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Jerking us around >>When it comes to theatre, comedian Steve Martin is not so wild and crazy by AMY BARRATT
We knew Steve Martin could write comedy sketches and occasional, albeit short, columns for the New Yorker--but a full-length play? Actually, no. Lapin Agile is a Spandex play: it's been stretched out to cover 90 minutes, but it's really a one-act. This is not to say it makes for an unpleasant evening at the theatre. It's cute, it's fun and I was home in time to see the season opener of ER. But is it art? The question has to be asked because the play itself is so preoccupied with what art is and what constitutes genius. "Take a couple of geniuses, put them in a room together and... wow," says aged barfly Gaston in the play. That's the germ of the plot. The two geniuses are 23-year-old Picasso and 25-year-old Einstein. The "room" is a Paris bar called the Lapin Agile. These two men are Martin's nominations for the greatest minds of the 20th century but, as one character points out, there has to be a third: "Father, Son, Holy Ghost, there's always a third point to the triangle." In the course of the play, a couple of bids are made for this post. The first is a vaudeville-style joke, tailored to Martin's home audience: Schmendiman, inventor of an inflexible building material to be used almost exclusively in southern California, claims that his name will be remembered alongside Einstein and Picasso. The second candidate (a mystery "visitor" whose identity I will not reveal) is a visual gag, but not quite a joke. It's rare for me to get this far without mentioning the actors. The reason is that they're fine. Eleanor Noble as Picasso's squeeze Suzanne could bring her pitch down a notch, but neither she nor any of the other performers (Paul Essiembre as Picasso, Eric Woolfe as Einstein, Peter Smith as the bartender, Barrie Baldaro as Gaston, Maria Syrgiannis as Germaine) is the problem. Christina Poddubiuk's set, decorated with faux Toulouse-Lautrecs and Matisses, is gorgeous. It may be a touch too realistic, though, for a play with pretensions to experimentalism. Again, trying not to give too much away: something happens near the end of the play that, coincidentally, echoes a line in that dreadful new version of "Candle in the Wind" by Elton John. I'm afraid that the emotions evoked by this play are scarcely more real than those manipulated out of us by that song. At the Centaur Theatre, 453 St-Francois-Xavier, until Oct. 19
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Just a couple of points before we get started. One: I've liked Steve Martin ever since he was wearing an arrow through his head. Nevertheless, two: Centaur wouldn't be doing Picasso at the Lapin Agile had it been written by Joe Schmoe. It's just not that good a play.