I SAW A PLAY, ONCE. . .

"Frank's Home"

by Richard Nelson, directed by Robert Falls, featuring Peter Weller in the title role and produced by Goodman Theatre.

So Pleasant!
O, God! Why must I suffer these pleasant, little, drawing room dramas? Ok, so it was on a beach, not a drawing room. Whatever, lacking an antagonist, the drama never arrived. Wright's antagonists in life were his clients, and that's where Richard Nelson, the playwright, could have looked for one or two or, what the heck, a boatload of 'em. Well, Mr. Nelson did write in that pleasant, little, school-teacher client, for whom Wright was building a school house, and, oh, yes, Mr. Nelson, also, wrote in Wright's daughter's fiance: a pleasant and handsome banker, who offered to procure clients for Wright from amongst his own clients at the bank.

The casting was top-notch, and the acting was superb by all, especially Peter Weller as Wright.

. . . but it was all so pleaant and low-key and casual and pedestrian and . . . and what? WITHOUT DRAMA!!!
No antagonist = No drama. It's a law of the universe, for heavan's sake!

Ok, ok, ok, I've calmed down.
May I digress, please?
The foundation of theatre is the relationship between the Dramaturges and the Audience.
Dramaturges being everyone associated with the production. The footlights make a good dividing line. When something is going wrong with a production, the cause can be found in that relationship. If something is going to go wrong with a production, the cause will come through the doorway marked Audience. The Audience on this particular evening appeared old, tired and disinterested. Ergo, the production was a perfect mirror of the Audience. BUT, you say, the play was written well before that particular audience ever bought tickets. Yes, but, I say, Goodman Audiences are, by and large, old, tired and disinterested. Oh, yes, they are! Subscription Audiences are the pits--by and large.

The solution for all of this is for someone on the stage side of the footlights to take command of the production and to shout orders to those people out their in the audience to "WAKE UP!"
I mean this literally. Then does the drama in Frank's Home, as meager as it is, have a chance of being saved, truely.