Review - A Delicate Balance

I'm sure I've mentioned before how much I admire Edward Albee's A Delicate Balance.  It's one of my very favorite plays - like most college students, I'd read Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf in school, but not much else.  When I got to grad school, A Delicate Balance was on our season.  I watched all eighteen performances.  I was completely mesmerized by the language, the power and the utter hopelessness portrayed on the stage.  The arias, the profound truth.  I just adored it.  Then, after I moved to New York, the great Lincoln Center revival of the play took place.  I saw it at least five times.  That production is one of the best I've ever seen, from top to bottom, just superb theater.  Rosemary Harris, George Grizzard and Elaine Stritch are my gold standard.

When this revival was announced, I admit I was a bit apprehensive - I'm not really a huge Glenn Close fan.  I find her a bit...something.  Studied, maybe.  I feel like I can always see the performance instead of the character.  I realize I'm in the minority, but ah well.  I'm often in the minority.  But I was prepared to be proved wrong because the play she's starring in is just that brilliant, plus, on paper, she's just sort of 'right'.  I've been waiting for months to see the show, and due to much sturm and drang, I finally made it there last night, two weeks before it closes.  And I was...disappointed.

I felt like I was watching a historical re-enactment of a play instead of a play.  Everyone was talking, but no one was living.  At least I didn't see it.  I didn't feel the hopelessness or the rage.  I heard people talking about their pain and terror and rage, but I didn't believe it.  It was lovely, like a painting, and everyone was so...careful.  Beautifully spoken, but sterile.  Inert, even.  Now, I completely understand that this is a valid interpretation of this play and of this type of WASPy family.  But there HAS to be something underneath.  What's the point otherwise?!  Albee is all about the underneath!  I didn't see the underneath.  And I was heartbroken.



photo credit: Sara Krulwich

At times, I felt as if they were trying to hypnotize me, or put a spell on me, using that gorgeous dialogue in a soporific way; as if when they pronounced the words oh so carefully, the meaning would just appear.  Well, no, it didn't.  At least not to me.  I also became obsessed with the costumes, which to me, were just hideous.  I was fuming in my mind about these costumes, which made me realize I was displacing my anger about the play.  Oh, that wacky displacement. 

I did feel that the actors playing Harry and Edna, the neighbors who appear and move in because of their 'terror,' were quite good.  I saw the surreal qualities that I love in this play as they sit alongside the naturalistic settings.  Edna, in particular, was quite frightening at times, which I thought was great.  But on the whole, for me, this production missed the mark.  And I had such high hopes.

I was ready to adore this production, just as much as the last one I saw, because just because you love one thing, doesn't mean you can't love another.  I loved both of the last revivals of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf I've seen.  I've really enjoyed the last couple of revivals of Gypsy, too.  I wanted to love this one and I'm so sad that I didn't.