The play, directed by Hamilton Clancy (who at a recent performance stepped in as Hastings to replace an ill actor; he acted ably, with nary a look at the script he held) is best at the beginning and the conclusion, when this oily and scheming villain is clawing his way to the top, and then is unable to stop his fated fall.
Tonya Pinkins, the Tony Award-winning actress (for "Jelly's Last Jam"), is the celebrity attraction, playing a Hollywood manager in "Supernova in Reseda," Jerrod Bogard's inventive work about a terminally ill actor (Lawrence Merritt) who desperately wants to be part of the In Memoriam segment of next year's Oscars telecast.
Following on that arc, the character's debut episode would leave his morality as ambiguous, publicity materials asking, "Is he a force for good or ill?" Actor John Barrowman himself was a key factor in the conception of Captain Jack.
But their play, "The Mines of Sulphur," edges close to the murder of Braxton, and when it ends after one of the players, the scarlet-clad Jenny, falls ill, the actors make it clear that they know about the murder and other details of Boconnion's past.
So when the famous appear in the theater, let's try to forget their celebrity or stardom, stop trying to parse their motives, and try, if only for a few hours, to appreciate them solely, for good or ill, as actors.
Three ill-assorted actors perversely manage to crash-land attempted poetic flights and turn overheated language into dead prose.
Yes, DeGeneres and Rock have both done the job before to mixed reviews, and, yes, we started by suggesting that you should never go back, but surely last night, coupled with the disaster that was the year before, simply proves that if the Oscars are to remain watchable then the Academy must find some sort of happy medium between a couple of ill-suited actors and a past-his-joke-date comedian.
At other times, however, Mr. Carlyle just looks like an actor ill at ease in a Hitler costume.
Dr. Cole was also involved in volunteer work helping ill Screen Actors Guild actors.
And, on the first night, there was artistic director Dominic Dromgoole's additional message to the audience, pleading for a show that has been dogged by ill health (with actors dropping out and in).
Her favourite moment with him came in Intensive Care, a hospital drama, in which Bennett was roped in to play the lead after the actor fell ill.
