Hyperbolically speaking, some dramatists might call the actors in the new play by Matthew Lombardo at the Huntington Theatre 'a cast to kill for.' After all, the lineup in this world premiere (but not a Huntington production) of his comedy "When Playwrights Kill" features such Tony Award— winning actors as Beth Leavel ("The Prom"), Matt Doyle ("Company"), and Marissa Jaret Winokur ("Hairspray"). Unfortunately, while these talents and others in the cast do their best on the Huntington mainstage, savvy Hub theatergoers may end up wishing they could follow the lead of Lombardo's title with regard to the play's problem-ridden script.
Inspired by problems regarding the 2019 revival of his own earlier (2002) one-woman play "Tea at Five" with Faye Dunaway portraying Katharine Hepburn (also at the Huntington mainstage), Lombardo has created a theater diva named Brooke Remington (Leavel) who plans to return to Broadway in a one-hander named "The Return." Theatergoers familiar with Dunaway's controversial run in "Tea at Five"— where she was accused of allegedly slapping a crew membe— are likely to call her to mind as Remington proves to be consistently difficult with her director and production staff as she rehearses her role. Jack Hawkins, the author of "The Return" and a Lombardo persona, discovers that Remington has ongoing difficulties memorizing her lines and requires special ear cues to remember them (something that Dunaway— who says she is bipolar— reputedly needed as well in the earlier play).
These difficulties make Hawkins understandably anxious about carrying off the scheduled three-week run of the play in Boston before the Tony Award cutoff. Along the way, the money— focused producer Freddie Carlton (Adam Heller) insists that the well-known diva will help production costs. The veteran director Oliver Kendall Walker (Kevin Chamberlin) displays amazing patience with Remington, while the harried stage manager Liz Jennings (Marissa Jaret Winokur) struggles to keep her cool.
By the time the Boston run opens— at the Colonial Theatre no less, Hawkins is virtually at his wit's end. At this point— the close of the first act, the playwright concludes that the diva must die. Sadly, Lombardo's first act seems as problem ridden as the story of the play within the play. Stereotypes are employed with annoying frequency— among them that all actors are crazy and that producers only care about investors. The latter stereotype effectively disregards the many producers who pay as much attention to the artistic quality of the work as to its financial success. Theater buffs who see shows on Broadway as well as locally should certainly recognize the names of two such producers— namely Daryl Roth ("Three Tall Women") and Boston's own Spring Sirkin ("Skylight" and "The Faith Healer").
Overwrought farce becomes even more pronounced in the second act. As Hawkins devises ways to kill off Remington, Lombardo's unsatisfying writing makes facile references to disturbing murder options in plays by Shakespeare and Tennessee Williams in ways that are frankly insulting to their authors. At other moments in the play, there are also essentially unmemorable references to such significant dramatists as Orton, Marlowe and Terrence McNally. A standout demeaning moment involves a very large Gummy Bear— that resembles a sculpture by pop artist Jeff Koons— that calls into question the intelligence of binary drug dealer Tobias Deschanel that Hawkins calls on for a high milligram pill for drug-addicted Remington.
Under Noah Himmelstein's sharp direction, cast members prove real troupers. Matt Doyle has all of exasperated Hawkins' insecurity and frustrations. Beth Leavel properly goes to town as the histrionic diva so that some humor does result. By contrast, Kevin Chamberlin smartly understates the struggles of weary Walker. Marissa Jaret Winokur makes the most of Jennings' underwritten role, while Adam Heller does the same with annoyingly money-fixated Carlton. Despite stereotypical aspects of the role of Deschanel who prompts Remington about her lines, very talented Tomas Matos proves a high energy and sometimes amusing scene stealer.
Does Hawkins' opening straight jacket attire prove a kind of metaphor for the play's future problems? Not surprisingly, playwright Hawkins laments the trimming of "The Return" to a mere 57 minutes. In Lombardo's case, such cutting might help his overwritten two-hour effort (including one intermission). Without major changes, though, the producers of "When Playwrights Kill" would do well to put any Broadway run on hold for now.