Interludes

THE HANGOVER REPORT – Alex Lubischer’s BOBBIE CLEARLY is flawed but introduces a promising new voice

• By drediman
• April 4, 2018
• No Comments

Ethan Dubin as the title character in Alex Lubischer’s “Bobbie Clearly” at the Black Box Theatre via Roundabout Underground.

Last night marked the opening night of young playwright Alex Lubischer’s Bobbie Clearly at the Black Box Theatre at the Harold and Miriam Steinberg Center for Theatre. The play had previously played Chicago’s Steep Theatre to some acclaim and is now enjoying its New York premiere via a new Off-Broadway production directed by Will Davis for Roundabout Underground, Roundabout Theatre Company’s excellent developmental programming series. Like the Bengsons’ new musical The Lucky Ones, which also just recently opened Off-Broadway, Bobbie Clearly tells the story of a horrific act committed by a young man – the titular Bobbie Clearly – in the small, rural Midwestern town of Milton, Nebraska, and the damaging long-term effect it has on the community.

The play is refreshingly structured in the classical three-act mold and is written as a series of investigative first person interviews. Bobbie Clearly starts off promisingly; I was thoroughly engrossed for the first third of the piece. I was intrigued by the premise, especially as tantalizingly laid out by Mr. Lubischer. However, for me, the play started to unravel as Bobbie is injected into the play as an actual character. Had it remained a “Rashomon”-like meditation on truth and perception, I think the play wold have benefited. A more speculative, elusive stance would have thrown the play into shadowy, murky territory, as opposed to under glaring, revealing light. Indeed, over the course of the evening, the characters – despite being sharply-drawn, often satirically, by the playwright – start to read to obviously and less convincingly with Bobbie’s brooding physical presence, fist looming and then eventually emerging from the background as one of them. Only the character of Darla (gorgeously played by Constance Shulman with quiet fortitude), the town’s sole policewoman, comes across as fully three dimensional.

Nevertheless, Bobbie Clearly marks a strong New York debut for Mr. Lubischer. His play skillfully draws from various sources – from Our Town to Heathers – and I applaud his willingness to combine disparate tones to create a complex mix of emotions, just like what usually happens in real life. I hope Bobbie Clearly ultimately finds just the right combination; I think there is a truly compelling play in all this. Luckily, the play is being a given a top-notch production by Mr. Davis and his relatively large cast of committed, mostly young cast. His immersive staging in the tiny Black Box Theatre literally throws the audience into the very midst of the suffocating world of Milton, as if they themselves were residents (a smart, highly effective homage to David Cromer’s seminal production of Our Town).

RECOMMENDED

BOBBIE CLEARLY
Off-Broadway, Play
Roundabout Underground at the Black Box Theatre at the Harold and Miriam Steinberg Center for Theatre
2 hours, 20 minutes (with two intermissions)
Through May 6