Hi everyone!
What to say about the new revival of Tennessee Williams's 1959 play "Sweet Bird of Youth" that recently opened at Chicago's Goodman Theatre starring film actress Diane Lane and Broadway veteran (the recent award-winning revival of "Death of a Salesman") Finn Wittrock?
James Schuette's sets and costumes are beautifully evocative of the Gulf Coast circa late-1950s. Keith Parham's lighting design is equally atmospheric. The show looks great. But for a three-hour-plus production, you can't rely on visuals alone to provide an entertaining and thought-provoking evening of theatre.
I wish I could say the performances lived up to the scenery. Alas, however, I can't.
"Sweet Bird of Youth" is one of Williams's later plays and the last to really experience popular success, coming as it does on the heels of the mighty theatrical triumvirate that is "The Glass of Menagerie", "Streetcar Named Desire", and "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof." It's a long and windy play that tells the story of Alexandra Del Lago (traveling under the assumed name of Princess Kosmonopolis), a fading Hollywood actress who is convinced she's just starred in the biggest flop of her career; and 29-year-old gigolo and wannabe actor Chance Wayne. As the play begins, they are holed up together in a luxurious hotel room in Chance's hometown of St. Cloud. They drink vodka and smoke pot. They have sex. They talk and talk and talk about how Alexandra is going to help jump start Chance's acting career. Chance has brought Alexandra to St. Cloud ostensibly to 'rescue' his former girlfriend, Heavenly, and take her away from the rather bigoted clutches of her father, local politician Boss Finley, and her brother, Tom. What Chance doesn't know is that there's a price on his head for giving the once virtuous Heavenly a venereal disease because of which she was forced to undergo a hysterectomy. Heavenly's father, Boss, has vowed to castrate Chance if he catches him in town.
This is a play that should be great fun to watch, if not riveting. What's currently onstage at the Goodman is oddly inert and utterly lacking in any sexual heat between its stars, Ms. Lane and Mr. Wittrock. The hour-long first act takes place entirely in Alexandra's hotel room. It is meant to introduce us to Alexandra and Chance, to understand where they're coming from and what they both want out of life and each other. Alexandra is hung-over if not still drunk. And when she and Chance share from her stash of marijuana, they should be high. They spend most of the first act in bed, half-undressed, and yet there is simply zero chemistry between these two very attractive stars. Hence, the audience never really connects to them or cares about what happens. As a couple, Ms. Lane and Mr. Wittrock simply aren't convincing. Both come across as entirely one-dimensional. Ms. Lane has a tendency to declaim all of her lines to such a degree that she becomes monotonous as opposed to sultry and seductive, while Mr. Wittrock relies too much on volume to get his character's passion across. He comes across as merely petulant and spoiled.
The very brief second act introduces us to Boss Finley and his daughter Heavenly. This is when we learn of her shame and the scandal it's created within the family and Boss Finley's constituents. John Judd as Boss provides a welcome jolt of energy to the production that sticks out like a lightning rod whenever he occupies the stage. As Heavenly, Kristina Johnson is suitably winsome in, as played here at least, a relatively underwritten role.
Act Three parallels the first act in length and while visually the most striking part of the whole production, it is also the most uneven. The highlight of Act Three is definitely Jennifer Engstrom as Miss Lucy, Boss Finley's mistress, and town gossip. The problem however is that Ms. Engstrom almost seems as though she is the star of an entirely different play because her energy and overall stage presence is never matched by those of her colleagues, Mr. Judd excepted. With her bright red poodle skirt and (at times) incomprehensible drunken drawl, you can't take your eyes off of her. She is riveting to watch while being a distraction from the ho-hum quality of all that surrounds her. This of course is problematic because it pulls focus from the events transpiring in the play.
While I praised the lighting design at the top of this review, I have to say though that the lighting was somewhat problematic for me in Act Three. Its relative dimness at times cast strange shadows on the actors--particularly Ms. Lane--that obscured their faces and served to further block the audience from feeling fully engaged with the characters on stage. This may have merely been a technical glitch that will be corrected in subsequent performances. I can't say.
All in all, this is a wildly schizophrenic though handsomely mounted production that lurches from a maudlin kind of ennui to a hyperkinetic energy that is as distracting as it is occasionally welcome. It is still very early in the run (it opened last Friday and closes October 25th) and I'm confident the production will continue to evolve and find some kind of consistent pacing. Still, the chemistry between Ms. Lane and Mr. Wittrock is so non-existent that it weighs and I fear dooms the entire production to failure from start to finish.
This is a shame because, on paper anyway, this could have been something special.
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