[NEohioPAL] Review of "A Life in the Theatre" at CVLT

[Bob Abelman]

CVLT brings Mamet moments to 'Life'

 

Bob Abelman

News-Herald, Chagrin Valley Times, Solon Times, Geauga Times Courier

Member, International Association of Theatre Critics 

 

This review appeared in the News-Herald 5/14/10

 

"Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more."

 

Shakespeare wasn't the first playwright to find parallels between life and the theatre, but he was certainly the most eloquent.  Contemporary dramatist David Mamet won't be the last to do so, but he has certainly distinguished himself by blatantly being the least eloquent.

 

Mamet's work, which includes the powerful American Buffalo and the Pulitzer Prize-winning Glengarry Glen Ross, is renowned for its terse, intermittent dialogue, where characters constantly interrupt one another, sentences trail off unfinished, and conversations peppered with vulgarities overlap.

 

Such is the case with A Life in the Theatre, an early off-Broadway comedy of Mamet's.   The play revolves around two regional theater performers and explores life on both sides of the proscenium arch.   

 

Robert is an aging, affected actor with no shortage of profound-sounding insight and vapid perspective on life and the theatre arts.  Throughout this one-act, 90-minute play, he shares his witless wisdom with John, a novice actor and Robert's involuntary protégée.  The play is a distillation of self-contained moments on stage and backstage that, collectively, track the evolving relationship and power struggle between these two thespians.

 

The Chagrin Valley Little Theatre production of A Life in the Theatre features John Q. Bruce as the veteran actor.  Bruce has an ear for Mamet's rhythms and the stage savvy to deliver Robert's hollow banter with bravado and good intention.  He has created a charming character who is simultaneously endearing and repugnant; much like a family elder who has earned the right to reminisce but whose reflections grow increasingly disjointed and maddening. 

 

Brian Diehl is delightful as John, the rookie actor whose respect and tolerance for Robert's stream-of-conscious observations grow thin.  Although Diehl is older than the role calls for and his character's self-assuredness does not quite evolve at the same rate as Roberts' dissolve, he is outstanding and a pleasure to watch.  His comic timing, particularly during the stock, cliché "on stage" scenes he and Bruce perform, is impeccable. 

 

Director Don Bernardo keeps things moving with just the right Mamet-momentum, which requires the delivery of plodding dialogue at a rapid pace.  Not an easy task.

 

The flow of this production is somewhat hampered by the small River Street Playhouse stage.  Bernardo has elected to make separate set changes for each of the play's 26 scenes rather than devote a section of the stage to a permanent dressing room set and the rest to the assorted "on stage" scenes.  The set changes are expedient, thanks to Amy Pelleg, who plays and actually serves as stage manager, but they are disruptive nonetheless.

 

It has been suggested that, artistically speaking, David Mamet has a split personality.  On the one hand there are the lean, mean confrontational plays with their brutality and acidic street poetry.  These are an acquired taste.  On hand at the CVLT is an example of his less substantial but more pleasurable plays.  A Life in the Theatre is a nice dose of Mamet and the CVLT has done a fine job with it.  

 

A Life in the Theatre continues through May 22 at the Chagrin Valley Little Theatre's River Street Playhouse, 56 River Street, Chagrin Falls.  For tickets, which are $10, call 440-247-8955 or visit www.cvlt.org.
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