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Sep 18,
2002
Reviewed By: Philip
Hopkins
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Teresa L. Goding
and Leo Lauer in Split (Photo: Thomas
Hinton) | Synchronize your watches to the schedule
of Broken Watch Theatre Company's new production. The troupe is offering
something not of this era in its staging of Michael Weller's 1979 breakup comedy
Split. Playing
through October 20 at the Lions Theater in the newly renovated Theater Row
complex on 42nd Street, this hilarious revival is both punchy and polished. In
fact, the show echoes its refurbished venue by taking something created decades
ago and updating it in ways that please and surprise. Ironically, the greatest
pleasure here is not contemporary, but anachronistic: the tight team ethos that
suffuses the evening.
While Broadway and Off-Broadway are increasingly the home of
instant-ensembles thrown together for one production, a real ensemble seems like
a throwback -- especially one that is in its first phase. Though Split is
dominated by two-character scenes that embody the social disjointedness which
Weller's script targets, one feels that every player onstage is committed to
serving the piece as a whole. This is no accident: The principals of Broken
Watch have collaborated for several years, formally coming together under their
apt moniker last fall for their New York debut, a widely-praised revival of
Howard Korder's Boys' Life.
In this production, we get to enjoy not only the varied and intimately
realized performances of Leo Lauer and Teresa L. Goding as Paul and Carol (the
couple whose split is the play's catalyst) but also the work of actors in
smaller parts who, in not trying to steal the show, manage to sketch deep
characterizations with just a few lines. Throughout, we feel an actor's touch in
the direction of Drew DeCorleto, the group's artistic director, as each
performer is allowed to pull from his/her role just what is necessary and to
trust that it's enough. With a few advancements in set design and some budgetary
support, Broken Watch's productions could challenge many of the high-profile
star packages on and Off-Broadway that provide us with memorable moments but
rarely a unified production.
Split concerns a group of friends shaken when the "perfect couple"
among them breaks up. Carol and Paul are normal in a time and place when
normality seems -- well, boring. Their failure to find creative ways past their
boredom hurts their sense of who they are as individuals and as a couple. Paul
is hangdog but funny, caring and genuine in a combination that Leo Lauer brings
off with aplomb. His Paul is someone we know and envy for his ability to
appreciate what he has, yet we don't begrudge him his longing for what he
doesn't have. Lauer integrates Paul's contrasts deftly, blending subtle colors
without muting them.
His somewhat estranged wife, Carol, is an engagingly confused woman --a
mixture of loony and sensible, affable and snide, insecure and deceptively
powerful. Teresa L. Goding takes this wider set of contrasts and does very sharp
work with them. She gives us a person who has begun to question the premises of
her life and finds them wanting. How does one change and keep love alive? Her
treatment of the quandary is compelling, never forced. (When explaining to her
husband why she continues relations with a friend of his whom she admittedly
dislikes, her defiant "because I'm not going to give her the satisfaction of
not hanging around her" brings down the house.)
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The Split
ensemble (Photo: Thomas Hinton) | Also
entertaining are Stephen Brumble, Jr. as Bob, whose marriage to Marge (Veronica
Mittenzwei) has taken some turns toward the unconventional in order to keep it
interesting. While predictable now, and perhaps even when written, this couple's
reaction to their friends' breakup and their own marital troubles is a fun,
satiric sideline which had me wondering what these able actors might have done
with the leading roles. Nina Edgerton is spot-on as Jean, the flighty and
self-dedicated friend to Carol and Paul; and Andrew J. Hoff and Jeremy Koch are
magnetic in the play's briefest assignments.
Split could have suffered from a less pleasant kind of anachronism.
Were it not for DeCorleto's astute directorial choices, the script's pitfalls --
some dated references and the burden of having been among the first of many
plays to deal with this topic in this manner -- might have made for more jarring
moments of déjà vu. As it is, the similarity of Donald Margulies' 2000
Pulitzer winner Dinner With Friends to Split in terms of theme and
structure is striking.
One begins to feel, however, that this choice of play is a bit too easy for
the performers and the audience. Broken Watch is clearly about actors, but the
experience of watching talented performers stretch themselves is largely
confined to a few nice moments in the second act of Split. I overheard
one patron remark that the play, witty as it is, seemed to have been chosen
primarily because it gives all of the founding members of the company a chance
to perform. For a group that is just getting on its feet, this is acceptable;
but shouldn't artists who are just out of school feel, at least for a while, as
much a desire to create new artistic paths as successful careers? Given that
their first steps have been so sure, one hopes that the Broken Watch actors will
bring their mastery of ensemble playing to bear on material that is steeper and
more challenging while continuing to present worthy, established plays as
showcases for their talents. |