Theatre in Review: Merry Me (New York Theatre Workshop)

	Nicole Villamil, Shaunette Renée Wilson, Ryan Spahn. Photo: Joan Marcus

Merry is hardly the word for this entertainment; motley is more like it. Playwright Hansol Jung has thrown into her creative Vitamix a bizarre array of ingredients, blending elements of William Wycherly's The Country Wife, The Oresteia, Our Town, and Angels in America into a frothy, farcical concoction set on a military base located somewhere or other. Giddiness abounds: The protagonist of Merry Me, Shane Horne, a sexually swashbuckling lesbian, recalls her childhood habit of masturbating with The Complete Works of William Shakespeare. ("My William was rubbed practically spineless," she says, fondly.) General Aga Memnon (get it?) barks orders to family and staff via a telephone consisting of paper cups linked by string. This is not a metaphor or a theatrical device. "It's a Government Paper Cup," he warns his wife, who has been using it for personal affairs. Doctor Jess O'Nope, Horne's sidekick, is being counseled by an angel -- an emissary from Tony Kusner's play -- to revenge herself on the male half of humanity. Do issues like persistent pay inequities or centuries of being denied the vote rile Dr. Jess' anger? Nope. Then the angel asks, "In the 69 years since its existence how many female directors have been hired to direct a Shakespeare in the Park?" "Give me that axe," snarls Dr. Jess.

Indeed, Silly Me would be a better title for this loose collection of plot devices and carelessly contrived situations. Horne is just out of the brig, having been caught in flagrante delicto with General Memnon's wife, and she has a plan: Dr. Jess will declare Horne a successful graduate of gay conversion therapy, providing a cover story that will allow her to continue cutting a swath through the ladies on base. Meanwhile, Private Willy Memnon, the general's son, is trying to keep his new wife, Sapph, under wraps, away from Horne's clutches; he dresses up Sapph as his (nonexistent) brother-in-law, a disguise that fools nobody. And then the general's wife invades Horne's quarters, seeking another liaison; caught yet again by the general, they claim to be locked in the bathroom, exploring Horne's "soap collection." Don't forget that angel, making an entrance right out of Millennium Approaches, who informs Dr. Jess that it is her duty to eliminate the male half of humanity. If she does, the electrical black that has stymied the army will be revoked. Of course, all the soldiers will be dead, but never mind.

Jung, whose previous works have skewed toward the dramatic, is in a much airier mood here, putting her characters through all sorts of complications while dropping jokes about The L Word, Shonda Rhimes, Emma Thompson, HBO Go, and the Marvel Cinematic Universe. But hers is a peculiarly ADHD form of comedy, in which gags vanish on impact, leaving no trace. The sort of farce on which Merry Me is modeled has roots in frustration (usually sexual) and fear of exposure: We laugh at characters trying to indulge their appetites without getting caught, enjoying the spectacle of them trying to squirm out of trouble. That's why Feydeau's adulterers are forever galloping down the halls of seedy hotels in the wee hours, and why Restoration comedies are filled with incriminating letters, backbiting gossip, and screens behind which illicit lovers can be stashed.

Farce depends on pressure, relentlessly applied; the situations are ludicrous but, for the characters, the peril is real. In Merry Me the stakes are so low as to be nonexistent. The general and Willy, representing the forces of repression, are empty, easily gulled blowhards. (Why is Horne not court-martialed for cuckolding the general? Because, we are told, she is too valuable a soldier to lose. Okaaaay...) Willy, trying to keep Sapph on ice, tells Horne that his wife is being treated for leprosy. This is a direct lift from The Country Wife, when Mr. Pinchwife, keeping his wife isolated from a gaggle of fashionable ladies, pretends she has smallpox. The joke is that a) at the time, smallpox was a real danger to public health, and b) the ladies see through Pinchwife's stratagem, flatly announcing that they have all had the disease and are immune. Wycherly's gag is a glittering satirical thrust; Jung's use of leprosy is a dumb throwaway bit.

Some will suggest that Merry Me is just a lark, not to be taken seriously, and unworthy of too much scrutiny. But even with the lightest comedy needs to be rooted in recognizable emotional reality; if all the gags and plot points are disposable, why are we there? The action arguably follows the seemingly casual model of The Country Wife -- a play in which inordinate amounts of time are devoted to making plans for dinner and the theatre - but Wycherley's characters inhabit a world in which scandal can lead to personal ruin, especially for the women. In Merry Me, nothing has any weight or consistency, so nothing really matters.

This is due in part to Leigh Silverman's rushed direction of a cast that isn't always up to the demands of Jung's stylized writing. (Certain passages read rather better than they play at New York Theatre Workshop.) Some are better than others: As Horne, Esco Jouléy certainly seems capable of breaking hearts and ripping bodices. Marinda Anderson demonstrates a solid comic style as the addled Doctor Jess. Nicole Villamil has a sly way with a line (and a vibrator) as Sapph. But David Ryan Smith, Cindy Cheung, and Ryan Spahn contribute unamusing one-note turns as the general, his wife, and his son. As the angel, Shaunette Renée Wilson garbles some of the play's most interesting writing; also, she must put up with a too-cute running gag in which everyone keeps confusing her with...Shaunette Renée Wilson.

It can't be easy to design a show when the script specifies the location as "classified for government purposes, latitude redacted degrees redacted minutes; longitude redacted degrees redacted minutes, at the Naval basecamp of a nation's most prestigious navy on an island not far from another nation's most vulnerable coast cities." What Rachel Hauck has come up with is a pair of walls sporting geometric shapes; the whole thing looks like a giant Colorforms display. Alejo Vietti's costumes include an impressive angel ensemble. Barbara Samuels' colorful lighting is a solid achievement. The sound design, by Caroline Eng and Kate Marvin, makes lively use of pop hits like "Make Me Feel" by Janelle Monáe and "I'm the Only One" by Melissa Etheridge, not to mention the strategic use of reverb and angelic harp effects.

Jung is out to celebrate what more than one character calls "the merries," a combination of sexual satisfaction and joy that, the play avers, is our best weapon against social ills like inequality and even fascism. It's a lovely thought if not an especially convincing one. Even so, it could be made far more strongly than it is here. This is a remarkably toothless idea of satire. --David Barbour