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Message: <br /><br /> If you are having trouble reading this email, you may view this article online at: http://www.jweekly.com/37876/full/37876/woody-allens-light-bulb-burns-brightly-at-tjt/ <br /><br /> <b>Woody Allen’s ‘Light Bulb’ burns brightly at TJT</b> <br /> Thursday, April 23, 2009 | by dan pine <br /><br /><p>In Traveling Jewish Theatre’s new production of Woody Allen’s “The Floating Light Bulb,” the lead actor performs a few magic tricks on stage.</p> <p>Even more magical: the production’s heart-rending blend of comedy and pathos.</p> <p>The cast of “The Floating Light Bulb” does both magnificently. At once tragic and resoundingly funny –– “Annie Hall”-level funny –– the production ends TJT’s 30th season on a high note.</p> <p>Though sealed in the cultural consciousness as a filmmaker, Woody Allen has also enjoyed a number of Broadway hits, from “Play It Again, Sam” to “Don’t Drink the Water.” As a playwright he excels in the fundamentals of plot and character, more so than with his films, and never better than in this play, first staged on Broadway in 1981.</p> <div class="capDivLeft" style="width: 216px;"><img alt="Atjt" class="left" height="311" src="/images/uploads/z_photos_2009/zh_04_24_09/Atjt.jpg" title="Enid (Ellen Ratner) gets her son, Paul (Ben Freeman), ready for an audition in “The Floating Light Bulb.” photo / ken friedman" width="216" /> <div class="caption">Enid (Ellen Ratner) gets her son, Paul (Ben Freeman), ready for an audition in “The Floating Light Bulb.” photo / ken friedman</div> </div> “The Floating Light Bulb” has the autobiographical trappings of a Neil Simon hagiography: Brooklyn 1945, Jewish family, hard times. But unlike Simon’s gauzy gold-tinged memoirs, Allen’s Canarsie is a place dreams go to die, a neighborhood where “Murder Incorporated buries the bodies,” as Enid, the Pollack family patriarch says. <p>The play centers on Paul Pollack (Ben Freeman), a shy, stuttering lad of 16, whose only relief from his cloistered existence is relentlessly practicing dime store magic tricks. Living with him in a cramped apartment: his wise-cracking younger brother, Steve (John Murphy); his two-timing shnook of a father, Max (Andrew Hurteau); and his mother, Enid (Ellen Ratner), a faded beauty with a taste for the bottle, barely holding the family together.</p> <p>When the opportunity arises to have Paul audition his magic act for a theatrical agent, Enid pushes her fragile son far beyond his readiness. And thus, a play is born.</p> <p>By today’s standards, Dr. Phil could devote a week of episodes to fixing the Pollack family. Dysfunctional barely begins to describe it. But in 1945, the Pollacks were just one more bickering Jewish family one or two generations removed from the shtetl.</p> <p>It’s one of the play’s revelations to observe a family so utterly unaware of its own pathology. Max’s solution to his son’s constellation of psychological woes is to take a “personality course” where they can teach him “arm gestures” and “salesmanship.”</p> <p>Meanwhile Max prepares to desert his family and run off with a dim-bulb floozy (Jessica Kitchens). If only his number would come in and the loan sharks would get off his back. The deadbeat dad is a cliché, but in the hands of Allen (and director Nancy Carlin), we understand why this loser could contemplate such cruelty.</p> <p>The play takes an abrupt turn in Act II, when Paul goes through with his audition. The dapper theatrical manager, Jerry (Rolf Saxon), remains ever polite, but soon we see he, too, is little more than a loser among losers. An extended scene between Jerry and Enid, a fast-burn romance with all the heat of a great first date, ends up the most compelling of the play.</p> <p>But this is Woody Allen’s Canarsie, and nobody ever makes it there.</p> <p>Director Carlin has a gift for pacing and comic timing, made easier by a superb cast. They deliver huge laughs with a minimum of jokiness. Ratner’s Enid is a special marvel, at once a battleaxe ball of thunder (“I don’t nag,” she says. “I encourage”) and a humbled failure jumping at the slightest wisp of affection.</p> <p>The magic, as performed by Freeman, is good, too, especially the title trick, which opens and closes the play. And yes, it floats.</p> <p>The only sore spot is the character of Paul, as written by Allen. Though Freeman convinces as a nebbish in extremis, one wonders how permissible it is to laugh at a truly pathetic, emotionally crippled boy. The opening night packed house decided it was OK, but the laughter was nervous.</p> <p>Otherwise “The Floating Light Bulb” is a joy. Perhaps rather than churn out 1.5 mediocre films a year, Woody Allen should go back to basics and write more works for the stage. Judging from “The Floating Light Bulb,” it’s where he belongs.</p> <p><strong>“The Floating Light Bulb”</strong> plays through May 24 at Traveling Jewish Theatre, 470 Florida Street, S.F. $15-$45. Information: (415) 292-1233 or <a href="http://www.atjt.com">http://www.atjt.com</a>.</p>

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