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A DELICATE BALANCE This Week

Posted by: sergius 02:13 pm EST 01/18/15
Caught up with this Wednesday night, and it's a jumble. This mostly has to do with poor casting and, following this, the inability to find the right tone. Duncan and Plimpton especially are in different plays. Duncan's a hair's breadth away from Miss Hannigan in ANNIE; it's a superficial, mannered performance. Plimpton is similarly broad except she's in a Coward farce, an overprivileged gale force bellyacher. So, ironically, the play's balance, of all things, is neither delicate nor sustained. As written--and it is really "written"--the play's a wonder though: as fine a piece of literary savagery as VIRGINIA WOLFF and maybe even better for being less obvious. Albee's usual preoccupations--language, loss, dread or, more precisely the dread of losing language and mindfulness--are on full throttle display here. Every character is an author, composing and editing their thoughts as they go along. Because the actions in the play are mostly speech acts the characters are difficult to animate. Only Lithgow comes close. For my money, the 1996 revival was far superior and the one I'll remember.


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