see in “Pippin.” Energy that has never been fully expended gets an outlet triggered by the ill-gotten gains of Warren’s heist.
Culkin and Cera both show us their characters’ basic behaviors – Culkin with a sullen, almost acrid delivery, Cera with a timidity that reminds us of a giant plush toy rabbit. He even has his own collection of rare toys that gets sacrificed in the tumult. Gevinson, in an impressive stage debut, holds her own against Dennis, as the plot-device third character who almost likes Warren but does not follow through with the plan Dennis has to use her for the devirginization of his friend. And while all three never fail to represent their characters very well, there is a sterling moment near the end of the play when Warren shows a glimmer of independence, a hint at what may yet happen, if and when he comes to terms with his hero worship of Dennis, and demolishes it, and his dependence in the bargain. He’s not anywhere near that revelation yet, but Cera shows us that Warren may one day free himself from this psychological addiction. Look for Cera’s well-calibrated few moments that show us what may lie ahead.
Overall, this is a ‘snapshot’ play – two very meaningful days and nights in the lives of disastrously disaffected young people as they try to control events even as they spin out of control.
It’s a smaller universe that gets the microscopic treatment in “The Fatal Weakness,” another gem of a revival from the Mint Theatre Company, whose mission is to present long-forgotten plays that were heralded in their day. Set in 1946 in a post-WW II American city, George Kelly’s drama begins deceptively enough. The action takes place in an eye-popping living room, with wall coverings of silver reflective embossed paper that serve to create a symbolically reflective environment. The set design work by Vicki R. Davis creates such a sumptuous home for the story’s upper-class middle-aged couple that you are tempted to get up and join the conversation. At rise, Ollie Espenshade is just returning from the wedding of people she does not know, simply because she adores the rituals and accoutrements of the wedding ceremony. She’s an unrepentant romantic. And in the personage of Kristin Griffith, Ollie has a rather regal bearing, all polished, well-spoken and in good form. So it is very easy to jump to the conclusion that this will be all light-hearted fun and frolic – a domestic comedy with little on its mind but misunderstandings that trigger humorous outcomes.
This supposition is nurtured by the sparkling performance of Griffith, who puts one in mind of a very successful and prominent actress of mid last century named Natalie Schafer. She gained notoriety as Eunice ‘Lovey’ Howell on “Gilligan’s Island,” but was a frequent guest on most television programs of the ’50s, including “The Goldbergs” and “I Love Lucy,” but who also had a distinguished film career earlier in such pictures as “The Snake Pit” and “Back Street.” This is said to make the point that playing a woman of a certain age, who seems preoccupied with life’s little annoyances, but who then is confronted with a more serious agenda to tackle, requires true skill, and Griffith has it and then some.
Ollie has begun to suspect that her dapper, country club-habitue hubby Paul [the appropriately distinguished Cliff Bemis] has not been golfing on many previous Saturday afternoons, but keeping company with another woman. She calls on the services of her close friend and confidante Mabel [the magnetic Cynthia Darlow] to help her sort out the truth. And the nuptial difficulties of her over-indulged married daughter Penny [an entitled-acting Victoria Mack] crowd out her time and take her off her game, trying to concentrate on her own fraying marital state. Throughout the proceedings, comic relief is supplied through the services of Ollie’s maid Anna, portrayed by the veteran treasure Patricia Kilgarriff, who shines whenever she’s present.
Evidence of his dalliances is obtained via an unseen friend with a car, who surreptitiously shadows the husband, providing blow-by-blow accounts of his visitations to a certain lady doctor. Ollie decides to plan a detailed response, and the result is not at all what one might expect. Coupled with an alliance with her daughter’s distraught husband, who sees his marriage disintegrating, due in part to the kind of pampering Penny received constantly from her father, Ollie now has life-changing battles on two fronts to wage. The fate of her young grandson’s upbringing also hangs in the balance. With Mabel’s unflinching aid and good spirits, Ollie comes out in a place not at all where well-made comedies of that era would have placed her. And Kelly’s well-structured, three-act play, guided with a firm hand by director Jesse Marchese, provides us with a truly satisfying theatre escape. Women discovering their potential independence rings out in each scene, and the play itself puts one in mind of Clare Booth Luce’s classic “The Women” – and bad company that ain’t.
We’re three-for-three now, with powerhouse women performing in shows that re-create the performance styles, and lives of iconic singers. First, Mary Bridget Davies blew the roof off the theatre with her gut-punching renditions of the acid rock queen in “A Night With Janis Joplin.” Then, we are seeing how Audra McDonald is channeling the great blues diva Billie Holiday in “Lady Day in Emerson’s Bar and Grill.” And now, Tammy Faye Starlite shows us the drug-addled, psychedelic-soaked Nico of Velvet Underground late ’60s fame in “Nico: Underground.” Set in the basement black box space of Theatre for a New City, this perfectly-crafted piece interweaves a dozen songs from her recordings with a free-form interview she conducted in Melboune in 1986. The piece, crafted with wit and deference by T.D. Lang, is winding down its run, but is rumored to be moving somewhere. Look out for it, then look in on it. It’s uniquely compelling work, and Miss Starlite knows just how to hold in her emotions, letting out just enough to keep us fully engaged.
ON BOOK
If you are admirer of Kenneth Lonergan’s work – as I am – your admiration will only grow if you pick up a copy of “This Is Our Youth,” to see how carefully chosen his character’s words and phrasings are. Mamet gets a good deal of credit for this kind of character attention; Lonergan deserves even more praise because his dialogue flows so naturally. And while you’re at it, pick up his “Lobby Hero,” a play that deserves a revival by now . . . Prep yourself for the upcoming production of the Frank Marcus dramedy “The Killing of Sister George” by reading it first, in the Samuel French edition. When it premiered in London in 1965, it starred the remarkably talented twosome of Eileen Atkins and Beryl Reid. The film three years later replaced Atkins with Susannah York. Nothing can replace the joy of reading this one, and then, get yourself to the theatre to see it come to life [and death] . . . With George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart once again dishing up truckloads of laughs with “You Can’t Take It With You,” which I’ll be discussing next time around, it’s a good time to indulge in two other of their masterworks – “Once In a Lifetime,” and “The Man Who Came to Dinner” in a smart collection by Grove Press . . . and if you fancy yourself a serious student of the business of laughter, you will be amazed at the insight, research and downright ardor of Laurence Maslon and Michael Kantor’s “Make ‘Em Laugh – the funny business of America.” The title may be familiar, because this is the companion book to Kantor’s acclaimed PBS documentary of the same name.
============================================================
TONY VELLELA wrote and produced the PBS series about theatre, “Character Studies.” His award-winning play “Admissions” is published by Playscripts. “Maisie and Grover Go To The Theatre” is published by Art Age Press. He has also written seven other plays and musicals, all produced, as well as dozens of articles about the performing arts for Parade, Dramatics, The Christian Science Monitor and Rolling Stone, among many others. He has taught theatre courses at Columbia University Teachers College, Lehman College, HB Studio and other institutions nationwide. Currently, he conducts theatre-related classes at the 92nd St. Y [visit 92Y.org for details] as well as small group sessions and private coaching from home. He is a member of the Writers Guild East and the Dramatists Guild.