Theatre in Review: Five Models in Ruins, 1981 (Lincoln Center Theater/LCT3)

	The full company. Photo: Marc J. Franklin

I don't know why Caitlin Saylor Stephens has it in for the world of couture, but it seems to be a long-running grievance. In her 2023 drama, Modern Swimwear, the leading lady, a bathing-suit designer, comments that her favorite piece of music is Swan Lake, it being "about pretty creatures. Who get hunted." She adds, "It's totally a metaphor for the fashion industry." This is before her boyfriend clubs her to death. Do you see what I mean?

Modern Swimwear was about a brutally dysfunctional relationship. Five Models in Ruins, 1981, is a full-frontal assault on the ugly business of presenting pretty women in chic ensembles. The play revolves around a photo shoot for Vogue, staged in the wreck of an English country house, featuring five models decked out in the bridal gowns rejected by Diana Spencer for her marriage to Prince Charles. As enterprises go, it's about as promising as...Diana Spencer's marriage to Prince Charles. The venue offers occasional power blackouts, no running water, the absence of indoor plumbing, and no apparent contact with the outside world. One model is MIA, and so is the makeup artist. These young women are expected to camp out amid the torn plaster and creeping ferns, sleeping on the floor, then arising and turning themselves into devastatingly glamorous creatures. Is this a professional gig or a hostage situation?

The understandably grumpy sirens tapped for this grueling assignment include the incessantly self-adoring Chrissy, who defines her job as "defining the zeitgeist;" Alex, the in-house intellectual, who reads Kant and namechecks the philosopher and literary critic Julia Kristeva; Tatiana, who wants to get of this mess ASAP ("I have abortion. Tuesday. Germany. They're cheaper in Europe"); and Grace, who, inexplicably, has been hired with zero experience; the personification of American innocence, her reaction to her sharper-clawed colleagues is to pass out cold. Pretty reasonable, if you ask me.

Mostly, the play marks time as everyone waits for Roberta, the exacting photographer, to set up. Chrissy, proud of being "a Betty Ford girl," details her epic sex life, unrolling a list of art and fashion world names that would leave Mozart's Don Juan feeling like an underachiever. (Talking about the as-yet unknown Prince, whom she did in a limo, she says, fondly, "That tiny little man rattled my bones in joints I never knew I had.") There's a can-you-top-this session involving their all-time worst assignments, which includes a faux crime scene with real dead bodies, and a trip to the Brazilian jungle where the theme was "Diamonds. Chimpanzees. Waterfalls. And extreme starvation." Chrissy, talking about Roberta's love of kooky concepts, recalls a shoot featuring "those poor girls in Normandy, just standing around in the freezing cold for hours on end...like sad little Mormon wives in Ungaro."

If this all sounds excessively nutso, I remember stumbling on an episode of America's Next Top Model for which the contestants are flown to the Australian Outback and instructed to create art pieces based on Maori culture. (No word on what the Maori thought of this.) One aspirant, afflicted with a high fever, is criticized by the photographer and makeup artist for not delivering enough sparkle; they look back fondly on the trip to Paris, where host Tyra Banks "kept giving" to the camera despite a temperature of one hundred and three. (Personally, I think they all belong in straitjackets.) For context, there's also George Cukor's 1950 film A Life of Her Own, in which Lana Turner, as a simple Kansas lass, crashes the Manhattan modeling scene only to find backbreaking work and handsy married men. It's a jungle out there!

This is by way of pointing out that nothing in Five Models in Ruins, 1981 is especially new, although some of Stephens' writing has a certain comic verve; this is a much better play than Modern Swimwear. Still, it's a sluggish evening, undone by too much sour, snarky attitude and a tendency to note the obvious. The action shifts between the models' bitch sessions and Roberta, who, surprisingly, bonds with the ingenuous Grace giving her a tutorial in her craft. This is one of many plot points glossed over without sufficient explanation. For example, where is that fifth model, anyway? What about the sudden appearance of Sandy, the makeup artist? Would Roberta really pour Sandy into a blood-stained Ralph Lauren gown to complete her tableau? And would Chrissy, a Wilhelmina model, be unable to spell her agency's name -- or is the playwright unable to resist the urge to produce an easy laugh?

Morgan Green's staging is handsome -- more about the design in a moment -- but lacking in energy; listening to the characters complain incessantly becomes fatiguing. Still, the production showcases some impressive young talents, including Stella Everett, a strange combination of the wholesome and depraved as Chrissy; Britne Oldford, offering mordant commentary as Alex; and Maia NoviMadeline Wise has better luck as Sandy, who has a showpiece monologue about her perilous journey from a London disco to the shoot's location. As Grace, Sarah Marie Rodriguez offers something extra -- a real mind lurks behind her smiley, nervous exterior -- especially in her scenes with Elizabeth Marvel's Roberta. Marvel, a pro with effortless presence and timing, makes Roberta compelling, even if she can't convince us that her character lives in emotional and professional thrall to Alexander Liberman, Vogue's married editorial director, an offstage character portrayed as a cool manipulator.

The production does showcase the startling talent of Afsoon Pajoufar, whose two-level set is a marvel of decay: ripped wallpaper, shattered windows, greenery creeping in everywhere; you can practically smell the mold. The pastoral scene painted on one of the rare intact walls is an especially poignant touch. A designer with relatively few New York credits -- she has worked regionally and abroad -- this project instantly puts her on the list of names to look for. Cha See's lighting effectively blends warm and cold whites, giving this squalid site a distinctly haunted quality. Kathy Ruvuna's sound design includes an alarming thunderstorm and snatches of EDM, allowing the models to strike fierce poses in the intervals between scenes. The wedding gowns designed by Vasilija Zivanic are hideous, bizarrely overthought creations, but maybe that's the point? In any case, they certainly underline Stephens' point, which might be summed up as: We are all fashion victims now.

Five Models in Ruins, 1981, climaxes with a full-cast freakout, everyone unleashing primal screams, just like they do on Broadway in John Proctor is the Villain. This episode is followed by the long-awaited shoot, which may or may not be art. Trouble is, at the end of a long hour and forty minutes, the question seems less than pressing. Stephens' work is improving, but hunting down the cruel in couture increasingly seems like a fish-in-a-barrel expedition. --David Barbour