Embedded

Embedded wears it politics on its sleeve, on its face, and on its masks. Yet it's not a polemic. It is a parody, but it's also a serious look at war. Probably the most accurate description is that Embedded is a series of set pieces, some brilliant, some broad, some harrowing, some obvious, which add up to a moving piece of theater but which fall somewhat short if one considers them together as "a play."

Three stories compete here: we have soldiers, whose stories are told more or less straight; embedded journalists, whose stories veer from comedy to documentary; and a cabal of presidential advisors, who are portrayed in grotesque Commedia masks and are the villains of the piece. The ensemble is the thing here. VJ Foster seizes the stage like the colonel he plays, as a tough guy riding herd on a pack of journalists in the Iraq war. His every metaphor is from musical theater, drawing laughs from character, not military stereotypes.

Lolly Ward, whether playing a masked Paul Wolfowitz character, a compromised journalist, or the clueless mother of Jen-Jen (a Jessica Lynch echo), projects instantaneous authority in each role.

Steven M Porter has vocal control any other actor would envy, playing a masked Dick Cheney and the naive dad of Jen-Jen, who tells his daughter as she goes off to war that he has failed her, because he hasn't earned enough to get her a college education without the military. Later, when he reads a letter from Viacom offering them everything from cash to a news special, movie, Simon & Schuster deal, and an MTV2 event Jen-Jen can host with her friends, the laughs come from how grotesquely our heroes are courted - and it turns out the text is precisely the letter Viacom sent to the Lynch family.

Kate Mulligan and Andrew Wheeler both slice through theatrical convention as they give genuine Iraq War reports that defy military stage managing; these documentary moments were among the most effective of the short evening. Educational, too. The heart here, as in so many Gang productions, is to highlight the humanity of characters on every side of the issue. The colonel is doing his job. The soldier who kills a family at a checkpoint because he wasn't trained properly is among the most fully realized characters (beautifully portrayed by Ben Cain). Jen-Jen's fight to convince her family that her own version of events, not the military's, is the true one, told me more about Pvt. Lynch than her televised interviews.

The compromised journalists who behave precisely as they're told are flesh-and-blood characters scared out of their wits, trying to be good patriots, and keep their jobs. Even the masked members of the Office of Strategic Planning, featuring parodies of Cheney, Wolfowitz, Donald Rumsfeld, Condoleezza Rice, and Karl Rove, maintain an internal logic, however harrowing. When they hum together, plotting an alert status change - "it FEELS orange now" -- the text is careful to mention, "the intelligence DOES support it."

Is Embedded great art? Not in toto, but in pieces, perhaps. It was written as instant history and parody both, as a "Bob Roberts" sequel was about to leap from Mr. Robbins' pen, and this came out instead. If his writing here in uneven, his direction is impeccable. Dazzling visuals, costume changes in plain view, and his brother David's sound design all heighten the experience.

And though I've heard some performances get partial standing ovations, the Friday late-night applause I heard was unlike any other I've heard in a theater. You know the movie cliche of the single clapper for a brave act, which becomes an earnest round of applause from a crowd? This ovation was the second half of that, a room full of theatergoers pounding their hands together, through curtain calls, in thanks as much as appreciation. You'll have more fun at Embedded if you're not a fan of the current war, but even the most gung-ho veteran would have a hard time picking out a moment that doesn't give the greatest respect to the men and women now fighting and reporting on it.