Italian American Reconciliation
It’s telling that playwright John Patrick Shanley’s story about a bizarre love triangle set in New York’s Little Italy (the program says it’s the present, but the neighborhood presented here is a proper ethnic ghetto) isn’t presented straight-on, but as one man’s account of his best friend’s adventures with the fair sex. Aldo (John DeCarlo) is a proper Mama’s boy — she’s in the audience, don’t you know — neglected by Dad, terrified of women…but somehow comfortable telling the audience about the time he was buried in sand at the beach and got a slight erection at the sight of a bird. (Shanley’s Italian-Americans are stereotypically emotive, but also weirdly loaded with self-awareness and insight and ease of expression. Not many hot-blooded blowups involve a man shouting, “You never respected meekness as a virtue!”) Anyway, Aldo wants us to know about his pal Huey (Marco Kengott), a man so miserable at the outset that he’s been reduced to playing (and dressing) the part of melancholy poet. He’s got a swell gal named Teresa, but he can’t stop pining for crazy ex-wife Janice, even though she shot his dog. Why? “I want my power to stand up and be a man, to take, and I think Janice has it.” So yeah, there are women involved, but don’t be fooled by the talk of love: this is a tale told by a man about another man’s quest to regain his manhood. (Huey even declares, “Janice is like a hill I gotta take.” Swoon!) It’s a pity, because the women are pretty interesting when they’re considered as people instead of hills, particularly Lynnia Shanley’s Janice, whose great desire is just that. Director Charles Peters has his actors playing against the dialogue, broad and loud even as the subject matter is nuanced and intimate, and it helps keep things entertaining if not completely engaging. And his brick-alley set design gives us an inspired balcony for Janice: the black steel bars make a prison cell out of her self-chosen retreat above the fray. —M.L.