June 2016
I’m
not sure what to make of Long Lost by Donald Margulies, which just ended at the Manhattan Theatre Club. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a play by
Margulies that failed to engage, but I wonder about this one, because…how do I
put this?…I’m not sure it’s telling the truth.
It
tells the story of the chaos thrown into the life of hugely successful
businessman David (Kelly AuCoin) when his long-estranged, slightly older brother
Billy (Lee Tergesen),
a drifter, a layabout and a manipulator, and the
cause of past family trauma, appears unannounced in David’s office, looking for
a place to stay, temporarily. David resists, but then Billy drops the
bombshell: He’s dying. (He says.) David’s wife Molly (Annie Parisse) is not happy that David
caved to the pressure and doubtful about Billy’s claims…and then there’s the
effect Billy’s starting to have on their almost-adult teenage son, Jeremy (Alex Wolff) who has both his mother’s
cynicism and his father’s susceptibility.
Basically,
Billy is a malignant narcissist, classically so. Yet, Margulies plants seeds of
ambiguity. This is indeed valid, up to a point, as narcissists thrive on that
benefit of the doubt; but there are late-breaking plot developments suggesting
that not only is Billy more ethically layered than he may have appeared for
most of the play; but that David may be less so. On the one hand—this is a
classic technique of contemporary drama; the leaving of room for debate, thus
enhancing the themes being explored. On the other hand—it makes the play itself
feel a little manipulative, as if you’ve been asked to believe one reality
simply to experience a kind of gotcha, fooled you as
we head toward endgame. ("Yes, Billy’s toxic, but, guess what, toxicity was
already in play. Can’t blame him for everything!")
Which strikes me as a little different than resolving the tease of a mystery.
It’s
almost as if Billy himself had written the play, to get you to see his side of
it.
All
this said, Margulies is, as always, a supremely gifted storyteller and
dramatist. Long Lost isn’t dull for a
moment, and it’s acted with all the honesty the text allows, under the clean,
no-frills, no-comment direction of Daniel
Sullivan.
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