Theater Review by Samuel L. Leiter . . . .
The idea behind Ronnie Larsen’s sentimental farce, The Actors—now playing at Theatre Row—is, for all its seeming improbability, so comedically promising it seems likely someone has used it before, even if not in the same way: a lonely, depressed, gay bachelor, missing his late parents, hires actors to impersonate them, thus filling the emotional gap in his life. Perhaps we should consider calling Larsen’s play, which mingles broad comedy with poignant feeling, a farcedy.
Without further research for works with similar plots, I can’t verify my suspicions, but I can point to Family Romance, LLC, a fiction-based 2019 film by documentarian Werner Herzog about an actual Japanese company that rents actors out for similar assignments. A quote describing the film says: “Werner Herzog follows Family Romance founder Yuichi Ishii on several different ‘jobs,’ questioning the nature of loneliness and how the modern world handles the absences where our cultures say important people should be. And this theme is built even into the film itself because it’s not one of Herzog’s documentaries, but a constructed story.”
Larsen’s play, which premiered in 2018, preceded the film, but there are certainly interesting parallels in not only the premise but the ethical and aesthetic complications regarding the line between truth and artifice that underlie both.
His needy hero is the chubby, nerdy, but not unintelligent, 54-year-old Ronnie (Larsen himself), living in his gray, nondescript apartment: bedroom on our left, living room/kitchen on our right. Stone Dog Studio did the set, Laura Turnbull the costumes, Leonardo Urbina the lights, and Stuart Meltzer the sound, all of which do their respective jobs efficiently.
Ronnie’s ad for actors brings down-on-their-luck, middle-aged thespians Jean (Jeni Hacker) and Clarence (Allen Lewis Rickman) to his door, seeking an audition. Each, insecure and desperate for work and money, engages in a casting scene during which the ground rules for their gigs are explained before they get a grip on just what Ronnie’s asking them to do. Everything seems above board, as the actors must sign contracts stipulating several hours of employment a week and salaries, which they comically negotiate; they also must sign NDAs. Funding the “project,” as Ronnie dubs it, comes from his mother’s inheritance.
Larsen, who plays himself as what could be a six-year-old, even donning oversized Superman pajamas, does a decent job of satirizing both the actors’ desperation and their determination to succeed. Even Ronnie’s being punished by his stern new dad for misbehavior is permitted within the parenting guidelines.
As the actors and Ronnie get into the swing of things, it’s inevitable that a real family dynamic springs up, with Clarence not only seeking to move in full-time but showing a spark of interest in Jean. Ronnie, pleased with the initial results, is soon struggling to control what is becoming a runaway horse. With boundaries crossed it becomes difficult for the actors to prevent themselves from confusing their roles with reality, hinting at a metatheatrical, Pirandellian world where the line between reality and illusion comes into conflict. Jean even suggests turning the situation into a play and selling tickets to it, a notion that Ronnie quickly shoots down: “Why would I want anyone to see this?” But intellectual concerns, while given lip service, play second fiddle to the opportunities raised for garnering laughs.
Ronnie is persuaded to hire a third actor, Jay (Gabriell Salgado)—Jean’s son—to play his younger brother of that name. Eventually, the real Jay (Jason Guy), from whom Ronnie’s been estranged, shows up, the charade comes to an end, and a satisfactory rapprochement and resolution brings the by now borderline schmaltzy proceedings to an end.
Larsen, who had several profitable shows Off-Broadway in the 1990s regrets having been unable to show them to his parents because they were too blue for their conservative Mormonism; he admits, in a program note, to the irony of now having a written a play his parents would have enjoyed, although he’d never have written it while they were alive. It was first produced in Provo, Utah, in 2018, the current production originating at Larsen’s South Florida theater, the oddly named Plays of Wilton (POW!).
Stuart Meltzer, who staged the earlier productions, resumes that job with a nicely calibrated work that includes one of the Florida actors, Jeni Hacker, giving a fine performance as the addled matriarch. The ensemble is equally balanced, with a spot-on job by Allen Lewis Rickman (full-disclosure: a former student of mine) as the avuncular Clarence, hungering to get as much from this gig as he can; a more straightforward turn from Jason Guy as the concerned, misunderstood brother; the hunky Gabriell Salgado as the faux version of that brother; and Larsen himself, shifting seamlessly from farcically infantile behavior to an adult striving to get a handle on a situation spinning out of control. Meltzer’s direction, despite a tendency to have actors stand at center, speaking to the fourth wall, manages to stress the play’s overt comic style while never losing the underlying humanity of the characters.
Despite the relatively consistent laughter at the preview I attended, I found The Actors only fitfully laugh-worthy, perhaps because the premise initially seems so outrageous. The characters agree that Ronnie’s plan is “weird,” but its psychological implications appear to go much deeper than that. However, by Act Two I’d accepted the situation and appreciated how deftly the play’s serious themes about human connection were made amid the punched-up comic activity. There also are several very funny moments in Act Two, but the two-hour play, on the whole, would benefit from losing 15 to 20 minutes.
Audiences seeking something amusingly lighthearted on the outside with a softhearted core inside will appreciate Ronnie Larsen’s The Actors.
The Actors. Through June 1 at Theatre Row (410 West 42ndStreet, between Ninth and Tenth Avenues). www.bfany.org
Photos: Russ Rowland
