August: Osage County

The TKTS booth where you can buy discounted Broadway tickets is always surrounded in this season (or perhaps, year-round) by a mob of tourists. Luckily, there is a way to shorten the time you stand in line considerably: go see a play. With everyone calling August: Osage County the front runner in the Tony nominations for Best Play this year, it seemed like a good idea to go see this show before it blew up at the awards ceremony tonight. "Partial view" tickets from TKTS got us in the orchestra, with a slightly - angled - but - very - much - able - to - observe - the - actors' - facial - expressions view of the stage in Row E.

A distinctly American play set in Oklahoma, August shows a distintegrating family as it faces the crisis of a missing patriarch, much-decorated poet and melancholic misanthrope, Beverly Weston. His wife--pill-poppin', fiery-tongued Violet Weston--is a shrill, manipulative woman who will do anything to prove her own strength and independence from a family she feels has abandoned her. As the story unfolds, we witness their deep-rooted dysfunctionality has been passed on to the next generation: their three daughters. The eldest, Barbara, struggles to take hold of the reins of responsibility in the broken household while reeling from her longtime husband's infidelity and her teenage daughter's rebelliousness. While family members come together to support Violet through this difficult time, what ensues is a heartbreaking yet laugh-out-loud funny portrayal of a family so broken there remains little hope for healing.

The matinee tonight elicited a standing ovation for good reason. The play is incredibly well-written, funny, acerbic without being alienating--and really touches a nerve with anyone who has ever experienced dysfunction in a family, which is to say, to some degree, everyone. There were moments when I could just feel my heart aching for Barbara as she desperately tried to make her family whole again; times when I wanted to punch some of the characters in the face for hurting each other so much, for lashing out to prove themselves instead of listening to one another; and just times when I had to sit and marvel that someone could capture in words and on stage the frustration, anger, resentment, hatred, and despair brewed by family fights. It's an inescapable poison; you can't get away, because they're Family, for God's sake--but sometimes everything becomes so unbearable that you have to wonder whether it's better simply to be alone, unbound by genes and responsibility. All of that, and so much more, was conveyed by this play. There's no way to do it justice here, so I won't try.

My only disappointment while watching the Tonys (well, not quite: I don't understand why the Rent original cast number was so short) was that I was rooting for Amy Morton to win the Best Actress in a Leading Role award, but it went to her on-stage mother, Deanna Dunagan, instead. Not to say Dunagan didn't deserve it; Amy just completely blew me away with her performance... The former more made me want to strangler her--which I suppose, could be construed as compelling also, but it's difficult for me to wish a character I find fundamentally soul-grating the best of luck. (And yes, I have trouble separating the actor from the character they play on stage.)

I'm not sure whether there will be any discounted tickets available going forward, but apparently the original cast is already on its way out, so go see it soon (within the month) if you care about that sort of thing.