There is no denying that a fine cast can make an acclaimed and also familiar play resonate as if one is seeing it for the first time. If this third time for me around the park with Tom Stoppard's cleverly erudite play does not necessarily offer any surprises, the Roundabout production is grand and generally rewarding. It will undoubtedly dazzle those as yet unfamiliar with the renowned playwright's ultra sophisticated wordplay.
I have a fleeting memory of the original Broadway production directed by Mike Nichols in 1984 that boasted a knockout cast that included Glenn Close and Christine Baranski, as well as the strikingly spare but also stunning Donmar Warehouse production that came to these shores in 2000. Now, I'm again amazed by the ability of this play to astonish me, something that this production did for the most part.
There is something to be said for a plot that is so utterly contrived and conspicuously convoluted that we can appreciate its ability to unravel into the ether of time and forgetfulness. Perhaps that is one of the reasons that it appears over time to be better and better. Certainly the current high-profile cast under the direction of Sam Gold has found plenty of plot in which to spar and also make it their own unique arena for endless rounds of verbal fisticuffs.
Henry, the playwright hero of The Real Thing is a successful writer of romantic comedies. His own personal real life escapades are alluded to in a scene from one of his frothy comedies that serve as a prologue to the play proper. Stoppard, the playwright, uses this "play before the play" and "play during the play" structure to parallel both his protagonist's trap in creating a romantic comedy that his audience might find amusing, with the necessity of real people to embroider life, i.e., “The Real Thing,” with as much theatricality and complexity as their own credibility can muster.
Under Gold's snappy direction this revival certainly has a lot going for it. Stoppard's theatrical conceits seen in counterpoint to real life's more hard-edged and dangerous struggles with fidelity and truth. The dialogue, both in the hilariously superficial prologue and the body of the play, is Stoppard at his most dazzling. Words, epithets, and metaphors hurtle, cascade and bombard us into distraction and bring to mind such equally worthy-for-revival gems as Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, Travesties, and Arcadia.
I particularly enjoyed the doo-wop music that kept the cast singing, swinging and swaying as they all pitched in to become furniture and prop movers. Notable among the movers and shakers was Madeline Weinstein, who plays the role of the hippie daughter Debbie. This amusingly staged activity by the ensemble gives designer David Zinn's smartly spartan settings their mobility. Although I believe that this has become traditional, it seems to have been enhanced musically, all to better enjoy the many welcome breaks between the stretches of high-toned blather.
In the prologue, a scene from Henry's play, House of Cards a husband (solid work by Josh Hamilton) suspects his wife that is unfaithful when he finds her passport has been left at home when she supposedly was off to Switzerland. The unseen lover, presumably the author, is immediately encountered in Scene 2 married to the cheating actress in his play. This time, Henry, as played with an irrepressibly arrogant charm by Ewan McGregor in his Broadway debut, is having a tryst with the cuckolded actor-husband's wife, Annie (of Scene 1). Maggie Gyllenhaal is terrific as Annie.
Neither Henry's wife, Charlotte (a superb Cynthia Nixon) nor Annie's husband Max (also played by Hamilton) is as immediately aware of their spouses' affair as they are of Annie's current secondary interest in rescuing a political activist from prison. Amidst niceties and crudities, the affair is eventually exposed, and four lives are rearranged.
Henry —a strict constructionist when it comes to marriage, love and use of words— and Annie — a free-spirited liberal whose marital commitments need constant re-enforcing— are now married. They become embroiled in another escapade when Annie recruits Henry to change and polish her anarchist friend Brodie's (a scarily funny Alex Breaux) awful play. While performing it she has a dalliance with Billy, the young, good-looking leading man, as convincingly played by British actor Ronan Raftery. The emotional traumas and unsettling of their relationship force them into re-defining their love as "the real thing.”
If Stoppard's exploration of fictional stage life, theatricalized real life and love is intentionally dense, it is also indefensibly glib. The cast wend their way with dexterity through the author's brittle and erudite ideas about commitment, conscience, and infidelity. I was especially taken with Nixon, a Broadway veteran and an Emmy, Grammy and Tony Award winner, who brings to the play a super sophisticated chic. She is particularly stunning in the wardrobe designed for her by Kaye Voyce. In complimentary contrast to Nixon, the equally radiant Gyllenhaal is dressed with a sexy stylishness.
A large dollop of glamour, however, goes a long way in dressing up a spectacularly verbose play that begins to wear a little thin long before it's over. But, for those who expect and rely on words and lots of them to ultimately take precedence over wardrobe, this is The Real Thing.
