Talk Radio: Fighting Words

The name Alan Berg isn't quite in the forefront of American pop culture these days as it was twenty years ago.  The so-called "Wild Man of the Airwaves" was a confrontational Denver-based radio host whose nighttime call-in show could be picked up by listeners in 38 states.  A skilled debater with a sadistic edge, Berg would regularly humiliate fans and foes alike who would call in to discuss gun control, gay rights, religion, racism and other hot topics.  He would name names on the air, including those of local Klansmen.  In 1984, Berg was assassinated by members of a neo-Nazi organization.  In 1987 Eric Bogosian played his own Berg variation at the Public Theatre as author and star of Talk Radio.

In this era where one of the media's most popular personalities achieved fame by regularly humiliating everyday people who subject themselves to his judgment in hopes of gaining his approval and being idolized by millions, the new Broadway production of Talk Radio, a sharp and funny and evening directed by Robert Falls, shows that the themes of Bogosian's play not only haven't dated, they've been amplified.  Is the risk of public embarrassment better than a lifetime of anonymity?  What is the attraction of cruelty and finding entertainment in the misfortune of others?  How real can reality programming be when there's always the awareness of an audience?

Taking place entirely at a Cleveland radio station (designed with excellent detail by Mark Wendland) the play depicts a complete broadcast of Night Talk With Barry Champlain, a local show that can go national if they can impress the suits with this one broadcast.  As played with smoldering bad boy sex appeal by Liev Schreiber, Barry is the swaggering, hard-drinking, cocaine snorting, chain smoking embodyment of that alpha male rock star persona usually attributed to politicians (Bill Clinton), stand-up comics (Eddie Murphy), professional athletes (John McEnroe) and, on occasion, rock stars (Ummm… Madonna?).

From offstage Christine Pedi, Christy Pusz, Barbara Rosenblat, Adam Sietz, Marc Thompson, and Cornell Womack play the unseen callers who populate Champlain's airwaves, including a teen mother who can't find her baby's dad, a guy who really loves animals, a threatening racist and those who just want to kiss his ass.  Under the guise of having frank conversation and telling it like it is, Champlain uses his callers as raw material for improvised entertainment meant to do nothing but still up controversy.  Some callers are contemptuously cut off.  Others are allowed to ramble on, exposing their own ridiculousness.  The less fortunate are subjected to the hosts' verbal beat downs delivered with Schreiber's smooth, cello-like timbre.

The sextet of voicers often sound a bit cartoonish in their roles, but as a longtime listener, zero time caller of talk radio programs I can vouch for their authenticity.  There's something about talk radio shows that make a good deal of their callers sound like broad stereotypes.  Perhaps part of the reason is that screeners like Nite Talk's Stu (Michael Laurence) are carefully selecting guests with the most entertainment potential.

Though most of the play is the interaction between Champlain and his invisible guests, Talk Radio is far from being a one-man operation.  Bemused assistant Stu seems to enjoy Champlain's complaints that he's sending callers he can't work with.  The host is arrogantly abusive to his frustrated producer Linda (Stephanie March), who he's also dating, while crisply pressed station manager Dan (Peter Hermann) puts up with his antics so long as the ratings are climbing.  The silent interaction of this quartet while the show is on the air, punctuated with blasts of tension during breaks, is what makes Talk Radio sizzle.  And when prankster caller Kent (Sebastian Stan) shows up at the station, all safety nets are removed.

With personalities like Barry Champlain, there is always the question of where the real person ends and the public persona begins, since we only see him in instances where he may be "in character".  If listeners know no difference between the entertainer and the real person, Talk Radio eventually ponders if it can actually exist.

 Photos by Joan Marcus:  Top:  Michael Laurence and Liev Schreiber

Center:   Stephanie March

Bottom:  Sebastian Stan and Peter Hermann