Usher Nonsense #33 – Small Tragedy
SMALL TRAGEDY --by Craig Lucas (Prelude to a Kiss, The Secret Lives of
Dentists, Reckless) Directed by Mark Wing-Davey (Mad Forest, The Skriker)
Featuring Rob Campbell, Rosemarie DeWitt, Daniel Eric Gold, Lee Pace,
Ana Reeder (Sight Unseen, Hedda Gabler), Mary Shultz
Sets by Douglas Stein, Costumes by Marina Draghici, Lighting by Jennifer
Tipton
At the end of the first act of Small Tragedy I was thinking that this review would
begin with the good news that the oxygen supply had been restored to the
administrative offices at Playwrights Horizons . Then came the second act.
Nevermind.
This is the backstage story of a production of Oedipus that is produced in the
burbs of Boston. There are the requisite odd balls - An actor who supported her
husband un until the divorce, her room mate who drinks a little too much but asks
all the right questions, and the lonely gay guy who is looking for someplace to
belong; the failed director trying to make a comeback; his wife, an actor, who is
an HIV "survivor" and demands her say as co-director, and a mystery man who is
a refugee from the Serb/Croatian War. We get to meet them as they audition and
begin rehearsal. Some are quite funny and no one is perfect. Characters
DISCUSS ideas and argue about life as well as the play. (We even find out that the
name Oedipus means "swollen foot" - which should have been a clue to Jocasta
from the get go.) OK so far.
In the second act, however, it is as if all the characters had amnesia and just forgot
who they were and what they wanted. People fall in and out of love. Atrocities of
contemporary wars are revealed. There is a lot of changing into and out of
rehearsal clothing onstage. We sit through the ENTIRE speech of Oedipus after
he gouges out his eyes. This is followed by the post show cast party, which made
me think Oedipus might have had the right idea.
The final scene is so slow it is hard to believe that the audience is left wondering
what happens to the main character. Does she or doesn't she? Even the ushers
were asking each other. No one could figure it out. Except Craig Lucas and the
actors. They all seemed to know, and as the lead character, Anna Reeder even has
several monologues throughout the play, put there to guide us, presumably,
through the “the Small Tragedy."
But each monologue ultimately reflects this production. It starts out promising,
but ends up sounding as though it was being dubbed in a language you don't
understand. You see their lips moving but you can't understand a thing their trying
to tell you.
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