"Other Desert Cities"

Last night, Ed treated me to a performance of a play called "Other Desert Cities."  I can say without hesitation that it was the best play I have ever seen.  This is what I always thought theater in New York would be like, and I just can't say enough about the script, acting, set, or costumes.

The fabulous Stockard Channing as Polly

The whole play is set in the living room of a house in Palm Springs over the course of Christmas Eve. Two adult children, Brooke and Trip, have come back to visit their aging parents, Polly and Lyman. Brooke is a recently divorced author who has moved to the East Coast and has a history of depression, while Trip lives in LA and produces a court TV show a la "Judge Judy."  Polly, a witty, sardonic Texas girl who moved to California to write movie scripts after college, is retired now.  Her husband is also retired, though in his youth he was a prominent movie actor until his buddy Ronald Reagan made him an ambassador. Both parents are thoroughly old school Republicans, and both children are more liberal, though Brooke can't keep her strong opinions to herself while Trip is kept busy defusing these tensions with jokes in an effort to keep the peace.  The fifth and final character is Aunt Silda, who lives with her sister and brother-in-law after a recent stint in rehab for alcoholism.  She's sarcastic, funny, and merciless, and is initially much more sympathetic than her sister Polly, though that dissolves as the story unfolds.  Obviously, there's already plenty there to make a plot, but the meat of the story comes to light when Brooke announces that her second book, the reason she was able to pull herself from a six-year spiral into depression, is a memoir focused on a dark chapter in the family's history.

Aunt Silda

So much was remarkable about this play that it's hard to know where to start.  It struck a perfect balance between being funny and deeply tragic.  Polly, Trip, and Silda all use black humor to deal with discomfort, and they were busy dealing out witty quips because this play was absolutely wrought with tension.  The dialogue was sharp and intelligent, but the characters made each of their lines completely believable.  The caliber of the acting in this play was superb.  I was curious to see how Stockard Channing, who was once Rizzo in the movie Grease, would pull off a role like this; little did I know that she's been a serious stage actor for most of her life.  The New York Times speculated that this may be the best performance of her career, and it's hard to imagine her being better than she was in this play.  Stacey Keach, who plays her husband, is at once lovable and formidable, and reminded me sharply of older, conservative men I have known.  The other three performances were stellar as well, but I was completely blown away by Channing and Keach.  Trip is clearly the wisest member of the family, but as he's also a wise ass, so his keen insight isn't immediately apparent.  My loyalties throughout the charged drama shifted continuously.  At first I sided with Brooke, then with her parents, then back to Brooke again, and then I wasn't sure who was right.  Trip found himself stuck in the middle most of the time, and Aunt Silda took Brooke's side until the unraveling of family secrets left her completely without allies.  One thing that was striking to me was the palpable love and anger with which each family member seemed to be overflowing.  It's a tough dichotomy to portray, but each of the actors on the stage accomplished it seamlessly.

Lyman comforts Brooke

And what a stage.  The setting included an exposed rock wall made of pale desert stones, a working gas fireplace, and a blue, rippling light off to the side of the stage that cast the kind of reflections on an outside wall you'd get from a swimming pool.  There were magazines on the tables and set of glass shelves on a side wall bearing an ice bucket and decanters of various liquids.  (All of the characters except Silda visited these shelves often.)  And Ed and felt like we were in the middle of this realistic living room. He got us second row seats, which was at once fantastic and wrenching.  We both commented during intermission that we felt as though we were guests at a family home in which a feud had broken out, and I couldn't shake the feeling that one of the characters was about to look right at me and ask me what I thought.  I can't think of a better play to be close to, though.  I was privy to the subtlest changes in the actors' expressions, and it was spectacular.

This show should win every award there is, and then some.