A special light snaps on before a backdrop of stars and there stands Kathleen Turner and the audience gives her due applause. I love Kathleen Turner for being one of those movie stars that regularly returns to Broadway and now Matthew Lombardo has written a great play and a great role for her. She is aged, grizzled, throaty––like an elderly Lauren Bacall. Her deep smoky voice fills the house, but she slurs a bit and seems to take in deep breaths of air to get through slices of her many speeches. Yet, a few minutes in, especially when she begins to engage with Stephen Kunken as Father Michael and Evan Jonigkeit as teenager Cody, she becomes transcendent. Directed by Rob Ruggiero, this small play quickly becomes riveting. The story is about Sister Jamison Connelly (Turner) who is given the task of trying to rehabilitate the drug addicted nephew of Father Michael. After a first trying consultation, Sister Jamison Connelly insists that she won’t be able to handle such a severe case––that the boy should be turned over to the state. Father Michael, feeling guilty about his distant relationship with his now diseased sister, feels he must protect and help Cody and insists that Sister Jamison Connelly try to work with the teen. What follows is a series of both comical and harrowing episodes between the nun and the boy. Faith is a strong theme in the play and each character has their own version of God’s place in their lives––each prays for the best outcome and it is left open as to whether the ending represents what was best for the boy or simply what was inevitable. This is a serious and tragic story, though the author finds numerous ways of inserting humor and Ms. Turner is particularly adept at landing a punch line. A number of stars of a certain age could succeed in this great role of Sister Jamison Connelly, but right now it is Kathleen Turner and she triumphs. Holding his own to this monster performance is Evan Jonigkeit who is bound to be honored with a Tony nomination, for he can match Ms. Turner round for round. Kunken is likable, but somehow insignificant by comparison and I didn’t believe he believed what he had to say in his important speeches. He needed to have the voice of conviction that perhaps this actor simply isn’t able to bring to the role. That is a small missed step in an otherwise terrific production.
Nicely reviewed. Ive been following your site for a little while now and this is my first posting, I disagree with you on a few points, but otherwise a cogent response to the play.
ReplyDeletePerhaps you saw an odd night, but I had no problem with Ms. turner gasping for air. On the night that i saw the play she was all stamina and verve through her speeches. I felt the main problem with Sister Jamison was that she too often would be cursing and worldly and then shocked by Cody's past admissions to the point of speechlessness and unprofessionalism. Ms. turner does her best to play these moments and she's pretty darn successful, but to me the character as a whole lacks veracity.
As for Mr. Kunken. He is a terrific actor who I have seen be great many times in other shows. In this role he unfortunately doesn't have the showy material that the others do. The believability factor of the actor is more about the character. In my opinion a byproduct of a man whose beliefs are not in line with his actions. A man in power...who is uktimately a weakling at heart. That being said, I actually found his understated performance to be most welcome opposite two performances that due to the demands of the material force two actors to teeter dangerously close to melodrama.
I also found it interesting that you think you could see other actresses in the Sister role, I wonder as Mr. Lombardo is also the author of "looped" how many other productions of that play there are. In subsequent casts/productions I wondered who you thought of. I came up with a few other actresses for down the line. Cherry Jones, Diane Venora, Judith Light, and although shes too old...wouldn't Shirley McClain have been great in her day.
Thats all. Again keep up the good work.
our ideas for other actresses as the Sister are just the people I would have suggested.
ReplyDeleteAnd perhaps I should have specified, because I actually did like Father Michael's role as a contrast two the other two showy roles as you did, but more specifically, his scene where he tells the Sister his version of how God works didn't register with the conviction of someone who believed it so thoroughly that it would impress me (the audience) as well as the Sister, the way it might have in other hands. If that had happened, I would have been hooked by him completely. Let's take an odd example that applies: In the old days, in the movies of course, had it been done by either Gregory Peck or even Bing Crosby, there would have been an unfailing sense of total believability in that same scene. It's a thing I can't put my finger on exactly that comes from the right actor (though I'm not sure that either Peck or Crosby would have suited that role as a whole--he's not their kind of priest.). Stagewise, I suppose I would have liked to see a younger Christopher Plummer do the scene.
Also, perhaps the Sister's ability to cuss with abandon and her shock at the boy's story of his childhood horrors are two different things--one does not necessarily mean that she is strong enough to handle the other.
Uh...that first word in my post should be "Your"
ReplyDeleteInteresting. Although I think that the examples of priests you mention...Crosby, Peck, Plummer all seem to belong to a different world than this play. It seems you are looking for a kind of morale absolute or centeredness from your religious figure that just isn't who this character is....to me at least. But who wouldn't want to watch Plummer do anything? Although father Michael... If we take him at face value is a work a day priest with a crumbling facade and a slightly corrupted center...and I definitely got that. That being said I do also agree with you that the priest doesn't get to articulate his faith very well. I throw this at the authors feet though not at the actors. I would have loved the father to answer the same question he posed to the nun..."why did he become a priest?"
ReplyDeleteBtw, what did you think of the set?
The set: I am into simple settings and I think what was done was really all the play needed. Something more realistic would have been nice, but it wouldn't have served any necessary purpose. The outer space star drop was pretty and perhaps better than just a black void, though a black void, which is what we'll see in regional productions to come, will serve the speeches just as well. This show will eventually play in really small spaces--black boxes. There may only be the two chairs and an end table and really, what else is needed. So, it was nice to have the automated movement of the few walls and the star drop to help fill a Broadway stage and still keep the show simple.
ReplyDeleteYou are right: I am not finding the right example for my ideal priest for this play.
OH NO! The critics hate this play. My experience just wasn't that bad. I basically liked it. Oh well. No one knows anything really, right?
ReplyDelete