Saturday, November 2, 2019

106 (2019-2020): Review: BELLA BELLA (seen November 1, 2019)


“Abzug-lutely”

One night after I saw The Great Society, the second play in Robert Schenkkan’s epic diptych about Pres. Lyndon Baines Johnson, the play I was watching, Bella Bella, not only heavily referenced the 36th POTUS but, even more coincidentally, quoted his famous line about not seeking the nomination of his party, which headlined my review.

Harvey Fierstein. All photos: Jeremy Daniel.
Bella Bella, at the Manhattan Theatre Club’s City Center Stage 1, is a one-man work about New York activist and politician Bella Abzug (1920-1998),written by and starring the redoubtable Harvey Fierstein. And while being far more modest than The Great Society it’s also much more entertaining.

Fierstein (Torch Song Trilogy, Kinky Boots), the buzz saw-voiced actor-playwright who can do drag with the best of them, did not originally intend to play “Battling Bella,” but, given his dipped-in-New York/Yiddishkeit persona, it’s hard to think of anyone (male or female) who could more delightfully have brought her to raging life, warts and all. Still, it’s ironic that a man is playing a woman whose life was largely dedicated to giving women equal rights with men. Whoever the actress might have been, a man took her job!

Abzug, the profane, colorfully outspoken, antiwar, feminist activist and politician, known for her broadbrimmed, eye-catching hats, served productively in the House of Representatives from 1970-1976, when—seeking to break into the then entirely male Senate—she lost her run to Daniel Patrick Moynihan. And not by much.
Harvey Fierstein. 
It’s unlikely that anyone not familiar with New York politics of the 60s and 70s would find the name-dropping world of Bella Bella particularly enthralling, although Abzug had a mouth on her that could have served equally well for a career in stand-up comedy. Those who remember her (what New Yorker from those days cannot?) will find Fierstein’s Abzug a sharp-tongued, very funny, and still absolutely relevant figure. She took no crap for her radical beliefs, never wavering in her support of her favorite causes.

Fierstein, smartly directed by Kimberly Senior, makes the unusual choice not to play the part in drag, or to do much to make himself particularly “feminine.” Somewhat stockier than the amply proportioned Abzug, he performs barefoot (with red toenails), in black slacks and a black shirt (Rita Ryack gets the design credit). He wears no makeup other than, perhaps, some lip rouge; his hair—no wig—is its natural silver. A large, circular red hat, not donned until the end, is prominently displayed, reminding us of Abzug’s trademark prop.

The setup places Abzug in a dressing room/cum bathroom (perfectly designed by John Lee Beatty and lit by Tyler Micoleau), in the Summit Hotel (now the Doubletree) on Lexington Avenue, at two a.m. in September 1976. As she waits to learn whether she’ll win a five-candidate, Democratic primary, giving her a shot at becoming New York’s first woman senator, she provides her narrative without saying why we’re being addressed, a problem endemic to many of these solo plays.

Abzug rambles through her memories in a digressive, "I-just-thought-of-this" manner, sometimes addressing particular spectators. She waves her hand in yenta-like “listen to this” style, tosses off politically stinging zingers, speaks with a light Eastern European-inflected intonation, and laces her lines with Yiddish, usually offering a translation. When she mentions a pishke, for example, she says it’s a tin can for collecting money, adding, “you can’t ask Jews for money in a piggybank.”
Harvey Fierstein. 
For 90 minutes, interrupted a couple of times for updates by her husband, Martin, at the door (where he remains unseen), Abzug chats about her fierce feminism, including the need to have more women in politics; her reasons for disdaining five modern presidents (like FDR, whom she accuses of having done too little to prevent the Holocaust); refers amusingly to prominent feminists like Gloria Steinem and Betty Friedan (who gets a wisecrack about her looks); and outlines her career as an activist and labor lawyer. 

She gets a laugh when she says her father, a butcher, had a shop called The Live and Let Live Meat Market; tells us that she went to Columbia because Harvard didn’t accept women; reveals that she began wearing hats to ensure no one took her for a secretary; explains her outspoken anti-Vietnam War position; informs us of her work for gay civil rights; mentions her pro-Nixon impeachment stance; covers her HUAC activity; reviews the promise and tragedy of RFK; reminds us of her hand in releasing the Pentagon Papers; and, naturally, informs us of why she went into politics.

Abzug touches on numerous other people (John Lindsay, Richard Nixon, Shirley Chisholm, Paul Robeson, Ed Koch, etc., etc.) and events. Particular emphasis is devoted to her struggle between 1950 and 1951—it contributed to the pregnant Abzug’s miscarriage—to prevent the execution of Willie McGee, a black man from Mississippi accused of having raped a white woman (their affair was consensual).

By the end of her discourse, you realize that, beyond the façade of a personality, wit, and intellect that makes Donald Trump look like Donald Duck, she was a unique and awesome woman the likes of which we could use right now.  If Abzug were alive and running for president, though, it’s doubtful she’d have the wide appeal to challenge the incumbent. But, boy, would it be fun to hear her give her two cents worth.

Did I enjoy Bella Bella? As a prospective campaign button once shouted: “Abzug-lutely.”

City Center Stage 1
131 W. 55th St., NYC
Through December 1

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