The conflict here isn't very exemplary or exciting, even by modest drama standards.
Spain's dramatic election result – a hung parliament and a roughly equal split between left and rightwing parties – was followed by only modest drama in financial markets.
That distinction goes to "Duet," a modest drama about an imagined meeting between Sarah Bernhardt and Eleonora Duse by Otho Eskin, a former diplomat making his New York debut as a playwright.
It's a modest drama with relatively few surprises, but that's not to say it is predictable or rote, as it lives or dies on the excellence of its leads – and Ben Kingsley and Patricia Clarkson are rarely anything but brilliant.
They played siblings who reconnect after years apart and, thanks to the history between the pair off-screen, there's a genuine lived-in chemistry that brings an added dimension to the modest drama.
He is at the heart of two brief moments of clarity and modest drama: in one, Rakel (Monique Vukovic) tries to show Jason what it's like to lug around breasts.
I recently read an interview with Andrew Bujalski, a writer-director I love and who's usually credited (to his dismay) with inventing "mumblecore," a strain of American indie filmmaking notable mainly for its modest, intimate dramas and drolly inarticulate protagonists.
Good television is now talked about as much as – if not more than – its feature film equivalents, whether you're looking at huge US shows or more modest Australian dramas.
Frankcom's intervention is, arguably, a bit over the top for a play that still shows its origins as a modest, studio drama whose lack of pretension was part of its charm.
"Yohen," which opens the 30th season of the Pan Asian Repertory Theater, is a modest, touching drama, loaded with meaning.
