Theatre in Review: Any Given Monday (59E59)

	Lauren Ashley Carter and Hilary B. Smith

Imagine a sitcom written by Thomas Hobbes and you have an idea of the peculiar nature of Any Given Monday. The show doesn't simply posit the idea that human existence is nasty, brutish, and short -- it celebrates it, with wisecracks. The protagonist, Lenny, is a middle-aged schoolteacher and the very model of a modern sensitive male. He loves animals, believes in marital fidelity, and always tears up at the end of To Kill a Mockingbird, a film he has seen dozens of times. In Lenny's case, however, virtue has not been rewarded. His wife, Risa, a party planner who fears she is drifting into a passionless middle age, has decamped from their Philadelphia home to have an affair with the wealthy, and odious, Frank. (We know he's wealthy because he lives on the Main Line. We know he's odious because he has made a pass at Sarah, Lenny's and Risa's daughter.)

As a result, Lenny, who takes such insults lying down, is perched on his couch, licking his wounds and watching Monday Night Football. On hand to offer moral support is Mick, Lenny's best friend, a subway worker with the manner of The Honeymooners' Ed Norton and the moral vision of Archie Bunker. Among other things, he complains about "the pussification of America," in which men are made the abject slaves of dainty female standards. Speaking of the widening gap between rich and poor, he says, "We're the only country inna' world with fat homeless people." I will draw a veil over his opinions of the black community, except to note the N word is used freely and often.

Just when you are beginning to wonder if anyone is left to be offended, Mick drops a little bombshell, revealing that, in an act of solidarity with Lenny, he has dispatched Frank with two bullets to the back of his head. Lenny, who wants to keep his divorce civilized, is predictably horrified, but, as Mick says, that is the nut of Lenny's problem: "'Civilized.' You're the only guy I know who steps outta' the shower to take a leak."

The rest of Any Given Monday follows everyone as they all-too-quickly accommodate themselves to the fact of Frank's death. Included in this are Sarah, a college philosophy major -- she tests prospective boyfriends by making them watch Schindler's List -- who employs a tasteless gag about the Holocaust to suggest that Jewish men are too henpecked, and Risa, who quickly discovers that adultery isn't all that it's cracked up to be. Most of all, we're meant to cheer Lenny on as he embraces his inner caveman and restores the natural order of things -- which, in this case, means keeping Risa on pins and needles while indulging in formerly forbidden behavior, like getting a dog, or sitting with this feet on the coffee table.

If there was a shred of emotional reality to Any Given Monday, it might make for an evening of good, nasty fun along the lines of one of Yasmina Reza's theatrical bestiaries. Instead, it's a crude domestic comedy populated with cardboard characters and punctuated by lengthy passages of direct address repeatedly making the point that living by the rules is strictly for sissies. Otherwise, Bruce Graham's script is loaded with mysteries. It's totally unclear why Mick is willing to commit a capital crime for Lenny's benefit. It's even more unclear why nice-guy Lenny is friends with Mick, a troglodyte through and through. And, aside from a few expressions of shock, why does nobody entertain one serious argument against murder?

The real drama in Bud Martin's production involves watching four capable actors struggling with material that lacks the faintest conviction. Paul Michael Valley can't do anything with Lenny's author-mandated transition from born loser to Alpha male, but at least he doesn't have to deliver one offensive, unfunny line after another, as does Michael Mastro, unhappily cast as Mick. (One especially grim passage, following Mick's attendance at the funeral of a Chinese colleague, tries fruitlessly to wring laughter from the constant repetition of the phrase "Dang's dead.") Lauren Ashley Carter's appealing presence takes some of the edge off of Sarah's charmless monologues, but the character is still pretty much a pill. Hilary B. Smith works hard to make Risa seem more than a selfish and shallow caricature, but it's an uphill battle.

Overall, the production benefits from a solid design package, including Dirk Durossette's exposed-brick den setting, Paul Miller's lighting, Bobby Pearce's costumes, and Jacob Subotnick's sound design, which includes bits of the film of To Kill a Mockingbird and excerpts from an NFL broadcast, which distracts the characters from their moral dilemma from time to time.

None of it matters, however, because Any Given Monday is a thin and timid piece of work posing as an act of provocation. It aims to shock, and settles for being crass.--David Barbour