Theater can take you to so many places, and two shows that opened last week demonstrate the possible range — a classic modern tragedy at Cincinnati Shakespeare and a contemporary comedy at Ensemble Theatre. Take your pick — they’re both winners.
The production of Arthur Miller’s 1949 Pulitzer Prize-winning Death of a Salesman is coinciding with the 100th anniversary of the playwright’s birth. It’s unarguably one of the great plays of the 20th century, and Cincy Shakes’ artistic director Brian Isaac Phillips has put together a masterful staging featuring two of our region’s finest professional actors.
Bruce Cromer pours himself into the weary nowhere man, Willy Loman, a traveling salesman at the end of his sadly frayed rope. He admits to being “a little tired,” but he’s way beyond that. He lives in a world of self-aggrandizing fantasy, haunted by his past, roads not taken and wrong-headed decisions. He vacillates between blaming others for his plight — especially his weak-willed son Biff (Justin McCombs) — and reverting to glories that never actually happened in a life that was truly humdrum. He yearns to be remembered, but of course, he’s not done much worthy of recollection. Cromer runs the gamut from delusion to regret in an anxious, wrenching performance.
Opposite Cromer is Annie Fitzpatrick as Willy’s devoted wife Linda. She clearly loves him and his efforts to provide, even while recognizing his shortcomings. She strives to buoy him up no matter what sad turn of events boils over, but Fitzpatrick does not play Linda as a doormat: When she angrily confronts Biff and his ne’er-do-well brother Happy (Jared Joplin) about how they’ve disappointed and angered Willy, she’s steely and no-nonsense, defending her man, even though she knows he’s as much or more to blame as they are. The play closes with Linda at Willy’s graveside, almost tearlessly mourning; we realize that the tragedy is as much hers as his.
McCombs looks a tad boyish to be a faded, onetime football star, but when he finally stands up to his father and says he needs to follow his own path, it’s a show of strength — even though it leads to a sad end. He’s the one who says, “We never told the truth in this house,” and that’s the sad reality of past lies, denials, expectations and demands that permeate the story. Of his father, he says, “He had all the wrong dreams. All, all wrong.”
Phillips has drawn fine performances from the company’s acting corps — Barry Mulholland as the evanescent Uncle Ben, Willy’s successful older brother; Jim Hopkins as Charley, the boisterous next-door neighbor who’s Willy’s only real friend; and Billy Chace, as Charley’s nerdy son Bernard, who attains the success that Willy wished for his own sons. Kelly Mengelkoch plays “The Woman,” a louche business contact with an oppressive laugh who Willy dallies with, and Josh Katawick is Howard, Willy’s callous boss. They stir the vortex of this sad man’s downward spiral.
If Miller’s sad play sounds too tragic, I can recommend Jonathan Tolins’ Buyer and Cellar, receiving its regional premiere at Ensemble Theatre. Nick Cearley’s one-man performance as the shopkeeper of Barbra Streisand’s basement mall had me laughing out loud, even when I knew what was coming.
Inspired by Streisand’s coffee-table book, My Passion for Design, Tolins imagined an actor recruited to maintain the “shoppes” and provide customer service to the only customer who drops by to browse, banter and barter. Cearley plays all the characters — Alex the actor and his gay partner Barry, Streisand and her husband James Brolin as well as Sharon, the crusty property manager of the Malibu estate.
In a 90-minute monologue, Cearley slips from character to character as Alex recounts his astonishing adventure. He conjures Streisand with simple gestures — hair-stroking, head-turning, odd diction and a touch of neurosis — but does so lovingly. The show could become a snarky gossip-fest, but it doesn’t, thanks to Tolins’ clever writing and Cearley’s performance. Streisand and Alex don’t exactly become friends, but confidences are exchanged. And Alex is strengthened by his outlandish experience. (Find a full-length review at citybeat.com.)
DEATH OF A SALESMAN, presented by Cincinnati Shakespeare Company, continues through Nov. 7. BUYER AND CELLAR, presented by Ensemble Theatre Cincinnati, will be onstage through Nov. 1.
This article appears in Oct 21-27, 2015.
