Welcome to a new Wildcard Wednesday! This week, I’m sharing the latest in our “potpourri” series on midcentury Broadway plays, specifically comedies, that I’m reading for (mostly) the first time. In this entry, I selected three more titles performed at some point by I Love Lucy‘s marvelous Vivian Vance, who was born 115 years ago this week!
KISS THE BOYS GOOD-BYE (1938)
Logline: All the weekend guests at a Westport estate hope to dissuade a Hollywood executive from picking a southern unknown to play the leading role in a forthcoming epic.
Author: Clare Boothe | Original Broadway Director: Antoinette Perry
Original Broadway Cast: Millard Mitchell, Helen Claire, Frank Wilson, Ollie Burgoyne, John Alexander, Edwin Nicander, Carmel White, Philip Ober, Sheldon Leonard, Hugh Marlowe, Lex Lindsay, Benay Venuta, Wyman Holmes
Thoughts: On its face, Clare Boothe Luce’s Kiss The Boys Good-Bye is nothing but a bombastic lampoon of the public search for an actress to play Scarlett O’Hara, offering an opportunity to satirize Hollywood hype, Southern clichés, and media eggheads. And indeed — it’s got all that, with ripe parody as a result of this topical subject and big characters all designed for comedy. But, true to the author’s form, the play also injects pointed social criticism, deliberately, via the inclusion of a conservative news tycoon, his very liberal columnist, and a conviction-less magazine jokester — all representing an elite class meant to contrast with the southern belle. A lot of this — including their debates about politics and news and humor — feels gratuitous in the context of the story, except as an excuse to earn a moment where the most strident of the three, the leftist columnist whose contempt for the south has been palpable, finally compares the attitudes and culture of Dixie with the fascism of Nazi Germany. It sounds like hyperbole — especially from a character defined by Luce as an extremist. However, in her introduction to the published text, she reveals that the perspective of the columnist is hers as well — the play’s thesis — and she was disappointed in herself for not making it clearer. Her opinion is compellingly expressed there… but she’s right, it’s totally lost in the play, first because she denies credibility to the liberal by having him depicted as both a jerk and a communist, with a polemic rigidity that isn’t pleasant and would have been alienating to most audiences of the era. And, more importantly, the southern girl is rendered too sympathetic to be a viable stand-in for a Nazi — she’s framed as an outsider underdog in a cruel house where almost everyone treats her rudely and/or condescends to her as an idiot. Oh, she is an idiot — in fact, she’s blatantly racist and hypocritical and exhibits many negative traits, but it doesn’t mater, as the arc of the play finds her triumphing over the snobby northerners, inevitably becoming its hero. Accordingly, this thematic failure — which muddies Kiss The Boys Good-Bye‘s focus — ensures that it never reaches The Women’s insight or Margin For Error’s clarity. And that’s a shame, for it’s otherwise quite funny — with a lot of good characters (Vivian Vance played the Hollywood vamp in the touring company), and I’d like to see it staged because it’s a fascinating snapshot.
Jackson’s Rating: 6.5/10
OVER 21 (1944)
Logline: A glamorous writer spends six weeks trapped in a cramped Florida bungalow to help her middle-aged husband get through his Army Air Corps training.
Author: Ruth Gordon | Original Broadway Director: George S. Kaufman
Original Broadway Cast: Ruth Gordon, Kay Aldridge, Carroll Ashburn, Jessie Busley, Eddie Hodge, Philip Loeb, Dennie Moore, Beatrice Pearson, Tom Seidel, Loring Smith, Harvey Stephens
Thoughts: The first play written by actress Ruth Gordon — who also starred in the original production — Over 21 (or Over Twenty-One) has a handful of sound comic setups that are enough to predicate an enjoyable three-act comedy: an urbane Hollywood writer is forced to play homemaker while slumming it in a cramped Florida bungalow as her middle-aged newspaperman hubby struggles to keep up with rigorous Army Air Corps training while also resisting the call of a former partner who wants him back at the news desk. All of that’s cute, with much room for screwball-esque humor that would have played well, especially in the early 1940s. However, I have to be honest — Over 21 is under par. I can imagine how the unique and charming Gordon may have enlivened the material in performance — it is said that she got laughs where none were expected on the page (which jibes with what we can see of the work she left behind on film) — but nothing that’s set up in the plot, as succinctly described above, is fully maximized for comedy within the storytelling. With crescendos that never come, and opportunities for direct tension, both comedic and dramatic, that seem actively ignored, very little of the inherent promise in Gordon’s ideas are felt within the text as a piece of theatre. And in terms of laughs, the writing, specifically, is meandering when it should be pointed, and obvious when it should be clever, which has the effect of really downplaying most of the amusement value, and diluting some otherwise suggested potential on behalf of character. I think the ending does its best to whip itself up into a madcap mania, and I admit I do enjoy the added complication (implausible though it is) of the Hollywood bigwig descending on the bungalow to pester Gordon’s character before eventually inspiring her with a reference to the 1938 M-G-M film Test Pilot — which is earned because of his depiction as a fairly clichéd movie man — but it never gets to hilarity. The stakes always feel low due to the writing style and the disappointing application of decent ideas within story. Ultimately, I come away thinking this is just a dull play. And if you don’t have Ruth Gordon, why even revisit it? (Incidentally, Vivian Vance played a secondary role in a lengthy USO touring production.)
Jackson’s Rating: 4/10
LIGHT UP THE SKY (1948)
Logline: Opening night for a new play in its out-of-town tryout proves to be an emotional roller coaster for the young, idealistic playwright experiencing his first taste of the theatre.
Author: Moss Hart | Original Broadway Director: Moss Hart
Original Broadway Cast: Virginia Field, Sam Levene, Barry Nelson, Philip Ober, Phyllis Povah, Glenn Anders, Audrey Christie, Jane Middleton, Bartlett Robinson, Donald McClelland, S. Oakland, John D. Seymour, Ronald Alexander
Thoughts: An ensemble comedy with a cast of big characters that runs on one set over just a few hours, Light Up The Sky is the kind of play I like, emphasizing human interaction sans gimmicks, and with the reliable Moss Hart as author, my expectations were high… Well, I’m afraid it never reaches the heights of, say, Hart’s (& Kaufman’s) The Man Who Came To Dinner, and there’s no figure as brilliantly relayed as Whiteside. But each of the major roles (excepting the secretary) is distinctly depicted with an eye on laughs (several were allegedly based on real people: the actress on Gertrude Lawrence; the producer on Billy Rose, the director on Guthrie McClintic), and its plotting is expert, aiding the comedy simply by structure. Of course, it’s another showbiz satire — taking place at the out-of-town opening of a new play — in the star’s hotel room before the performance (Act I), right after (Act II), and then hours after (Act III). Yet each act has its own comic idea — the first sees the actress, director, and producer speaking with exaggerated, self-satisfied reverence about the play, a highfalutin allegory that nobody else has seen except her mother (Vivian Vance took this role later in life), who snuck into rehearsal and is now warning of disaster — creating comic tension as we brace for the worst. Act II indeed reveals it was a dud, with laughs coming from the quick turnaround by the actress, producer, and director, who alternatively want to bail and/or make big changes to the play they were just praising. And Act III, which occurs hours later, finds the producer’s bankrolling wife trying to unload the investment on a naive Shriner who saw the performance, before they all learn that it actually got smash reviews — yielding another turnaround that shocks the now-disillusioned playwright. All three work — thanks, perhaps, to big changes during Sky’s own tryout, as Hart injected more comedy, removing some smug sermonizing about the theatre and its commercial corruption. There’s still some of that here — showbiz about showbiz is unavoidably self-important, even when cynical — but it’s mostly played for yuks by characters who also feel like genuine ambassadors of the industry. Oh, Sky is ultimately not a stellar piece, for the leads are caricatures whose raison d’être Hart also tries to venerate, which is a tough line to walk, but I’d like to see it live — it’s actor-focused and finely constructed.
Jackson’s Rating: 7/10
Come back next week for a new Wildcard! And stay tuned Tuesday for more Curb!