THE HANGOVER REPORT – Aubrey Plaza and Christoper Abbott hurl themselves at DANNY AND THE DEEP BLUE SEA, to mixed results

Aubrey Plaza and Christopher Abbott in John Patrick Shanley’s “Danny and the Deep Blue Sea” at the Lucille Lortel Theatre (photo by Emilio Madrid).

One of the hottest tickets in town this fall/winter season is the Off-Broadway revival of Danny and the Deep Blue Sea by John Patrick Shanley at the Lucille Lortel Theatre. The main draw of this hit production of the 40-year-old two-hander is the casting of its two headliners – Aubrey Plaza (most people may recognize her from Parks and Recreation and Season Two of White Lotus), in her stage debut, and independent film actor Christopher Abbott.

Together, they hurl themselves at this hopeless/hopeful tale of two lost souls who come across each other in the Bronx during the dead of winter. In many ways, Shanley’s play is a dangerous turbulent of danger, lust, and love between two unlikely lovers, very much in the same vein as Terrence McNally’s Frankie and Johnny in the Claire de Lune and, to a lesser extent, Lanford Wilson’s Talley’s Folly. Although Plaza and Abbott’s full throttle performances – including their aggressive Bronx accents – threaten to make a comic parody of the play, their sustained fearlessness and obvious chemistry ground the piece in a certain level of authenticity (having injured his leg a few weeks ago, Abbott now performs with a crutch, thankfully further grounding at least his performance in some sort of forced humanity).

This production of Danny and the Deep Blue Sea has been directed by Jeff Ward, another newbie to the world of live theater. Thankfully, he’s an instinctual director who has a natural feel for theatricality (e.g., the striking lighting, Bobbi Jene Smith’s emotive choreography during the play’s interludes). Even if I have mixed feelings about the unrelenting intensity of the endeavor, there’s admittedly something strangely compelling about the extremity of it all.

SOMEWHAT RECOMMENDED

DANNY AND THE DEEP BLUE SEA
Off-Broadway, Play
Lucille Lortel Theatre
1 hour, 20 minutes (without an intermission)
Through January 13

Categories: Off-Broadway, Theater

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