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August 19, 2005
TT: Imagine there's no Lennon
Friday again, and time for the weekly postmortem...er, Wall Street Journal drama-column teaser. This time around I slit the throat of Lennon and report on Terrence McNally's Dedication or The Stuff of Dreams:I give the cast full credit for trying to make something out of nothing, but halfway through the first act I was muttering, "Bring on the deranged assassin!" Alas, "Lennon" needed no Mark David Chapman to supply the coup de grâce: It was dead on arrival....
Terrence McNally has a way of writing plays that start well, then go off the tracks. "Dedication or The Stuff of Dreams" is a good example of this bad tendency. For the first half-hour or so, it's a witty, agreeably sentimental backstage play about a middle-aged theatrical couple (Nathan Lane and Alison Fraser) who gave up their dreams of stardom to run a small-town children's theater. Then it hits a pothole and turns into a problem play about a cranky, cancerous grande dame (Marian Seldes) who wants Mr. Lane to euthanize her. Then it hits another pothole and turns into an overripe melodrama about sexual frustration. By the end, Mr. Lane is wearing a dress--but I'll stop there....
There's plenty more where that came from--and this week the Journal has posted a free link to my review on its "Today's Free Features" Web page. To read the whole thing, go here, with the compliments of The Wall Street Journal. Stagebloggers, take note!
(As always, I encourage you to subscribe to the Online Journal by going here. It's soooo worth it.)
Posted August 19, 2005 12:04 PM
