LIBRA
Shattered Globe Theatre
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Writing some 30 years after Condon, Don DeLillo explored the question in his brilliant novel Libra, a study of how a maladjusted nobody like Lee Harvey Oswald could be groomed into one of history’s most significant figures. In DeLillo’s view, Oswald was a patsy recruited by disgruntled intelligence operatives who wanted to kill Kennedy in revenge for his failure to overthrow Castro. The psychological profile DeLillo gives of Oswald turns out to be very close to Raymond Shaw’s: a fatherless boy raised in unhealthily close circumstances by a mother whom he resented. Resenters make the best assassins.
The nearly simultaneous openings of stage versions of Condon’s and DeLillo’s novels reinforce the connection between the fictional Shaw and his real-life counterpart. John Lahr (best known as Joe Orton’s biographer) penned his Manchurian Candidate in 1991 for an English theater company; it’s subsequently been seen in the United States in only two or three productions, including Shattered Globe Theatre’s, a Chicago premiere. Steppenwolf Theatre’s Libra, meanwhile, marks John Malkovich’s return to the company that launched him; following in the footsteps of fellow ensemble member Frank Galati, Malkovich is directing his own script.
Metcalf’s mugging and an even more grotesque performance by Rick Snyder as Jack Ruby overwhelm more subtle acting by Ned Schmidtke as a conscience-stricken conspirator, K. Todd Freeman as the second gunman on the grassy knoll, Ron Perkins as a renegade FBI agent, and most important Alexis Arquette, who brings a slacker’s aw-shucks irony to the enigmatic Oswald. An actor of considerable presence, Arquette holds the stage with easygoing charisma–yet he makes hardly any impact in this woefully underwritten part.
The Manchurian Candidate works far better in the second act, when director Louis Contey drags the story’s incestuous implications out of the closet, generating a chilling tension in the climactic confrontation between Shaw mere et fils. Though Brian Pudil as Shaw is somewhat lacking in arrogant charisma in the play’s first half, he’s riveting as the automaton assassin fighting for his soul against his power-hungry mother, who’s played with gripping intensity by Linda Reiter. They’re well matched by Joe Forbrich as the haunted Marco, and for the most part the three are ably supported by the rest of the 11-member ensemble. The only false note is Doug McDade’s portrayal of Shaw’s senator stepfather as a fanny-pinching, shit-kicking buffoon. The real thing would be far cooler and more eerie. Check out Oliver North.
