Billy & Ray
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Cititour.com Review
When you see a play titled “Billy & Ray” is directed by TV legend Garry Marshall, you might expect a sitcom-like work about two vastly male brewery workers in Milwaukee who become best friends. As it happens, you’d only be partly wrong.
Mike Bencivenga’s dramedy, now at the Vineyard Theatre, is actually about the complex working relationship between the Austrian-born film director Billy Wilder (Vincent Kartheiser) and the noted all-American mystery writer Raymond Chandler (Larry Pine) during the making of the 1944 film noir “Double Indemnity.”
While this is a subject that could be handled with extreme depth, especially as the movie was one of the most challenging projects ever undertaken in Hollywood because of the limitations of the Hays Production Code, Bencivenga has given the story an endearing, often funny, yet slightly superficial treatment. Meanwhile, Marshall has helmed the two-hour piece with the precision he gave to the best episodes of “Laverne & Shirley.”
Most of the play takes place in Wilder’s studio office (well designed by Charlie Corcoran), where more arguing (by both men), drinking (by both men), and joking (mostly by Wilder) goes on than actual writing. And while the show’s constant exploration of the two men’s differences in behavior and supposed moral structure is interesting; sadly, what we do hear of the film’s script and its genesis is actually the most fascinating material on the stage.
Kartheiser, the show’s marquee name due to his role on AMC’s “Mad Men” as advertising executive Pete Campell, gives an almost whimsical performance as Wilder, landing Bencivenga’s gags with aplomb and emphasizing Wilder’s so-called “charm.” Still, he fares extremely well in the show’s few truly dramatic moments, notably when the director receives an alarming letter from the State Department. Pine, one of the theater’s most reliable actors, delivers yet another worthy turn, showing both Chandler’s outward appearance of rectitude and his inner struggle with sobriety and self-doubt.
As it happens, the stars are sometimes upstaged by the two supporting players in the cast. Wilder’s sassy secretary Helen is portrayed by the gifted stage newcomer Sophie Von Haselberg – who has inherited both the looks and the brilliant comic timing of her mother, Bette Midler. Meanwhile, Broadway musical star Drew Gehling proves that he doesn’t need to sing to shine as Wilder’s frustrated producer, Joe Sistrom, who is always one step away from moving back to Brooklyn.
I wish Benceveniga hadn’t ended the piece with all the actors breaking the fourth wall to tell us the fates of the film and its characters. We already knew happy days were ahead for Billy and Ray.
By Brian Scott Lipton
Visit the Site
http://www.vineyardtheatre.org/billy-ray
Cast
Vincent Kartheister, Larry Pine, Sophie von Haselberg, Drew Gehling
Open/Close Dates
Opening 10/1/2014
Closing 11/23/2014
Box Office
866-811-4111
Theatre Info
Vineyard Theatre
108 East 15th Street
New York, NY 10003
Map
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