I lucked out last night and received a last-minute comp ticket to the final preview performance of The Unavoidable Disappearance of Tom Durnin by Steven Levenson. It opens tonight at Roundabout Theatre's off-Broadway house, the Laura Pels. I knew I wanted to see the show, since I'm a huge fan of David Morse - his performance in How I Learned to Drive is one of my very favorite performances ever, and hello, he was Jack on St. Elsewhere. Love. I hadn't heard much scuttle on the show, so I went in with an open mind. I have been reading some online commentary today, which I've been finding interesting...
I will say, though, that I went into the theater last night in a bit of a bad mood. Although the day started with happy tears over the defeat of DOMA, there were some frustrated, sad tears when my Roger lost at Wimbleon. Argh. I may do a separate post on trying to move on from that. And to make things worse, getting to my seat about twenty minutes before curtain meant I had to listen to the guys behind me talk about how Roger is through. Seriously, who talks about tennis in the theater?!?! I mean, I think about it, but what are the odds I'm going to have to be subjected to men just twisting the knife in my heart a little more?! By the time the show started, I was worn out. I was also tired of my seat neighbor on the right hogging my armrest. I need to learn new armrest etiquette, or how to protect my personal armrest space, I guess. Anyway. I digress. As usual.
I enjoyed The Unavoidable Disappearance of Tom Durnin, though I will admit that I wasn't quite sure how it hung together as a play. But each scene had fascinating character development and realistic, smart dialogue. I was completely engaged during each scene, but when I think about the play as a whole now, I'm not quite sure what I was supposed to get from it.
David Morse plays Tom Durnin, a former attorney who is returning home after five years in prison. Christopher Denham played his son, James, with whom he stays for a bit. Lisa Emery is Tom's ex-wife, Rich Sommer is Tom's son-in-law and Sarah Goldberg is a quirky young woman James meets in community college. The production is well-acted across the board - David Morse does a good job of keeping the audience guessing his intentions. I felt sorry for him, then hated him, then felt sorry for him. It was an interesting tightrope walk. He did terrible things, destroyed his family, then comes back and feels he should re-take his rightful place at home. The way he goes about it, though, shows that the last five years (hey! that would make a good title for a musical! ha ha) in prison have given him a hardness and a way of dealing with people that probably isn't appropriate 'on the outside.' You can see his survival instincts kick in whenever he feels threatened, and some of what he does is truly evil. But is it justified? Should he be forgiven? It's a question that permeates the piece, but there's no real throughline to get a satisfactory answer.
A lot of the online chatter mentions that Christopher Denham plays his role in a monotone way. Well, yes, he does, in a way, but I completely understood how this young man had been completely destroyed and demoralized by his father's imprisonment and his mother's despair. He is trying to rebuild his life, and you see bits and pieces of it in his interactions with his new community college friend, but his father's return is bringing it all back to him. I got the whole generational slacker/entitlement/questioning thing, but it had a deeper resonance for me that I bought. But I guess I can see how if you're not really engaged in his journey, you wouldn't really enjoy the actor's methodology. I guess.
Lisa Emery is her usual wonderful self, bringing so much seething rage to her role as the wronged ex-wife. But you can also see her hope and attempts to move on with her life. Both of her scenes are charged and quite good. Rich Sommer is terrific as the ineffectual son-in-law and the scenes he plays with Morse are fantastic, especially the ones that take place in the back seat of a car. You can feel the claustrophobia and sweat. Sommer is trying to do the right thing, but he's also weak, so he just sort of dithers along. Which raises Morse's temperature a little higher each scene. It's really good work and they exhibit excellent acting chemisty.
Sarah Goldberg is a little too quirky for my tastes, but I did mainly enjoy her performance as the troubled young woman in James' community college class. Though the costume designer needs to get rid of those tinkly bracelets asap. They drove me INSANE. And if the point was to make the character more annoying by adding the bracelets? Didn't work in a character way, sorry.
So, on the whole, excellent acting, terrific writing in each scene, plus an interesting story line made The Unavoidable Disappearance of Tom Durnin an enjoyable evening for me. Even if I don't quite get how the whole play added up. I had a vaguely terrifying moment on the way out of the theater though: there were quite a few people who were having trouble navigating the stairs out of the house, so there was a pileup trying to get out. Fine, no hurry, we'll all take our time. But the people behind me started pushing to get out. I suddenly had an image of a Who concert in an Ohio town. I had a brief moment of panic that if a fire started, I would be crushed. Thankfully, the Laura Pels isn't that big of a theater. The crowds opened up and I maneuvered my way out. I don't think I unduly jostled anyone who was having difficulty with the stairs. But maybe there needs to be a better escape plan the next time I go...
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