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Opined March 5, 2006
Defiance - By John Patrick Shanley (Danny and the Deep Blue Sea, Doubt); directed by Doug Hughes(A Touch of the Poet, Doubt, Beard of
Avon, Last Easter)
WITH: Chris Bauer (Chaplain White), Chris Chalk (Capt. Lee King), Margaret Colin (Margaret Littlefield), Stephen Lang (Lt. Col. Morgan
Littlefield), Trevor Long (Gunnery Sergeant) and Jeremy Strong (Pfc. Evan Davis) .
Sets by John Lee Beatty (Rabbit Hole, Doubt, Wonderful Town); Costumes by Catherine Zuber (A Light In The Piazza, Doubt); Lighting by Pat
Collins
Presented by the Manhattan Theater Club, Lynne Meadow, artistic director; Barry Grove, executive producer. At New York City Center, Stage I, 131
West 55th Street, Manhattan, (212) 581-1212. Through April 30. Running time: 2 hours 30 minutes.
OK, I admit it. I started comparing this to Doubt the minute the curtain went up. But mainly because, as in Doubt, the first character we meet
addresses us, not as a congregation, which we are, but as a line up of Army recruits, which we are not. This Gunnery Seargeant is followed in due
course by the Lieutenant Colonel who is the top officer on the base. Both men are meant to be intimidating and threatening. They are not.
Which pretty much how the rest of the play goes alone. Events are set up as important, but often don’t meet the challenge.
This is a story of am obsessed white officer running an army base in the 1960’s. He invites a black Captain and the new Chaplain over to talk race
relations. It’s a forced conversation that goes nowhere. And, oddly, it seems like a created theme – on that is being inserted into the story even if the
story doesn’t want it. The black captain is a person who would rather be invisible and carry out his job. He shuns conflict and avoids promotion. It
is not the Lt. Colonel who finally brings him out but rather, the chaplain who forces the Captain to take a stand, when conduct unbecoming an
officer slops out of the pail and lands at the Lt. Colonel’s feet.
Perhaps this story might be more convincing were it not for the lackluster performance of Stephen Lang . His Lt. COlonoe is a jumble of grimaces
and barks. He seems more interested in what Lt. Colonel should look like than who he is. Paried up with the elegant and balanced performance
turned in my Margaret Colin, his performance comes off as shallow.
What surprised me the most was that the act of defiance we watch pales in comparison to the one we don’t see. The Lt. Colonel’s son is a draft
dodger. He is in Canada which is not far enough away to diminish the shame and anger his father feels. It is he who has skewered this Lt. Colonel.
But we never see this son, so we miss what would have been a helluva story. Instead we got something a little watered down and a lot less tasty.
©2006 Tulis McCall