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That Mamet's farce lacks the slap-in-your-face force it
might once have had is, of course, in part thanks to Mamet for
his widely breeding, in this and subsequent work, a unique
brand of contempt for such soulless types as Charlie Fox (Greg
Germann) and Bobby Gould (
Jon Tenney). Also, the lack of impact
might stem from a certain predictability as well as a too
convenient momentum-shifting linchpin. The language is pure Mamet, heavily rhythmical with what
have come to be accepted as street-smart accents, littered with
machine gun repetition and alternating streams of overlapping
interruptions and blank stares. His language becoming a known
commodity, of course, carries with it a further wonderful touch
of unreality: that the characters in a Mamet play have
apparently never seen a Mamet play. The play is structured A-B-A, the two outer scenes taking
place in the office of the new head of production Gould as he
and underling Fox prepare to pitch a can't-miss
sex-and-violence exploitation flick to the studio boss. The
middle scene takes place in Gould's home, to which he has lured
beautiful temp secretary Karen (Silverstone) by asking her to
give him coverage on a popular (among East Coast intellectuals)
book prophesying the end of the world. To Gould's surprise, Karen has become taken by the book and
erupts in a series of increasingly intoxicated soliloquies on
why Gould should make it into a movie for "good." In the
process, Silverstone finds unexpected dimensions in Mamet's
flat language as she amplifies and explicates, pouts and
whines, in an extraordinary, uninhibited and totally adorable
exhibition of verbal foreplay. Silverstone also stands out brilliantly in part because her
function in the play is one-dimensional, whereas the roles of
Fox and Gould in their more unstable reality are relatively
complex. As a result, Gould, who realizes that Karen is indeed
a serious threat to his well being, and Fox, who while knowing
that he cannot entirely dismiss practical considerations would
kind of like to try, have to resolve the issue of which movie
to make. Germann does so with a manic, spastic spin that never lets
up, gripped by hysteria at the least suggestion that there are
other realities besides his. At the other end of the emotional
spectrum, Tenney pushes the vacuous state of Gould's mind to
the edge of an abyss of nonexistence, challenging the others to
engage, instinctively knowing how much they depend on him. Running through March 25, the production has time for
Germann and Tenney to further tweak their performances within
the solid framework provided by director Randall Arney for
Mamet's unbounded size and energy. But there is no denying that
Silverstone's performance alone makes going to the play not
only worthwhile but, for Hollywood types, essential. Reuters/Hollywood Reporter
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Fueled by David Mamet's
infernal dialogue machine and by a spectacular tour de force
from 
