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A CurtainUp Review
The Body of an American
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"
You're right: There is definitely a lot of boredom up here."— Paul Watson
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Michael Cumpsty (top) and Michael Crane (Photo: T. Charles Erickson)
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Dan O'Brien's The Body of an American, playing at Hartford Stage before moving to New York, examines the lives of two men, their creative processes, the ghosts that haunt them, their search for themselves and their symbiotic need for connections. The play is based on the true story of Paul Watson, the photographer who, in 1993, took the widely-disseminated Pulitzer Prize picture of Sgt. William David Cleveland, the soldier dragged through the streets of Mogadishu. It wants also to be the story of a growing friendship between Watson and O'Brien, a character in his own play.
Instead of a more conventional format, O'Brien spends 90 minutes giving us both a travelogue and a peek into the process of writing, a subject more endearing to fellow writers than audiences. The travelogue is Watson's avoiding his inner conflicts as he circles the world on assignments to India (where he interviews Mother Teresa), Kosovo, Pakistan, Iraq, Burma and the Arctic where, after countless exchanged e-mails, he and O'Brien meet in person, talk about the cold and go on a dog sled ride.
O'Brien, haunted by personal ghosts of his childhood, has been pursuing Watson because he wants to write about debilitating apparitions. Watson has been fighting his own demons since the time he took his famous photo. Then, he thought he heard the dead soldier say, "If you do this, I will haunt you forever."
Wherever he goes, Watson can hear that admonition until, exorcising his guilt, he phones Cleveland's family — first his mother, then his brother — leading to the evening's one true doozy of a dramatic scene. But that highlight is a long time coming. Before, we have to endure narrative devices in which the characters tell us how they feel. Playwright O'Brien also has a tendency to self-conscious metaphors like, "boys running naked like a snake along a river's blood-red spine" and "the sea is an undulating eternity of black sludge."
Director Jo Bonney has her hands full, dealing not only with the prevailing stasis but also with the play's form. In addition to playing O'Brien and Watson, the two actors play Somalians, NPR's Terry Gross and several others. Throughout, they often split identities, so one may finish the other's sentence. Bonney has the men circling one another for much of the evening, keeping the action fluid.
Mainly as Watson, Michael Cumpsty is adept at showing the empathy beneath a journalist's objectivity, commingled with guilt about having to maintain that very objectivity in the face of misery and death. As O'Brien, Michael Crane is bristly, edgy and subjective.
Backing scenic designer Richard Hoover's bare stage, Alex Basco Koch's projection design places us in specific locales. So effective are they that they suggest The Body of an American might work better as a film. But first, get rid of the meta-theatrical framework of a writer's travails and stick to the dramatic tale of a journalist's maneuvering the divide between private humanity and public impartiality.
Our London critic saw another production of this play in a tiny theater and was moved enough not to be bothered by David's problems with the structure. To read that review go here .
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The Body of an American by Dan O'Brien Directed by Jo Bonney CAST: Michael Crane (Dan), Michael Cumpsty (Paul) Scenic Design by Richard Hoover Costume Design by Ilona Somogyi Lighting Design by Lap Chi Cu Sound Design by Darron L. West Projection Design by Alex Basco Koch Dialect Coach: Deborah Hecht Casting: Binder Casting, Jack Bowdan Dramaturg: Elizabeth Williamson Production Stage Manager: Lori Ann Zepp Assistant Stage Manager: Alisa Zeljeznjak Associate Artistic Director: Elizabeth Williamson Running time: 90 minutes, no intermission Hartford Stage, Hartford, Conn., Jan. 7-31, 2016 Reviewed Jan. 15, 2016 |
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