Although written more than
twenty years ago, Lobby Hero is a
highly relevant 
play for our post truth world.
It was Sir Walter Scott who penned "Oh, what a tangled web we
weave, when first we practice to deceive!" which is at the heart of this ensemble
character-driven plot, leading to disturbing moral and ethical dilemmas. Each character's actions and choices affect one
another's lives.
The palette may be small, but Kenneth Lonergan creates major layers of meaning: class issues, racism, sexism, police cronyism, and workplace harassment, leavened by very humorous moments. These themes clearly emerge in this thoughtful and entertaining production.
The stunning set was envisioned by Dramaworks’ award-winning Scenic Designer, Victor Becker, who died earlier this year and to whom the play is dedicated. This realistic lobby in a Manhattan high rise apartment building is more than a space merely to be passed through. It is a stoic observer, a fifth character, enabling the lives of the players to be challenged and changed before us.
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| Tim Altmeyer, Elisabeth Yancey, Britt Michael Gordon, Jovon Jacobs |
Lonergan builds the play around a pair of parallel relationships, the action unfolding over four successive nights. The first pair is Jeff, a uniformed nighttime security guard for the building and his captain William and the second is Bill, a uniformed policeman and Dawn, his rookie partner.
Jeff is the antihero in the lobby, “an Everyman,” who views his situation in the world for what it is, having to live with his brother because of debt, hoping for a break, although not knowing what to do in life. Sometimes he feels that he was born to fail; a discernible Dreiserian undercurrent permeates all the characters.
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| Elisabeth Yancey and Britt Michael Gordon |
Britt Michael Gordon plays Jeff with an affability which has you pulling for him, in spite of his unguarded casualness in dealing with others. Amusingly, but sometimes disastrously, he just says his private thoughts out loud, even blurting out the truth about others, leading to “the tangled web” of the characters’ enmeshment. His demeanor makes him feel “safe” for the other characters to talk to, even confess to, and to lecture to as well.
Gordon portrays him with a quirky innocence, belying some poor past choices and the estrangement from his late father of whom he is always reminded as being a “real hero” during the Korean War. He uses humor as a defense mechanism, particularly to cope with personal insecurities in dealing with others.
His boss, William, a black man, is played with an ironclad moral implacability by Jovon Jacobs. He espouses “living by the book,” especially for the edification of Jeff, but William is on the horns of a dilemma as he later confesses to Jeff -- his brother was arrested for a monstrous crime, one he’s almost certainly guilty of, but he is relying on William to provide an alibi.
William now must weigh that against his equal certitude that his brother will not receive a fair trial particularly as the public defender is overburdened with other cases. Will he do the right thing, or will he provide an alibi knowing the system, one that is blind to black men without resources, will fail to provide true justice? Jacobs plays this moral seesaw to the hilt, the impossible choices, drawing Jeff into the details.
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| Tim Altmeyer and Jovon Jacobs |
The second pair is headed by Bill, Tim Altmeyer delivering an exaggerated performance as a macho, intimidating cop, imbued by his own self-importance. However, he certainly nails him as the most unlikable person in the play, who even Jeff in all his innocence calls a “scum bag.”
While carrying on an affair with a woman in the same building where Jeff and William are security guards (bristling at being called “doormen” by their police counterparts), Bill also is engineering a fling with his rookie partner Dawn, played by Elisabeth Yancey, her PBD debut who balances bravado, and later, betrayal. She sees Bill as a love interest until Jeff innocently stirs the pot by blurting out the purpose of Bill’s visits to the building. Yancey convincingly plays the gullible and then jilted rookie and delivers a lot of pathos in her role.
Jeff’s loose tongue provides for many laughs as well. Gordon’s performance rises to a climatic high point when he is charged by Dawn to share William’s confidence. He successfully renders this as an existential crisis of finally being able to do something meaningful in his life. The denouncement hints at some future for Dawn and Jeff, an understanding of doing the right thing, a hopeful upbeat.
Director J. Barry Lewis extracts first-rate performances from his very skilled actors, including some fast sounding “New Yawkr tawk .” Maybe it’s a little over the top along with the mannerisms of Altmeyer and Yancey in their police roles, but those in the audience who grew up in NYC (including myself) will identify.
Lewis magnifies some uncomfortable confrontations, such as William’s fury at Jeff for revealing confidences and especially when Bill mincingly and aggressively confronts Jeff for involving himself in Bill’s business, on the precipice of physical violence. He has paced the play so the humor can land, elevating some laugh out loud moments, so necessary given the play’s themes.
The PBD technical staff supports the efforts with Roger Arnold’s sound designs, jazz interludes between scenes as well as the siren sounds of the city, the barking of a dog, the ding of the arriving elevator. The lighting design is by Kirk Bookman perfectly capturing that glaring light of a lobby in the middle of the night, and PBD’s resident costume designer, Brian O’Keefe devises immaculate uniforms, badges and caps for the four characters, purposely disheveled at times, and street clothes for Dawn in the last scene.
Palm Beach Dramaworks production of Lobby Hero successfully deals with its large enigmatic moral dilemmas, with heart, humor and acumen.
All photographs of the actors are by Tim Stepien
