| Kid makes good >> Mark McKinney is remarkable in Fully Committed by AMY BARRATT
The production casts Kids in the Hall and Saturday Night Live alumnus Mark McKinney as a poor schlub working the reservations desk at one of Manhattan’s trendiest restaurants. McKinney didn’t write the one-man show, but the actor and the material are such a good fit, he might as well have. His sketch-comedy background serves him well as he portrays a total of 39 characters without so much as putting on a hat. The text, by New Yorker Becky Mode, focuses on Sam, a struggling actor. It’s the busiest month of the year, December, and Sam comes into work to find that, instead of being one of three clerks on duty, he’s all alone. Over the next 90 minutes (which is meant to represent a whole day), he’s forced to deal with one crisis after another, on an empty stomach and a full bladder. The set, by James Noone, represents a scuzzy, windowless room that the patrons of the chi-chi restaurant will never see. McKinney wears a headset, allowing him the freedom to move about the space. He has nothing but his voice and physicality, and one lighting trick, to create the various co-workers who call from elsewhere in the restaurant and the many desperate patrons on the line. The performer of this piece has to be absolutely sure of himself if the illusion is to work. The minute he stumbles over a line, the whole thing could unravel. Happily, McKinney never once stumbles. On the level of memorization alone, this is a remarkable piece of work, and the blandly handsome kid, like a good magician, makes it look easy. I’m particularly fond of his evocation of the rich lady who phones repeatedly wanting to speak to the maître d’-every time McKinney morphs into Carol Ann Rosenstein-Fishburne, he adjusts his imaginary shoulderpads. Sure, a lot of the minor characters are stereotypes-gay, Jewish, even Japanese-but that’s not McKinney’s fault. The playwright didn’t conceive of these callers as sympathetic, three-dimensional people. We do feel for Sam, because he’s a decent guy who could probably get away with being a lot ruder to the callers than he is. By halfway through, I was hoping he would tell management to take this job and shove it. But Sam finds an even better way to get what he wants, and simultaneously leave the doormat side of his personality behind. Fully Committed may not be high art, but it sure makes a fun July evening. And if you call for reservations, remember to be nice to the box-office babes. : Fully Committed, to July 21, at Centaur Theatre. Evening Tickets $39.50/32.50 students & seniors. Sat. & Sun. Matinées $34.50/28.50. Box office 288-3161 >> Stage Listings |
Anyone who’s ever answered phones for a living should get a kick
out of Fully Committed, this year’s Just for Laughs theatre offering,
currently running at Centaur theatre-where, incidentally, yours truly
once answered phones as a box office clerk.