Tracy Letts's "August: Osage County' on tour (2nd review)

BSR contributor Neal Zoren and I attended different performances of August: Osage County— when we saw the 2007 Broadway production several weeks apart, and again last week when we saw the touring production two days apart at the Forrest Theater in Philadelphia.

Neal preferred the tone of the current version; I did not. For me, the traveling cast played August: Osage County mostly as a comedy. I missed the serious drama that prevailed in the Broadway version. Those actors expressed strong emotions when confronting suicide, addictions, infidelity, child molestation and incest. Wouldn't you, if this were your family?

Zoren felt that what he saw in New York was "intense" (not necessarily a negative criticism) and "oversized." Some but probably not all of our feelings are attributable to the fact that we saw different performances in both cases.

What sets August Osage apart from other plays about drugs and alcohol"“ like O'Neill's Long Day's Journey Into Night "“ is playwright Tracy Letts's insouciance about those situations. Nevertheless, August: Osage County is primarily a drama, and I'm disappointed that Anna D. Shapiro, its director since the beginning, is now allowing or encouraging the actors to mug for laughs.

Begging for laughs

August Osage provides plenty of laughs, to be sure. But they work best when they come because of our knowing recognition, not because an actor is begging us for a reaction.

As the play unfolded here, I marveled at how strong a work it is, and how well it holds up even when substantially reinterpreted.

The two most disappointing changes came from Jon DeVries as Beverly Weston, the alcoholic professor and family patriarch, and Estelle Parsons as his drug-addicted wife. On Broadway Professor Weston appeared to be a dignified exemplar of culture and erudition. Here in the touring production, DeVries played Beverly with stilted artificiality.

This posture may be an accurate depiction of how some alcoholics speak, but it's off-putting and doesn't serve the drama. It's crucial to the arc of the play that we start by thinking of Beverly as an admirable man. His likable side should predominate. Then we will experience more shock when we learn about some of his darker secrets.

Parsons in overkill

Deanna Dunagan was outstanding as Violet in New York. Parsons's performance was a magnificent re-creation, but wrongheaded in one regard. In the first act, Parsons rendered Violet literally unintelligible. Her squawks got laughs from the audience, but we already knew that Violet was impaired by drugs; this was overkill. Later in the play, the blisteringly bitter Parsons was excellent as she attacked each of her family members, in effect serving us acid on wry.

In the interplay of actions vicious, funny and sad, last week's Tuesday night cast members repeatedly pounded the comic lines and subordinated the reality. Perhaps the Thursday night audience, which included Neal, was quieter and left the cast more relaxed. Neal characterized the touring cast as "more subdued, calmer and more natural... a close, knowing family." That wasn't what I saw.

Nevertheless, this is a rich and multi-faceted play.♦


To read another review by Neal Zoren, click here.