The Father Previews

I have heardgreat things about this play....also looking forward to early reports

So, no one is going to tonight's first preview?

I'm just settling in back at home after the first preview and despite an interesting start and a few visual tricks I didn't much care for The Father.



The show begins with Andre (Frank Langella) being scolded by his adult daughter, Anne (Kathryn Erbe) that he can't keep scaring away the nurses she hires to come take care of him. She is getting too busy, and furthermore she is contemplating a move to London- the play takes place in Paris- with her new boyfriend; Anne hasn't had a relationship in over ten years when she split from Antoine. Blackout.



Scene two. Andre is in the flat when a man walks in and startles him. What are you doing in my flat? Who are you? The man identifies himself as Pierre, Anne's husband of ten years. He reminds Andre that they took him and calls Anne to come home and calm her father. Anne enters, but now played by Kathleen McNenny. Andre doesn't recognize her and doesn't know what's going on. Anne hands Pierre some chicken to prepare in the kitchen and he exits. Blackout and Kathryn Erbe is back on stage as Anne. She denies ever bringing chicken home and the kitchen is empty.



At this point I was very intrigued. I assumed we were in some Alan Ayckbourn set-up with perhaps Andre being in the same apartment with two different families who had occupied the flat in two different eras or something like that. Whatever it was, the audience was going to be in for a fun mystery to solve.



Unfortunately it didn't go that way and it quickly became crystal clear what was happening. Names and actors and settings and details continued to be jumbled, but it was obvious you didn't need to pay attention to them because there was nothing to figure out.



They really should have reset the play in New York because there wasn't anything remotely Parisian or European about any of the performances. I remember they tweaked the God of Carnage script for American audiences and I think changing the setting would have behooved them here as well.



Langella was good and you can tell he's enjoying his showy role. The rest of the cast is fine. None of them really have much to sink their teeth into.



I would like to see the British production. Definitely seems like the type of thing they do better than we do.

What was the run time?

The new norm

I'm putting the visual tricks in a spoilers box...I really don't think you should read it if you're going to see the play.

Saw this tonight and am definitely in the positive camp. It's not a feel-good night of theater, but it is a challenging piece that is, at once necessarily obvious and ultimately devastating.

Frank Langella is a theatrical treasure and impresses me more every time I see him on stage. The remainder of the cast is not given as much to do, but that is the nature of the subject matter and what it's like in real life.

I'm still digesting the play, but I wonder if I would have liked this as much, if it wasn't telling the story of my family and my life. Dementia and memory issues are rife in my family (my mom & 2 of her sisters) and I have been primary caregiver. I found myself nodding, numerous times, with serious recognition, even at some of the most difficult scenes in the piece.

The play is non-linear, so if linear storytelling with traditional plot and character arcs are your preference, this is not for you. I'm not sure it sheds a lot of light on something more and more folks are having to deal with and, to be fair, I'm not sure it can. Every dementia situation is, like autism, unique to that individual.

The staging is effective and as jumbled as everything else. Doug Hughes does a very effective job keeping everything from slipping into chaos.

I think, if you have any connection to a similar situation, by the end, Langella will leave you a mess. I won't give spoilers, but I have personally witnessed and lived the exact final scene of this play. It is soul-crushing.

Many sniffles, including the usher sitting near me who said it had been the first time she watched it through. Poor guy two rows in front of me put his head down sobbing. I felt for him. The audience cheered quite loudly at the end, much of it, I believe, for Langella and it was well-deserved.

It was another show but I believe it was a different name.

This was not the show I was thinking of.

Perhaps the other show was Match in 2004? Ray Liotta costarred.

That may have been it.



Just saw it today. May have been Langella's best performance to date. His performance is heartbreaking as you see a man affected by dementia slowly lose it all. Erbe plays his daughter.The part has not much to it and she does not project well. At times, you have to strain to hear her. TDF gave us mid orchestra and we still had issues with her low voice as did others around us.



See it for Langella who may walk away with another Tony this year.

^And it now looks more likely that the four nominees for Best Play this year will be Eclipsed, The Father, The Humans, and King Charles III.