Michael Riedel: Trouble With "Garden"

[Patti LuPone FANatic]

Posted: 6/30/10 at 8:48am

Michael Riedel's newest column from the NY Post.



It's summertime, and the big Broadway players are all running around the Hamptons. So I'm afraid I'm going to have to pick on the little guys who are stuck in the city.

But even that has its pleasures.

Off-Broadway's Peccadillo Theater Company is reeling from last week's item about Edward Albee walking out of a reading of his 1967 play "Everything in the Garden," which Peccadillo was considering for a full-scale production.

Albee kept muttering, "No, no, no" during the interminable first act. He was, I'm told, dismayed that a play he considers to be a sharp comedy of manners was directed as if it were a molasses-paced Method acting exercise.

He bolted at intermission, followed by his longtime producer, Elizabeth I. McCann.

Kevin Kennedy, managing director of the Peccadillo, fired off an angry e-mail to Albee and McCann, a copy of which he also sent to me.

I asked McCann if she wanted to respond.

She said: "I'm too busy. You respond."

What a good idea!

Kennedy defends the director of the reading, Dan Wackerman, a co-founder of the theater and its artistic director:

Mr. Wackerman was also unhappy with the 'Method-like' approach of some of these actors, none of whom he had ever worked with before. [He] pointedly reminded them that they were playing a comedy of manners.

Let me get this straight, Kevin. Your reading goes so poorly, a legendary playwright leaves in disgust. But rather than take responsibility as the head of the theater, what do you do? Blame the actors!

Never mind that they worked on Monday, generally their day off from whatever show they're in, to participate in your reading for a measly $100. You pin the disaster on them, and then run them down in e-mails to America's greatest living dramatist and a leading Broadway producer.

I spoke to one of those actors, who said: "Dan gave us one note. He said, 'This is like an Oscar Wilde play.' So we were very broad and very mannered. It was fun. And Dan told us we were great. He was very effusive in his praise. And now they're blaming us?"

Kennedy also writes:

It is patently unfair, given the time restraints, to subject a reading of this sort to the kind of scrutiny we see today in Mr. Riedel's column.

Well, Kevin, you certainly didn't hesitate to order your press agent to send out a release announcing the reading. A quick check reveals articles on Playbill.com, Broadwaystars.com, BroadwayWorld.com and Show Business, to name a few. Clearly, you wanted attention.

But attention can be a double-edged sword, as it's often followed by "scrutiny" -- which, as you now know, can cut off your legs.

Finally, Kennedy fumes:

Attendance at this reading was "by invitation only" and press was not invited. As Mr. Riedel was not in attendance, his column today amounts to a review by hearsay, ensuring that Mr. Riedel need not take responsibility for smearing both Dan Wackerman's reputation and the reputation of The Peccadillo Theater Company.

Au contraire! I'm happy to take responsibility for smearing people. And when I get it wrong, I own up. For example, I was told that Billy Crudup was at the reading and that he, too, left early. But apparently Crudup's got a doppelganger running around town because he was in Los Angeles last week, his press agent informs me.

I'm happy to set the record straight.

But Edward Albee was at "Everything in the Garden." And when he bails on a reading of his own play in plain view of the audience, that's not "hearsay."

It's juicy theater gossip, and it gets around.

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Updated On: 6/30/10 at 08:48 AM

[After Eight]

Posted: 6/30/10 at 9:01am

I attended this reading, and didn't think the actors were bad at all. John Rubenstein, in particular, was excellent. Moreover, we're not talking about a full-scale production here. I think Riedel was wrong to pick on a no frills reading by an excellent company that always does interesting work of high quality, and whose current "Another Part of the Forest" is one of the best productions now playing, on Broadway or off.

As for "Everything in the Garden," the reading in question got better in the second half, but the play is likewise better then. If Albee had stayed till the end, perhaps he would have enjoyed it more.

But having also seen the original production with Barry Nelson and Barbara Bel Geddes, both excellent, I think the problem is with the play itself. It's just not very good. It lacks sufficient bite for the satire it aims to be. And it dawdles in the first act.

So don't blame the company or the actors. The play's the thing, or in this case, not the thing it should be.

[dramamama611]

Posted: 6/30/10 at 9:12am

I dobn't think Riedel was 'blaming anyone'. He seemed to just be dishing....and pointing out the flaws in how the company poorly handled the situation.

[newintown]

Posted: 6/30/10 at 10:04am

I admit that this is, guiltily, my favorite kind of gossip - it's what a certain historian once identified as "the march of folly," that is, when someone makes a mistake or fails, and then, rather than simply saying "I made a mistake," they invest their time and energy in shouting that they did NOT make a mistake or fail, it was someone else's fault, or the event is being misinterpreted.

Rather than fighting through the morass of rationalizing and justifying, can't Wackerman and Kennedy, just say, "we made a mistake and are moving on?"

On further thought, though, screaming from the morass is going to get them a lot more attention than dignified adult behavior. And what does an Off-Broadway company need more than attention? Only cash.

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 6/30/10 at 10:05am

I admit that this is, guiltily, my favorite kind of gossip - it's what a certain historian once identified as "the march of folly," that is, when someone makes a mistake or fails, and then, rather than simply saying "I made a mistake," they invest their time and energy in shouting that they did NOT make a mistake or fail, it was someone else's fault, or the event is being misinterpreted.

*Cough*HunterJennMeredithChris*Cough*

[Borstalboy]

Posted: 6/30/10 at 10:44am

Oh, I don't know. This could go either way. Having seen Albee interviewed by a friend up close and personal, I can tell you he is one prickly character, very quick to condescend and declaim how wrong you are about any idea. And Lord knows he's one of the worst interpreters of his own material (anyone catch his directed-within-an-inch-of-its-life Cherry Lane revival of SANDBOX/AMERICAN DREAM? I've never seen actors with the life squeezed out of them like that).

One thing playwright, company, actors and director in this situation AREN'T, however: A completely failed actor like Michael Reidel. SO glad he found something to make all about him. Kudos you f**king mediocrity!