McCarter Theatre Center presents Nilo Cruz's 'Bathing in Moonlight'

What’s on stage at McCarter’s Berlind Theater, however, doesn’t live up to the hype or my hopes.

An old trope

Some compare Cuban-born Cruz to Tennessee Williams, and the melodramatic premise of Bathing in Moonlight might have worked early in Williams’s career. Catholic Father Monroe (Raul Méndez) is in love with parishioner Marcela (Hannia Guillen) in modern-day Miami. She loves him too, and her family, daughter Trini (Katty Velasquez), mother Martina (Priscilla Lopez), even estranged brother Taviano (Frankie J. Alvarez) like him.

The tortured father, however, is sworn to celibacy. “God wants us to remove barriers and extend the parameters,” he says after telling a charming story. But his idea of a loving god doesn’t mesh with the Catholic Church’s priestly requirements.

There was a time when such a thought would be controversial, when the Church was a commanding authority in our culture (especially, but not only, for Catholics), and an illicit affair more scandalous. Today, the Catholic Church has been battered by its own hypocrisy; obeying strict medieval celibacy rules enforced by a church that systematically protects pedophile priests from prosecution is laughable. Michael Rudko plays church mouthpiece Bishop Andrews, who says, “There are some things that can never be questioned in the Church.” Oh, really? Ask Pope Francis about that.

As for affairs — well, we need look no farther than both major parties’s presidential candidates to see how much society really cares.

Were I prone to outbursts in theaters, I would have yelled, “Just resign and be happy!”

A family overlooked

As Cruz focuses this 110-minute play on Monroe, he abandons the other characters, all brightly played and interesting. I’d love a play focusing on Guillen’s poised Marcela, a single mother and pianist trying to start a home hat-sales business, and her smart teenage daughter, who wants to study marine biology. Matriarch Martina often drifts to her glamorous Havana past, dancing in the moonlight again with her late husband, played by Alvarez. A play about these three living together would be fascinating. Taviano Jr., arriving home after two years at medical school with a big surprise, just adds more intrigue and dredges up old conflicts. Rich stuff.

Instead, Cruz traps us in a dark church with Father Monroe. “Do you want me to describe how happy and miserable I feel since I met you?” he asks Marcela. Don’t worry, he does. He also says things like, “Kiss me here, in the house of God,” which might have worked 60 or 70 years ago (with a make-up darkened Burt Lancaster playing the Latino priest, of course, orchestral strings swelling on the soundtrack), but today just feels trite.

More galling is that in Philadelphia, we never see plays like this. No professional local company has staged Anna in the Tropics or any Cruz play yet, and we seldom see plays by Latin playwrights or casts with Latin actors. (It’s a familiar Catch-22: Philadelphia won’t have more minority actors until theaters produce more plays with minority roles, but theaters won’t produce those plays because we don’t have enough minority actors.)

Bathing in Moonlight occupies precious space and resources that could support a good play about modern Latin American life.