“Heil Trump”
Tony
Kushner, of course, is mainly known for Angels
in America, his epochal, two-part play inspired by the AIDS crisis of
the 1980s. But before Angels in America made Kushner a playwriting icon there was A Bright Room Called Day, his
first play, fueled by his conviction that Ronald Reagan’s presidency was somehow
comparable to the rise of fascism in Germany under Adolf Hitler. |
| Nikki M. James. All photos: Joan Marcus. |
Following the outcome
of the 2016 election, with the ascension of a president who makes Reagan look
like FDR, it was only natural that someone would present a major revival of a
play equating Trump with Hitler, and that’s what the Public has again provided,
with Eustis (who gave us a Julius Caesar with the title role resembling
our Dear Leader) once more at the director’s helm.
The dramatist has done
some heavy lifting to bring the material up to date, and Kushner being Kushner,
there’s much to admire and ponder. Speaking of pondering, though, much of A Bright Room Called Day’s two hours and 45 minutes is nearly as
ponderous as the six and a half required to sit through Matthew Lopez’s The Inheritance on Broadway.
 |
| Crystal Lucas-Perry, Jonathan Hadary. |
I never saw the
play’s first version but the chief revision appears to be the addition of a new
character—an avatar of Kushner himself—called Xillah (Jonathan Hadary, humorously
kvetchy), to engage in interstitial discourse with a woman named Zillah (Crystal
Lucas-Perry, fiery), originally a Jewish woman from Long Island but now played
by a black actress. Xillah and Zillah are fourth wall-breaking characters who periodically
interrupt the episodic plot, which focuses on the thoughts and actions of a
group of leftist friends in Berlin in 1932-1933.
 |
| Crystal Lucas-Perry. |
Set in the high-walled, tastefully shabby apartment (smartly designed by David
Rockwell and lit by John Torres) of actress Agnes Eggling (Nikki M. James, intense
but unconvincing), the play expresses the relative commitments of each character
to the constantly shifting dictates of Communist Party ideology and their
response to the nation’s dangerously rightward shift.
 |
| Linda Emond. |
As the plot
proceeds, projections inform us of specific political events, among them the crumbling
of the Weimar Republic
as the Nazis gain power, the burning of the Reichstag,
Hitler’s election, the violence toward the left, the creation of the Dachau
concentration camp, and so on. With the pressure mounting, the friends must
decide whether to stay or flee. Ultimately, it’s implied that we, the audience,
face similar dangers, and that we must not repeat the feckless inaction of the
Germans but take measures to prevent the destruction of liberalism from happening
here.
 |
| Grace Gummer. |
Agnes’s friends—suitably
garbed by Susan Hilferty and Sarita Fellows—are Paulinka Erdnuss (Grace Gummer,
too shrill), a fashionably accessorized, opium-puffing actress; Vealtninc Husz
(Michael Esper, heavily accented), a passionate, bearded, Hungarian filmmaker
who lost an eye in a 1919 communist uprising; Annabella Gotchling (Linda Emond,
truthful), a graphic designer; and Gregor Bazwald (Michael Urie, mannered but persuasive),
called Baz, an openly gay man in a homophobic world, employed at the Institute
for Human Sexuality. Emil Traum (Max Woertendyke) and Rosa Malek (Nadine
Malouf) are CP functionaries with differing views on party positions.
 |
| Max Woertendyke, Nadine Malouf. |
These realistic
persons are countered by an aged, disheveled, nightgown-wearing crone called
the Älte (Estelle Parsons, at 92 still a powerful presence)—the Elder—a mysterious,
poetry-spouting figure who enters through a window in search of food. We also
meet Gottfried Swetts (Mark Margolis, rhetorically strong), summoned by Husz. A
businessman from Hamburg, he’s really the devil, offering a powerful diatribe
boasting of his resurgent powers as the fires of hell rise up behind him.
 |
| Mark Margolis. |
And then there are
the metatheatrical presences of Xillah and Zillah, who periodically enter to
argue about not only politics and morality but to comment on Kushner’s play,
including his revisions, with commentary even extending to apologies for its
length and loquacity. At one point, Xillah takes up time with an anecdote
about how the play got its unusual name.
 |
| Jonathan Hadary, Nikki M. James, Crystal Lucas-Perry. |
So, the play is now
not only a warning about what Kushner perceives to be our current flirtation
with fascist leadership but about his own negative evaluation of the play’s
first incarnation. Cute? Momentarily. Necessary? Hell, no. Speaking of irrelevancies,
should I mention that Zillah opens act two singing “Memories of You” while Xillah
accompanies her? Or how about . . .
 |
| Michael Urie, Nikki M. James. |
For all the
suspense implicit in the situation of 1930s German leftists being threatened by
a frighteningly oppressive regime, Kushner’s play is a garrulous discussion
drama that reads better than it plays. The ideas may be stimulating but, even
with considerable use of colloquial language, the dialogue is frequently prolix
and, at first hearing, not always easy to follow. Sturm und drang arguments fill
the air but the actors, many among New York’s best, rarely seem more than
mouthpieces for Kushner’s thoughts. They display high-quality technical skills and
lots of emotion but, with one or two exceptions, create people we can neither
believe in or care for.
 |
| Nikki M. James, Michael Esper. |
For many, the
opportunity to hear Donald Trump trashed in Kushner’s rich invective will prove
satisfying enough for them to remain awake during this linguistically dazzling but often-soporific
exercise. On the other hand, such abuse has become so endemic in the op-eds,
social media outlets, and late-night monologues that, its point made, it’s quickly
blunted.
 |
| Estelle Parsons. |
While it’s easy to
share the author’s frustrated rage—why else so many current shows shooting
poisoned darts at POTUS—A Bright
Room Called Day, for all its intrinsic
historical interest, places too much emphasis on didactic polemics (with which
I happen to agree) and not enough on drama to brighten one's day.
The
Public Theater
425
Lafayette St., NYC
Through
December 8