Off-Broadway Reviews—"The Qualms," "Of Good Stock," "The Spoils"

The Qualms
Written by Bruce Norris; directed by Pam MacKinnon
Performances through July 12, 2015
Playwrights Horizons, 410 West 42nd Street, New York, NY
playwrightshorizons.org

Of Good Stock
Written by Melissa Ross; directed by Lynne Meadow
Performances through July 26, 2015
Manhattan Theatre Club, 131 West 55th Street, New York, NY
manhattantheatreclub.com

The Spoils
Written by Jessie Eisenberg; directed by Scott Elliott
Performances through June 28, 2015
The New Group @ Signature Center, 480 West 42nd Street, New York, NY
thenewgroup.org

Kate Arrington, Jeremy Shamos and Sarah Goldberg in The Qualms (photo: Joan Marcus)

Having won the Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award for his 2010 world premiere at Playwrights Horizons, Clybourne Park—a play far worthier in theory than in execution—Bruce Norris returns with his latest, The Qualms, again indulging in his predilection for words—mainly, parsing what people say to one another—to the detriment of all else.

Swingers Gary and Teri have invited newcomers Chris and Kristy to a party at their beachfront condo where, after drinks, hors d'oeuvres and small talk, the invitees—who also include friends Deb and Ken, and Roger and Regine—pair off for wife- and husband-swapping. The other couples' relaxed and carefree attitudes intrigue Kristy but unnerve Chris, who starts arguing with the others on the slightest pretext about anything. 

If you go to this play for sex or nudity, don’t bother, since Norris isn’t interested: a short scene when each partner pairs off with another is short-circuited by Chris erupting angrily after Regine teases him with face slaps. Chris then insults Deb's weight, Ken's androgyny, Gary's hippier-than-thou temperament and Roger's tough-guy persona, resulting in Ken finally knocking him down and Chris becoming a pariah among a pretty liberal group of people, which embarrasses Kristy, who’s obviously itching for spice in their (her?) life.

After setting up this uneasy situation among normal, everyday people, Norris short-circuits it by having Chris go too far, to the point where it becomes apparent that being aggressively pedantic and jealous would almost certainly have prevented him from even attending this party, however enticing the thought of an orgy might have been in the abstract. Despite such implausibility, Jeremy Shamos plays Chris with such intensity and brilliant bitchiness that he makes us at first root for—then, later, against—him, even when Norris ramps up his reactionary reactions against the others.

Really, there's not much of a play here—a late appearance by a delivery man is designed to extend the flimsy plot for a further few minutes with cheap laughs, while Teri’s final monologue adds little—but Pam MacKinnon's skillful direction and an accomplished cast get the job done. Although Shamos is the stand-out, Sarah Goldberg’s appealingly smoldering Kristy and Noah Emmerich’s hilariously matter-of-fact Roger are not far behind. And it all takes place on Todd Rosenthal’s astonishingly enticing set of Gary and Teri’s condo that’s almost (but not quite) in Ikea-like bad taste.

Jennifer Mudge, Heather Lind and Alicia Silverstone in Of Good Stock (photo: Joan Marcus)

The set is also the thing in Melissa Ross's Of Good Stock, where master Santo Loquasto—winner of 3 Tony awards and 18 Tony nominations, along with 3 Oscar nods for Woody Allen's Zelig, Radio Days and Bullets Over Broadway—has fashioned a Cape Cod summer cottage so warmly enriching and homey that anyone would want to kick the actors out and move in.

Not that Ross's play is totally negligible; far from it. Exploring how three grown sisters have been screwed up by their famous novelist father's legacy—along with how he treated them and their saintly mother while alive—Of Good Stock introduces down-to-earth Jess, the oldest, fighting cancer and living in the family house (now hers) with food writer husband Fred; headstrong Celie, the youngest, who arrives with her latest boyfriend Hunter, one of 13 siblings from Missoula, Montana; and high-strung Amy, the middle one, newly engaged to Josh and flaunting her impending wedding to the consternation of the others, even her fiancé.

Ross, whose characters and dialogue alternate between funny and poignant, acerbic and sentimental, sweet and crude, has engagingly written about a too-familiar subject. But her ear at times turns tin: everyone drops F-bombs as casually as DeNiro and Pesci in Raging Bull, which wouldn't be bad if the play's pivotal scene—the sisters, outside the house at the dock after a night of drinking and arguing, finally let their feelings out by yelling "Fuck Dad," “Fuck cancer,” ad nauseum at the top of their lungs—didn't go over the top with the same expletive. Having the F-word already scattered throughout the play sucks the emotion out of what should be a powerful moment of catharsis for the sisters and the audience.

Slickly staged by Lynne Meadow, the play features several fine performers, with Jennifer Mudge’s Jess as subtle as Alicia Silverstone’s Amy is shrill. Still, a decent production of a decent play on an outstanding set is a not-bad way to spend a couple hours.

The cast of The Spoils (photo: Monique Carboni)

Jesse Eisenberg, who specializes in narcissistic geeks as an actor, has been writing those same parts for himself as a playwright. His last play, The Revisionist, was insufferable; his latest, The Spoils, is less so, but still wears out its welcome long before it ends. It concerns Ben (Eisenberg, of course), a borderline sociopath who enjoys mocking everyone and everything, mainly his roommate Kalyan from Nepal, along with Kalyan's Indian girlfriend Reshma, who at least sees through Ben. 

Eisenberg piles incident on top of incident as Ben embarrasses others and himself as he loutishly talks and talks, and insults and insults: it's amusing for a while, but a little of it goes a very long way, as Eisenberg the actor and Ben the character aren’t as charming and Archie Bunker-ishly loveable as Eisenberg the playwright thinks they are. A 75-minute one-act might work, but 2-1/2 hours and two acts don’t. 

Not once but twice Ben goes into a lengthy—and unnecessarily explicit—description of a dream he once had about Sarah, a childhood friend he wants to take from Ted, another grade-school buddy with whom he just reconnected; then there’s the entire second act, which comprises another long and unfunny digression, this time of all of the characters punning on the phrase "I can't believe it's not butter," followed by desultory showdowns between Ben and each character in turn.

The final moments—Sarah’s lone memory of Ben as a nice person (albeit in grade school), dragged in out of left field in a belated attempt to bandage his reputation as a jerk—are a playwright’s desperate but failed attempt at meaning. But with Scott Elliott's lively directing on Derek McLane's purloined Manhattan apartment set and finely tuned performances by the cast (even Eisenberg in his motor-mouthed, single-minded way), I can’t believe it’s not better.

The Qualms
Playwrights Horizons, 410 West 42nd Street, New York, NY
playwrightshorizons.org

Of Good Stock
Manhattan Theatre Club, 131 West 55th Street, New York, NY
manhattantheatreclub.com

The Spoils
The New Group @ Signature Center, 480 West 42nd Street, New York, NY
thenewgroup.org